Webslinger

Types of Mobile Devices

2012-01-25T14:38:00.001-05:00

While preparing for my recent survey exploring sense of place and location-based services, I wanted to find out the mobile device types and usage patterns of participants. I have previously offerred my take on the definition of mobile device and blogged on What exactly is a mobile device. I define mobile devices as having:

the ability to connect to the Internet (or other data network)
supports user input and interaction
offers multiple functionalities
is lightweight and is less than 10"

In preparing for the survey, I thought I had all the major types of mobile devices listed.

Devices that are "mobile devices":

smartphone (and some feature phones)
tablets
netbooks and ultraportable laptop
personal digital assistant (e.g. iPod Touch)
GPS navigation device (a.k.a. car or personal navigation device)

Some participants used the "other" field to answer laptops and e-Readers. I also considered whether portable game consoles and digital audio guides (as some museums use) should be considered mobile devices.

Wikipedia's definition is pretty broad. To them a mobile is "small, hand-held computing device, typically having a display screen with touch input and/or a miniature keyboard and less than 2 pounds (0.91 kg)". Wikipedia lists calculators, digital cameras, and MP3 players as mobile device. I normally love Wikipedia but I think they are stretching the term to mean pretty much any portable electronic device.

Perhaps these are all just types of handheld computing devices. I think my definition fits the core functionality of what a device needs as a category term.

So although although all the devices mentioned so far have some computing power and many have network connectivity (as even many e-Readers and digital cameras now have). But an e-Reader and digital camera are pretty much single function devices. The Kindle e-Reader does have the cool ability to of user interaction in the ability to highlight passages of eBooks and share them online with others, but users can't create substantial content and it essentially it is a single function device (hence the name even).

Laptops may be portable but they aren't portable enough to allow ubiquitous access - a trait that I think is central to the concept of mobile device (opposed to just portable device).

This is the definition I'll be using for the indefinite future in my research. I'd love to hear any feedback on additional criteria to include. I'd also love to hear of any other devices that would fit this definition.

Research Proposals Methodology Checklist

2012-01-24T14:33:00.003-05:00

Earlier this month, I finished work as a teaching assistants for my department's research methods class. I've TAed this for the past 2 years and I love it. There are so many (almost countless) research methods and planning a research project is probably the most fun part of the whole thing.

It's also great to read about what the masters students plan to study and the various dimensions of research possible in the field of Information. I've graded a large number of research proposals now and have been impressed by students' approaches and their research interests. However, even in the best proposals they are often missing key elements.

I put together a checklist of items to include in a research proposal for a guest lecture I did for the class. Some students found it useful, so I thought I'd share it here. Surprisingly, I haven't found a concise checklist like this in research methods texts.

I'm covering the major items that apply to common methods, such as interviews, observation, focus groups, discourse analysis, and surveys.

Sampling

Population - describe the characteristics of the group you will be studying, mention any pertinent demographic (e.g. age, gender, location, occupation) and pyschographics (habits, attitudes, hobbies, opinions) - if studying texts or artifacts, describe the unifying characteristics
Sampling strategy - e.g. census, random, stratified random, or nonprobability sampling such as convenience, purposive diversity/dissimilar, snowballing, key informant, etc.
Sample size - number and if this number is appropriate (or the stoping point, e.g. saturation)
Access - how you will get access to this group and permission to study them
Recruitment techniques to be used - e.g. posters, web posts, emails, etc.
Incentives - if using why is it necessary, how much, and how to be distributed
Inclusion and exclusion criteria - conditions to be met to qualify or exempt people or texts from study

Method considerations

Format - online, print, email, instant messaging - which one(s) and why
Interview guide or questionnaire - how will questions be determined (if appropriate)
Questioning style (e.g. structured, semi-structured, conversational for interviews) and question format (i.e. open or closed ended)
Probing or follow-ups if used and when (e.g. during or after)
Discussion aids - will think-aloud protocol be used, artificts (e.g. diaries, photos) or cultural probes
Rapport - how to establish trust, confidence, and ease amongst participants

Session preparation

Meeting location details - discuss any pertinent details such as the type of place to be held and why (e.g. convenient for participant, comfortable setting), logistics, arrangement of furniture, noise levels, position of camera, presence of others, etc.
If communicating or observing online discuss the technology to be used and any applicable norms or constraints

Data collection

Recording of session - audio or video taping, photodocumenting, log files
Note-taking - during or after session?
Third-party observers or facilitators - whether or not used, relationships to researcher, training provided, and any issues that may result
Role of researcher - researcher biases, how will the researcher be involved in and shape data collection and any steps to mitigate or place the researcher (e.g. passive observer or participant observer)

Data analysis

Transcription - style to be used (e.g. naturalistic, selective) and whom will do it
Approach to data analysis (e.g. grounded theory, statistical tests, etc.)
Software - name and describe how used
Coding technique used and how codes determined
Reliability measures - particularly if more than one person is coding results

Data presentation & dissemination

Anticipated findings
Presentation formats - e.g. case study, charts, narrative, performance, etc.
Outcomes - e.g.recommendations, program evaluation, etc.
Dissemination - planned conference presentations, sharing among an applicable association, publication plans, etc.
How might the findings be shared other than a traditional paper (if applicable)?
Sharing results with participants - e.g. send them the final paper and - will they get permission to edit?, post summary on blog,or participant community (e.g. trade association)

Ethics

Considerations when studying a given group
Informed consent - how it will be obtained and special situations (e.g. minors or other who may not be able to provide it)
Deception - if used, explain why necessary
Harm - plans to avoid any emotional or physical harm to participans, e.g. if sensitive topics raised how will this be handled, referals to specialists, etc.
Debriefing plans (if applicable)
Anonymity or confidentiality - steps taken in data collection,storage, and presentation to protect participants' privacy

Obviously an entire book, or several, could be written on this topic. This is meant to touch upon the major and common areas. But please let me know if I missed something crucial.

Internet Hall of Fame - Nominate First Inductees

2012-01-23T18:52:00.000-05:00

The Internet Society, a global non-profit organization devoted to promoting open access and innovation for the Internet, is twenty years old this year.

To mark their 20 years they have started the "Internet Hall of Fame" to honour the contributions of individuals to the development of the Internet.

Despite the ubiquity of content on the Web, I have been surprised how little work there has been done documenting the history and achievements of Internet and digital media history. Granted, a few stars (including Internet Society founders Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn) are well-known for their contributions, but there are many more people who's contributions are not well-documented or significantly recognized. This led to my efforts to document Who's Who in Canadian Digital Media & Technology.

So I am excited to see the Internet Society launching the Internet Hall of Fame.

I'm also excited that Internet Society is allowing anyone to nominate someone. The final decision will be made by judges from a cross-section of related sectors.

Internet Society has published the nomination form online.

Here are their criteria for nominees:

Any individual who has played a key role in the conceptualization, building, and development of the Internet in any region/country will be considered for induction into the Internet Hall of Fame based on the influence and impact they’ve had on the Internet’s origins, growth, and evolution.

Other factors considered by the Internet Hall of Fame include the relevance and reach of a nominee’s contribution to the Internet, and the extent to which a nominee successfully took risks and challenged existing paradigms.

Further, the Internet Hall of Fame considers the originality, creativity, and innovation of a nominee’s contribution. In addition to those who have been more visible, the Internet Hall of Fame is seeking nominees who have made crucial, behind-the-scenes contributions.

The nominee’s work can include, but is not limited to, individuals who have played a key role in:

• Researching and/or building Internet infrastructure;
• Improving Internet access and/or functionality;
• Fostering growth of the Internet community; and
• Developing new Internet technologies and/or user interfaces that have had valuable and broad-reaching impacts on society.

I'm hoping to nominate someone - probably someone from my Canadian Who's Who list. But I can't decide who. Let me know below who you think should be nominated.

Nominations close February 13, 2012.

Is Facebook an Echo Chamber?

2012-01-21T16:30:00.001-05:00

Researchers at Facebook this week published the results of an extensive research project examining the popular conception that social networking sites promulgate a singularity of information sources and voices - creating an echo chamber. With the ongoing demise of broad information sources, such as the newspaper, and the increasing usage of social media (e.g. Facbeook, Twitter, LinkedIn) and other news feeds as the primary, or only, source of news, people are not exposed to anywhere near the same diversity of issue coverage as they used to.

So the study, Rethinking Information Diversity in Networks, is an important contribution in understanding this area. It is truly impressive in its design, scale (millions of Facebook users), and dazzling graphs. The study found that:

even though people are more likely to consume and share information that comes from close contacts that they interact with frequently (like discussing a photo from last night’s party), the vast majority of information comes from contacts that they interact with infrequently. These distant contacts are also more likely to share novel information, demonstrating that social networks can act as a powerful medium for sharing new ideas, highlighting new products and discussing current events.

Before I settled on my current research topic, I planned to research if the Internet promotes homophily and how to facilitating serendipitous information. I, as with many others, believe that access to a diversity of information sources and voices is important for an informed society and hence good government.

Facebook's study is really useful - but they are a couple claims that differ from my experience.

One, is that the nature of information on Facebook is diverse. It may be vast and it may be broad, but I found that with rare exceptions, the information circulated falls into maybe four categories. To me, I mostly see my social circle accounts, entertainment news & commentary, political news & rants, and occasionally news of the odd (okay it's me sharing those stories).

I am also not sure that those we are less close to, i.e. "weak ties", are necessarily that dissimilar and thus expose use to novel information. I don't doubt the value of weak ties in sharing information, but I still think the information falls into common categories and still tends to roughly entail a common voice or political leaning. Weak ties are still similar to individuals or they wouldn't be a tie at all. People on social network sites certainly friend indiscriminately, even wantonly, but we don't usually friend our polar opposites.

There is no doubt that the Internet exposes us to a greater diversity of voices than older media allowed. And the Internet definitely has improved the ability to share information - I did find out about this study through a friend's posting on Facebook. I'm still not convinced, however, that we are receiving anywhere near the diversity of coverage of issues and viewpoints that we need.

Sense of Place & Location-Based Services - Survey Summary

2012-01-17T16:22:00.003-05:00

This past December, I designed a survey as part of my coursework for a PhD in Information at University at Toronto. As promised, I'm sharing my early results of the survey.

The survey sought to uncover foundational knowledge about how people form a sense of place (defined as the feelings and meanings attributed to place), the role of information in this process, and the potential of location-based services (LBS - defined as mobile applications or sites that deliver content based on a user's location). As location-based services are still an emerging technology, this subject has not been sufficiently addressed by academia or industry.

I'm still in the process of compiling and writing up the results, but here is a high-level summary of the findings grouped by research questions.

78 people completed the survey, with participants representing a cross-section of ages, education levels, and residences. 86% have a mobile device, with smartphones the most popular (68%) followed by GPS navigation device (31%), tablet (22%), and netbook (18%). Participants can be described as frequent users as over 80% (53 participants) indicated they used their device at least once a day.

1) What is the nature of relationships people have to places they encounter?

