William H. Dutton » Information Communication and the Social Sciences

The Co-Production of Knowledge: iCS Symposium, University of York, 18-20 July 2012: Call for Papers and Participation

Bill — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 14:56:52 +0000

Symposium to be held at University of York, UK 18-20 July 2012

Call for Papers: http://www.york.ac.uk/satsu/news-events/ics/

The ubiquitous social and cultural adoption of social media, such as Twitter, Google, Wikipedia, YouTube and Facebook can be seen to present a significant example of scientific and technological innovation in many contemporary societies. While some studies of social media and, more specifically, Web 2.0 platforms built around user-‐‑generated content, have made reference to the importance of the field of science and technology studies (STS) for understanding their development and diffusion, scholars working within this academic framework have yet to fully turn their focus on this area. This three-‐‑day symposium is intended to explore the intersection between STS and social media inquiry, with a specific focus on how Web 2.0 is both generative and challenging of different forms of knowledge (co-‐‑)production and the authority it commands.
• The user-‐‑centred and mass-‐‑collaboration characteristics of social media platforms have a clear affinity with recent STS models of the co-‐‑construction of technologies. Notions such as ‘prosumerism’ have been used to describe this blurring of the relationship between the consumer and producer. However, we need to ask whether this is to be seen as co-‐‑construction or primarily a re-‐‑ engineering of labour relations and the locus of production? We also need to ask whether the ubiquity extends across all social media for all types of content. In other words, are new forms of expertise being inscribed, or are old knowledge hierarchies being reinforced?
• STS challenges the traditional perception of scientific ‘discovery’ and technological advancement, to demonstrate the co-‐‑production of claims to knowledge and the different forms and assemblages of knowledge this involves: how does this map onto commentaries on the importance of lay knowledge and ‘citizen science’ found in Web 2.0 as individuals and groups distribute ideas and information across their social networks? Could this provide a new impetus for ‘public interest science’?
• How do the same issues relate to the social sciences themselves: how might Web 2.0 provide opportunities for new forms of data and data analytics (for example, as ‘virtual knowledge’ via crowdsourcing, real-‐‑time data streaming, by-‐‑product
data etc) and in what ways do these challenge conventional social science by opening up questions about what data itself constitutes and what order of being it represents?
• How might lay, amateur knowledge be mobilised as ‘citizen science’ and what warrant, authorisation and location in established science might it secure? How might the contribution of Web 2.0 science platforms differ from the amateur societies of the 19th and 20th centuries?
• It has been claimed that algorithms and code play an increasingly powerful part in shaping and constituting everyday life, it has even been claimed that algorithms are creating new rules and power structures that unknowingly come to restructure social hierarchies and divisions. How, for example, do algorithms make decisions for us? How do algorithms bypass or re-‐‑craft human agency? What are the implications of this? Exactly how do algorithms, code and metrics shape everyday life and access to knowledge?
• Do the open source platforms and social media tools of Web 2.0 come into tension with the international standardisation and codification of global ICT infrastructures and local and global knowledge infrastructures?
• Finally, the more celebratory characterisations of social media emanating from the marketing world typically lack a critical focus: can social media and STS analyses build a political economy of Web 2.0 to provide such a focus, by explicitly addressing issues of participatory surveillance, exclusion and control?
Papers are invited that explore these broad questions around a number of possible themes, including:

• The boundaries and future of social media as a medium of knowledge creation, dissemination, and regulation
• The co-‐‑production of knowledge via Web 2.0 platforms • Knowledge, expertise and disruptive/disrupted authority • Capturing social media: the commercial/political exploitation by or empowering
of Web 2.0 • Ownership, dissemination and use of scientific knowledge • E-‐‑governance and the regulation of knowledge within social media • National practices and global opportunities • Novel forms of knowledge creation through group processes, archiving, digitization etc. • Public and visible science
Confirmed plenary speakers include: Geof Bowker, University of Pittsburgh; Leah Lievrouw, UCLA; Adrian MacKenzie, Cesagen, University of Lancaster; Rob Proctor, e-‐‑Research Centre, University of Manchester; Robin Williams, ISSTI, Edinburgh; Sally Wyatt, e-Humanities Programme, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.

This conference is intended to bring together some of the leading scholars in the fields of STS, Communication and Social Media analysis, and the history and philosophy of science to critically explore these issues.

Please send abstracts of proposed papers to sarah-‐‑shrive-‐‑morriosn@york.ac.uk by 29 February 2012 Registration information is available on the SATSU site: www.york.ac.uk/satsu

Conference organising committee: David Beer, Darren Reed, Mike Hardey, Brian Loader, Sarah Shrive-Morrison, Andrew Webster, Robin Williams, Sally Wyatt

The deadline for this call for papers is 29 February 2012. If you are interested to submit an individual paper or panel including 3 papers please go to web-‐‑link or contact email satsu@york.ac.uk

Conference Fees The ICS conference is completely funded through self-finance. iCS therefore needs to charge a conference fee applicable to all participating in this conference, including speakers. However, all panel organisers, speakers and moderators will receive a £25 discount on the conference fee. The conference fee covers the administration and production of the conference, hire of venue and a/v equipment, and the catering costs. The estimated conference fees for this coming year are: Full fee between £100-150; Concessions between £75-£125; Day fee between £75-‑125 (all fees to include lunch).

Digital Literacy and Self-Regulation Online: Insights for Policy: Event on Friday, 18 November 2011, University of Leicester, UK

Bill — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 13:15:05 +0000

ESRC Seminar Series: ‘Digital Policy: Connectivity, Creativity and Rights’ (RES-451-26-0849) 2011-13

‘Digital Literacy and Self-Regulation Online: Insights for Policy’
Friday November 18 2011, University of Leicester, UK

(Hosted by the Department of Media and Communication)

This seminar explores different understandings and roles of digital literacy and issues of online self-regulation. It works against the background of shifts towards individualization in the digital economy and the implications for policy. It approaches policy in the broad sense recognizing the role of varied stakeholders including nongovernmental actors and organizations and the importance of informal as well as formal processes. It considers the nature of online technologies and access and their fast changing nature and the impacts on regulatory environments, and specific contexts within which regulation can and should take place.

The seminar will address a range of issues related to digital literacy – what it is, where it should be developed, who should be responsible for it? How and what kinds of organizations and processes are relevant to it now, as well as what kinds of developments should there be in the future? Other questions will include: what does online safety mean and what are its key components; is there too much emphasis on technical rather than informational literacy; how do market drivers affect self-regulation; what are the generational issues that need to be addressed? The seminar will examine the nature of self-regulation online including in relation to the broader regulatory environment and other actors engaged with it.

Confirmed speakers include: Brian Simpson (University of New England, Australia), Peter Lunt (University of Leicester), Gillian Youngs (University of Wales, Newport), Dr Martin L Poulter (Wikipedia) and Josie Fraser (Social & Educational Technologist and consultant)

Call for Papers

We still have room for more papers and would welcome proposals from PhD students, academics and media and other practitioners and policymakers working in this area.

