February 15, 2002 Report of the a(o).i.r. executive committee Prepared by Steve Jones AoIR Executive Committee President: Steve Jones Vice-President: Nancy Baym Secretary: Ulla Bunz Treasurer: Benjamin Bates Open Seats: David Silver and Barry Wellman Appointed Seats: Matthew Allen and Leslie Shade Student Seat: Lisbeth Klastrup Publications Officers: Jeremy Hunsinger and Charlie Breindahl 2002 Conference Coordinator: Monica Murero 2002 Conference Program Chair: Klaus Bruhn Jensen Ethics Working Group Chair: Charles Ess 1. Introduction & General (Jones) Below is the monthly report from AoIR executive committee members. 2. Executive Officers' Reports 2.1 President (Jones) 2.1.1 If we didn't know before that serving on the AoIR executive committee would be a lot of work, we know it now. Much has been discussed since the last report, and I think we are making good progress on several initiatives, as reported below. My thanks to the committee members for their hard work and dedication. 2.2 Vice President (Baym) 2.2.1 This month I raised several issues I had heard voiced at our conferences, executive committee candidates' election statements (both those elected and those who nobly volunteered to serve and were not elected), and air-l for consideration by the executive committee. These included outreach, enhancing our website, and examining our election procedures. Vigorous discussion ensued, and I worked hard pulling these discussions together to draft potential charges to potential working groups and to craft compromise solutions to bridge differences amongst executive committee members. Though these discussions have been occasionally stressful and often exhausting, I think the members of aoir should feel some excitement to know that they have one heck of a passionate and committed group of people struggling with the issues of how to make aoir a solid and consistent organization that can best serve the interests of its members. Next time though I think I'll raise issues one at a time so the exec committee can get some sleep and make it through weekends without having to check our email and offer opinions hourly :) 2.3 Secretary (Bunz) 2.3.1 It has been a busy month because the Executive Committee has made many decisions. Please see the summary below. I have participated in these discussions, created various summaries, and investigated various awards and plaque vendors. Short-Summary Jan 10-Feb 10, 2002: The Executive Committee (EC) agreed: * to create monthly summaries of decisions made on the air-exec list. The job was added to the secretary's responsibilities. Procedural decisions are available to current and future members of the EC. Major changes will be reflected in the bylaws. All other decisions will be shared with air-l either through the monthly summaries, or through separate postings. * to continue its current policy on listserve postings: Messages over 10K are technically rejected. "Public shaming" is continued for people who don't delete previous messages when replying to them. * to allow the Carl Couch Center for Social and Internet Research to give an award at AoIR 3.0. * to register AoIR as an organization for the World Summit of the Information Society, Geneva 2003. * to accept a discount offer by vanDuesseldorp and Partners for their TV Meets Web Seminar. More information will be made available on air-l soon. * to encourage outreach and recruitment towards all groups, but especially currently underrepresented groups. Promotional material will be made available on the website. * to investigate demographics etc. of membership in the near future. A call for volunteers will be posted on air-l soon. Please wait until this call has been posted before you volunteer. * to create a work group that will be responsible for Internet Research related online materials posted on the AoIR website. A call for volunteers will be posted on air-l soon. Please wait until this call has been posted before you volunteer. * to create a work group that will investigate a possible election reform. A call for volunteers will be posted on air-l soon. Please wait until this call has been posted before you volunteer. * to raise conference fees very slightly to confirm with higher costs associated with conference planning. * to begin giving keynote speaker award plaques. To continue giving a "best student paper" award, which consists of a book and a plaque. The program chair decides on the best student paper. The secretary is responsible for having the plaques made. * The EC is currently debating policies for possible affiliation, association, and joint ventures with other organizations, businesses, and associations. 2.4 Treasurer (Bates) 2.4.1 We had a pretty good month. Paid some bills, processed 16 new memberships, 2 renewals. Managed to lose my local dump of the "treasurer" emails during a disk crash, but thankfully had kept originals on the server, and have been able to reconstruct most of the correspondence (Thanks, Jeremy!). 2.5 Open Seats (Silver, Wellman) 2.5.1 Silver: I've spent the better part of the month trying to wade through and in turn contributing to all of the email generated by the executive committee mailing list. We've had a very productive last few weeks, discussing important issues regarding outreach, collaboration, and the elections process, among other topics. Personally, I think these are the kinds of discussions and debates that are useful for a growing organization, and reflect the amount of commitment all of us have for this organization. I've fielded dozens of emails regarding AIR 3.0, and tried to pass along word of the conference to all virtual nooks and crannies I could find. 2.5.2 Wellman: On leave. 2.6 Appointed Seats (Allen, Shade) 2.6.1 Allen: Nothing to report; clearing the decks here for my leave; semester starts on Feb 18 and we have just worked out that the 22 fulltime staff in my school are teaching 684 equivalent fulltime students this year lord! 2.6.2 Shade: Started review process for AOIR 3.0. Talked to lots of Canadians about participating in AOIR 3.0 2.7 Student Seat (Klastrup) 2.7.1 Nothing much to report, still trying to catch up with backlog after sickleave and discussions on EC-list. Taken first steps towards gathering interested phd.students in a taskforce which can think about phd.student initiatives within A.i:R. If you are interested in participating, please contact me! 2.8 Publications Officers (Hunsinger, Breindahl) 2.8.1 Hunsinger: busy month general aoir maintained/upgraded aoir server new security patches, maintenance patches new perl installed new security policies and systems installed other assorted things it was a very active discussion period on exec. conference aoir helped Klaus with conference finished rewrite and maintaining conference submission system 90+submissions as of the 12th helped Monica with conference answered questions for the reviewers and coordinators sent out final cfp answered some submission related questions, sent others to Klaus and/or Monica 2.8.2 Breindahl: I have been formally assigned the task of maintaining aesthetic properties of our web presence by the Honorable and Ever-present-in-e-mail Dr. Hunsinger. I have even been able to answer several listserv requests before said Dr. Hunsinger (requires sub-second response times from Europe). 2.9 2002 Conference (Monica Murero, Coordinator; Klaus Bruhn Jensen, Program Chair) 2.9.1 Murero: The organization of AoIR 3.0 is proceeding as planned, here in Maastricht. I am coordinating several activites, from the choice of the conference facilities, to the update of the conference web-site . The first payments have been done. Particular attention is dedicated to the quality of the organization for the AOIR 3.0 conference. 2.9.2 Jensen: I have been working with Jeremy Hunsinger and volunteer reviewers in adjusting the review system for October 2002 conference as well as initiating the review process itself, which is on schedule. Following the February 15 deadline for submissions, we will gradually move from reviewing papers to planning the elements of the program. 2.10 AoIR Ethics Working Group (Charles Ess, Chair) 2.10.1 We are beginning to discuss a draft of a document that we may present at aoir 3.0 in Maastricht as a follow-up to our preliminary report posted in October, 2001, as part of aoir 2.0 (see <aoir.org/reports/ethics.html>). This document is more oriented towards specific questions to be raised by researchers, IRBs and others in the efforts to evaluate proposed research; it provides case studies that illustrate both dilemmas and possible resolutions; and offers a range of additional resources for considering the ethical dimensions of Internet research.