96% of participants indicating there was a place in which they associated strong feelings or meaning.
When asked what place characteristics are meaningful, past personal experiences, physical qualities of place, and social dimensions received the strongest support with all over 75%.
These findings confirmed phenomenologist place theorists, who believe that a relationship to place is a foundational experience in human existence and individual experience is the paramount way we process place.
The factual elements of a place, its history and role in culture, were selected by at least half of respondents, the lack of stronger support for the these qualities was surprising as LBS can offer unique functionality to deliver this information (perhaps leading LBS have yet to effectively tap this).
When describing a place where participants felt a "strong sense of place" in an open-ended question, 58 participants recounted experiences revealing personal experiences tied to place - a good example of this is: "Another place with a strong sense to it is an ordinary intersection... where I was told 'I love you' for the first time, in the romantic sense...the spot is still very dear!".
Often accounts such as this reveal facets of a place hidden to others but are nonetheless significant - through LBS these types of accounts can now be made more visible.
Descriptions of meaningful places often (67% of respondents to this question) mention emotions tied a place. Top mentioned emotions are nostalgia (fond remembrance), contentment, and excitement.

2) How are people currently using information in forming a sense of place?

All participants agreed that access to information while at a given location is valuable.
When asked to describe how they come to know of a specific place, experience was echoed here, with 50 participants indicating this was a primary information source.
Personal experience was often described as an initial source of learning about a place, but was then followed by consulting various other information sources to learn more about place.
Approximately half of respondents using two or more sources of information when learning about the place.
When asked specifically the information sources participants use when visiting a new place for either a short (less than 1 day) or extended visit, the top five sources are (in descending order): Short visit - social network/word of mouth, website, pamphlets, mobile application, plaques. Extended visit: website, social network/word of mouth, print book, pamphlets, video or tv program.
People are more apt to use an information source for extended visits than for short visits with the exception of mobile applications and plaques.
In general, the more a visit demands of a person the more apt participants are to invest the time to consult a greater number of sources and more in-depth sources.

3) How, if at all, have mobile devices affected sense of place?

The majority of participants with a mobile device are using it, in relation to place, to find location, directions or contact information.
There is strong indication that participants are currently using mobiles to seek out facts about place beyond directions. This behaviour can be seen in the following comment: "I found out recently not to use a public car park ... after dark. The Foursquare entry had a tip that car thieves were targeting the car park".
The ability to use mobile devices to record or share place was described by some participants as changing their experience of the place, as illustrated by this comment: "The process of inscribing your thoughts on a place while at that place is very useful in concretising your thoughts on that place. I think the practice of reflecting on the place to compose an entry requires a thinking about that place, and an ordering of thoughts about that place that gives meaning to the place (whether good or bad) and which in turn improves the memory one has of that place."
Participants also expressed comments that they are experiencing the physical and digital worlds simultaneously, along the lines of "hybrid space" as discussed in academic litearature, this can be seen by this comment: "I pulled up a mobile app the other day when I took my children to a museum, so that I could supplement the information at the museum with information from the mobile app."
The larger the device screen the more apt participants are to find something useful.
The type of mobile device used does not have a strong association with usage of geotargetted information seeking via mobile device, the creation of place-based user generated content, or the likelihood to use a LBS.

4) What is the potential of location-based services to improve sense of place?

Participants were not big users of LBS applications - of the people with a mobile device less than half have installed one of the most popular LBSs.
The most installed used mobile applications with LBS functionality used by participants were Foursquare at 23%, Google 23%, and Facebook at 22%.
All three of these, with the exception of Google’s Places, predominantly revolve around geo-social networking. Although place-based information can be found in the form of "tips" left by friends or made public, the core functionality of these leading apps are tracking the whereabouts of one’s social network.
Of the participants using LBS, they expressed appreciation for the ability for the applications to enhance their sense of place by learning more about a place, as typified by these comments: "I think they have affected how much I can find out about a place and provides access to types of information about a place that I wouldn't otherwise have access to - provides richer dimensions to knowing about a place" and "Location based services have, by bringing other peoples social gazetteers into consideration, made a sense of place easier to achieve."
LBSs were also mentioned by participants as improving their attachment to place.

5) What could be done with mobile technology to improve sense of place?

To meet the needs of users, however, there improvements to LBS or mobile technology in general are need. Over 60% of participants offered suggestions.
The top five suggestions were: better content (32% support) , new functionality (26%), personalization features (21%), user experience improved (21%), and content available in more locations (17%).

Final thoughts

As one considers the possible implications for location-based services accessed via a mobile device to affect sense of place, the current iterations of technology may not reflect the qualities of future versions. The LBS market is rapidly evolving and new features and innovations as well as improvements to existing features will undoubtedly continue. Ideally, I would like my research as it continues to be able to inform future developments in this area.

Thanks to everyone who participated in this survey!

I held a random draw for an iTunes giftcard and a participant from Vancouver was chosen.

I'll revise and enhance these findings as I continue my data analysis. But I'd love to hear any thoughts below on these early results.

Locative Media & Media Used to Convey Place Information

2012-01-12T21:54:00.001-05:00

As much research continues into how we use location based services on mobile devices to access geotargetted information, I've been considering other ways we can access information about place. There is a lot of buzz over the past couple years about locative media - with a frequent assumption that it is new technology. Humans have had ways to leave information about a place at the place for millennia. I'm not convinced that new technology has created an entirely new experience, but rather has facilitate access to this information.

I've found it helpful for my research to maintain a list of various forms of media used to convey place-related information.

The table below lists each medium, its corresponding modalities, the presence of user participation functionality, and the physical portability of the medium.

Medium	Modalities	User participation	Portability
Audio tours	Sound	No	Mobile
Billboards	Visual	No	Situated
Books and e-books	Visual	No	Mobile
Directories	Visual	No	Situated (if in phone booth), mobile otherwise
Films and videos	Visual, sound	Yes (if creating)	Situated - if viewing on tv or cinema Mobile - if viewing on mobile device
Flags	Visual	No	Situated
GPS devices (for cars or hiking)	Visual, haptic	Yes	Mobile
Graffiti	Visual	Yes	Situated
Guestbooks (physical)	Visual	Yes	Situated
Guides (human)	Visual, sound	Yes	Mobile
Help desks/info booths	Visual, sound	Yes	Situated
Interactive kiosks	Visual, sound, haptic	Yes	Situated
Maps, atlases, and charts	Visual	No	Mobile
Media facades and electronic billboards	Visual, sound	No	Situated
Mobile applications	Visual, sound, haptic	Yes	Mobile
Newspapers	Visual	No	Mobile
Pamphlets	Visual	No	Mobile
Photographs	Visual	Yes (if creating)	Mobile
Plaques	Visual	No	Situated
Posters	Visual	No	Situated
Sandwich boards	Visual, sound	Yes	Situated (somewhat mobile)
Sculptures	Visual	No	Situated
Signage (print & electronic)	Visual	No	Situated
Television shows	Visual, sound	No	Situated
Website	Visual, sound	Yes	Situated (unless viewing on mobile device)
Word of mouth	Visual, sound	Yes	Mobile

Let me know if I missed a medium or if there's another key dimension I should add to this table.

My Favourite Webslinger Posts of 2011

2011-12-30T15:17:00.002-05:00

As the old year is almost over, I have a tradition of recalling my favourite blog posts from the preceding year.

Here are my favourite posts from the past year. The provide a snapshot of my evolving interests in online topics and my personal past-times.

January
Chicago Is My Kind of Town
To celebrate a milestone birthday of mine, my wife took me on a trip to Chicago. I was greatly impressed by the city's cool use of digital media.

February
Pondering Effects of Foursquare
After eagerly adopting (and blogging about) the geosocial location-based mobile service, Foursquare I cooled off to its use. I've resumed using it in late 2011 as it is has become the prime LBS and perhaps only one to hit critical mass. This post recounts how I uses it and my hopes for it to offer richer experiences.

March
IPTV - TV over the Internet with Bell Fibe
After years of using rabbit ears, I got my family cable TV for Christmas last year. I got Bell's new Fibe service, which is delivered over the Internet. The blog post details some of its pros and cons. But recently Bell Fibe launched some great new apps, including Facebook and Twitter - so I'm liking it even more now.

April
Types of Geotargetted Information
My doctoral research this year has been laying down ground work on on central concepts for location-based services. This posts looks into the nature of various forms of geotargetted information.

May
Elegy for Yahoo
When I first started using the Internet - first email, calendars and web searching, then photo sharing, blogging, and folksonomies it was all via Yahoo. But when Yahoo "updated" their services and didn't support syncing with my BlackBerry I sadly had to quit using them. I believe my experience is indicative of Yahoo's overall fate.

June
TEDx LibrariansTO - An Idea Worth Spreading
I'm not a fan of the elitism of TED conferences, but I think their format for presentations is highly effective. This posts recaps what I found particularly effective about the TED format, as I experienced at a TEDx event.

July
A good month so I have two favourites:

McLuhan Centenary
2011 was the hundredth anniversary of Toronto's media visionary Marshall McLuhan. His program is now housed at the Faculty of Information (iSchool) at the University of Toronto (where I'm studying). There were lots of events to mark his centennary and this posts highlights some of McLuhan's bon mots on media.

Good Things Grow in Ontario
Foodland Ontario ran one of the most fun and effective social media campaigns that I've heard of (and I don't just say that as my kid entered).

August and September
- No posts; on vacation to Alaska and Whistler and then back to iSchool.

October
Locative Media Innovation Day
Location based services and locative media are the subject of my doctoral research, so I was really excited to attend a local conference on the subject on Toronto's new premier conference venue, TIFF.

November
Blogging is History
iSchool often has great speakers. This blog post captured a public lecture on archiving considerations for bloggers. I was surprised by how many important considerations I - and I'm sure many other bloggers - was missing.

December
The Top 15 Canadians in Digital Media
I particularly like this post on an article I wrote for Backbone Magazine for a few reasons. For one, I I think it is important to honour Canadians making significant contributions to the digital media sphere, and I think this article highlights 15 incredible Canadians. But also, this article began as a blog post I wrote for Canada Day in 2008. It's great to see something that started here evolve into something more prominent.

2011 also saw the loss of my mentor and digital pioneer, Liz Metcalfe. Canada's online scene is not the same without her and we greatly miss her.

I blogged more in 2011 than I have in years. But I missed a post for September 29th of 2011 which was the five year anniversary of Webslinger. What began as an experiment in blogging - and despite occasional neglect and even considerations of abandonment - has become a vital part of my academic and personal life.

The Top 15 Canadians in Digital Media

2011-12-23T15:56:00.001-05:00

A blog post that I started a couple years ago in honour of Canada Day to track notable Canadians working in digital media has continued to grow over the years. Backbone Magazine asked me to write an article on this, so I selected 15 Canadians whose contributions to digital media was particularly outstanding.

The article, The Top 15 Canadians in digital media, is the November/December cover story for the print edition of Backbone Magazine. But the article is also available online on Backbone's website (along with other of my blog posts).

The editor of the magazine also started a discussion on LinkedIn to hear from other people on who else should be added to the list. I'd love to keep this list going - encompassing more people and a broader spectrum of industries and roles.