Participation

We have a limited number of places for the seminar so would like to hear from anyone who would like to take part as soon as possible. There is no charge for attending and lunch will be provided. We can meet UK travel costs (standard rail fare) for speakers and PhD students. Contact

Paper proposals and requests to participate should be sent to Tracy Simmons (tas11@le.ac.uk) who is organizing this seminar as soon as possible. The seminar series is led by Gillian Youngs (University of Wales, Newport) in collaboration with Tracy Simmons (University of Leicester), William Dutton (Oxford Internet Institute) and Katharine Sarikakis (University of Vienna). Weblink for seminar series: http://www.newport.ac.uk/research/researchcentres/Institutes/iab/projects/ESRCSeminarSeries/Pages/default.aspx

YouTube clip http://www.youtube.com/user/DigitalPolicyUWN.

A Decade in Internet Time: OII-iCS Open Plenary Session on 22 September 2011 at 4.30pm at Said Business School

Bill — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 11:37:10 +0000

A Decade in Internet Time: OII-iCS Open Plenary Session

in celebration of the Oxford Internet Institute’s tenth anniversary

Thursday 22 September 2011 16:30 – 18:30

Location: Nelson Mandela Lecture Theatre, Said Business School, Park End Street, Oxford OX1 1HP.

This public plenary panel is the centrepiece of the iCS-OII Symposium on A Decade in Internet Time, and the 10^th Anniversary celebration of the OII. A distinguished panel has been asked to reflect on the defining developments of the past ten years and the key challenges and opportunities that the next decade may bring. We hope this special session will stimulate and inform debate over the future of the Internet and our field.

Chair: Bill Dutton, Professor of Internet Studies, Oxford Internet Institute

Speakers:

Manuel Castells, Wallis Annenberg Chair in Communication, Technology and Society, University of Southern California, ‘Internet and the Network Society’

Vint Cerf, Chief Internet Evangelist, Google, ‘ Everything is Connected to Everything’

Andrew Graham, Master of Balliol College, University of Oxford, ‘The Internet: Looking Back and Looking Forward’

Wendy Hall, DBE, FRS, FREng is Professor of Computer Science at the University of Southampton, UK, and Dean of the Faculty of Physical and Applied Sciences, ‘A Web Wise World’

Professor Eli Noam, Columbia Institute for Tele-Information, Columbia University, ‘Next-Generation Policy Research for Next-Generation Internets’

Dame Stephanie Shirley BSc, CEng, FREng, The Shirley Foundation

18:30 – 19:30 Wine reception (Lobby, Said Business School)

Oxford Union Debate on Informal Learning

Bill — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 11:23:53 +0000

I participated in a debate at the Oxford Union last year on the significance of informal learning. I argued that informal learning is a critical resource that is being utilized by networked individuals, and that networked institutions, like universities, need to understand how to capture the value of these informal practices. A nice summary and edited video of the debate is available online, and published in eLearn Magazine.

Participants in Debate

Converging Technologies, Divergent Cultures

Bill — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 18:37:28 +0000

The FT published an interesting comment by Vittorio Colao, the Chief Executive of Vodafone, which essentially argued that the French President, Nicholas Sarkozy, was right to argue for stronger regulation of the Internet (FT 6 June 2011). Mr Colao’s view nicely illustrates the degree that real convergence of media must be based on more than simple technical convergence. Technically, the mobile phone and the Internet are increasingly converging on common and hybrid infrastructures. However, the mobile phone industry is anchored in a very different culture – the same culture that has fostered so-called ‘walled gardens’, which have only recently begun to be lowered. Surely the mobile industry has evidence that most users do not wish to be walled in by the providers. Whomever is right, in the longer-run, this cultural split between that of the closed mobile phone and the open Internet industries is a major obstacle to real convergence. I can’t see the world returning to walled gardens, but that might be my own wishful thinking.

An excellent discussion of the many dimensions of convergence was written years ago by Nicholas Garnham, see: N. Garnham, ‘Constraints on Multimedia Convergence’, pp. 103-19 in Dutton, W. H. (1996, reprinted 2001), Information and Communication Technologies – Visions and Realities (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

Internet and Society Conference, Peking University, 20-21 May 2011

Bill — Sat, 21 May 2011 08:17:20 +0000

Summer Palace 2011

I have been attending a conference, entitled ‘Interne and Society: Challenge, Transition, and Development’. It has been organized by XIE Xinzhou (Director) for the School of Journalism and Communication at Peking University as one activity associated with the 10th Anniversary of the School, when communication joined the former school focused on journalism. I spoke on the 20th of May, discussing what I am calling ‘The New Internet World‘, and was joined by a number of other academics from abroad, primarily from the US, including Pamela Shoemaker (Newhouse School at Syracuse), Professors James Katz (Rutgers), Stephen Reese (University of Texas at Austin), S. Shyam Sundar (Penn State, but also visiting Sungkyunkwan University in Seoul), and from Europe, Richard Ling (IT University of Copenhagen). We were joined by many professors from Peking University, Renmin, Wuhan, and other universities in China, plus some outstanding representatives from industry, including WANG Liang (President of Radio Beijing Corp), LI Fang (Deputy Editor of Tencent Inc), and GUAN Jianwen (VP of People’s Daily Online).

No Name Lake at Peking Un

My presentation is on slideshare at: http://www.slideshare.net/WHDutton/the-new-internet-world

Information Communication and Society in the Thomson Reuters Social Sciences Citation Index!®

Bill — Sat, 16 Apr 2011 16:02:39 +0000

Information, Communication and Society is now included in the Thomson Reuters Social Sciences Citation Index!®

Drawing together the most current work upon the social, economic and cultural impact of the emerging properties of the new information and communications technologies, iCS positions itself at the centre of contemporary debates about the information age. Inclusion in the SSCI signifies the quality of work published within the journal and we are delighted iCS has been accepted.

If you would like to be kept up to date with news? Follow iCS on Twitter (icsjournal) and Facebook.

News from the OII

Bill — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 13:11:42 +0000

Dear friends and colleagues of the OII,

It gives me great pleasure and pride to invite you to attend an event designed to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the OII’s founding – OII@10. Ten years ago, when the OII was set up, many regarded the Internet as a novelty that would pass. How wrong they were! It is difficult to overstate the significance and impact of the Internet over the last decade, but leading figures tied to the Internet, Web and the OII, including Vint Cerf, Wendy Hall, Manuel Castells, and Andrew Graham, will be reflecting on this very point at our September symposium (details below).

A range of activities is being planned for our anniversary year. We are currently soliciting nominations for awards to recognise individuals who have led the way in shaping the Internet and its use: nominations close this Friday (you can still nominate at: http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/awards/). The awards will be presented at a gala dinner on 22 September, which will be attended by big names from the Internet world. We will also be presenting our own lifetime awards, honouring individuals who have played a uniquely significant and long-lasting role in shaping the Internet and its study. Worldwide, the role of the Internet in everyday life and work is reshaping politics, economies, and societies: we hope to take this opportunity of the OII’s first decade to celebrate our achievements and the vision of our founders.

Celebration of our anniversary will be embedded within a three-day academic symposium organized by the OII and the journal Information, Communication & Society (which I co-edit with Brian Loader and Barry Wellman). Related to this event, I am very pleased to say that iCS has just been accepted into the Social Science Citation Index, reinforcing its value to this new field. Like the OII, iCS defined a focus that did not align with traditional academic disciplines, in order to address key social issues tied to information and communication technologies, such as the Internet. Institutional change does not happen in Internet time, but slowly; universities, disciplines, and academia more generally are beginning to recognize the significance of Internet studies – and the OII is well placed to lead in this research in ways that will help shape policy and practice.

