Research Conversations Archive

Spring 2008
April 4th - Undergraduates in iSchools: The View from Syracuse
April 11th - No conversation scheduled
April 18th - Social Networks and New Product Diffusion
April 25th - Research Administrative Orientation
May 2nd - Public Access to ICT
May 9th - Growing a CyberSecurity Research Program within the Department of Energy
May 16th - A Tale of two Homes: Observations about the information needs of the rural poor in Ensenada, Mexico
May 30th - Building integrity for accountability in public information systems: Research from Africa and South Asia 
June 6th - Green Learning, R&D and Business in 4D

Winter 2008
January 11th - The Role of FRBR and Topic Maps in Designing a Semantic Digital Library
February 1st - Orders of Intentionality in the Archival Theory of Arrangement 
February 8th - SearchTogether and CoSearch: New Tools for Enabling Collaborative Web Search
February 15th - iSchool One-Minute Madness
February 22nd - Interactive 3D Visual Retrieval for Art History Education
February 29th - Online Conversations and Interventions for Long-Term Health Behavior Change 
March 7th - Electronic Piers Plowman: Implementing an Edition of a Six-Hundred-Year-Old-Poem for Twenty-First Century Students
March 14th - Urban Archives: Adaptive Tools for Creative Collaboration and Cultural Research

Fall 2007
September 28th - Digital Natives:  Ethics, Behavioral Norms, and the Strategies of Knowledge Management 
October 5th - Debriefing on the First Annual Information Security Compliance and Risk Management Institute: Topics, Problems and Future Directions
October 12th -   Overview of the Center for Internet Studies ICT and Development program
October 19th - Visualizing Voice
October 26th - Technological Initiatives for Social Empowerment: Design Experiments in Technology-Supported Youth Participation and Local Civic Engagement
November 2nd - Designing a Useful, Useable Website for Older Adults 
November 9th -  Are there ontomon?  Looking for types of information organization frameworks and systems
November 16th - Personal Information for World as We Want It to Be
November 30th - Social Traces: sociological topographies for enhancing search, community and social science
December 7th - An Investigation on the Use of Computerized Patient Care Documentation; An Evaluation of How Search Engines Respond to Greek Language Queries 

Spring 2007
March 29th - Jimmy Lin - Beyond "Bag of Words": Towards a Framework for Conceptual Retrieval
March 30th - Craig Smith - HIT Lab
April 6th - Robert M Mason - Should We Consider New Approaches to Information Ethics?
April 11th - Geoffrey Parker, Associate Professor of Economic Sciences, Director of the Entergy Tulane Energy Institute
April 13th - Kirsten Foot, Representing Digital Scholarship Digitally: Creating the Web Campaigning Digital Supplement
April 20th - Tabitha Hart & Robert Mason, A Discussion of Culture, Starbucks, Disney, and the Design of Future Digital Global Libraries 
April 27th - Meghan Dougherty, PhD Candidate, Communication
May 4th - Paul Wouters,  The Virtual Knowledge Studio for the Humanities and Social Sciences, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
May 11th - Sandy Hirsh, Use of mobile technologies 
May 18th - Karen Fisher, Associate Professor, The Information School
May 25th - Bob Franza, Seattle Science Foundation
June 1st - Bryan Kirschner & Paula Bach - FLOSS Usability: Supporting HCI expertise with Design Rationale

Winter 2007
January 19th - CHII - Kari Holland
January 26th - Credibility Tools - Shaun Kane
February 2nd - the Institute for Innovation in Information Management (I3M) - Panel Discussion
February 9th - Arnie Lund, Director of User Experience for Microsoft’s Mobile Platforms Division, MGH 254*
February 16th - Part I 2:30-3:30 - Hongyan Ma - Facilitating User-System Coordination by... 
                     Part II 3:30-4:30 - Efthimis N. Efthimiadis, David G. Hendry, and Chong-Ki Tsang - UW/Microsoft Symposium, MGH 241*
February 23rd - Beverly L. Harrison, Senior Scientist, Intel Research Seattle 
March 2nd - Sean McNee, Computing Research Scientist at Attenex Corporation
March 8th -Deborah Tatar - Practice into Theory..., 9:30-10:30am*
March 9th - IMT 550 - Search Engine Simulation, 3:30-5:00pm*

Fall 2006
September 29th - Introducing INSC 599 (for PhD students)
October 6th - Planning for University of Michigan iSchool Presentation
October 13th - Human Subjects Policies and Procedures
October 20th - Value Sensitive Design
October 27th - Creating (Library) Values in the age of Amazoogles
November 3rd - Serious Gaming
November 6th - Wired Shut
November 17th - Beyond Self-monitoring: Designing Systems to Support Sustained Behavior Change
December 1st - Pictures of Traces of Places, People and Groups
December 8th - What is the Internet Doing to Community -- and Vice Versa 

 

 

 

Green Learning, R&D and Business in 4D

Abstract:

Move photons, not people. Emit more electrons, not CO₂. Education, research, and business are advancing into 3D immersive virtual worlds at an amazing pace. Strategic Analytics' Barry Gilbert identifes there are 137 million virtual world users as of May 2008, and he predicts there will be 1 billion by 2017. Libraries and educational institutions were first to create substance in the virtual world's arena, and have the scars and stories to prove it. Government agencies are talking about cybersecurity in virtual worlds, telemedicine researchers are exploring interaction models, cognitive scientists are examining immersive simulations and how they might be used to treat Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Several business have entered and some have exited. Why? And what could be done differently? Imagine a world where users create content at blinding speeds, where researchers can aggregate worldwide data over longer periods of time with larger diverse populations, where collaborative information spaces persist both context and content. Come to this event and we'll talk and show significant promise for innovations in information management, knowledge creation, performance metrics, and intellectual property.  We'll feature Second Life because of its versatility, but we're heading for much, much more and we'll weigh the choices. How will virtual worlds change education, R&D and business?  Let's talk virtual worlds and get the conversation rolling.

Bio:

Randy Hinrichs is CEO of 2b3d, a virtual world company with offices in Second Life. Randy has been examining gaming and immersive environments for learning for over two decades.  Formerly, he created and led Microsoft Research's Learning Science and Technology group enabling learning in 3D virtual worlds at MIT, multicast video conferencing for world leading universities, and mobile and pen based learning platforms for corporate learning. He left last year while serving as operating manager for Microsoft's Advanced Strategy group on open access and e-science to form his current company. He was an early entrant into the Web while at Sun Microsystems in the 90s and became an expert on intranets and business transformation. Currently, he is creating Medipelago, a full set of islands for health care research, education and services. And, he has two Husky girls keeping him on the edge of learning.

 

 

Building integrity for accountability in public information systems: Research from Africa and South Asia 

ABSTRACT

Electronic information systems streamline processes and enable a wealth of information to be efficiently managed and quickly accessed. Such systems provide a basis for informed decision making and effective service delivery in government. Often such systems are viewed as tools to reduce corruption and to enhance government accountability. Yet many electronic systems have been introduced in developing countries where manual input information has been poorly managed and little or no account has been taken for maintaining and preserving records as evidence.  Instead of streamlining processes, problems prevalent in manual systems are replicated and even exacerbated in the electronic system. Data is often incomplete, inaccurate, and subject to unauthorized manipulation or loss. Rules and procedures must be in place to protect this information over time, to change and update it only when authorized, and to lay an audit trail. Proper management of manual and electronic records preserves the rights and entitlements of citizens and ensures transparency in government decision making.

Through funding from the UK Department for International Development, the London based International Records Management Trust has been exploring these issues by conducting a series of research case studies on various government information systems in Africa and South Asia. Human resources and financial (specifically payroll) management systems have been studied in Tanzania, Zambia, Lesotho, Ghana, and Sierra Leone. In addition, and by way of comparison, land management information systems have been examined in Botswana and in Karnataka State in India. Discussion will center on the findings of these studies. 

BIO

Michael Hoyle is currently Project Manager and Lead Researcher at the International Records Management Trust. A New Zealand-born Australian based in Seattle, Michael has a Masters in Information Management and Systems from Monash University, Melbourne Australia. He has a background in information management with the federal government of Australia and was a senior manager in the archival authority of New Zealand. Through professional leadership roles, Michael was closely involved in training and education in records and archives administration in the Pacific Islands and has been active in information management issues in the Commonwealth of Nations. He is currently involved in research, the development of guidance and training materials, and the use of assessment tools for governments moving from manual to electronic information systems in developing countries. Michael is specifically interested in aid and development issues, particularly the use of information communication technologies (ICTs) in government and the public sector, and the resulting impact of those ICTs on citizens.

 

A Tale of two Homes: Observations about the information needs of the rural poor in Ensenada, Mexico

ABSTRACT

Several prominent ICT authors including the United Nations Development agency have found that many ICT4D (Information and Communication for development) projects share a number of fundamental flaws. One prominent author, Alfonso Dargan, in his article “Take Five” A Handful of Essential ICTs in Development” notes the following problems and challenges for ICT effectiveness in bringing about real social change and development:

1.       Community Ownership – Many projects are initiated without community input that leads to equipment theft or deterioration because of lack of a sense of ownership.

2.       Local Content – Most Internet content is irrelevant to the developing world’s poor and is controlled by commercial rules. The demand for telephone, fax, and computer services far exceeds the demand for the Internet in most rural centers.

3.       Appropriate Technology – Computers themselves remain a luxury, and purchasing decisions appear to be out of step with the needs of communities. The newest hardware/software capacity is generally underused and is not available to be repaired in most local settings. Technology must be appropriate and adequate to the needs of the communities, not in technical terms but in terms of utilization, learning, and adoption.