So please offer any suggestions you can think of either on the LinkedIn group or here.

Practitioner barriers to diffusion and implementation of web accessibility

2011-12-20T15:15:00.005-05:00

My research on the adoption challenges of web accessibility that I conducted during my master's research has been published this month in an academic journal. The article Practitioner barriers to diffusion and implementation of web accessibility is published in the journal "Technology and Disability" (Volume 23, Number 4).

The paper looked at how as people are increasingly integrating online activities into their daily lives, disabled people are often impeded from accessing websites due to code and design barriers. Despite guidelines on how to improve web accessibility that have been around since the early days of the Web, accessibility adoption remains low. The responsibility to implement web accessibility tends to fall on web practitioners, yet prior scholarship has failed to adequately consult this group on their barriers to adoption.

I conducted a qualitative study using semi-structured interviews with web practitioners from various sectors, locations, and job duties. I found that current social and individual values, inadequate guidelines and support, and monetary demands are halting the diffusion of web accessibility. These factors perpetuate an artificial construct of online disability and impede developments towards an inclusive Web medium.

The paper offered a model and recommendations to remediate this environment and thus improve accessibility rates. I have previously posted my recommendations on this blog, but my model has been updated and I will include it here.

Thanks to everyone who helped out with this research either as participants or as reviewers!

Answer My Survey on Sense of Place & Location Based Services

2011-12-08T21:51:00.003-05:00

Over the past few months, I’ve been exploring how location-based services and geotargetted information affect our relationship to the places we encounter. More people are using these mobile applications, including Foursquare, Gowalla, Google Places, SCVNGR, Layar, and a seeming endless array of apps to help us locate and learn more about everything from where we parked our car to the nearest restaurant.

Despite the growing popularity of location-based services, they still have not been well studied. My PhD work is examining the interplay of people, mobile applications, and space. One of my first steps is to uncover how sense of place is formulated and how location-based surveys may affect this.

As such, I’m conducting a survey on location-based services (LBS) and sense of place. I think it is important to hear from mobile device users to understand how their usage of LBS might influence sense of place. This research will be used for coursework for my PhD studies at the Faculty of Information, University of Toronto.

I will be posting a summary of the findings here on the blog so that we can all better understand this growing technological trend.

Update December 20, 2011: The survey is now closed, but if you have thoughts on how location based services affect your sense of a place, please share them below.

Blogging is History

2011-11-26T23:09:00.004-05:00

Earlier this week, I was at a public lecture given by Carolyn Hank, an information professor at McGill University, on archiving considerations for blogs. Archiving isn't a topic that stirs many people's interest (no offense to my archivist friends), let alone those in the notoriously now-oriented world of digital media.

But upon hearing Hank speak, I realized there are preservation and copyright issues that apply to all bloggers (not those, however, who blog about what they just ate or the club they're at).

Here are useful considerations for all bloggers:

1) Does your blog have historical value?
Probably. But many bloggers prune or delete without thinking that there could be historic value to their posts. I admit, I delete as I please without any thought to any greater implications. As blogs are one of the main discursive forms of our era, they are definitely worth preserving.

Also studies, and certainly my blog's stats, show that there is tremendous value in the long tail of blogs, so it is worthwhile to keep old posts around.

2) Who owns the copyright for your blog?
This may seem a rather basic issue. But there are factors that can make things more complicated. This can particularly become an issue if you decide to publish your blog in some other format (e.g. as a book) or port to another provider.

If you use a hosted solution, you probably won't own the technology of the blog. As for the content, it's not a bad idea to check the terms of use with your service provider or any blog network or syndicators you may belong to.

Comments are a thorny issue as it doesn't seem there are clear laws or norms on who owns them. I tend to see blog comments as similar to callers of a radio show, audience members on a tv talk show, or someone interviewed by the media. Once you say it to them, you don't own it anymore. So I am not clear why bloggers wouldn't own their audience's comments?

I believe that commenters do not have the right to edit or retract without the blogger's permission. Of course, this wouldn't apply to comments that are libellous, against a terms of use, or otherwise morally problematic. Either way (and I'd love to hear other people's thoughts on this), a blog should have a policy on this and should be clearly articulate to users.

3) Do you clearly state your ownership of your blog and its components?
Hank found that many blogs don't have any statement as to copyright of the blog or the rights of commenters. Considering how easy and free Creative Commons makes it to declare copyright and usage permissions, I was surprised that some bloggers don't have any sort of statement about this. I recently updated my Creative Commons licence after Hank's presentation. Clearly, I also need to state something about my commenting policy.

4) Is your blog already archived?
Hank pointed out that there are organizations already archiving blogs such as Internet Archive and others. I never thought of this, but I assumed this blog would not be archived. I checked with Internet Archive and a portion of it is. I never directed it to crawl my site, so this was a surprise.

This is important for bloggers to think about. I have posted items that I later regretted and wanted to edit or delete (and I did). But if your blog is archived without your awareness, one can loose control of what lingers around. It is, however, great to have my blog preserved with no effort on my part, but as a result I have lost a bit of control. Internet Archives does offer instructions on how to add or remove your blog.

5) How does one archive a blog?
It's not as easy it seems. It's not simply a case of just backing-up past posts. First, if one is using a hosted solution, there could be technical or commercial limits to what can be saved - so one may be able to archive the text of the blog posts but not the wrapper or other elements.

6) What are the elements of a blog that should be archived?
Considering the dyanmic, contextual, and hyperlinked nature of blogs, it's impossible to perserve all the dimensions of a blog. So what are the essential elements that should be archived?

Certainly the main post is essential, but what about comments (and back to the issue of who owns these), the profile links, embedded content, hyperlinked context, and sidebar elements? Once one has determined the essential elements the next issue is how to technically preserve all this.

7) Whose responsibility is it to archive blogs?
It seems rather safe to me to say that some blogs should definitely be archived. It also seems safe to say that most bloggers and blog owners operate in the moment and often haven't considered this issue.

Should blog archiving fall to individual bloggers or is this something that should be handled by a government, academic, or non-profit organization?

Although the concerns addressed above are applicable to most bloggers, the latter issue concerns everyone. Blogs are history. And we should protect our history.

Locative Media Definition

2011-11-02T16:41:00.000-04:00

I recently attended a conference on locative media and the definition of locative media offered, and one that is often assumed, is that locative media are mediums that address a physical space through digital technology.
It is safe to assume there is consensus that locative media, should be media that address the location issue. But I find the digital assumption to be problematic. It may be useful for writers and pundits to use the term to distinguish it as a trend or as emerging technology, as per the use of term social media.

I think digital is not a defining traits so much as the ability to (easily) access a medium's content while in the referenced space.

Films, for example, would not generally be locative if viewed on a screen or television. So Herzog's Cave of Forgotten Dreams about the cave paintings in southern France are not locative. But it could be, if it was viewed on a mobile device or laptop while at the cave (or the cave authorities have a screening room at their interpretation centre). It's more feasible to consider a scenario of watching a clip of Woody Allen's Manhattan on a tablet while sitting in Central Park.

Access to the medium is definitely a defining trait too. Books about a place are not often easily accessible while at a given location unless one has planned ahead and brought the book along (as happens with travel guides). But this access barrier is breaking down with the growing popularity of e-books (although the form of the medium, i.e. its length, makes it less suitable for place-based consumption).

So if many media have locative aspects, perhaps the term locative media is meant for media that are exclusively locative, that is primarily consumed while at a location? This would be the case for interactive kiosks that malls and museums often use for wayfinding and other place-related information. Digital media don't have a monopoly on locative however, as plaques and print guestbooks, for examples, are non-digital and exclusively locative. The idea of exclusivity is problematic as some media may be mostly used while at a location, for example travel guidebooks or geosocial networking apps, can be also used a lot while in various locations.

I'm thinking that a definition of locative media would then be media that address place and are used while in the place.

I think discussing what the term locative media means is important not just for researchers and scholars in the field, but for developers and content creators. Considering the prior media that have come before and offer their strengths and weaknesses can be invaluable for guiding design and technical decisions.

Locative Media Innovation Day

2011-10-31T01:32:00.000-04:00

Bill Buxton opened a half-day conference on locative media this past Friday at Toronto International Film Festival's (TIFF) new building, by noting that it is not just realtors anymore asserting the importance of location, location, location.

Considering the importance of location and my propensity to begin conference recaps by discussing the event location, I would like to say that TIFF is the best conference venue in Toronto. It was my first time attending an event at TIFF's headquarters in downtown Toronto (although I did attend their Tim Burton exhibition and blogged about their use of QR codes). Their building, the Bell Lightbox, is located on the spot I used as a shortcut to my first ever Internet job. Formerly a lacklustre parking lot, it is now a centre of cinematic and new media culture.

Unlike other conference venues, TIFF's seats are comfortable and the leg room is fine. I find it hard (and boring) to sit still and silently for hours and listen to people talk at me, but it's even more difficult when the seats cause excruciating pain. The event was filled to capacity, which made it a bit stuffy and hot - but it was worth it to see so many people interested in locative media.

The conference is a joint event between TIFF Nexus series on new media and Toronto's Digifest, a week long conference and celebration of digital innovation. Considering this broad mandate, there were a few speakers that strayed from the locative media focus, but the innovations presented were incredible so I didn't mind. Attendees represented a good mix of developers, artists, producers, educators, students, researchers, and vendors. This mix is so much more rewarding than most other conferences attempt to assemble.

Bill Buxton a principal researcher at Microsoft opened the event by noting that intelligence of technology lies not so much in the innovation itself but in its context. "I don't care about technology" he stated, "it a utilitarian thing that can be easily discarded". The important consideration is the fundamental human behaviour or need that technology enables. He cited an automatic door opener as being a prime example of intelligent technology - not because it is technically sophisticated (it isn't) but because of its "embedded intelligence". Its intelligence comes from where it is and how well it fits into the ecology of the physical system. As such, locative media creators should not get wrapped up on new abilities of a technology, but rather consider the different dimensions of human behaviour. For one, closeless is not necessarily physical proximity, Buxton noted. There are different types of closelessness such as proximity but also emotional, cultural, and relational bonds, as well as intermediaries or physical impediments that all affects closeness. So assuming that physical proximity is the lead or only factor for locative media may lead to technology that doesn't serve the needs of users.

The next speaker, Richard Lachman of Ryerson University, offerred some foundational concepts of locative media. As the term locative media is used rather nebulously, Lachman offers a definition that locative media is "annotating physical space with digital content". To Lachman, technology such as augmented reality, location based services, and QR codes are examples of locative media. I can see the importance of having consistency in terminology, but I wonder if the content being digital is a fundamental criteria. As I have blogged about before, there are many types of technology or media that annotate physical space, from plaques and posters to graffiti and flags. There are commonalities between these older media and digital media. I don't like to extend a term to the point of meaningless and Lachman's digital focus is consistent with contemporary usage, but I think this exclusive digital focus makes it easy for creators to forget the lessons learned from earlier efforts and to not adequately consider how a new technology is offering something new or improved.