Best wishes,
William Dutton, Director

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/

1. Events Diary
2. New Research Programme: The Internet and Political Science
3. Final Report: Information Practices
4. New Project: Mobilization and Student Protest
5. Oxford Internet Surveys: Update
6. Webcasts: Arab Revolutions, Susan Greenfield
7. From the Blogs: Middle Earth, body sensors, Twitter
8. Student Diary: Student Open Day, Summer Doctoral Programme

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1. Events Diary
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Wednesday 20 April:
Yorick Wilks, et al.: Ethics and the Internet

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/events/?id=422

Wednesday 27 April:
Ilhem Allagui: The Internet in the Arab Region: Use, Adoption and Changing Societies

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/events/?id=434

Monday 9 May:
Matthew Allen: A Question of Boundaries: What Next for the ‘Edgeless University’?

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/events/?id=436

Friday 20 May:
Kathryn Eccles, Eric Meyer: Digital Impacts: How to Measure and Understand the Usage and Impact of Digital Content

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/events/?id=428

Thursday 2 June:
Jonathan Clough: Barely (il)legal: The Problematic Definition of ‘Child’ Pornography

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/events/?id=440

Tuesday 28 June:
Cristobal Cobo, Eric Meyer: Building the Future Internet: The Social Nature of Technical Choices

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/events/?id=426

Tuesday 28 June:
Cristobal Cobo, Eric Meyer: Should the Design of the Future Internet Be Driven by Technology or Societal Concerns?

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/events/?id=427

21-24 September:
A Decade in Internet Time: Symposium on the Dynamics of the Internet and Society

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/events/?id=398

All the events:

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/events/

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2. New Research Programme: The Internet and Political Science
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A major OII research programme has just started on collective action, governance and citizen-government interactions in the digital era, led by Professor Helen Margetts, recipient of the three-year ESRC Professorial Fellowship that funds this work.

Collective Action, Governance and Citizen-Government Interactions in the Digital Era

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/research/projects/?id=71

ESRC Professorial Fellowship

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/news/?id=516

The programme assesses where political science understanding, knowledge and theory should be re-examined and developed in light of widespread use of the Internet, developing models of governance and methodologies to study online behaviour (such as propensity to participate), and using the Internet to generate new data and experiments. Although there has been a ‘dramatic drift’ towards experimentation in political science, the methodology remains scarce in public management research, a major strand of this programme.

Helen’s recent article in Public Management Review: “Experiments for Public Management Research” considers the potential of the experimental method for public management, and argues that experimental approaches should now be added to the toolkit of public management research.

Experiments for Public Management Research

http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a934039823~frm=titlelink

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3. Final Report: Information Practices
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Many humanities scholars are enthusiastic users of digital resources, however there is a potential mismatch between what (and how) resources are offered, and how scholars might use them. How do humanities researchers discover, use, create and manage their information resources? How should they be designed to ensure maximum use by scholars? An OII study of 54 humanities scholars across disciplines such as history, English, and philosophy has found that the most significant barrier they face is the disconnected nature of current archives.

The final report is available on the project site:

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/research/projects/?id=58

Report recommendations include following examples such as London Lives and Connected Histories, which provide searches across several databases, as a starting point to promote stronger connections between information resources. The report was presented last week at a workshop hosted by the Research Information Network at the Foundling Museum in London.

Read more: Social Dimensions of Humanities Research

http://monicabulger.com/2011/04/social-life-of-humanities-research/

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4. New Project: Mobilization and Student Protest
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How are digital media changing the way in which people mobilize for a collective cause? Why do some individuals take part in protest, and others not? A new OII project will investigate these issues, focusing on the UK student campaign against raised tuition fees.

Student Protests and Digital Media:

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/research/projects/?id=72

The project will first explore the motivations for participation using semi-structured interviews, where respondents can answer at length and be quizzed directly about their perceived political efficacy and the problem of marginal contribution. The digital trails of the Oxford campaign will then be analysed, particularly the changes in online activity preceding and following key events in the mobilisation process. By analyzing these data sources, we will be able to track the growth of the campaign over time and identify the motivations and tipping points that helped attain a critical mass of followers.

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5. Oxford Internet Surveys: Update
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Data collection has begun for the 2011 wave of the Oxford Internet Surveys, with ICM Research hired to collect a random sample of about 2000 British respondents. We expect to receive the data in early May.

OxIS is in the field:

http://microsites.oii.ox.ac.uk/oxis/blog/2011/field

Social media use has blossomed very quickly since the 2009 OxIS Report, and we have added nine items to the survey to measure it. We will ask how often people use social media like FaceBook, MySpace, Twitter, Bebo, and LinkedIn, and also about specific uses, such as how often respondents update their status, post photos, or check or change privacy settings.

An issue we hope to address is the extent to which respondents receive news and information from social networking sites, rather than by going to news sites. We also want to know the extent to which respondents click on links in social networking sites as a substitute for a Google search or clicking on a bookmark in their browser. We have also added a standard political efficacy scale, and items on occupation and use of the Internet at work.

The OxIS 2011 Report will be launched this summer, with in-depth data on Internet use and attitudes in Britain (2003-2011). More information will be made available closer to the time.

Follow the OxIS Blog:

http://microsites.oii.ox.ac.uk/oxis/blog

OxIS mailing list:

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/mailinglist/

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6. Webcasts: Arab Revolutions, Susan Greenfield
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Facebook Resistance? Understanding the role of the Internet in the Arab Revolutions

http://webcast.oii.ox.ac.uk/?view=Webcast&ID=20110328_348

Revolutions are currently sweeping the Arab world, from Tunisia to Egypt and Libya to Bahrain. The Internet has been reported as a key factor, but we in fact know little of its role in these revolutions.

Susan Greenfield: Does the Mind have a Future?

http://webcast.oii.ox.ac.uk/?view=Webcast&ID=20110407_350

Baroness Greenfield discusses how Information Technology is changing the way humans think and feel. Whilst there are clear benefits, she also highlights the less desirable consequences, and suggests how best to minimise these threats.

