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Archive for December, 2006

Pod Save the Queen

The Queens message is podcast this year. I can’t wait! (link)


What is the Community Informatics Research Network?

The Community Informatics Research Network (CIRN) is an international network of researchers, practitioners and policy makers concerned with enabling communities through the use of Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) and specifically with research and practice in Community Informatics and community networking or community technology practice.(link)


What is the Centre for Community Networking Research?

This centre at Monash University holds a conference on ‘community networks’ annually at Monash’s Prato Centre in Italy (link 2006)

The Centre for Community Networking Research, Caulfield School of Information Technology, at Monash University, aims to understand how communities and community organisations are using new technologies. We are interested in the practicalities of information and technology usage and broader issues of community and institutional culture and memory as they are shaped through different understandings and uses of technologies. We are involved in 21 current projects and have 10 local and international PhD students.(linK)


What is the Text Encoding Initiative?

The Text Encoding Initiative is one of the most important developments in the field of Humanities Computing.

The Text Encoding Initiative (TEI) Guidelines are an international and interdisciplinary standard that enables libraries, museums, publishers, and individual scholars to represent a variety of literary and linguistic texts for online research, teaching, and preservation (link)


Blog Growth Slowing

Could blogging be near the peak of its popularity? The technology gurus at Gartner Inc. believe so.One of the research company’s top 10 predictions for 2007 is that the number of bloggers will level off in the first half of next year at roughly 100 million worldwide (link the Age)


Victoria gets first Greens in Parliament

Greg Barber is one of three Green representatives recently elected to ‘Northern Metropolitan’ region in the 40-seat Legislative Council with Greens colleague Sue Pennicuik and one DLP member (with which he will share the balance of power). These are the first Greens in the Victorian Parliament.

Here is an interview I did with Greg for the project Milkbar.com.au (2001) about the gentrification of Fitzroy.


Identity 2.0

Dick Hardt is somewhat of a corporate man, but what a great public speaker! (in a field not famous for it). Check out this talk on Identity 2.0. He’s on to something, although what a pity that most of these innovations emanate from the commercial sphere. There are educational equivalents here in the UK, but these debates need to be linked to discussions of privacy and quickly. (Link).

Also, check out The Augmented Social Network which is a Civil Society proposal that deals with the same issue (link)


What is the International Network of E-Communities?

Also see the ‘Delclaration of Open Networks’.

The INEC Declaration on Open Networks outlines the imperative need for Open Networks and the benefits they are to provide to communities.

In ten articles, the open networks are presented as the network which best caters the needs of signatory communities. Open networks must be operator-neutral, symmetric, are capable of carrying data over infinite bandwidths and provide a level playing field for any service to be offered over the network under equal conditions, creating a free and competitive market. The signatory communities believe telco and cable monopolies/duapolies to be an obtacle to innovation and community development. Signatory communities recognize the need for a new and enhanced role for both government and private sector as to initiate a new and innovative era of human social evolvement and economic growth. The declaration maintains technological neutrality. The declaration outlines several directions for the main players in the broadband network arena, but does not stipulate who should or should not own passive infrastructure. It encourages visionary leadership and up-to date forging of regulatory frameforks which avoid vertical integration of infrastructure and services. (thanks to Andrew G for the link)


Mobile Social Software Applications

Here is a list of Mobile phone social software applications. (Thanks to Timo Arnall for the link)


Review of New Gay Social Networking Sites

There are some interesting developments coming out of the gay community in terms of online social software. It’s about time, after the unimaginative and technically stagnating Gayday and Gay.com (thanks to techcrunch for the link)

As you can see by the following short profiles, these sites targeting a demographic with two traits in common (gay men) are all very different. Just as there’s a wide diversity of gay men in the world, there may well be ample room for a variety of gay male social networking sites - presuming they are able to build sufficient critical mass for monetization and financial viability


What is Frappr?

Frappr is a ’social software’ mapping site..(a mashup).


Gay Scene Tasmania

Here is a listing of all the gay venues, services and events in Tasmania. I couldn’t find a comprehensive listing online; so please send me your links if you know of any more.

  • Bars:
    • Flamingos Open on Saturday nights 10.30PM until late: Corner of Argyle and Bathurst St, Hobart. Access from Argyle Street, next door to the Men’s Gallery.(link)
  • Clubs:
    • La La Land Open on the 1st Saturday of every month. It is held in Halo Nightclub which in on the Elizabeth Mall and you enter via Purdey’s Mart (link)
  • Cafes
    • Soak@Chaos A Cafe and Bar (link)
  • Events:
    • Tasmanian LGBTI Pride Festival Usually held in October: see GLT Tas Website for details (link)
    • Queens Ball: Usually held in June; biggest night on social calendar (not sure where to get details; perhaps try the GLT Tas Website closer to the date (link)
    • Halloween Ball: Usually held in August (again not sure where to get details; perhaps try the GLT Tas Website closer to the date (link)
  • Community Services:
    • Working it Out (link)
    • Gay, Lesbian, and Transgender Tasmanian Website (link)
  • Politics:
    • Rodney Croome: Gay Advocate (link)
  • Tourism:
    • The government sponsored Tourism Tasmania has a visitors guide online (link)
  • Students
  • QSOC Queer Studenst on Campus; University of Tasmania (link)

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What is the Virtual Knowledge Studio?

Recent transformations in communication and information exchange have created new opportunities for researchers in the humanities and social sciences. It is not self-evident, however, in what ways scholars can best use these possibilities while maintaining and further developing their specific roles in academia and society. This new KNAW programme, The Virtual Knowledge Studio for the Humanities and Social Sciences, aims to support researchers in the humanities and social sciences in the Netherlands in the creation of new scholarly practices, termed here e-research, as well as in their reflection on e-research in relation to the development of their fields (link)


Victoria’s ‘Connected Communities’ project

Connected Communities is a project from the Victorian Government with the ambition to (funny enough) ‘connect communities’. It appears to be driven by the ‘digital divide’ thesis (here are the details link).

But I have never really understood what a ‘community’ is. The term has become so ‘normalised’ that it is rarely discussed critically. It is a vacuous term and needs to be used strategically. And if the definition of a ‘community’ is less than clear then how can they possibly be connected through the Internet with any degree of certainty (and why would you want to?) These should be fundamental questions driving a project of this size and expense.

Sorry to say this, but this project is primitive (web1.0). Nice sentiment but poor ideas. And that dodgy voting thing; please how naive does the Victorian government think their citizens are? Let me think about this project some more and get back to you whilst I play my banjo and cook up some rabbits.

See: My Connected Community (link)


What is Iqueer?

Thanks to Rodney Croome’s Blog for the Link

iqueer has started as a group of television and multimedia producers keen to exploit developments in high-speed internet access and digital production technology to distribute quality content to a smaller, more specialised gay audience than commercial television could ever hope (or dare) to support.Our aim is to create a channel that screens locally-produced shows across a variety of genres and formats that will appeal to a gay Australian audience…(link)


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