Lachman continued to explain other fundamental qualities of locative media by offering examples of current innovations. Proximity can be personally useful in some imaginative ways, he demonstrated by showcasing iNap, an application to wake up sleepy commuters when they pass a predesignated zone so they won't miss their stop. Discovery Channel's SharkRunner is particularly interesting in how it combines game play with the real-world by having users interact with real GPS-tagged sharks. Citing the case of Nicaragua invading Costa Rica based on faulty Google Maps data, Lachman also cautioned about the need for applications to preserve our trust. Accuracy is not the only element of trust that is essential, as privacy concerns of locative media can also be disconcerting as the new technology is in wide use "before we had time to adapt our social practices or norms". Lachman described how locative media can not only offer push content (content that pops out at you based on your location) or pull content (geolocated data that one selects to receive) but can be an interface to our world. To do this we need to consider awareness, expectations, user experience, values, and design.

The creator of murmur, one of the world's first digital locative media projects, Shawn Micallef spoke next about why he feels locative media has something special to offer. Upon moving to a new city (in his case Toronto), he realized that his "mental map of the city had a lot of dark spots". He wanted to uncover these "mental hinterlands" and found that exploring the city as earlier psychogeographers had done enabled him to form relations to his new spaces. He also began tweeting while he explored the city and received tweets back within moments that offered personal experiences or histories of his location that enriched Micallef's understanding of the place. His project murmur is now in 25-30 cities and will be soon relaunching with GPS ability. Micallef cautions that current locative media applications such as Foursquare really need to examine the value of place. To Micallef, Foursquare is mostly spam as he doesn't care where someone is but it is people's more thoughtful and unique relations to place that are interesting.

After speaking, Micallef introduced a series of locative media creators describing their projects. Incredible projects were presented such as Ghostbusters, a location-based game; Sauga 2030, a futuristic tour of Mississauga, Ontario; Sousveiller, participatory surveillance identification; This Dark Encounter, a marketing effort using real world, bookstore interaction to promote a new book; and Rocket Radar, proximal public transit schedule updates.

Adam Schwabe of Rocket Radar effectively summed up the role locative media projects must play to offer the "right information, at the right time, in the right way". Schwabe, however, doesn't believe in users setting up preferences or customization, he believes that is a lazy solution for developers. Instead, he believe it is paramount to build a system that should know about the user and get it right the first time.

I mentioned earlier that I loved the location of this conference, the other great thing about TIFF is they computer labs on site so they were able to offer a round of hands-on workshops. I also mentioned that I find it boring to sit and be spoken to for hours on end, so these workshops were a welcome technique.

I attended a session allowing me to create my own augmented reality work through SnapDragonAR. The software was created by York University's Future Cinema Labs and now spun off as a private company, Future Stories. I was blown away with the software as within moments I was able to make a really cool augmented reality application that responded both visually and aurally to a user's location in space. Fisher describes her reasoning behind developing the software as she's not concerned with "what technology makes possible, but what it makes easy". The software is a great tool for prototyping and experimenting with augmented reality. But Fisher envisions it being extended to further facilitate it integrating with location-aware technologies to offer geotargetted augmented reality. She did caution that this technology needs to improve as users are not necessarily interested in holding a device up to a precise spot or going out into traffic to get content. Fisher encourages people to focus on "spatial storytelling" and to do this effectively she suggests creator think about: structure, grammar, poetics, interactivity, interface, narrative, immersion, presence, and proprioception.

The following sessions of the conference introduced developers in TIFF Nexus Peripherals Initiative creative jam project that provided funding for game developers to experiment with game play and the physical world. Although all the presented games were amazing, they mostly focused on new types of physical controls and as such weren't up my alley.

As one who studies locative media, I was excited to see my hometown clueing in to this growing area and displaying some impressive local thought and innovation. Shawn Micallef, the grandparent of locative media via his murmur project, summed up this remarkable change with his conference tweet: "When we started [murmur] in 2003, I don't believe the word 'Locative Media' existed -- now there are #TIFFNexus conferences on it. Fun."

Tips to Get a SSHRC Graduate Grant

2011-10-17T22:12:00.008-04:00

Checking the stats of this blog, I discovered that my posts on tips to get Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) graduate grants were the most popular. So I thought I'd update my tips. This post is a distillation of advice I have gathered from my professors and fellow students and determined what worked for me. I won a SSHRC grant at the masters and doctoral level - but there is no one recipe, so get advice from other sources and disregard whatever makes sense to you.

Before beginning, visit SSHRC's website and find out the eligibility basics, such as does your research fall under the domain of SSHRC (social science and humanities), NSERC (science and engineering), or CIHR (health). Unofficially, I heard that NSERC grants are easier to get than SSHRC grants (but I'm not sure if there are less applicants or more money to give out) so if your research can apply within their mandate you may want to consider applying there.

SSHRC publishes some application tips, which are good, but general. The first and most important tip I have is don't consider any instructions or tips from SSHRC as optional; they are commandments. Don't deviate from their instructions - no matter what. If you think you have a compelling exception, change it so it follows SSHRC rules.

SSHRC also states, rather vaguely, how they evaluate applicants:

past academic results, as demonstrated by transcripts, awards and distinctions;
the program of study and its potential contribution to the advancement of knowledge;
relevant professional and academic experience, including research training, as demonstrated by conference presentations and scholarly publications;
two written evaluations from referees; and
the departmental appraisal (for those registered at Canadian universities).

They don't give specifics or offer a weighting for doctoral applicants. They do offer the weighting for masters students. Academic excellence is weighted at 60%, research potential is 30%, and communication skills is 10%.

I've heard speculation from various sources that there is a SSHRC bias for certain regions, universities, faculties, etc. SSHRC releases their applicant data and I went over it. There does appear to be carefully balancing to ensure that the awards to match Canada's regional population distribution and by university. There does not appear to be a significant bias by the year of doctoral study, as I had heard. Considerably less people apply in year four of doctoral students, yet the award rate is still roughly the same as other years - so one's odds are definitely better in this year.

Below are my tips for grades, application form, publication record, program of study, and references.

Your department and university

A lot of applicants don't adequately consider that it isn't just the feds approving your application, as your department and university (in most cases) must approve and forward your application first (most major Canadian universities have a quota of how many applications they are allowed to submit) . Many applications die at one's department level. So make sure you address this internal audience too. Make sure your program of study fits into your department and program. It doesn't hurt to mention the strengths of the department and university either and include a name or two of key faculty. This is buttering up, but it is sincere as this is what drew you to the program in the first place.

Grades

Everyone agrees that grades are a prime importance. If your grades suck, then there is no use applying. For doctoral students, anything lower than an A- average in your master's degree would probably be too low. For masters, I'm not sure but it is likely at leat a B or B+ during one's bachelor's degree. I don't know how far back they look though - my first couple years of my bachelor's degree I didn't do that well, but managed to pull my grades up for the final couple years (even then they weren't that great - it was only once I became an old student that I really started to care about my grades). There's not much you can do to improve your grades - but I included my transcripts from two college certificate programs I did. I got great grades in that - so perhaps that outweighed my bachelor's.

My suspicion is that since all candidates that get forwarded by their universitywill represent the best and brightest, I am not convinced that one's grades and academic awards alone are that influential. It opens the door, but your program of study, publication record, and letters of reference are what closes the deal.

Application form

The application itself is rather onerous. The application is filled out online - you can save and edit it right up to submission. The application asks general, expected questions and questions about your research and background. My thought was I don't like to leave sections blank or almost blank. I don't advocate square pegging anything into inappropriate holes, but think outside the box. For example, I included professional awards in the awards section and a volunteer position in my work experience.

I heard a great tip about the keywords that the form asks. First of all, don't leave these blank and be sure to choose these wisely. SSHRC publishes an online database of prior funded research. Use their search engine to find work similar to yours and identify the keywords they used and then, as appropriate, consider those.

Publications

They ask for your publications twice - in the application form and as an attachment. I think that doctoral applicants really need to have at least one peer-reviewed article. I also included my writings from non-academic sources. I'm not so sure that self-published sources (e.g. your own blog) is necessarily great - but if you blog is picked up by another source or syndicated (as mine is) then that would help. The publications should ideally be relevant to one's program of study or at least academically related. Still, I think some publications regardless of the topic are better than nothing.

Program of study

I think this is often underestimated by applicants. I think applicants need a kickass, flawless, unique proposal to stand out from the crowd. Also be clear on what you plan to do, how exactly, and why.

Obvious rules for any proper academic work apply. Avoid jargon or concepts only understandable by one's own field as the reviewers are from a broad range of departments. Be sure to define key terms. Consider the visual appeal of the application by judicious use of whitespace, headings, and bold.

I frequently hear that "telling a story" is vital with grant proposals. I think it is true as reviewers do have a stack of papers to go through so a lively, concrete, compelling narrative can convince the reviewer of the interest and importance of your work. Have a clearly articulated research question and everything should center and flow from this. The last paragraph should end the work on a strong note, reestablishing the "so what" of the work.

Include how you (your interests, academic and professional background) fit into this story. Demonstrate how your professional and academic path has lead you to this point you are in as linear a form as possible. It's not a c.v. so you don't need to mention every career detail - I highlighted the parts of my history that were relevant and disregarded those that weren't. It's not an autobiography, either, so only share your life history that is relevant. It's rather boring to begin or end your paper with a paragraph about yourself unless your experience is vital to the proposed research.

You should also demonstrate that you have experience and ability to execute your study, so explain relevant coursework, access issues, necessary skills and how you have or will attain them. Don't include a course list with all your professors names and course numbers.

Considering the current political climate in Canada and budgetary concerns of government agencies, I have a hunch that SSHRC is also looking for research that has contemporary social value - not esoteric academic navel gazing. I've seen a few proposals that had the Miss America syndrome, in that they promised their research would save the world. It's not a dream study either, so ground it in some reality of what one can feasibly accomplish.

Your method section should have the specific steps of your plan, but you don't need to go overboard and specify minute details such as your transcription strategy. In general, you should touch upon your approach to sampling, recruitment and/or access, data gathering, data analysis, and presentation of results and dissemination. Show you know your method. For example, don't say you plan to do interviews, for example, but rather specify structured, unstructured, semi-structured. A citation or two to show why your methodology is appropriate is definitely helpful. I prepared a research proposal checklist. It goes into more details than may be necessary for a SSHRC application, but it is useful to look over to make sure you haven't missed any major areas.

If you plan to study humans (or animals), be sure to briefly mention your ethical review process. If you're using deception or planning any research that will harm or will greatly upset participants, you'd probably should reconsider. This kind of research is sensitive and needs to be handled carefully. If you really need to do this, then you should probably have at least 2-4 sentences on what this is the only possible approach and how you are going to mitigate harm.

Demonstrate your knowledge of your subject area. At a master's level this should include at least a couple citations to canonical sources and probably at least a couple to more recent (within the last 2-3 years) research published in journals. Identify your camp and pitch your tent - that is figure out what discipline you are in and show how you fit into this area. If you are deliberately trying to shake things up (and a SSHRC graduate grant application is probably not the place to do this) then mention that you are aware of your unorthodox approach and state why it's a good idea and how you will make it work.