4.       Language and Culture Pertinence - English dominates the web, and when combined with the Internet’s class and cultural uniformity, create a new “Apartheid”. The developing world is also left to inherit a “user culture” because of a lack of opportunities for contribution. Without the presence of local cultural/language, ICT’s cannot contribute to the development of communities. The present unbalanced “cultural exchange” must be altered and will occur only if communities are empowered to produce more local content.

5.       Convergence and Networking – Projects are initiated in areas with no history of participation, no convergence with other programs or organizations, and no networking with other ICT projects. Projects are instituted in isolation without alliances amongst each of or the community.

The above issues could be characterized by what the Human Computer Interface (HCI) community calls a failure to “know thy user.” Without adequate consultation and understanding of the target users and their communities, many projects lack sustainable impact.  As a result, an obvious “design reality” gap exists between the people who create development informatics solutions and the people and communities that use them.

My talk will describe an ethnographic exploration to understand the information needs of the rural poor in Ensenada, Mexico by studying their day-to-day lives and introducing several technology interventions that are customized to their needs.

The research will begin by closely examining two home-building programs that I’ve participated in as a volunteer builder and community worker during the past five years. The first program, Homes of Hope, has built more than 3,000 wood houses in Ensenada since 1990. The houses are built from scratch, and take 20-24 total human hours to complete. The other program, Arial Homes, builds manufactured homes made of sheet-metal panels and foam insulation, which are completed in less than 8 human hours.  Arial Homes has built 15 homes since 2006.

I will discuss my observations and present field notes from preliminary field trips to the region in November 2007 and April 2008. I’ll also discuss a series of proposed field trips in June, July, and August 2008 that will focus more broadly on the information technology needs of the rural poor in Baja, Mexico.

Some possible research explorations include:

- What role do social networks play in the community at large and in neighborhoods such as the Colonias?

- Who are the information gatekeepers in the Colonias?

- Can information and technology enhancements be used to close the digital divide in Ensenada and its surrounding area?

- How can we discover which information and technology interventions are best suited for the rural poor in developing countries?

- Can I generalize the research findings of the rural poor in Ensenada Mexico to rural poor populations in developing countries around the world?  

BIO

Phil Fawcett has worked in the computer-science industry since the early 1980s. During this time as a corporate controller turned IT manager, he planned and implemented manual-to-automated system conversions for small-and medium-sized businesses in manufacturing, land and building management, and large-scale construction.

Since joining Microsoft in 1984, Fawcett has held positions as a support engineer, test lead, and test manager and helped ship more than 25 products, including Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Works for Apple and Windows operating systems, and Microsoft Project for Windows. He also served as a supportability program manager, technical evangelist for Windows hardware platforms, and regional call-center manager. He is currently a principal research program manager doing technology transfer from the research work of 850 Microsoft researchers worldwide to the Microsoft Windows and Mobile and Embedded product divisions.

Mr. Fawcett holds a B.A. degree in Accounting and Marketing from Seattle Pacific University and an MBA from Seattle University. He is a doctoral student in Information Science at the University of Washington.

Fawcett’s volunteer work in Central America and Mexico has led to a strong research interest in information and communication technology for development (ICT4D). In the mid-90’s during the Guatemala civil war, he transported computers to rural Guatemala for use in medical clinics north of Guatemala City. In the past five years, he has been involved in house-building projects and community development in Ensenada, Mexico.

Fawcett holds five patents in modem and communication-related technologies in Windows. His hobbies are technology, photography, motocross riding, painting, and long-distance bicycle riding. He has participated in three transcontinental bicycle rides across the United States in 21 days or fewer.

 

 

 

Growing a CyberSecurity Research Program within the Department of Energy

ABSTRACT
National laboratories and academic institutions both place a strong emphasis on successful research programs, but it can sometimes be difficult to identify ways for researchers in these different institutions to work together to the benefit of both parties.   This talk will suggest ways that academics can develop successful research relationships with, and within, the Department of Energy (DOE) national laboratory system in cyber security.  We will begin by discussing the motivations and evolution of existing research programs for CyberSecurity researchers within DOE, and at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.  Three different styles of research programs will be used as examples:

Internal laboratory research, as exemplified by Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) and laboratory initiatives

The emerging DOE CyberSecurity Grass Roots Community, and prospective DOE ASCR's new research program

Joint proposals to federal agencies

As part of the talk, "success drivers" for  laboratories such as the DOE Pacific Northwest National Laboratory will be discussed, from the perspective of how this affects academic partners.

BIO
Deborah Frincke joined the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in 2004 as Chief Scientist for CyberSecurity. Prior to joining PNNL, Dr. Frincke was a Full Professor at the University of Idaho, and co-founder/co-director of the U Idaho Center for Secure and Dependable Systems, one of the first such institutions to receive NSAs designation of a national Center of Excellence in Information Assurance Education. She is an enthusiastic charter member of the Department of Energy's cyber security grass roots community.