All the webcasts:

http://webcast.oii.ox.ac.uk/

Also! We have recently added a second webcam, commanding sweeping views of the north end of St Giles:

http://webcam.oii.ox.ac.uk/

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7. From the Blogs: Middle Earth, body sensors, Twitter
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“there is more written about Middle Earth than about many countries in Africa” – Mark Graham on why the geographies of the Internet matter:

http://www.zerogeography.net/2011/04/mapping-internet-presentation-at-sameas.html

“This data gives us a fascinating insight into just how spatially concentrated our knowledge of history is” – Mark Graham finds a heatmap of Wikipedia history articles:

http://www.floatingsheep.org/2011/03/heatmap-of-wikipedia-articles.html

“It was amazing to see some of the body sensors and actuators being developed by bioengineering researchers and companies” – Ian Brown on security and privacy in Implantable Medical Devices:

http://dooooooom.blogspot.com/2011/04/security-and-privacy-in-implantable.html

“My research has not included Arabic, unfortunately, but has found consistently that the English-language web is very insular” – Scott Hale on translating Twitter:

http://www.scotthale.net/blog/?p=152

“It is amazing that with so many risks and dangers, e-voting is still seen by many politicians and citizens as a silver bullet” – Anne-Marie Oostveen on electoral participation:

http://people.oii.ox.ac.uk/oostveen/2011/03/26/electoral-participation-e-voting-and-windscreen-wipers/

“conceptualising, prioritizing and advancing study of next generation research is one of the most significant but difficult challenges facing scholars” – Bill Dutton on the politics of next generation research:

http://microsites.oii.ox.ac.uk/oess/blog/2011/politics-next-generation-research

“the book that John Moravec and I wrote, ‘Invisible Learning: Toward a new ecology of education’ is about to be printed” – Cristobal Cobo:

http://blogs.oii.ox.ac.uk/cobo/?p=161

All the Blogs:

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/blogs/

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8. Student Diary: Student Open Day, Summer Doctoral Programme
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The application process has now closed for 2011-2012 admissions to our DPhil and MSc programmes: it will reopen in October. Prospective students are welcome to contact us at any time of year, however, and are warmly invited to attend our next Student Open Day:

Thursday 10 November 2011 14:00 – 16:00

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/teaching/openday/

There will be introductory talks by the Director of Graduate Studies, the MSc course convenor and student representatives, followed by questions. A webcast of the 2010 Open Day is available at the above link, and also of our first virtual open day (which was a great success: thanks to everyone who took part on Twitter).

The Summer Doctoral Programme selection process has also now been completed and we are thrilled to have once again received a very strong set of applications, with far more applicants than spaces available. We look forward to welcoming the SDP2011 group to the OII in July.

And lastly: rowing! OII MSc student Alec Dent was a member of the Oxford crew which won a commanding victory in the recent University boat race. Oxford University’s Blue boat upset the odds to win the 157th Boat Race, beating Cambridge by four lengths.

http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/news/?id=527

Editor: David Sutcliffe

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enquiries@oii.ox.ac.uk

Creating an Information Sharing Environment in the Public Sector: Talk on 8 April 2011

Bill — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 09:10:15 +0000

This was an important talk about information sharing in the public sector, given by one of the key people seeking to create an information sharing environment for the US government. It was entitled:

‘The Need for Achieving Appropriate Information Sharing and Information Protection’

I was held on Friday, 8 April 2011 at 16.00-17.30 at the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, 1 St Giles Oxford OX1 3JS

The slides are posted on Slideshare at: http://www.slideshare.net/WHDutton/information-sharing-and-protection and an audio recording of his talk should be posted in due course in the OII’s Webcasting archive.

Speakers

Dr David Bray, Information Sharing Environment (ISE)

Abstract

In the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks, the United States began a historic transformation aimed at preventing future attacks and improving its ability to protect institutions at home and abroad. As a result, the US is now better informed of terrorist intentions and plans, and better prepared to detect, prevent, and respond to their actions. Enhanced information sharing has provided a greater capacity for coordinated and integrated action.

The Information Sharing Environment (ISE, www.ise.gov) was established by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004. The ISE provides analysts, operators and investigators with integrated and synthesized information on terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, and homeland security. This talk will describe what the ISE is and by doing so will explore post-9/11 information sharing in the United States, and the efforts being made towards information sharing and protection. David will also give a brief outline of on-going ISE development efforts.

In essence, this talk highlights that when examining the full scope of information sharing and protection, there are many widespread and complex challenges that must be addressed and solved by multiple agencies together. Policies and solutions should be framed to address all types of protected information, classified and unclassified, as critical national and homeland security issues cut across security domains. Protection also includes privacy and civil liberties protections. Without privacy and civil liberties protections, sharing is not possible; and without sharing, protection loses its relevance.

About David Bray

Dr. David A. Bray is Executive for Innovation, Integration, and Interoperability, Office of the Program Manager, Information Sharing Environment. He joined the Office of the Program Manager for the Information Sharing Environment (PM-ISE) in October 2010 as a Senior National Intelligence Service Executive. The Program Manager has government-wide authority to plan, oversee the build-out, and manage use of the ISE to implement the President’s information sharing priorities. Dr. Bray’s work focuses on empowering the ISE partnerships of five communities – Defense, Intelligence, Homeland Security, Foreign Affairs, and Law Enforcement – in support of whole-of-government solutions for assured information sharing, protection, and access. Prior to joining ISE, Dr. Bray served as a strategist at the Institute for Defense Analyses and the Science and Technology Policy Institute. Dr. Bray holds a PhD in information systems, a MSPH in public health informatics, and a BSCI in computer science and biology from Emory University, alongside two post-doctoral associateships with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Center for Collective Intelligence and the Harvard Kennedy School’s Leadership for a Networked World Program. He also serves as a Visiting Associate with the National Defense University.

Digital Wales: A Segue into Wide-ranging Discussions of Policy Issues

Bill — Sun, 03 Apr 2011 19:56:36 +0000

The launch seminar of our ESRC Seminar Series, ‘Digital Policy: Connectivity, Creativity and Rights’, was held Friday, 1 April 2011. This first seminar was held at the Centre City Campus of the University of Wales in Newport and hosted by the School of Art, Media and Design. Professor Gillian Young, recently appointed at the University of Wales, and Principal Investigator of the ESRC Seminar Series, chaired the launch. The Web site for the series is at: http://idl.newport.ac.uk/digitalpolicy/

This first seminar was entitled ‘Digital Wales: Inclusive Creativity and Economy’ to take full advantage of key speakers and participants from Wales, including: Cardiff University Professor Ian Hargreaves, one of the founding members of the Ofcom Board; David Warrender, Director of Digital Wales for the Welsh Assembly Government (WAG); Alan Burge, Communities Directorate for the WAG; and Rhodri Williams, Director Ofcom Wales. This worked well, in part because Wales has placed a real priority on a set of initiatives around a ‘Digital Wales’, focused largely on the creative industries, but also on access to next generation Internet infrastructures. http://wales.gov.uk/topics/businessandeconomy/publications/heartofdigitalwales/?lang=en

The discussion was wide-ranging and engaging – too broad to be summarized here, but it will be summarized in due course on the series Web site. However, Professor Young has posted a short overview of the objectives of the series online at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzKZF6Ff7JY

I came away from the launch seminar more fully convinced of the value of having a focus on specific local, regional and national initiatives, such as Digital Wales. It anchors the discussion in a specific setting and provides an impetus to discuss specific projects, such as initiatives in video production across Wales. My own contribution to the forum focused on providing one perspective on the agenda for the series as a whole. I argued that the series could make a contribution by focusing on the UK context and the particular issues raised for nations, and such issues as rural access, the vitality of small businesses, and emerging debate over the ‘big society’. In addition, I thought we should focus on clarifying distinctions between initiatives relevant to network individuals, as well as networked institutions. And of course we need to address key issues of infrastructure, content regulation and new policy, such as the drafting of a new communications act for the UK.