Make sure you have ample, but not wanton citations. Initially, I only included works I referenced, but I believe there may be a limit of up to 5 pages of bibliography. Someone advised me to show my knowledge of the relevant literature in this space, so I did. I still only used 2.5 pages as I really doubt any reviewer will ever read 5 pages of bibliography. I believe it is better to have 2-3 pages of great references than 5 (or more) pages of filler - at that point it seems like shameless padding.

References

As with any time you need a reference, make sure they will give you a great one. After that, choose your references wisely - not just who likes you and who you like, but also consider your referee's position and credentials. For example, I was told that letters from adjunct faculty (ie. non-tenure track) don't count very highly. Can one infer that a letter from a dean would then be more impressive?

I was told that at least one reference should come from the university that you'll be studying at and one reference should be your current advisor. It makes sense that you should get an internal reference as in most cases applications must be vetted by one's department, so if you don't have someone there officially vouching for you it certainly doesn't help.

I heard a good tip to help get referee's to return their letters quickly is to open a courier account so they can easily express deliver it without having to worry about the cost.

Your references should definitely be familiar with your program of study - ideally even incorporating it into their reference letter. So be sure to give them a copy of your program of study and your c.v. - even if they don't ask for it.

General tips

The reviewers have huge stacks of applications to review, so they are looking for ways to weed out so be very careful in following all the rules. Have someone proof every word in your entire application. Actually, have two or three people proof it.

The best thing that helped me get the grant was listen to the advice of professors, university staff, and colleagues. Most universities, I suspect, hold seminars on how to apply for grants - don't miss them. Just the process of following all the steps is daunting, so it's best to get help. It also helps to get to know the contact person at one's university (e.g. an awards officer, registrar, etc.) as they are an invaluable source of information on the process. Another source of help and comfort in numbers is GradCafe.com. It has a forum thread where grad students get advice, fret, and lament with fellow stressed-out applicants.

It is painful to even apply for these things, but it does represent a decent amount of money and prestige so it is worth the effort.

In the end, the odds of winning a SSHRC are not great. Only a handful of candidates get selected by a given university to be forwarded to SSHRC and of those less than half this year got an award. One can do all the "right" things, have a great academic record and still not get it. So it does almost seem like winning a lottery.

If you do not get it, it is definitely worthwhile to apply again, particularly if you improved your grades, added peer-reviewed publications, or wrote a better program of study.

Updated January 2012

McLuhan Centenary

2011-07-21T22:27:00.002-04:00

Due to the centenary of media theorist Marshal McLuhan, there has been a flurry of recent coverage and events on his work and life.

As a fellow Torontonian, media junkie, and as a student at the faculty now housing his program (University of Toronto's Faculty of Information) I feel connected to his work. I therefore attended three events this week hosted by the McLuhan Legacy Network and the McLuhan 100 that helped me decipher McLuhan and consider his ongoing relevance to understanding media and to my studies in particular.

I thought of writing a long post to summarize my take-aways from these events and how McLuhan work sheds lights on current digital tech and trends. But other sources (including my post excepting Bob Logan's insightful article on McLuhan) have already done this effectively.

In the spirit of Marshall McLuhan, I'll share one-liners or aphorisms from these events. McLuhan was famous for these, such as "the medium is the message" and "if it works, it's obsolete". As the sessions were panel discussions and invited audience participation capturing the speaker's name proved difficult - so my apologies for not attributing sources. All were quotations or rephrasings of McLuhan or commentary inspired by McLuhan.

Art is an early warning system. Artists are antennae of a race and prepare us for the coming onslaught.
With pervasive media are we amoebas pulled and stimulated by environment but ultimately torn asunder by it?
McLuhan is the patron saint of art schools for championing lateral thinking.
If it ain't broke; break it!
Northrop Frye on said he avoided McLuhan as 90% of what McLuhan says is original and I'm not used to it!
An obsolete medium becomes art.
Media provides both a service and disservice. (So mobiles can help us stay in touch with elderly relatives but can be used as reason to avoid meeting them in person.)
McLuhan liked to use paradoxes to provoke discussion, but these vex and confuse people.
The next killer app is user experience.
Is the iPad a medium? It's amorphous. At one moment it can be an reader like a book or a keyboard like a piano. Is it a medium of its own or a mimic?
I don't do theories, but rather break molds.
Page turning on tablets is bad user experience. It's a transitory technique from an old medium that limits the new medium.
I don't necessarily agree with everything I say.
We now have a distributed medium with the Internet now we need distributed participation.
McLuhan conspired for his centenary be hottest day in Canada's history! Is this a sign of new hot medium coming?

Marshall McLuhan - Digital Visionary

2011-07-20T15:45:00.001-04:00

Tomorrow is the 100th anniversary of Marshall McLuhan's birthday. To commemorate this milestone and recognize McLuhan's ongoing relevance to communication and media theory, various organizations and people have been holding events or writing about McLuhan. Although McLuhan is generally regarded as Canada's preeminent communication scholar and is still well known for his theories and concepts such "The medium is the message" and the "global village", his role as predictor and shaper of digital technology is less well known.

At a McLuhan event last evening a colleague and friend of McLuhan's, Prof. Bob Logan, related McLuhan's visions of future technology that has been realized. Logan's paper, McLuhan Misunderstood: Setting the Record Straight, addresses this topic and clarifyies other issues about McLuhan. The work is publised in full on the website McLuhan Galaxy, but Prof. Logan has allowed me to excerpt the passages regarding McLuhan's contributions and predictions to our digital culture.

***************

So many of McLuhan’s pronouncements about the effects of electric media are prophetic because it seems as though he was aware of the coming of the Net, the Web and other digital media. A simple example of his prescience is that he, in fact, through his writing foreshadowed the Internet. William Gibson, the author of Neuromancer, certainly deserves credit for coining the term cyberspace but long before Neuromancer was written or even conceived of, McLuhan (1967, p. 67) described the Internet in the following passage in response to being asked "How is the computer affecting education" McLuhan’s response was an almost exact description of the Internet:

The computer in education is in a very tentative state but it does represent basically speeded up access to information and when it is applied to the telephone and to Xerox it permits access to the libraries of the world, almost immediately, without delay. And so the immediate effect of the computer is to pull up the walls of the subjects and divisions of knowledge in favor of over-all field, total awareness – Gestalt.

McLuhan description of the Internet was complete with the exception of packet switching if you allow Xeroxing to represent the reproduction of a hard copy by a printer. And he opined this description two full years before the development of ARPANET in 1969, the forerunner of the Internet.

An even earlier remark by McLuhan (1962) in the Gutenberg Galaxy also foreshadows the Internet:

A computer as a research and communication instrument could enhance retrieval, obsolesce mass library organization, retrieve individual encyclopedic function and flip into a private line to speedily tailored data of a saleable kind.

One can also interpret without too much of a stretch the retrieval of "individual encyclopedic function" in the above quote as a foreshadowing of Wikipedia as Derrick de Kerckhove once did (http://www.blogger.com/www.utoronto.ca/mcluhan/marshal.htm).

McLuhan not only foreshadowed the Internet and Wikipedia, but he also foreshadowed Innocentive.com, a Web site that connects companies that have a problem to solve with experts that Innocentive has aggregated. They call the process "Open Innovation," which they describe as follows:

Open Innovation allows many people from different disciplines to tackle the same problem simultaneously and not sequentially. Anyone can participate with collaborative technology and Open Innovation training. When many minds are working on the same problem, it will take less time to solve it.

McLuhan (1971 – with my emphasis) in a convocation address at the University of Alberta said:

The university and school of the future must be a means of total community participation, not in the consumption of available knowledge, but in the creation of completely unavailable insights. The overwhelming obstacle to such community participation in problem solving and research at the top levels, is the reluctance to admit, and to describe, in detail their difficulties and their ignorance. There is no kind of problem that baffles one or a dozen experts that cannot be solved at once by a million minds that are given a chance simultaneously to tackle a problem. The satisfaction of individual prestige, which we formerly derived from the possession of expertise, must now yield to the much greater satisfactions of dialogue and group discovery. The task yields to the task force.

McLuhan not only foreshadowed the development of the Internet and crowd sourcing he with his co-author George B. Leonard in an article in the popular magazine Look also explained why the digital media would be so compelling to young people and to a certain degree their elders. They suggested that the age of print and the fragmentation that it encouraged was over (McLuhan and Leonard, 1967).

More swiftly than we can realize, we are moving into an era dazzlingly different. Fragmentation, specialization and sameness will be replaced by wholeness, diversity and, above all, a deep involvement... To be involved means to be drawn in, to interact. To go on interacting, the student must get some-where. In other words, the student and the learning environment (a person, a group of people, a book, a programmed course, an electronic learning console or whatever) must respond to each other in a pleasing and purposeful interplay. When a situation of involvement is set up, the student finds it hard to drag himself away.

He and Leonard (ibid.) also predicted that the relationship to humankind’s knowledge would change with electrically configured information as we are beginning to see in this the Internet Age.

When computers are properly used, in fact, they are almost certain to increase individual diversity. A worldwide network of computers will make all of mankind’s factual knowledge available to students everywhere in a matter of minutes or seconds. Then, the human brain will not have to serve as a repository of specific facts, and the uses of memory will shift in the new education, breaking the timeworn, rigid chains of memory may have greater priority than forging new links. New materials may be learned just as were the great myths of [p. 25] past cultures-as fully integrated systems that resonate on several levels and share the qualities of poetry and song.

Still another foreshadowing of McLuhan was that of the smart phone as described by his biographer Phillip Marchand (1989, p. 170).

He told an audience in New York City shortly after the publication of Understanding Media that there might come a day when we would all have portable computers, about the size of a hearing aid, to help mesh our personal experiences with the experience of the great wired brain of the outer world.

What makes this prediction even more amazing is that there were no personal computers at the time, no cell phones and no Internet (i.e. "the great wired brain of the outer world").

The notion of the need for keeping messages short and hence the power of the one-liner foreshadows in our digital era texting, instant messaging and Twitter.

...

I believe that I have only scratched the surface in explaining the ideas of this great thinker. No article can do justice to the ideas that Marshall McLuhan engendered. I hope that my essay helps the reader in their approach to McLuhan. However, the only way to understand McLuhan is to read him directly and figure out what he means for you for as he said “the user is the content.”

References:

Marchand, Philip. 1989. Marshall McLuhan: The Medium and the Messenger. Toronto: Random House.

McLuhan, Marshall. 1967. “The New Education.” The Basilian Teacher, Vol. 11 (2), pp. 66-73.

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Thanks to Bob Logan for permission to use this.

Cool Off at Toronto's Harbourfront

2011-07-18T15:36:00.000-04:00

It's too hot here in Toronto (41 degrees Celsius factoring in the humidity) to spend much time in front of a heat-producing computer, so I'm recycling an article I wrote awhile ago on a walking tour of Toronto's harbourfront that promises to offer scenic and historic sites by the cooling Lake Ontario...