Dr. Frincke's research spans a broad cross section of computer security, both open and classified, with a particular emphasis on infrastructure defense and computer security education. She co-founded TriGeo Network Systems, which was recently positioned by Gartner Group in the Leaders Quadrant for security information and event management. She has written over eighty published articles and technical reports.

Dr. Frincke is an active member of several editorial boards, including: Journal of Computer Security, the Elsevier International Journal of Computer Networks, and the International Journal of Information and Computer Security. She co-edits the Security Education Board column for IEEE Security and Privacy, along with Matt Bishop. She is a steering committee member for Recent Advances in Intrusion Detection (RAID) and Systematic Advances in Digital Forensic Engineering (SADFE). She is a member of numerous advisory boards, including the University of Washingtons Governing Board for the I-Schools Center for Cyber Security and Information Assurance and the State of Idahos NASA/EPSCOR Technical Advisory Committee.  She is also a member of the advisory board for the U of Washington Forensics Certificate, and for the iSchool's CIAC.

Dr. Frincke received her PhD from the University of California, Davis in 1992.

 

 

Public Access to ICT

ABSTRACT

The presentation is based on an ongoing research project at the Center for Information & Society. This research study focuses on the public access to information and communication landscapes in 24 countries, with specific focus on the information needs of underserved communities and the role of ICT.Through field research in 25 developing and emerging countries conducted by local research partners, and cross-country comparative analyses based on common research design elements, the project aims to expand our notions of public access and illuminate scenarios for expanding ICT in support of human development. Of particular interest and value are: the comparative look at key venues, and the mix of depth of in-country knowledge with breadth of global comparison to understand how diverse populations can and do access and use ICT to improve their lives. The project is unique in that it examines both venues with information access as a core function, regardless of the availability of ICT, and venues with ICT access as a core function.

BIO

Rucha Ambikar is a Research Associate at the Center for Information & Society at the University of Washington.  She is finishing her doctorate in Social & Cultural Anthropology from the California Institute of Integral Studies and hopes to be done by this summer. Her dissertation focused on schools run by religious-right wing organizations in India and she specializes in qualitative research methods.  She is interested in issues of sustainable development, and the intersections of gender, religion and nationalism. Her research work to date has been focused on South Asia. She also holds master’s degrees in Mass Communication from Marquette University, WI and in Sociology from Jawaharlal Nehru University, India.

Rebecca Sears is a research coordinator with the Center for Information & Society. Rebecca’s career interests center on information and communication technologies for social and economic development. She has been involved in large-scale technology implementations with the US Library Program of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the implementation of privacy compliance for the database marketing of the Microsoft Corporation, and public outreach on cyber fraud and identity theft for the Washington State Attorney General’s Office. She is interested in the power of information to make a concrete difference in the daily lives of people around the world. Rebecca holds a Master in Public Administration (MPA) from the University of Washington.

 

Friday, April 25th, Mary Gates Hall 420

The second annual research administrative orientation for iSchool researchers (students, staff and faculty).  We will have speakers from the UW Office of Technology Transfer, the UW Human Subjects Division as well as presentations from our iSchool pre-and-post award administrative team.

Topics include: non-disclosure agreements with industry, consenting participants from vulnerable research populations (including children), grant and fellowship budget development, cost-sharing commitments, and the financial management of sponsored projects.

 

Social Networks and New Product Diffusion

 ABSTRACT
Social computing models that increase the amount of information possessed by users, and greatly expanding the available set of choices to consumers, are proliferating in a variety of consumer markets. This paper is motivated by the success of You Tube, which is an exciting venue for content creators to interact with networked communities of users. The promise of a large untapped source of demand for user-generated content combined with the potential for content diffusion through a social network of users makes You Tube an attractive setting for content creators and media companies. We gather data from YouTube to understand the role of social influence on the diffusion of user-generated content. Econometrically, the inference problem in identifying social influence is that individuals’ choices depend in great part on the choices of other individuals. Another problem in inference is to distinguish between social contagion and user heterogeneity in the diffusion process. Our results are robust to alternate explanations and distinguish between user heterogeneity and social contagion. Implications for content creators and to consumers are discussed.

BIO
Anjana Susarla is an assistant professor in the Department of Information Systems and Operations Management at the University of Washington in Seattle. Her research interests are information technology outsourcing, business value of information technology and analyses of social networks in information systems. She holds a PhD in Management Information Systems from the University of Texas at Austin, an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta and a B Tech from the Indian Institute of Technology, Chennai.   

 

 

Undergraduates in iSchools: The View from Syracuse

ABSTRACT: 
While undergraduates have been with us for many centuries, they’ve only invaded iSchools in the last twenty years or so. Syracuse’s program, which began in 1989, is one of the oldest programs, and has evolved from an embarrassingly amorphous educational program to one that emphasizes scholarship and practical skills and sends over 100 students a year into relatively high paying jobs. Syracuse, along with many other iSchools, has learned many lessons about the challenges and rewards of helping teenagers to become fulfilled and productive members of society and the work force.