My other point was the there were several ways in which academic participation in this policy discussion could add value. One was the role we could play in assessing alternative policy initiatives from the perspective of connectivity, creativity and rights, among other criteria. We should be particularly well equipped to bring evidence and empirical research to bear on these issues, and be well positioned to question taken-for-granted assumptions about the impact of policy. Secondly, we should be well positioned to provide a neutral meeting ground for discussion among a full range of stakeholders. We may have interests and preferences ourselves, but our primary incentive is to be open, and accountable as academics. If we do not provide a neutral meeting ground, our reputation is at risk. Thirdly, we should have a special role in putting local developments, whether in Wales or Britain as a whole, in a broader context, whether that be global trends or the broader ecology of particular policy areas. I used my work on the ecology of choices shaping freedom of expression as an example. Finally, I hope that the participation by academics opens up discussion of the policy process in Britain. Is the policy process providing adequate opportunities for debate? Is it sufficiently transparent and publicly accountable? Is government tapping the expertise of citizens? My own sense is that progress could be made on all of these fronts.

Slides for my own presentation are posted on Slideshare at: http://www.slideshare.net/WHDutton/towards-an-agenda-on-digital-wales-2011

UNESCO Publication on Freedom of Connection – Book Launched and Accessible in Print and Online

Bill — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 17:16:00 +0000

Our manuscript has been published by UNESCO in a print edition, also available online. The citation is:

William H. Dutton, Anna Dopatka, Michael Hills, Ginette Law, and Victoria Nash (2011), Freedom of Connection – Freedom of Expression: The Changing Legal and Regulatory Ecology Shaping the Internet. Paris: UNESCO, Division for Freedom of Expression, Democracy and Peace.

There was a launch event in Paris on 30 May, with a press release providing details on the launch and access to the online and print versions of the manuscript at: http://portal.unesco.org/ci/en/ev.php-URL_ID=31418&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html

Networking Distributed Public Expertise: Strategies for Citizen Sourcing Advice to Government

Bill — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 16:52:27 +0000

My paper on ‘Networking Distributed Public Expertise: Strategies for Citizen Sourcing Advice to Government’ is one of a series of Occasional Papers in Science and Technology Policy, Science and Technology Policy Institute (TPI), Institute for Defense Analyses, Washington DC. I will post the abstract below and would welcome comments, directly or to this blog.

Networking Public Expertise

Abstract

The potential of crowd sourcing has captured the imagination of many managers and professionals across all sectors of society, but left many others quite skeptical. This is not only because conceptions of the wisdom of crowds appear counter-intuitive, but also, if taken literally, these concepts can be misleading and therefore dysfunctional for governments seeking to adopt innovations in distributed collaboration. This paper challenges conventional notions of the wisdom of crowds, arguing that distributed intelligence must be well structured by technical platforms and management strategies. After clarifying these conceptual issues, the paper explains how collaborative networking can be used to harness the distributed expertise of citizens, as distinguished from citizen consultation, which seeks to engage citizens – each on an equal footing. Networking the public as advisors aims to involve experts on particular public issues and problems distributed anywhere in the world. The paper then describes the lessons learned from previous efforts to citizen source advice, and why governments should again pursue this strategy as a means to inform policy and decision-making. This is followed by a set of nine strategies for fostering the bottom-up development of governmental initiatives aimed at harnessing distributed public expertise.

If there is any difficulty obtaining this paper, a copy is available on SSRN at: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1767870

Consumers and Internet Studies: a workshop on 10 January 2011, Barcelona

Bill — Tue, 04 Jan 2011 20:15:36 +0000

The OII is collaborating with IN3 on a promising workshop on Internet Studies that will focus on studies of the consumer. Called Consumer and Internet Studies, the workshop is part of a series of workshops designed to inform our understanding of the scope and methods of this emerging field. I am working with Inma Rodriguez-Ardura, an Associate Professor of Marketing at the Internet Interdisciplinary Institute, Open University of Catalonia (Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, or UOC), and a Visiting Fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute. See: http://www.uoc.edu/activitats/consumers/index_eng.html

Rationale

The Internet has become a motor of change in the relationships of consumers with business and industry. Internet users have new opportunities to enhance their power as consumers. They may obtain information regarding an immense range of relevant goods and services and benefit from the enormous possibilities available to participate in social networks, express their opinions on brand names, access independent sources of expertise, and interact and dialogue with firms and other service providers. They can play an active role in marketing communication processes and participate much more in the development and consumption of products. For their part, the Internet – including the processing systems used to manage great masses of consumer data – allow businesses to define and develop marketing proposals that are more precise and more closely matched to their customers. In sum, the new possibilities offered by the Internet make possible advanced forms of exchanges and interactions within which consumers, businesses and other service providers collaborate in the creation and reproduction of the market.

This potential of the Internet to transform the marketing and commercial environment could spawn a field of research within the larger arena of Internet Studies. Early research related to the Internet-based consumer focused on obtaining user profiles and on the segmentation of online consumers. However, as use of the Internet as a marketing channel increased, resulting in its wider use as a purchasing medium, subsequent research became centred on a plethora of questions directly related to the consumer, such as the factors influencing the consumer’s involvement in purchasing behaviours; online consumer satisfaction and loyalty; trust in purchase decisions on the Internet; consumer affairs and protection; as well as the adaptation of classic theories and models to explain online consumer behaviour. In addition, with the emergence of the applications of social networking and the thrust of recent proposals in business sciences – such as, for example, new service-dominant logic and Customer Relationship Marketing (CRM), a new wave of studies has emerged. New studies examine the forms in which the Internet empowers the consumer; exploring the new routes for co-creation of value and for participation on the part of the consumer in processes of innovation and in the generation of content; evaluating the impact of personalization practices tied to CRM programmes and to the new forms of interaction; and, finally, examining the relationship with the brand in virtual communities. A closely related area of research is focused on analyzing the institutional framework of online consumer protection.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to the following:

Critical perspectives on the growing body of research into the Internet and the Consumer, which help to define the state of this field, its dynamism, and the critical areas in need of clarification and further research.
Insights into the main contributions made in the research on the online consumer to the larger domain of ‘Internet Studies’, in terms of new theories, data and methods.
Comprehensive overviews of key issues in Internet Studies on the Consumer -such as, for example flow, trust, eCRM, brand communities, co-creation and empowerment, which include major findings and directions for further research.

For more on the workshop, see the Web site.

Digital Policy: Connectivity, Creativity and Rights

Bill — Sun, 02 Jan 2011 13:48:00 +0000

The ESRC has awarded my colleagues and I support for a seminar series on ‘Digital Policy: Connectivity, Creativity, and Rights’. This will involve: me and colleagues at the OII, University of Oxford; Dr Gillian Youngs, the principal applicant, recently appointed to a professorship at the Newport School of Art, Media and Design at University of Wales; Dr Tracy Simmons at the University of Leicester; and Professor Katherine Sarikakis at the University of Vienna (2011-13). [ESRC RES-451-26-0849] The project Web site is at: http://idl.newport.ac.uk/digitalpolicy/

Rationale

Digital policy is high on political, communications and commercial agendas currently with the Digital Economy Bill (BIS 2009-10) currently going through Parliament following on from the Digital Britain Final Report in June 2009 (BIS 2009). While the digital revolution is already well underway in the UK in terms of business developments and changes in daily life, these transitions mark a major policy and legislative push towards Britain’s digital future. Controversial areas such as copyright infringement, the future and functions of public service content, and the role of Ofcom are core to these changes. In broader terms the potential for economic transformations and growth through the digital economy, new skills, innovation and creativity, are key concerns.