To leash the dog days of summer, take a walk along Toronto’s waterfront. It was Toronto’s harbour that convinced John Graves Simcoe to choose this location as the provincial capital in 1793, because the natural cove was ideal to defend the city from quarrelsome Americans. The lake has been integral to the development of Toronto. It’s also where Toronto gets its drinking water. Lake water is also used to provide environmentally-friendly cooling for Financial District offices

Toronto’s shoreline has changed dramatically over the years. After the last ice age, everything south of Davenport Road was under the waters of giant Lake Iroquois. The waters gradually receded and the shore in Simcoe’s day was at Front Street. A storm in 1858 washed out the eastern edge of the harbour helping sever Toronto Island from the mainland. More recent landfill projects have extended the shoreline to its present location.

The waterfront was always a transportation hub - first ships, then trains, and then automotives with the 1966 opening of the Gardiner. (Toronto’s port, despite years of decline, is apparently increasing in use, due in part to high gasoline costs.) Industry located in proximity to transportation, and as a result of both, the Lake was cut off from Torontonians first by peers then by railway tracks – more recently its highway and now walls of condominiums blocking the waterfront from most Torontonians.

Nonetheless, it is possible to walk along much of Toronto’s lakeshore to enjoy views of the lake and key historic sites.

Start your stroll at the foot of Yonge Street with the Redpath Sugar Refinery, still an operating factory and the biggest user of the port. Their sugar shed has a huge whale mural by artist Wyland and is one of his 100 “Whaling Walls.” Redpath has a free, semi-sweet sugar museum.

Walking west you’ll pass Caption John’s seafood restaurant ship, docked there since 1975 (previously it was a Croatian ferry).

Further west there’s the ferry docks. Ferries have been running to the islands and other locales for decades. This is where to catch the ferry to Toronto Island. The trip affords great views of the city. Toronto Island (or more correctly islands) is probably Toronto’s best park - complete with gardens, beaches (including one for nudists), amusement park, farm, Toronto’s oldest structure the Gibraltar Point Lighthouse (reputed to be haunted by a former murdered keeper), restaurants, and it is the location of Babe Ruth’s first professional home run). The failed Toronto to Rochester, New York catamaran ferry also left near here but only lasted only a few months. Turns out Torontonians weren’t lining up to go to Rochester after all.

Continuing on, you’ll pass the Westin Harbour Castle Hotel. It is located on the site of Toronto’s worst disaster, the fire of the S.S. Noronic. In the middle of the night on September 14, 1949, the cruise ship, docked overnight, burned before many passengers were even awakened. Of the 695 on board approximately 118 died – all passengers. The cause was unknown, but a cowardly crew and inadequate safety measures were blamed.

Next, stop and grab an ice cap at Second Cup, housed in the original ferry terminal, Pier 6. Built in 1907, it is the oldest remaining waterfront building.

Next door is the Queen’s Quay Terminal, built in 1927, it was Canada’s first poured concrete building. Once one of the largest shipping warehouses, it was remodeled to house overpriced shops, restaurants and offices. The Terminal is part of Harbourfront Centre, Toronto’s preeminent cultural centre with (mostly free) festivals, concerts, art studios, galleries, and theatres. Harbourfront Centre was built largely by retrofitting heritage buildings including a power plant.

Conclude your walk with a rest on the beach of Toronto’s waterfront new park, “HTO,” complete with sand and sun umbrellas.

Good Things Grow in Ontario

2011-07-08T16:07:00.002-04:00

In a act of self-promotion (or rather, for my daughter) I'm going to blog about a social media campaign and urge you to vote for my daughter. But it is a great campaign and rather novel for Ontario.

Recently at the Canada Day celebrations at Queen's Park, Toronto the Ontario government agency, Foodland Ontario, had a booth set up. We were drawn to them as they were offering free samples. It is a truism that free food will always draw a crowd. I'd previously encountered Foodland Ontario for their TV commercials and there useful awhile Twitter account (great recipes using local produce).

So once we had our cucumbers and dip, we noticed they had a video setup for a song contest. The contest is "Sing and Win". Contestants sing the Foodland jingle and compete in an online voting contest for the chance to win free groceries. They had a mini-studio set up with a video camera, lights, and audio mixer. Videos are them uploaded to Facebook (via YouTube) where people can vote daily for their favourite. As the recordings were done so professionally, the final videos are refreshingly good technical quality.

Considering my tone deafness, I didn't feel anyone deserved having to hear me caterwaul. But my young daughter jumped at the chance to perform (I think she's the reincarnation of Ethel Merman). Participating in the contest was a lot of fun, as was watching other people sing. But any campaign that builds upon people's narcisstic joy at seeing and sharing stuff about themselves or their kids is guaranteed to succeed.
So within a couple days of the event the video was uploaded, we eagerly watched it and voted. This campaign has such incredible viral potential - of course, everyone would want to share their videos and get their friends to vote for them. But here's the problem - it is way too difficult to direct friends to a specific video for them to vote.

The process is cumbersome and vague. I think using Facebook is great as really almost everyone who is online on Canada is on it. But to participate in this campaign one has to friend the Foodland Ontario Facebook page, then one has to select the venue (Queen's Park) then scroll through pages of videos to find the specific one. I would have liked to be able to send friends directly to the video to watch and vote.

One shouldn't have to friend a company to participate. I think if this restriction was gone it might be possible to pass on a link directly to the video and the participation levels would be much higher. This is essential both from a contestant and company perspective. As a contestant, I want as many of my friends to vote as possible. From a marketing perspective, the more people that are aware of Foodland Ontario and engage with their brand the greater the campaign success.

To be fair, it seems like this problem is on Facebook's end, as I'm not sure one can interact with a company on Facebook unless one friends them. People may be reluctant to do this as not only is it another step (each obstacle thrown at people will entail a certain level of drop-out) but also people might be concerned that friending a company entails being spammed with their messages (as has happened to me).

Even if this barrier was removed, it would still not be possible to link directly to the video. I'm not sure why this is the case as YouTube assigns each video a unique identifier.

In the end though, Foodland Ontario's "Sing and Win" campaign makes excellent use of social media - but some technical obstacles really prevented it from being much more viral and effective than it could be.

Now here's my plug to vote for my daughter:

Visit Foodland Ontario on Facebook and "Like" them
Go to the "Sing and Win" contest page via the icon on the right
Select the venue "Queen's Park Canada" on the right
Go to page 6 of the videos (via the arrow on the right)
Watch the "Nora F" video and click the vote button
Visit every day to vote again

See what I mean? Anyway, thanks for any votes!

Job Posting Sites for Canadian Internet Professionals

2011-07-05T21:44:00.000-04:00

I looked at this blog's stats recently and noticed my post on Canadian Job Posting Sites for Internet Professionals from 2008 is not only my top blog post of all time but continues to be popular every month.

I haven't been on the look-out for a job in ages, but I know some of the sources I previously listed are no longer relevant. So I have updated my list and included it below.

All sites all appear to free for job-seekers. Rates for employers to post jobs vary greatly, from free (Craigslist) to expensive (Workopolis, Monster).

The Big Ones
These sites have a large number of Canadian jobs overall, and Internet jobs in particular. One can post one's resume here and create alerts to have postings emailed to you regularly.

Craigslist
Job Bank - job listings by Service Canada
JobShark
Kijiji
LinkedIn
Monster.ca
Workopolis

Internet and IT specific

Sitepoint
Backbone
ProBlogger - jobs for bloggers
Dice

Communications & Digital Media

International Association of Business Communicators (IABC)
JeffGaulin - journalism jobs
Applied Arts design-oriented jobs

Non-profits

Charity Village - usually has Internet and IT jobs posted
Ontario Public Sector Careers
Public Service Commission of Canada - jobs with the federal government

Miscellaneous

Academia.edu - academic jobs
Guru - for freelancers of various professions, including Internet)

Who's Who in Canadian Digital Media & Technology

2011-07-03T16:13:00.070-04:00

In honour of Canada's birthday, I'm updating my list of Canadian individuals and companies who contributed to digital culture or technology.

My goal is to document an aspect of Canadian history and culture that is overlooked. I'm fairly loose in my definition of Canadian. Some people or companies got their start in Canada, but were acquired or lured to the United States. Some innovations were done by Canadians while abroad. The point is not to debate citizenship, but rather to document innovations and their Canadian connections to demonstrate that Canada has made and continues to make a significant contribution to digital media and technology.

Update September 2011 - since writing this I've added over 30 more entries (and could add even more).

People

Parham Aarabi, professor and inventor of imaging and internet advertising software
Lorne Abony, e-Business (Petopia), gaming (FUN), and digital music business leader (Mood Media)
Melody Adhami, co-founder of Plastic Mobile and leader in mobile app development
Chris Albinson, venture capitalist, co-founder of C100, expat Canadian tech network
Arcade Fire, music group - their online, interactive and personalized video for The Wilderness Downtown is awesome!
Ronald Baecker, computer scientist and HCI researcher
Jim Balsillie, co-founder of Research In Motion
Michel Beaudet, creator of online humour videos Têtes à claques
Gilles Brassard, co-inventor of the first quantum cryptography protocol, BB84
Alexander Graham Bell, original telecom inventor
Tim Bray, father of XML & co-founder of Open Text