But the field, and thus the career outlook, is constantly expanding and changing. If we are to continue to be successful in undergraduate education, we must be aware of new opportunities in the field. What was hot five years ago, e.g., web design and management, is less in demand than security and risk analysis today. And online game development may become the next hot career path in the information professions.

Associate Professor Susan Bonzi has led the Syracuse BS in Information Management and Technology program since 1994.  In this session, Susan will discuss working with undergraduates (including research connections) and opportunities and challenges for the future.  This presentation is highly relevant for iSchool PhD students, faculty, and anyone interested in the future of our field.

BIO:
Susan Bonzi has been on the faculty of the School of Information Studies since 1983. An associate professor, she has directed the undergraduate program in Information Management and Technology sine 1993. She was named Outstanding Female Educator of Syracuse University in 1992 by Eta Pi Upsilon Senior Women's honorary, IST Professor of the Year in 1995, and the Syracuse University Alumni Association Teacher of the Year in 1998. She is a member of the Syracuse University Gateway Fellows.

Susan has taught courses from freshman level technology courses to doctoral level seminars, and currently concentrates her efforts in computer programming, and information reporting and presentation. She received her Ph.D. in Library and Information Science from the University of Illinois in 1983. Her research interests lie in the areas of bibliometrics and image retrieval.

 

 

Friday, March 7th, Mary Gates Hall 420

Electronic Piers Plowman: Implementing an Edition of a Six-Hundred-Year-Old-Poem for Twenty-First Century Students

ABSTRACT
The goal of this project is to create a new version of the Middle English poem "Piers Plowman" as a series of XML documents that will support multiple stylings.  Candidate stylings would include versions by different editors, modern and Middle English, spelling variants and so on.  One product of the project will be an XML archive of the poem for the academic community.  Challenges have been the specification of the XML document structure and the visual presentation of the poem for readers and researchers.

BIO
Terrence A. Brooks -  Graduate of the University of British Columbia (BA 1988), McGill University (MLS, 1971), York University (MBA, 1975) and the University of Texas at Austin (PhD 1981).  Brooks has authored software such as the Bibliometrics Toolbox, the Query Tutor and the Action Designer.  His research interests focuses on information architecture and the presentation of information on the Web.

Miceal Vaughan - Miceal Vaughan has been on the faculty at the UW since 1973, after completing his MA/PhD at Cornell University.  A 1968 graduate (English and Classics) from the College (now University) of St. Thomas (St. Paul, Minnesota), he has concentrated his researches in the later Middle Ages in England, with publications on Chaucer, *Piers Plowman,* and medieval drama.  Co-founder of the UW's Textual Studies Program, he is currently editing, for the Piers Plowman Electronic Archive, one of the A-Version manuscripts of *Piers* which he is also using as the basis for the new electronic edition being designed for the undergraduate classroom

 

Online Conversations and Interventions for Long-Term Health Behavior Change 

ABSTRACT 
Research has repeatedly shown that health care providers can successfully motivate health behavior changes in patients and families, but translating these efforts to general medical practice has faced significant barriers around time, training, and insurance reimbursement.  At the same time, there are an abundance of health-related websites, but most are relatively static and so are unable to effectively “meet the person where they are” in the process of change. 

Our research in recent years has focused on the design and evaluation of internet-based health behavior change interventions.  We have progressed from relatively simple programs to a system that comes closer to the motivational interviewing techniques that have been found successful in person-to-person interactions, as the system:

1. Assesses current health status, actions, beliefs, and readiness for change

2. Gives feedback about health status, impact on quality of life, and current treatment compliance

3. Provides tailored information to address false beliefs and motivate the next step in behavior change

4. Allows participants to choose goals; provides tips to help them reach those goals

5. Facilitates communication between participants and their health care providers

6. Provides periodic encouragement, reassessment, feedback, and the opportunity to revise goals to better meet most recent needs

We will discuss the challenges inherent in designing a system that needs to engage participants across a broad spectrum of health literacy and at very different places in the change process, as well as the issues involved in outcome measurement and motivating continued participation over the long-term.  

BIO
Michelle Garrison received her PhD in Epidemiology from the UW School of Public Health and Community Medicine.  For the past 10 years she has worked at the UW’s Child Health Institute, where her research has focused on quality of care measurement and improvement, the impact of electronic media on child health and development, and the design and evaluation of software and interactive websites around health behavior change models.