The three core areas of focus of the seminar series offer an original synthesis bringing together consideration of connectivity, creativity and rights to encourage links between technical, political and economic issues. The series will consider connectivity from social and skills-based as well as infrastructural and technical perspectives. Creativity will be examined in a wide sense including creative and media industries, transitions in public service and other forms of content, new knowledge and networking and political and commercial innovations. Rights points not only to the importance of digital inclusivity but broader concerns of digital empowerment through access not only to digital technologies but to the knowledge, skills and motivations that are required to use in imaginative ways and to their full potential. The benefits to individuals and communities as well as to the economy at large are at stake here. Across the seminar series different aspects of the digital knowledge economy, knowledge work and skills and rights issues will be addressed including from critical perspectives.

An innovative approach of the series will be to examine these areas through multi-stakeholder engagement to identify the practical implications and challenges as well as critical debates about winners and losers in the digital game. It will bring policymakers and politicians at different levels together with academics, regulators, communications, media and creative industry representatives as well as members of NGOs, social and digital entrepreneurs and innovators.

The organizers of the series recognize that at this moment of profound digital change an inclusive debate of the kind that can only be stimulated by bringing actors with contrasting interests together is crucial. Not least to identify major tensions and concerns as well as opportunities, but also any areas requiring a particular policy focus, including in relation to complex issues of access and digital rights at collective and individual levels. What kind of digital future is envisaged in Britain? Who continues to be left out or at risk of being left out of this digital future? What can be done to overcome major technical, knowledge and skills barriers to this? How much control needs to be exerted to achieve a safe online environment including for the most vulnerable? What new kinds of creativity and innovation are being unleashed by digital change and how can these be expanded? How is the public service ethos being tested and enhanced in the digital environment? These are the kinds of questions that are central to this series.

Seminar Format

There will be at least five seminars, with additional seminars possible through support from other sources. The first will be held over two days to launch the series and explore the linking themes in some depth, and then four one-day seminars to focus in detail on separate areas. The aim will be to have some core participants who will attend a number of the seminars and then participants related to each theme for the individual seminars. All seminars will have a mix of stakeholders, ranging across policy, business and civil society, in addition to academics to generate theory/practice connections in fresh and productive ways. The aim will be to involve between 30 and 40 people in each seminar including core group participants (regular attendees) and guest speakers and participants.

Dr Sarikakis

Tracy Simmons

Gillian Youngs

The series is international. First it aims to examine digital Britain in its global context. Secondly, it aims to do that in part through the direct participation in the series of leading scholars from North America, Canada, Europe and East Asia. Finally, it aims to harness digital media in its own methodology in engagement and outreach terms, such as by using the Internet to extend cost effectively the number of international speakers who can be invovled in the series, and by using the web to enable worldwide access to the series. By experimenting with popular social media such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, the series also aims to contribute to new models of academic practice.

The international contributions to the series are vital when digital communication and problems and challenges affecting it have national dimensions and characteristics but also go well beyond them in creating an era of everyday global communication for leisure as much as work, consumption as much as production. The international aspects of the series will stimulate interesting comparative questions for research, contrasting areas of good practice, varied perspectives on issues such as risk, and different sets of policy priorities and objectives. The international character of the series will also significantly enhance its outputs, both in terms of the text and audiovisual material to be mounted online, but also the academic publications from the series. It is also anticipated that new international networks will develop out of the series which will give academics at all levels of experience and others involved access to knowledge outside of the UK context. The in-depth quality of the seminars will offer plenty of opportunity for new research collaborations to be generated.

The ESRC Research Seminar Series ‘Digital Policy: Connectivity, Creativity and Rights’ (RES-451-26-0849) runs from 2011 to 2013 led by Prof. Gillian Youngs, University of Wales, Newport, with Dr Tracy Simmons, University of Leicester, Prof. Bill Dutton, Oxford Internet Institute, and Prof. Katharine Sarikakis, University of Vienna.

Internet Studies Arrives: A New Category Status in the Oxford Libraries

Bill — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 12:53:23 +0000

The Oxford University Library System – specifically the Subject Librarian most closely involved with Internet-related research – has decided to create a category for the library of ‘Media and Internet Studies’. These categories are listed in OxLIP+, and therefore significant in helping people to find work on the Internet.

Queen's College Library, Oxford

Of course, how Internet studies is categorized as been a long problem for those working in this field. Where do you look in bookstores, libraries, …? Often books on the social aspects of the Internet are shelved with computer sciences, sometimes with business and management, sometimes with media studies. At long last, Internet studies might well be moving to a new stage of legitimacy as it finds some place in the categories of major libraries. Now we can begin discussion of whether this is the right category.

I thank Nesrine Abdel-Sattar, one of our DPhil students, who – among others – has urged the library to up-date its categories to capture the development of Internet Studies. Well done.

The Global Internet Values Project

Bill — Sat, 06 Nov 2010 12:00:20 +0000

The Global Internet Values Project:

International Perspectives on Privacy, Security, Trust, and Freedom in a Networked World

Status: 2010 –

Results from this study will be published in the World Economic Forum’s 2010-2011 Global Information Technology Report, which will be made available in March 2011.

Research Team includes:

Professor Soumitra Dutta, e-Labs, INSEAD

Professor Sumitra Dutta at WEF

Professor William H. Dutton, Oxford Internet Institute

Ginette Law (Research Assistant), INSEAD

Derek O’Halloran (Research Assistant), World Economic Forum

Partners and Sponsors:

The Global Internet Values Project is a collaborative research project between INSEAD, the Oxford Internet Institute (OII), the World Economic Forum (WEF) and ComScore.

Abstract:

The Internet and related information and communication technologies (ICTs) are being integrated into everyday life and work in a growing number of nations.

Over a quarter of the world’s population has access to the Internet, with more than 80 percent of the global online population participating on one or more social networking sites. Nearly 80 percent of the world’s population has access to mobile phones, which are increasingly converging with the Internet. The consequences of these trends include growth in electronic commerce, which is rising at double-digit rates internationally, and a change in patterns of information consumption and creation.

As a result of this, Internet stakeholders ranging from governments to civil organisations to businesses and industries have become increasingly concerned about issues of online privacy, trust, security, and freedom. How are individuals experiencing change in their expectations and concerns surrounding such issues as their control over personal information, the credibility of information sources, the safety of their information, and their ability to express themselves online? These issues are of particular importance to track at this time as nations are introducing new Internet policies and regulations that could reshape the public’s experiences online – for better or worse.

Understanding and Comparing Global Internet Values

Many experts failed to anticipate the societal implications of ICTs that have unfolded over the last 40 years of the Internet. Even when the Internet became commercial and accessible to citizens 15 years ago, most pundits did not foresee the scale of its diffusion and impact. However the change has been rapid and today we are faced with some important questions in the context of increasingly ubiquitous technology.

How has the use of new information and communication technologies transformed the way people live, work and connect today?
What are the attitudes and behaviours of individual citizens with respect to pervasive concerns such as privacy, trust, security and freedom of choice and expression?
To what degree are these issues perceived as important values for Internet users and do individuals and households of different countries and demographics regard them in the same way?
How can government, business, and civil society, inspire an appropriate level of trust and confidence—in both people and transactions—online?

