Hi all, I'm organizing a panel on particpatory culture, in particular how websites like Flickr, Del.icio.us, Facebook, etc channel user behavior and encourage contributions and other participation in their design. In particular, they encourage: - further disclosure of personal data (for marketing purposes) - further contributions from the user - recruitment of or connections with other users - click through to advertiser and partner sites - purchasing a product or membership The panel will explore this dynamic on several levels: - analyzing the aesthetic syntax of the actual user interface - analyzing the rhetorical behavior of users through their actions and comments - analyzing the interaction of users and web designers other ideas are welcome too, like targeting specific groups, linkages between sites--it's open! If you are interested, please contact me with your ideas/abstract ASAP! Best, Kim De Vries -- http://else-if-then.blogspot.com