 

 

Friday, February 22nd, Mary Gates Hall 420

Interactive 3D Visual Retrieval for Art History Education

ABSTRACT

This talk, aimed at doctoral students, describes the architecture and the salient characteristics of a 3D visual information retrieval system for Art and History education purposes.  The system uses novel forms of interaction for sustainable exploration of retrieval sets and building subset collections based on the user groups' values, beyond what IR systems typically supply.  This project is in response to humanities educators' frustrations about their  lack of control over the data and difficulties integrating media into their work.  3D models provide visually-oriented people with a way to comprehend large data sets and, through the interactive controls and additional graphics, identify facets of value by experts in the field and local needs.  The integration of 3D interfaces, user enriched records, and domain-specific needs raise questions about IR systems design and evaluation.   A draft description of the project is at http://web.simmons.edu/~benoit/papers/Benoit-3DRetrieval.pdf 

BIO for Gerald Benoît, Ph.D. and related projects are described at http://web.simmons.edu/~benoit/interests.html

Friday, February 15th, Mary Gates Hall 420

iSchool One-Minute Madness

 

Do you have a new idea for a research project? Want to practice your presentation technique? Looking for an excuse to dress up in a silly costume? On Friday, February 15th, the iSchool Research Conversation will be taken over by MADNESS. Inspired by CHI's One-Minute Madness, and now just about every other conference these days, we'll be holding an afternoon of one-minute talks on any subject: your current work, crazy ideas for future collaborations, editorials on the state of information science, or any other topic that you like, so long as you can pitch it in 60 seconds or less. In the second half we'll discuss elements of an effective one-minute presentation and any interesting research ideas that emerge.

 

-       Everyone is encouraged to participate.

-       Bring half-baked ideas and unanswered research questions.

-       Give presentations alone or in groups.

-       Bring slides or video, use the whiteboard, or act out a scene.

-       Multiple one-minute presentations are encouraged.

 

HOW IT WORKS

 

Everyone is strongly encouraged to prepare a one-minute presentation on a topic of interest. Your presentation can be accompanied by slides, audio or video. Bring props if you'd like. These presentations can be serious or silly, but the goal should be to get the audience interested in the topic you're presenting. For examples of some successful one-minute presentations, see the CHI 2007 Madness page: http://www.chi2007.org/attend/madness/

Friday, February 8th, Mary Gates Hall 420

SearchTogether and CoSearch: New Tools for Enabling Collaborative Web Search

ABSTRACT:

Today, Web search is a solitary experience. All major Web browsers and search engine sites are designed to support a single user, working alone. However, collaboration on information-seeking tasks is actually quite commonplace! For example, students work together to complete homework assignments, friends seek information about entertainment opportunities, family members jointly plan vacation travel, and colleagues jointly conduct research for their projects.

 

In this talk  Meredith Morris will discuss the findings of surveys and interviews that reveal the challenges users face when attempting to collaborate on Web search using status quo technologies. Then, she will present two systems, SearchTogether and CoSearch, that address these challenges. SearchTogether is an augmented Web browser that enables collaboration among groups of remote users via integrated chat, group query histories, automatic division of labor, visitation awareness, comments, ratings, and shared summaries. CoSearch is a system that enables collaboration among groups of co-located users by enabling users' mobile phones to augment a shared computer, then using a browser with special queuing areas to manage query and URL requests sent from the supplementary devices.

 

 

BIO:
Meredith Ringel Morris is a researcher in the Adaptive Systems and Interaction group at Microsoft Research. Her main research interests are human-computer interaction and computer-supported cooperative work. She earned her Ph.D. in computer science from Stanford University, and her Sc.B. in computer science from Brown University. More information on Dr. Morris's research can be found at http://research.microsoft.com/~merrie.

Friday, February 1st, Mary Gates Hall 420

Orders of Intentionality in the Archival Theory of Arrangement 

ABSTRACT:

In Textualterity, Joseph Grigely argues that works of art and literary texts are not fixed at one moment in time; rather, they are in a continuous state of becoming as they are resituated and re-contextualized in different exhibition sites and publications. As such, they embody multiple intentions and, perhaps, multiple authenticities. The notion of textualterity, or textual difference, challenges the theory of authorial intention which, traditionally, has been the prevailing consideration in preserving or establishing the authenticity of art works and literary texts. It also challenges the archival theory of original order which is similarly rooted in a presumed connection between authenticity and authorial intentionality. The presenter will examine how issues of authenticity, originality and intentionality have been discussed in the context of the new textual scholarship and the implications of that discussion for the archival theory of arrangement.

 

BIO:

Heather MacNeil is Associate Professor and Chair of the Archival Studies Program in the School of Library, Archival & Information Studies at The University of British Columbia. She has published on a range of archival topics, including privacy, arrangement and description, the history of record keeping and the trustworthiness of records in analogue and digital environments. She is the author of Without Consent (1992; rpt., 2001) and Trusting Records: Legal, Historical and Diplomatic Perspectives (2000). Her current area of research is the relationship between authenticity and archival arrangement and description.

 

January 11th, Mary Gates Hall 420

The Role of FRBR and Topic Maps in Designing a Semantic Digital Library

 

ABSTRACT:
This talk will present the result of a research project that was funded by the National Library of Korea (NLK). The project investigated how FRBR (Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Relationships) model can be utilized in collocating related items of the NLK resource descriptions. An algorithm to convert Korean MARC data into FRBR was devised and tested. The benefits of modeling FRBRized data using Topic Maps were examined. Evaluating the benefits of FRBR and Topic Maps in meeting the needs of users is a major challenge and proper evaluation methods of the proposed models will be discussed during the presentation.