Methodology:

This research aims to identify patterns and trends in individual attitudes and behaviours related to online trust, privacy, security and freedom. A conceptual framework has been developed to help identify a typology of Internet users, regarding these issues. From this, a questionnaire was designed to understand individual values, opinions and behaviours regarding various matters such as the protection and dissemination of personal information online, the use of security mechanisms and safeguards, the degree of trust in other online actors as well as perceived levels of freedom online. Measures for high-tech households, patterns of Internet use and online activities were also included in the questionnaire.

Oxford Internet Institute

Data is currently being collected from adult Internet users from countries worldwide through the use of online surveys, designed by the research team, and administered by ComScore. This data collection will enable a more cross-national and cross-regional comparative perspective than previous Internet surveys that tend to be limited to a single locale or nation. The findings will complement research undertaken through the Oxford Internet Surveys (OxIS) and the World Internet Project (WIP), which includes OII researchers.

The research team fielded the survey in early November 2010, and expect data collection to continue to the end of November, when the team will begin to focus on its initial reports. Results from this study will be published in the World Economic Forum’s 2010-2011 Global Information Technology Report, which will be made publicly available in March 2011.

Interdisciplinary Analysis of the Network Society

Bill — Sun, 03 Oct 2010 13:48:09 +0000

Interdisciplinary Analysis of the Network Society

Professors Manuel Castells[1] and Bill Dutton[2]

An Online Graduate Seminar at the Open University of Catalonia

Open University of Catalonia

Autumn 2010

Professors Manuel Castells and Bill Dutton are offering their co-taught course on ‘Interdisciplinary Analysis of the Network Society’ during the Autumn of 2010 to graduate students at the Open University of Catalonia. The instructors have developed this innovative experiment in doctoral training over several years in which they have co-authored an evolving set of lectures. This course is only open to OUC students with the permission of the instructors.

This optional course introduces students to key concepts and issues in the empirical study of social issues tied to the Internet and related information and communication technologies. The course is taught online, with the instructors posting short lectures early in the week, which students and faculty discuss online during the week. Students are also asked to prepare a course paper that develops an empirical approach to the study of a topic of significance to the network society and relates it to their own research interests.

In addition to the subject matter, the experience of taking an online course, using Moodle’s course management system, is of value to graduate students with a serious interest in the Internet.

An outline of the earlier year’s eight-week course, which will be the basis for the 2010 offering, is available through Bill Dutton’s blog post on the topic at: http://people.oii.ox.ac.uk/dutton/2008/06/27/online-seminar-on-the-network-s ociety-by-castells-and-dutton/ If you have questions about the nature of the work, please contact either of the course instructors.

Over the eight weeks, key topics include:

Information and Network Societies
The Global Networked Economy
Social Shaping of Technology: The Internet in Historical Perspective
Media and the Internet: from Mass Communication to Mass Self-Communication
Social Machines: Reconfiguring Social Networks
Urban Forms of the Information Age: Space of Flows and Space of Places
Collaborative Network Organizations and the Emergence of a ‘Fifth Estate’
Social Movements and Informational Politics in a Digital Environment

[1] Manuel Castells is Professor of Sociology at the Open University of Catalonia (UOC), in Barcelona; Professor Emeritus of Sociology, and Professor Emeritus of City and Regional Planning at the University of California, Berkeley; Wallis Annenberg Chair of Communication Technology and Society, Annenberg School of Communication, University of Southern California; Marvin and Joanne Grossman Distinguished Professor of Technology and Society at the MIT and Distinguished Visiting Professor in Internet Studies at Oxford University.

[2] Professor of Internet Studies, Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford.

A Decade in Internet Time: Symposium on the Dynamics of the Internet and Society

Bill — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 17:51:29 +0000

A Decade in Internet Time: Symposium on the Dynamics of the Internet and Society

University of Oxford

21-24 September 2011

Event: Symposium

Location: OxfordUniversity of Oxford with sessions at the Social Sciences Manor Road Building, and Said Business School

Organized by: Oxford Internet Institute and iCS (the journal Information, Communication and Society)

Sponsors include: Routledge (Taylor & Francis Group)

The Oxford Internet Institute (OII) and the journal, Information, Communication and Society (iCS) are co-organizing a symposium to critically assess the last decade of social research on the Internet and identify directions for research over the next. The symposium will be held in Oxford from the afternoon of 21 September until noon on the 24^th. This event will be punctuated by a celebration of the 10^th anniversary of the founding of the OII, providing an opportunity to relate broader lessons for the field to the case of one of the first departments at a major university focused on the societal implications of the Internet and related information and communication technologies. Ten years is only a moment in the span of social research, but eons in Internet time. Has social research across the disciplines been up to the challenges?

There will be parallel sessions across the days, with late-afternoon plenary sessions, and ample time for informal discussion. One plenary session will focus on the Anniversary of the OII. The parallel sessions will focus on the presentation of papers submitted for review in response to this call.

Invited Keynotes

Manuel Castells is Research Professor at the Open University of Catalonia (UOC), in Barcelona. He also a University Professor and the holder of the Wallis Annenberg Chair of Communication Technology and Society at the Annenberg School of Communication, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, the Marvin and Joanne Grossman Distinguished Professor of Technology and Society at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Distinguished Visiting Professor of Internet Studies at Oxford University. He was Professor of Sociology and of City and Regional Planning at the University of California, Berkeley (1979-2003).

Vint Cerf is a computer scientist who is recognized as one of the ‘fathers of the Internet’.His contributions have been widely acknowledged by many honorary degrees and awards, including the National Medal of Technology, the Turing Award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and membership in the National Academy of Engineering. Vint Cerf is currently Vice President and Chief Internet Evangelist at Google. [Provisional Acceptance]

Andrew Graham is the Master of Balliol College, University of Oxford, and founding Chairman of the Advisory Board of the Oxford Internet Institute. He was the driving force in establishing the OII and was the Acting Director of the OII until July 2002. An Oxford graduate, Andrew Graham became economic adviser to Prime Minister Harold Wilson, 1967–69, before joining Balliol as a Tutorial Fellow in Economics. He returned to 10 Downing Street as a Policy Adviser to the Prime Minister, 1974–76 and later, from 1988–94, became economic advisor to the Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer and, from 1992, Leader of the Labour Party, John Smith.

Laura DeNardis is a Research Scholar, Lecturer, and the Executive Director of the Information Society Project at Yale Law School. DeNardis is an Internet governance scholar and the author of Protocol Politics: The Globalization of Internet Governance (MIT Press 2009), Information Technology in Theory (Thompson 2007 with Pelin Aksoy), and numerous book chapters and articles. DeNardis received a Ph.D. in Science and Technology Studies (STS) from Virginia Tech, a Master of Engineering degree from Cornell University, and a Bachelor of Arts in Engineering Science from Dartmouth College.

Eszter Hargittai is Associate Professor of Communication Studies and Faculty Associate of the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University where she heads the Web Use Project. Eszter received a B.A. in Sociology from Smith College and a Ph.D. in Sociology from Princeton University where she was a Wilson Scholar. She was a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford (2006-07) and a fellow at the Institute for International Integration Studies, Trinity College Dublin (2007). Currently, she is a fellow at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society.

