inicio mail me! sindicaci;ón

Archive for blogs

Is writing this blog killing me?

The New York Times reports that two men were so obsessed with internet activity, their health was fatally damaged (Link)


Politics: Web 2.0: An International Conference: Second Call For Papers

Politics: Web 2.0: An International Conference: Second Call For Papers

Hosted by the New Political Communication Unit, Department of Politics
and International Relations, Royal Holloway, University of London.
http://newpolcom.rhul.ac.uk

April 17-18, 2008.

http://newpolcom.rhul.ac.uk/politics-web-2-0-conference/

Second call for papers

Has there been a shift in political use of the Internet and digital new
media - a new Web 2.0 politics based on participatory values? How do
broader social, cultural, and economic shifts towards Web 2.0 impact, if
at all, on the contexts, the organizational structures, and the
communication of politics and policy? Does Web 2.0 hinder or help
democratic citizenship? This conference provides an opportunity for
researchers to share and debate perspectives.

Read the rest of this entry »


Australian Blogging Conference

Over the past decade, the internet has democratised publishing, transforming the way in which society communicates and researches. Once web page creation required a sophisticated knowledge of HTML, but user friendly tools now make it possible for anyone to create a web page. The easiest and most common web page to create is a blog, (or a weblog). These blogs take the form of an online journal or diary and can cover any topic – from the life of a high school student to complex political analysis and debate. With the proliferation of blogs over the last two years, their authors have had a significant influence on popular culture, scholarship, journalism and politics (link).


A Blog Philosophy

If a blog can have a philosophy, then the philosophy of this blog is that there is nothing particularly radical about the new. The new may be radical to some, but the new can only be new in the context of the old (or their ‘old’). Some of the old may be threatened by the new, but then again if the new isn’t new, the the old is only threatened by what it already knows, or what it has already learnt the hard way (remember Nuremberg). The new never follows what is new, the new leads in the context of ‘olds’ and what it keeps is a sign of how civilised it is, and what it discards, is often a sign of how lazy it is.

Few things are truly new and even the ‘new’ has a history of ‘newness’. Thus finding what is new and applying it to positive and progressive tasks, is far from a walk in the park. A blog is not an end in itself, it is a way of gaining perspective over-time, a cognitive perspective on what is new, what is useful, and how this can progress our knowledge (and make it new). Fundamental to the advancement of knowledge, is moving through knowledge, sharing knowledge, and imparting an alternative perspective to those who don’t look for it and to those who should.

What is new about new media, the Internet, and hypertext? It depends who you ask. In that famous line from 1972, Henry Kissinger asked the Chinese Foreign Minister, Zhou Enlai, for his views on the French Revolution of 1789. He responded, “It’s too soon to tell.”

Blog on, we might learn something.


The world’s most hated blogger

The man known on the internet as “the world’s most hated blogger” is cooling his heels at an undisclosed location near Sydney, working on a way to climb back out of the very deep hole he now finds himself in (link)

From the Melbourne Age


Too many passwords!

(From the AHDS Blog)

Those dealing with anything digital are aware there they have too many passwords and user names to allow easy access to computers, email, resources, subscriptions, mailing lists etc.  The UK’s Joint Informations Systems Committee (JISC) is leading the way in radically simplifying this with the use of Federated Access. The aim is that educational users only have to rely on one institutional password to access a range of local and national resources.

This is all explained in a jolly little video that JISC has produced and made available via their JISC website


Humanities Computing Links

Here is a list of links that are useful for humanities computing research. Thanks to Geoffrey Rockwell for the (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)


‘Blogging, the Nihilist Impulse’ Public Lecture by Geert Lovink

(Dr Lovink is a co-founder of the Fibreculture Network; that is now well and truly dead. I can’t say that I miss it; it brought out my Nihlist instincts in me in a way that blogging never has. This is sure to be an excellent talk; bloggers in Sydney should attend).

‘Blogging, the Nihilist Impulse’
public lecture by Geert Lovink

Tuesday 12 December, 6 - 7.30pm
Eastern Avenue Lecture Theatre
Eastern Avenue Complex, University of Sydney

hosted by the Department of Media and Communication and Digital
Cultures Program, and the Research Institute for Humanities and Social
Sciences, University of Sydney

About the event:

This lecture-presentation will consist of three parts. In the
introduction Geert Lovink will give an overview of the Institute of
Network Cultures in Amsterdam which he founded in 2004, emphasizing
possible Euro-Australian collaborations. He will then present the main
thesis of his upcoming book ‘No Comments’, a General Theory of Blogging
that investigates the ‘nihilist impulse’ behind all the ranking,
linking and commenting.