BIO:
Sam Oh is a Professor in the Department of Library and Information Science at Sungkyunkwan University, Seoul Korea and an affiliate professor at UW iSchool. Prior to joining SKKU, he taught at UW for 4 years. His teaching and research interest are in the area of metadata and ontology design, data modeling and knowledge management (KM). He has extensive consulting experiences in metadata and ontology design for digital libraries, KM companies as well as government sectors in Korea. Professor Oh serves as the chair of ISO/IEC JTC1 SC34 (Document Description and Processing Languages) and as the head of the delegates for ISO TC46 (Information and Documentation). He is also a DCMI (Dublin Core Metadata Initiative) board member.

December 7th, 2:30-4:00, Mary Gates Hall 420

Title: An Investigation on the Use of Computerized Patient Care Documentation: Preliminary Results (2:30-3:15)

Authors: Kenneth M. Cam, Efthimis N. Efthimiadis, Kenric W. Hammond

Presenter: Kenric W. Hammond

ABSTRACT

We report results of a pilot study on the use of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) computerized patient care documentation system by three stakeholder groups: doctors, nurses, and administrators. The study is informed by the Cognitive Work Analysis methodology. Results identified both benefits of using the system as well as limitations.  Based on these findings, design recommendations will be developed and validated in a larger follow-up multi-site study.

 BIO

Dr. Kenric W. Hammond: Dr. Hammond has practiced as a psychiatrist in the Department of Veterans Affairs for twenty-nine years, and throughout that time has participated in the VA effort to develop its computer-based medical record and order entry system. He holds a joint Associate Clinical Professor appointment in the Departments of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and Medical Education and Biomedical Informatics at the University of Washington. The Department of Veterans Affairs runs the largest health care system in the United States under single management. Last year, it cared for 5.5 million veterans of the armed services in 155 hospitals and over 800 clinics nationwide. VA manages the largest medical education and health professions training program in the United States. Its Computerized Patient Record System, known as CPRS, is highly regarded and is likely the most extensive and comprehensive patient care information system in the world.

Dr. Hammond has participated in and led numerous VA national groups related to the development of the CPRS. These include chairing the Mental Health and Problem List Expert Panels and membership on the Clinical Applications Requirements Group. He is presently Director of the Puget Sound VA Health Care System Post-doctoral Fellowship in Medical Informatics.

Dr. Hammond is currently involved in VA funded research project “Assessing Information Value in Computerized Patient Care Documentation Systems”. This presentation covers pilot work done for that project. Project co-investigators include Drs. Efthimis Efthimiadis, University of Washington Information School, Peter Embi, University of Cincinnati, and Charlene Weir, Salt Lake City VA Medical Center and University of Utah.

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Title: An Evaluation of How Search Engines Respond to Greek Language Queries (3:15-4:00)

 

Authors: Efthimis N. Efthimiadis, Nicos Malevris, Apostolos Kousaridas, Alexandra Lepeniotou, and Nikos Loutas

Presenter: Efthimis N. Efthimiadis

ABSTRACT

 

Over 20 billion Web pages from around the world have been indexed by search engines [10].  This study investigates how search engines respond to non-English queries and more specifically to Greek language queries.

 

To address this we conducted an evaluation using Greek queries in ten search engines: five "global" (A9, AltaVista, Google, MSN Search, and Yahoo!) and five Greek (Anazitisi, Ano-Kato, Phantis. Trinity, and Visto). A set of navigational queries for known Greek organizations was created. The organizations correspond to ten categories: government departments, universities, colleges, travel agencies, museums, media (TV, radio, newspapers), transportation, and banks. Searches were performed using the Greek and the corresponding English, Latin, or transliterated name of each organization. The ideal retrieval would be to get the website of that organization ranked first in the result set.

 

The results of this evaluation are presented in this paper, together with a report on how the engines respond to Greek and Anglicized queries, and on the best performing global and Greek search engines.

 

BIO

Efthimis N. Efthimiadis

November 30th, 2:30-4:00, Mary Gates Hall 420

Social Traces: sociological topographies for enhancing search, community and social science

ABSTRACT

Social Media, the computer-mediated collective creation of valuable artifacts, is a growing phenomena with already demonstrated power. Discussions, blogs, wikis, and social networking services are providing new infrastructures for collective action. This talk focuses on the study and enhancement of computer mediated collective action systems through projects that attempt to collect, analyze, visualize and potentially enhance their effectiveness.