Rhiannon Bury, academic, studies women and online fandom
Stewart Butterfield, co-founder of Flickr, pioneer in use of tagging
Bill Buxton, principal researcher for Microsoft, pioneer in human computer interaction
Garrett Camp, co-founder and CEO of StumbleUpon
Ann Cavoukian, privacy czar, promotes greater privacy in social network sites and privacy by design
David Cheriton, computer scientist, mentor & initial investor of Google - now billionaire
Vincent Cheung, creator of image software Shape Collage
Geof Collis, accessibility advocate and publisher of accessibility news
Michael Cowpland, founder of Corel & tech eccentric
William Craig, founder of iCraveTV, first company to stream television over Net
Cassie Creighton, 5-year old co-creator with dad, Ryan Creigton, of a popular online game
David Crow, organizer of tech events, DemoCamp and StartUpNorth
Douglas Coupland, author of Generation X, Microserfs, JPod, etc.
Ronald Deibert, researcher and campaigner against Internet censorship and cyber-espionage
Peter Deutsch, leader of the team that invented Archie, the first Internet search engine
John Demco, creator and first registrar of the .ca domain
Hossein Derakhshan, influential Iranian blogger
Sara Diamond, academic leader founding Banff's New Media Institute and Mobile Experience Innovation Centre
Cory Doctorow, activist, blogger & co-editor of Boing Boing
Markus Frind, founder of popular dating site Plenty of Fish
Ganz Sam and Howard, founders of children's virtual wold, WebKinz, pioneered plush toy with virtual counterparts concept
Michael Geist, prominent Internet law scholar
William Gibson, author and visionary of cyberculture, coined term "cyberspace"
Murray Goldberg, developer of WebCT one of the earliest and most popular e-learning platforms
James Gosling, inventor of Java programming language
Calvin Gotlieb, "father of computing in Canada"
Kevin Ham, world leading domainer
Caroline Haythornthwaite, researcher on social networking, online collaboration & communities
Graham Hill, founder of environmental blog site, TreeHugger
Cory Horner, early DIY programmer, leader in government transparency, launched How'dTheyVote.ca in 2005
Tara Hunt, online marketing and communities expert
Glenda Hyatt, accessibility advocate and blogger
Mathew Ingram, tech journalist and co-founder of mesh conference
Donna Jodhan, campaigner for web accessibility, launched the first federal court case demanding greater accessibility of government websites
Brian Kernighan, computer scientist, creator of "Hello, world" program, popular for training programmers (the first code I wrote)
Justin Kozuch, lead researcher of the 49 Pixels project, a study of Canada's digital economy
Deidre LaCarte, creator of Hampster Dance, believed to be first Internet meme
Lake Minnewanka Squirrel, Internet meme of scene-stealing rodent
Mike Lazaridis, founder of Research in Motion
Rasmus Lerdorf, creator of PHP and open source advocate
Pierre Lévy, academic, developed notions of collective intelligence
Bruce Livingstone, founder of leading stock photo service, iStockPhotos
mafiaboy, prominent website hacker
Amber MacArthur, tech journalist and podcaster
Marc MacKenzie, winner of most beautiful Twitter message
Don Mattrick, founder of Distinctive Software (predecessor of EA Canada) at 17, now Microsoft SVP of gaming
Marshall McLuhan, communications theorist and tech visionary
Sid Meier, game developer of the Civilization series, second inductee into the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences' Hall of Fame
Lane Merrifield, co-founder of Club Penguin and developer of children's virtual worlds
Michael Mulley, DIY developer of government transparency website, openparliament.ca
Ryan North, writer and creator of online comic Dinosaur Comics
David Ossip, founder of Workbrain, efficiency software
Emma Payne, author and founder of Wired Women
Rob Pike, co-creator of UTF-8, a unicode standard
Kate Pullinger and Chris Joseph, pioneers in transmedia storytelling, incl. Interactive Alice
Simon Pulsifer, prominent and prolific Wikipedia contributor
Jade Raymond, gaming executive for Ubisoft
Andrew Rivkin and Mark Rivkin, founders of online gambling tech company, Cryptologic
Ray Muzyka & Greg Zeschuk, co-founders of role-playing gaming company BioWare, 2011 inductees Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences' Hall of Fame
Mark Rzepka, pioneer of online pharmacies
Robert J. Sawyer, scifi author, including his recent WWW trilogy
Gerri Sinclair, founder of Canada's first multimedia research centre
Jay Steele, founder of Viigo, a news aggregator app for Blackberry
Jeffrey Skoll, co-founder of eBay
Star Wars Kid, another Internet meme star
Jennifer Stoddart, privacy czar
Don Tapscott, tech culture visionary and author of Wikinomics
Clive Thompson, journalist has written for Shift and Wired
Ilse Treurnicht, CEO of tech incubator and innovation centre, MaRS
Jutta Treviranus, researcher on web accessibility, lead author of authoring tool accessibility guidelines
Steven Turnbull, Facebook Scrabble champ
Barry Wellman, academic, pioneer in studies of online communities & social networking
Beatrice Helen Worsley, computer pioneer - possibly the first woman to earn a PhD in computers and her dissertation was first on modern computers
Tim Wu - Internet governance and policy scholar, coined term "network neutrality"
Michel Vulpe, inventor and founder of i4i, successfully sued Microsoft for patent infringement
Bob Young, founder of micropublisher, Lulu and former CEO of Red Hat

Companies or Projects

AbeBooks - once the largest used books e-tailer
Archie - first Internet search engine
b5media - blog aggregator
BiblioCommons - online library catalog enhancements
BioWare - gaming (acquired by EA)
Black Box Games - gaming (acquired by EA)
Bump Technologies - 3D desktop visualization (acquired by Google)
Cambrian House - crowdsourcing
Canarie - research network
Concept Share - collaboration software for design professionals
Chilly Beach - online cartoons
Club Penguin - children's virtual world (acquired by Disney)
Corel - office and imaging software
CryptoLogic - gambling software
Desire2Learn - learning based software
Discover Anywhere Mobile - location based services software
Distinctive Software - gaming (acquired by EA)
Digital Cement - marketing agency (acquired)
ePresence - webcasting software (acquired)
Extreme Venture Partners - venture capital for tech start-ups
500 pixels - online photo portfolio
Flickr - photo sharing website (acquired by Yahoo)
Fresh Books - online personal accounting software
eHarlequin - online storytelling and community
Geotoko - mobile marketing
GigPark
gShift Labs - search engine optimization
gsmprjct technologie - interactive technologies
Guardly mobile personal security app
Guestlist - event management
HootSuite - social media monitoring
Ice.com - early e-tailer
Idée - visual search engine
InGamer Sports - live event social gaming
iStockPhoto - stock photos
J2Play - developed world’s first mobile multiplayer game (acquired by EA)
Justwhiteshirts - early e-tailer
Kik Interactive - texting software
Iceberg Radio - Internet radio
Lavalife - online dating
LiveHive Systems
Long Pen - event software and robotics
MaRS - tech incubator
MegaDox - online legal forms and document templates
mTrip - mobile travel guides
MyVoice - communication aid
Naked News - online porn
Netsweeper - content filtering software
Nortel - telecom tech
NowPublic - citizen journalism
Octopz - online collaboration
OpenFile - user-generated online newspaper
Open Text - early web directory, content management software
Plastic Mobile - mobile app agency
PlentyofFish - online dating
Polar Mobile - mobile apps agency
PostRank - social engagement and influence ratings, incl. Aide RSS
Pretzil - check-in aggregator
Quillsoft - literacy and speech recognition software
Radian6 - social media monitoring
Reseach In Motion - mobile devices
Shopify - e-commerce solutions
Simply Audio Books - leading audio book e-tailer
Syncapse - social media management
Sysomos - social media monitoring
StumbleUpon - website social discovery
TakingITGlobal - organizer of IT volunteers
Task Avenue - location-based task reminders
Tech Vibes - tech news
A Thinking Ape - mobile agency
20-20 Technologies - interior design software
Tucows - ISP and application
UFile - tax-filing software
Viafoura - online user engagement
WebCT - early e-learning platform (acquired by Blackboard)
WebKinz - children's virtual world & game by Ganz
Weblo - virtual world
Wild Apricot - software for non-profits
Workbrain - business efficency software (acquired)
Xtreme Labs - mobile agency
Zerofootprint - environment software

This list is not exhaustive - but it was exhausting to put together.

I know I missed entries. My inclusion criteria is completely subjective and I have an Internet bias, but every year this list grows so hopefully it'll become increasingly definitive and encompass more elements of the digital sphere.

I'm particularly keen on capturing individuals and companies with a historic or international influence. Please help me out by letting me know of any additions.

July 14, 2011 Update: Thanks to the expertise of Sara Grimes, I was able to add a bunch of entries on Canadian gaming luminaries that was previously lacking.

TEDx LibrariansTO - An Idea Worth Spreading

2011-06-25T19:07:00.006-04:00

I've enjoyed watching TED talks online for years but I've never been among the elite who can attend the conference in person. TED talks are on a diverse range of topics but all are brief (18 minutes or less) and highly engaging. Between TED's effective format and history of impressive speakers, TED talks are a popular and powerful source of ideas and inspiration (and confrontation).

TED talks are available free to view on their website, but watching a video online isn't the same as attending in person. As the events are very costly to attend, far away (in California & the UK), and are only open to those approved of, attending in person is not an option for most of the planet. However, TED has opened up by allowing independent events to model themselves on TED, hence the TEDx movement. I think this is a great idea and have been eagerly awaiting a local TEDx event.

So I was excited to attend a TEDx event today in Toronto - TEDx LibrariansTO. Although, I am not a librarian (despite pulls to the contrary), I was interested in the conference theme as librarians inspiring society on new (hopefully better) ways to share and use information.

Speakers identified the importance of adding and valuing games to collections, on encouraging "slow reading" of print books, adding hackspace or playspace, organizing more community events and unconferences, or ditching the idea of libraries altogether. The goal was to reconceive of libraries beyond book storage and the librarian profession beyond the "bunhead" stereotype (although there was a heated discussion on working with the old stereotype). I would have liked more discussion on the role digital libraries and m-libraries can play, but overall the speakers all presented interesting and provocative ideas also pertinent to the information field in general.

Being new to a TED event and having heard that presenters receive instructions on the TED format, I was excited to experience something new and ideally more effective. I find academic conferences are often tedious and self-serving, industry conferences are often too vague and corporate self-serving, and unconferences are often lacking in focus.

Overall, I found the TED format was extremely effective. I read over the TEDx details they give to would-be organizers and they certainly have a lot of rules and guidelines - which they assert is based on their 25 years of experience. And it definitely works!

The TEDxLibrariansTO event organizers did a great job in finding interesting and effective speakers and ensuring that the event ran smoothly - managing logistics and overcoming technical hurdles is no small accomplishment. The caterer (Mystic Muffin) was awesome, which always keeps attendees happy.

Here's what I find worked well:

visionary, call to arms messages
no jargon, esoterica, or self-promotion
spartan, highly-visual slides
rigidly enforced time limits
smaller number of attendees

One of the problems with conference speakers is they get too much into the details of their subject. I'm Sesame Street generation so sell me on your vision. If people are interested in what you're saying they can look up the details. TED actually recommends people read their speech if they are not comfortable speaking without notes. But I'm not sure that reading a presentation is any better than rambling.

TED has lots of guidelines about the structure of the event too and advises against having any panels or keynotes (to promote equality) and they insist that some of their videos be shown (no hardship as there are so many amazing ones to choose from).

TED also recommends that there be long breaks (45 minutes) between sessions and that speakers stay for all or most of the day. This is so attendees can discuss amongst themselves or with speakers the points raised. The event organizers followed this and as the crowd was particularly friendly, so I found this format worked really well. But, I do not think it would work with other groups or with a large number of attendees.

TEDx LibrariansTO was an excellent showcase for the format. The event today raised a lot of fascinating points and sparked discussion all within a short period of time.

Location-Based Services - A Unique Experience?

2011-06-24T21:37:00.000-04:00

For the past year, I've been looking into location-based services (i.e. an application running on a mobile device that offers information or entertainment based on the device/user's location). Although, I do not think that functionality of information to be situated and pertain to a given location is unique to mobile devices (see my prior post on Types of Geotargetted Information), I do think that location-based services (LBS) are a unique experience.

The individual features of a given LBS may not in itself be unique. But when the various facets are added together I believe it is a new experience.

Characteristics of location-based services:

Location aware (i.e. can automatically detect location & deliver applicable content)
Context sensitive (e.g. light levels, accelerometer, time of day, etc.)
User customizable
Ubiquitous access
AND the potential for
Diverse sources of information
User-generated content (both to read and to create)
Social networking
Gaming

Having studied media for a long time now (too long, I suppose) I'm hesitant to declare anything a new phenomenon. However, other than talking to a particularly knowledge person who follows one around, I'm unaware of any other experience that offers at least the first four characteristics, let alone all of them. Please feel free to contradict me or add additional facets of LBS.