Lisa Nakamura is the Director of the Asian American Studies Program, Professor in the Institute of Communication Research and Media Studies Program and Professor of Asian American Studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign. She is the author of Digitizing Race: Visual Cultures of the Internet (University of Minnesota Press, 2008), Cybertypes: Race, Ethnicity and Identity on the Internet (Routledge, 2002) and co-editor of Race in Cyberspace (Routledge, 2000). She is editing a collection with Peter Chow-White entitled Digital Race: An Anthology (Routledge, forthcoming) and is writing a new monograph on social inequality in virtual worlds, tentatively entitled ‘Workers Without Bodies: Towards a Theory of Race and Digital Labor in Virtual Worlds, or, Why World of Warcraft needs a Civil Rights Movement’.

Barry Wellman is the S.D. Clark Professor at the Department of Sociology at the University of Toronto, where he directs NetLab. He is also a cross-appointed member of the university’s Knowledge Media Design Institute, and Faculty of Information. With Lee Rainie, he’s just finished Networked: The New Social Operating System, to be published by MIT Press, January 2012.

Call for Papers and Panel Proposals

Authors are invited to submit abstracts of unpublished, original work for initial review as symposium papers. Abstracts for papers should be limited to approximately 500 words; abstracts for proposed panels or workshops to 1000 words, including information about participants.

Abstracts for papers or panels should be submitted by 8 December 2010 to events@oii.ox.ac.uk and have ‘iCS Symposium’ in the subject. Authors for whom abstracts are accepted will be asked to provide a completed paper by 12 September 2011.

Abstracts and papers may address any topic concerning social research on the Internet and related technologies. Proposals can be made for individual papers or for a panel. They will be evaluated on the basis of their originality and promise for shaping theoretical, methodological or empirical advances in the study of the Internet. Work that has a promise to shape research, policy or practice in this emerging field would be especially welcomed.

Themes of parallel and plenary sessions are likely to focus on change over time, including, but not limited, to such themes as:

The diffusion of the Internet: shifts and plateaus in digital inclusion and divides across geography, generations, and society;
Sizing the Internet economy and its growth over time and space;
Changing patterns and requirements for digital literacy and skills;
Trust over time and across areas of Internet use, from commerce to public services and news and information;
Emerging roles of networking in the public domain, government, and democratic institutions and processes, such as in election campaigns, democratic accountability and the rise of a Fifth Estate;
The role of the Internet in major societal crises and natural disasters;
Evolution of digital academe, including digital collections, formal and informal learning, e-research and academic publishing;
The quality and changing sources of information – from news to research – and their consequences;
Collaboration – myths and realities of new forms of collaborative network organizations and technologies;
The developing role of the Internet in social networking, whether in the workplace, everyday life, or in shaping major life chances;
The dark side of the Internet: growth of cyber-crime, cyber-terrorism, malicious computing, and approaches to addressing these problems;
Collective action – the evolving role of the Internet in social and political movements;
Privacy and surveillance trends and research;
Localism – the new Internet frontier;
Closing of the Internet through appliances, aps, and regulations;
The rise of Internet governance and regulation in areas ranging across policy arenas, from standards to freedom of expression?
The development of Internet research and digital research methods.

Key Dates:

Submission of Abstracts for Papers or Panels: 8 December 2010

Notification of Acceptance of Papers and Panels: 21 December 2010

Papers due: 12 September 2011

Organization

Programme Chairs

Bill Dutton, Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford

Brian Loader, Science and Technology Studies Unit, University of York

Victoria Nash, Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford

Barry Wellman, Netlab, University of Toronto

Programme Committee

Members of the iCS Editorial Board

Faculty of the OII

Registration

Information about registration procedures and fees are to follow. Questions may be addressed to events@oii.ox.ac.uk

Call for Papers: Consumers and Internet Studies: a Workshop

Bill — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 12:01:17 +0000

Call for papers for a Workshop on ‘Consumers and Internet Studies’

Internet Interdisciplinary Institute (UOC) and Oxford Internet Institute

Barcelona, Spain (10^th January 2011)

Organizers

William H. Dutton, Professor of Internet Studies, Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford

and

Inma Rodriguez-Ardura, Associate Professor of Marketing, Internet Interdisciplinary Institute, Open University of Catalonia (Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, or UOC), and Visiting Fellow, Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford

Background

Two Internet research centres (the Oxford Internet Institute and the IN3-UOC) are organizing this workshop, with the aim of facilitating further exploration of the terrains and standing of Internet Studies focused on aspects of the consumer and consumer behaviour, and of providing direction for enhancing its substance, significance and impact. The workshop is the second in a collaboratively organized series, intended to support the development of Internet Studies through critical analyses and perspectives from a number of internationally recognized scholars and researchers along with younger colleagues, whose research promises new insights and perspectives.

Subject Coverage

We will invite a small number of speakers from academia and industry, but also invite proposals for contributions from a wide range of disciplines and perspectives, such as consumer behaviour, business sciences, media studies, psychology, economics, political science and other approaches, applied to study of the Internet and the consumer.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to the following:

Critical perspectives on the growing body of research into the Internet and the Consumer, which help to define the state of this field, its dynamism, and the critical areas in need of clarification and further research.
Insights into the main contributions made in the research on the online consumer to the larger domain of ‘Internet Studies’, in terms of new theories, data and methods.
Comprehensive overviews of key issues in Internet Studies on the Consumer -such as, for example flow, trust, eCRM, brand communities, co-creation and empowerment, which include major findings and directions for further research.

Submission information

Prospective presenters will be asked to provide an extended abstract/outline of no more than 1,500 words of their paper. Abstracts may be submitted in PDF (.pdf, preferred) or Word (.doc) format. The deadline for submissions is 10^thDecember 2010.

Organizers and Notes

You may send one copy in the form of an PDF or an MS Word file attached to an e-mail to the following:

Prof. Dr. Inma Rodríguez-Ardura

Internet Interdisciplinary Institute, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain, visiting the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom e-Mail: inma.rodriguez-ardura[at]oii.ox.ac.uk

with a copy to:

Prof. Dr. William H. Dutton, Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom e-Mail: william.dutton[at]oii.ox.ac.uk

Please include in your submission the title of the workshop.

The Local Frontier of the Global Internet: Networked Individuals and Communities of Digital Britain

Bill — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 13:00:34 +0000

I’ve just finished a draft of a paper by this title for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s Programme on Globalization, UK Poverty and Communities. My thanks to Bianca Reisdorf for assistance with the analysis, and Teresa Hanley for her valued comments.

Abstract

The Local Frontier of the Global Internet: Networked Individuals and Communities of Digital Britain

William Dutton

Worldwide diffusion and use of the Internet is changing how we communicate, but also reconfiguring patterns of local and global communication — shaping what we know, and whom we know. Rather than undermining social networks and local communities in the ways feared by many critics of new media, use of the Internet is empowering ‘networked individuals’ and their communities – local and global. This general theme is based on a synthesis of empirical research, and analysis of data gathered on the use of the Internet by people living in Britain and around the world. Longer-term outcomes will depend on how networked individuals and institutions will use the Internet in a rapidly evolving regulatory context that could enrich or undermine digital Britain.

The paper is posted and available on SSRN at http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1673426 Comments would be valued, as I expect to have an opportunity to revise this following a meeting at the Rowntree Foundation.