 

Community Buzz and Netscan (http://netscan.research.microsoft.com, http://msr-halo) are a set of tools and services for online communities. Netscan manufactures “social accounting metadata” about Usenet newsgroups and web boards, providing reports about discussion spaces and individuals that highlight patterns of activity and contribution in tabular and graphical forms. Community Buzz integrates language models to deliver enhanced search and trend tracking among automatically identified subpopulations within these communities. Building on sociological findings about the division of labor in computer-mediated spaces, which were built upon information visualizations of those behavior patterns this project points to possible methods of refining community tools and search. Community information visualization tools are available. SNARF (http://www.research.microsoft.com/communities/snarf) applies the concepts explored in the Netscan project to personal collections of email. SNARF implements “social sorting” – reordering email collections based on the strength of different dimensions of the relationship between sender and receiver.   A by-product of the use of this tool is the generation of a high-dimensional dataset describing the structure and temporal patterns created through the exchange of email overtime. This dataset offers useful insights into the nature of email-based communications. 

 

Mobile Social Software Sharing Location and Media (S.L.A.M.: http://www.msslam.com) explores mobile social networking and photo sharing among users of Windows Mobile devices. S.L.A.M. allows users to create groups of other users with whom they can share selected pictures and messages. This system is being extended to integrate additional sensors and richer support for space-time trails. SLAM XR (eXeRcise!) (http://www.msslam.com/slamxr/slamxr.htm) is a web application in which we are exploring the social uses of these novel documents of travel patterns and activity. The Advanced User Resource Annotation system (AURA: http://aura.research.microsoft.com) is a platform for Pocket PCs, Smartphones and mobile PCs that have various kinds of sensors such as barcode readers, digital cameras, WiFi signal strength detection, radio frequency identification (RFID) tag readers, and GPS. Using AURA today, users can scan the barcodes on everyday objects in the home, office, or store and gain access to related information and services such as competitive pricing and product reviews. Other kinds of tags, such as tags placed on art or equipment asset tags, can be easily linked to related data through Web sites or Web service interfaces. This talk covers several developments in the mobile annotation space and describes future directions for AURA and related services.

BIO

Marc Smith

  

November 16th, 2:30-4:00, Mary Gates Hall 420

  Personal Information for World as We Want It to Be

ABSTRACT

Imagine a car with an enormous rear-view mirror and only a tiny windshield. Not practical. Possibly dangerous.  But do our tools promote an analogous imbalance of perspective with respect to our information and its management? The vision of an all-inclusive recording of a person's past experiences now seems attainable with few economic or technical barriers standing in the way. But do advances in devices of data capture and storage place undue focus on recording information relating to past events? What about planning and the use of the information to impact the future? Tools we might actually use for support in this direction are either ad hoc and rudimentary or prohibitively complex and demanding. But better help many be on the way. This talk will consider ways in which tool support might help us to manage our information for a world as we want it to be.

BIO

William Jones

 

 

November 9th, 2:30-4:00, Mary Gates Hall 420

Are there ontomon?  Looking for types of information organization frameworks and systems.

 

ABSTRACT

Some say were are in a Cambrian age of information organization systems – with ontology engineering on the rise, social tagging sites blossoming online, and research projects focusing on controlled vocabulary interoperability – where many kinds of systems are growing in many different discourses. However, before we make this an assumption, we want to take stock in the data available to see how diverse a population of systems we have.  We want to understand this for two reasons: (1) We want to understand the scope and range of our information organization systems so we can gain insight into this basic human activity – questioning its nature through its extension, and (2) we want to know the complement of systems out there so we can craft adequate and robust design and evaluation rubrics for the whole population, not just a subset.

Working against this assumption, that we are in a time of increased diversity of information organization frameworks, is the single design ideal – that is, that every information organization system should follow the same design requirements because they are all built to satisfy the same purposes.  It is not clear, even from anecdotal evidence, that this represents the facts of information organization today, nor a good design methodology (i.e., one size fits all).

As a result, we must understand information organization in the wild – and specifically any speciation of such work and such structures.  This talk outlines the basic requirements for, and explores the limits of, our definition of a species of information organization framework, and describes the beginnings of a natural history of what might be called, in less serious moments, ontomon, shorthand for ontology monsters. 

BIO

Joseph Tennis

 

November 2nd, 2:30-4:00, Mary Gates Hall 420

Designing a Useful, Useable Website for Older Adults 

ABSTRACT

ActiveOptions (http://www.activeoptions.org) is a multi-agency effort to address the need to help people remain healthy as they age by providing access to information about senior-friendly activity programs. This talk is about the effort to make the site useable and useful through usability testing and applying existing knowledge about: our understanding of the aging process, the ways in which older adults use and respond to the web and other technologies, effective strategies for developing user-friendly interfaces, and successful health information projects.

BIO

Marilyn Ostergren is a 3rd year PhD student at the iSchool. Her interests revolve around effective presentation of information, focusing on visual design and interaction design.

 

October 26th, 2:30-4:00, Mary Gates Hall 420 

Technological Initiatives for Social Empowerment: Design Experiments in Technology-Supported Youth Participation and Local Civic Engagement

ABSTRACT