Read the rest of this entry »


Preparing Students for User-Led Content Production

Here is a recorded talk given by the prolific Axel Bruns of QUT at the ATOM Conference 2006 (link). Like most somewhat commercially-orientated researchers, this researcher works in a very crowded field and his most potent contribution seems to be in teaching rather that definable original research. I.e. too much process orientation, and not enough context and content, and I can’t really see anything original and significant apart from Bruns changing the words to describe what is already pretty much well-known in main stream thought. And I am indifferent to his research networks; but this happens in research, even in small countries. Pockets of like-minded people appear that are hostile to alternative views, but luckily in crowded fields, they aren’t that difficult to go around (a small speed hump rather than a mountain). His recent book on blogs perhaps reveals what happens in crowded fields; researchers retreat into islands of like-minded people that lack fresh insight and the ability to explore significant other contributions beyond comfortable and predictable networks of ‘like minded’ people. I wonder if this is common in the academy and how it effects research output? Now there is a research proposal for you; a Randall Collins type enquiry into academic networks in crowded fields in Australia.


Technorati : , , ,
Del.icio.us : , , ,


Student use of Wikipedia

This thread on the use of Wikipedia in the academy appeared earlier this year on the discussion list Humanist. Here is the link.

This message is a request for comment (the humanities version of a
RFC). 2006 appears to be the year that undergraduate students discovered
Wikipedia in a big way. My colleagues and I have been seeing an increasing
number of papers that use Wikipedia inappropriately as the sole or primary
reference. For example, I just read a paper about the relation between
Structuralism, Deconstruction, and Postmodernism in which every reference
was to the Wikipedia articles on those topics with no awareness that there
was any need to read a primary work or even a critical work. After writing
comments to a number of students on this topic, I set to work on a general
policy statement addressed to the student that might be shared among my
local community of scholars (see draft below). I thought such a statement
might be of general use. I welcome any suggestions from, or discussion by,
the Humanist community as well as pointers to any similar statements that
may exist. (Still to do is a one-paragraph version of such a statement
suitable for inclusion in a course syllabus.)

–Alan Liu, UC Santa Barbara

TO THE STUDENT: APPROPRIATE USE OF WIKIPEDIA

In recent years, Wikipedia (http://wikipedia.org) has become one of
the most important and useful resources on the Internet. Created by an open
community of authors (anyone can contribute, edit, or correct articles), it
has become a powerful resource for researchers to consult alongside other
established library and online resources. As in the case of all tools,
however, its value is a function of appropriateness. In the case of
college-level essays or research papers, students should keep in mind the
following two limitations, one applying to all encyclopedias, and the other
specifically to Wikipedia:

Read the rest of this entry »


US Senator Ted Kennedy on Net Neutrality

Wow, this video from Senator Ted Kennedy in the US in interesting on a number of levels. One, he and his campaign has a profile on Youtube (which I find extrodinary), and two, he has some very interesting things to say about Net Neutrality.


Free Speech online ‘under threat’

Bloggers are being asked to show their support for freedom of expression by Amnesty International. The human rights group also wants web log writers to highlight the plight of fellow bloggers jailed for what they wrote in their online journals. The organisation said fundamental rights such as free speech faced graver threats than ever before. The campaign coincides with the start of a week-long UN-organised conference that will debate the future of the net (from the BBC Link)


3) Morning Coffee with Craig: What is a ‘publicly articulated career’ blogger?

Today I talk about the notion of the ‘publicly articulated career’ blogger (or the ‘resume blogger’).

Also, check these links out:
http://homecookedtheory.com/
http://snurb.info/
http://jilltxt.net/

Also check out Danah Boyd’s blog: http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/

And also her somewhat ironic paper: Friendster and Publicly Articulated Social Networking.


Blogging for the Internet Governance Forum

(I received this political spam today. It is referring to the Internet Governance Forum that is being held in Athens which is a continuation of the World Summit of the Information Society)

Dear Blogger

Next week the Internet Governance Forum meets in Athens to discuss the future of the Internet. There is a real danger that human rights will be sidelined and that discussion will focus on security. A delegation from Amnesty International will be there to ensure that human rights stay at the top of the agenda.

Around the world, Internet cafés are shut down, computers seized, chat rooms monitored, and blogs deleted. Websites are blocked or heavily censored, search engines are restricted and foreign news prohibited.

A new Amnesty report on Vietnam this week revealed that web users are afraid to post information online and Internet café owners are forced to inform on their customers. People are harassed, detained and imprisoned for expressing their political views online. But the report also showed a growing network of activists and campaigners defying government controls and using the Internet to discuss human rights.

Our http://irrepressible.info campaign is all about the rise of Internet censorship and people who have been imprisoned just for what they say in blogs or on websites. It also targets multinational companies who collude with governments in restricting people’s right to freedom of expression and information on the net.

Thousands of bloggers have already supported the campaign, by putting a badge made of censored web content on their own site or email signature – effectively turning censorship on itself.

We’re asking the online community to show their solidarity with web users in countries where they can face jail for criticizing the government.

The Internet Governance Forum needs to know that the online community is bothered about free expression online and willing to stand up for it. If you and fellow bloggers are willing to post an entry about it and spread the word, they will have to listen.

Thank you

Amnesty International UK
http://amnesty.org.uk


Next entries »