What Happened in Vancouver?

2011-06-17T19:19:00.007-04:00

Like many Canadians, I watched the riots in Vancouver live on television. And like all Canadians (except a few contemptible rioters) I'm greatly ashamed that this happened here. By now, we've heard theories on what prompted the riots - the current pet theory being that it was the acts of a few determined, premeditated vandals (or "anarchists") with drunken masses spurring them on. I think these things are more complicated and multifaceted than most discussions of the issue are acknowledging, so I won't attempt to offer a definitive take on the events.

Riots aren't a new phenomenon. But what did struck me most while watching the live footage was the great many people taking pictures on their mobile devices of the riot. At times, it seemed like a few number of vandals were surrounded by a wall of mobile-wielding people.

There were two types of these people - those who posed inanely for photos in front of the violence and those who were photodocumenting the experience. The latter group did not have the gleeful facial expressions proudly displayed by the former. The main difference between the two were that the first group were clearly enjoying the riot and possibly encouraging it, while the other group appeared to be shocked or enthralled by the events.

I can understand the allure of a riot. They are a rare and powerful spectacle. And if such an event happens in one's city there would be a certain amazement that would incline people to stop in their tracks and watch the unbelievable and dramatic events unfold.

This is what happened to me when I witnessed my first (and only) riot. I was a teenager backpacking through Europe when a riot broke out in downtown Athens. There were emotional crowds, yelling, fights, and fires. It was classic Greek drama staged in the streets. As a kid from the 'burbs, this experience was like nothing I had ever encountered, so I, like many others in the vicinity, stopped and stared at the events. It seems human nature to be inclined to document and communicate such remarkable events. As I did in Athens. If I'd had a mobile back then I would have been uploading pix and status updates online. Instead, I took pictures on the device of the era - film camera. And later I shared what I observed to friends via the appropriate medium of the time: postcards. So I understand to some degree the behaviour of these riot paparazzi.

But when the Athenian police arrived to break up the riot, I knew it was time to leave - as should have all Vancouverites once things clearly were out of hand. Some Vancoverites no doubt did leave the riot area early and others intervened to try to stop the rioters - but, as I noticed with the live footage, many stood by continuing to take pictures. The gawkers who remained on the scene prevented the police from stopping those causing the riot. Thus, these seeming passive witnesses also bare responsibility - and shame - for their role in the riot.

I've been trying to understand the behaviour of these people. Certainly, the spectacle of the event captivated some people past the point of feeling any civic responsibility. Copious liquor no doubt did so too. Perhaps there is also a degree of bravado in displaying evidence of one's eyewitness position to extraordinary events - history in the making. Also, as we have seen with other riots, people are also motivated to produce catch criminals in the act to provide evidence to the police. But I think there is more to than just these factors.

My research lately has examined how fundamental one's relationship is to place. Having a sense of place is central for humans as it is a leading way for us to know and remember our world. Such a violent upheaval of one's place - whether a neighbourhood, city, or country, would produce incredulity. As in 'I can't believe this is happening - here!!'

I think that taking pictures and videos of such shocking events is a way for people to comprehend the events and to make them real, whether or not they want the events to be real. The more attachment one feels to a place, the greater the reaction such an event would provoke. And hence I believe this leads to a compulsion to remain, to continue photo documenting the personal attack on one's place - and to stay until a degree of equilibrium is restored (or the degree of violence is untenable).

Doubtless not everyone's motivations were so benign, but I do think this helps to partially explain the recent events in Vancouver.

In Memoriam: Liz Metcalfe, Digital Pioneer

2011-06-14T17:50:00.008-04:00

Canadians often don't recount or adequately value their history, let alone their online history. It was through the efforts of people like Liz Metcalfe that Canadians have an online voice. Liz Metcalfe was involved in a variety of early Canadian projects that launched national online properties.

Liz was a digital pioneer for Canada. Last night, I found out that she was killed in a horrible traffic accident.

Liz began her Internet career in 1989 - long before the Netscape IPO and the meteoric dot.com days. She worked for such Internet collossi as Canada.com, Yahoo, Rogers, and AOL. She help these companies establish their initial presence in Canada. One of the first online portals in Canada's was launched under Liz's direction, Southam's Montreal Gazette portal.

With Rogers she helped launch Quicken.ca, one of Canada's first and largest financial websites (subsequently merged with Canadian Business). Her collaborative reports on Canadian online banking and brokerage offerings were significant in assisting Canadians to move their financial affairs online and spurring the companies to improve their online services. She also provided a stream of regular content for the website and helped develop phenomenally popular RRSP tools. With a background education in film and journalism and a love of technology, Liz was one of the first people to understand the unique nature of the Web medium - helping develop interactive features when most other companies were still offering brochureware.

At an individual level, Liz authored email newsletters and blogs long before they were a mainstay here. Under the various forms of her Media Gleaner she covered domestic and international and tech issues. She was a locus of information and her Facebook postings became topics for diverse, occasionally heated, discussion. An example of this was the purchase of Huffington Post by AOL that she reworked into a blog post

In addition to being one of Canada's leading digital pioneers, Liz was an incredible woman with an unbridled and diverse range of interests and passions. She was a science fiction aficionado - introducing me to such treasures as Ender's Game, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and filk music. She wrote scifi and poetry. Her love of motorcycling was chronicled in her blog, Moto-Mojo. Her solo road-trip through Belgium and France and resulting escapades were a riveting travelogue and vicarious delight.

Liz died on her motorcycle riding back from a charity event that she regularly participated in for Toronto's Rape Crisis Centre. Please consider making a donation in Liz's honour via her CanadaHelps WROAR Ride campaign page.

I owe so much of my Internet career to Liz. After graduating from Humber's Internet management program in 1999, I went to work for a start-up doing programming. It wasn't my cup of tea, but already the dot.com bubble was bursting, as were career opportunities. I really wanted to make content and direct the structure and offerings of websites. I applied for a job at AOL that I didn't get, but a colleague of Liz's referred my name to her. I got a call from Liz about a web producer opening for Quicken.ca. I never liked personal finance and had no background in it, but Liz was so engaging and encouraging, I decided to set up an interview.

I didn't show up. Normally, not showing up for an interview is a definitive act, but Liz called me back. She instinctively knew my concerns and convinced me that my skills and interests could be applied, so I interviewed and started working at Quicken.ca in 2000. Liz was right; it was a great opportunity. She and the Quicken team were excellent role models and teammates. We built an incredible, innovative website together. One of the projects that Liz and I worked on together that I'm most proud of is the University Planner - the first tool in Canada to use StatsCan data to help students calculate and plan for the actual cost of a university education.

Liz also offered daily guidance at our regular morning meetings that she set up. The team would discuss topical news and project details every morning. Through Liz, I learned how to write killer homepage teasers (among them the "Vince Carter teaser" where attaching a celebrity name to any topic guaranteed click-throughs).

The dot.com burst hit the Rogers' online properties hard, so we all moved on to other projects. If it wasn't for Liz, I would likely not have had the opportunity to be a web producer, a job that I loved.

It was Liz who shaped my love of understanding what users want and figuring out how to offer content and experiences to meet their needs. She gave me the career outlet to refine my skills and interests, which I continue to expand through my PhD studies.

On a personal level, Liz was a close friend to me and my family. Liz befriended everyone she met and managed to find time to support all her many friends. As my wife recalls, "You were such a thoughtful, generous person and a true friend. I'll never forget how you actually volunteered to read my tediously long master's thesis (not even my own husband would look at it) and made such kind and supportive comments. You will be greatly missed!"

On her Facebook page, Liz described herself as "an incurable optimist, a collection of contradictions and a cultural hybrid." It was these elements that made her not only a wonderful person to know but such an important person in the history of Canada's Internet.

We miss you Liz!

Update:

Here is Liz's obituary in the Toronto Star and a news story on Liz and the accident on Global.

Libraries and the Mobile Web 2.0

2011-06-06T12:18:00.003-04:00

Earlier this year, I looked at the convergence of social media and mobile library applications. I found this was an area that could have a lot of potential to augment information services, but found little innovation in this area. The intersection of increasing user involvement in creating, finding, and sharing their own information, combined with the direct and ubiquitous access of mobiles has prompted discussion in library literature, but it appears little action - yet.

It appears that initial usage of social media by libraries focused on promotion and communication between librarians and patrons. For example, social networking sites, podcasts, and blogs were used to share library information and news (e.g., location, hours, new collections, events, etc.).

Libraries are also using social media to build a sense of community around the library through such means as book blogs and online forums (for example, a book club). Rather than focus on specific technologies, Rutherford attempted to examine the role of social media by libraries (2008). She interviewed public librarians and found social media used for four main purposes: 1) community development, 2) patron outreach and acquisition, 3) communication expansion, and 4) power distribution.

Rutherford found on the whole, that social media was not often used by libraries, and when it was, that it was used predominantly in a limited way. For example, libraries are allowing patrons to comment on library information or submit questions in new ways, but are not offering users the functionality to create content. This may be due to the profession wishing to maintain expertise and information authority and accuracy standards (Rutherford, 2008).

My review of the literature revealed the following types of social media usage by libraries:

collaborative information filtering and recommendation via user-generated ratings and reviews and collective usage data)
enhanced information retrieval via user-generated metadata and social search
content and annotation creation by users individually and collectively (e.g., via wikis, blogs)
information sharing via social networking sites and syndication.

I found no examples of mobile libraries social media functions other than the viewing of user-generated content (please let me know of any). There are signs, however, that social media for m-libraries have emerged this year.

In January 2010, Library Thing released their Library Anywhere mobile application that connects a library's online public access catalog (OPAC with Library Thing’s user-supplied rating and review data.

Similarly, SirsiDynix upgraded their BookMyne mobile application in November 2010 to add social recommendation data provided by the book social network Goodreads. Such user-generated metadata has been added as an information overlay of OPAC displays before. This functionality allows users to see how others have tagged a book and browse resources tagged similarly.

In addition to social metadata, researchers have found that mobile users want to annotate information resources for individual organization and/or social sharing. Amazon has demonstrated the potential of harnessing collective annotations Their e-Reader, Kindle, has a highlights feature that allows users to upload their e-book highlights. Amazon aggregates these highlights to display the collective sense of a work’s key passages.

The importance for libraries to offer similarly innovative functionality is highlighted by Lippincott who wonders,

Will libraries move quickly to implement strategies for mobile devices, moving beyond pilot projects, such as SMS text message in reference, that address only one segment of user needs? Will the library be perceived as less and less central to the academy’s content needs? (p. 212)

Portable Device Purchase Paralysis

2011-06-01T17:56:00.005-04:00

For the past few months, I have wanted to purchase a portable computing device but have been paralyzed by an inability to determine what best to buy. I don't have the budget to buy everything, so I've been trying to decide whether to buy a tablet, e-reader, or netbook. Recently our laptop computer has been gravely ill and so this adds to my purchase dilemma.

Basically, my requirements for a portable device is that it facilitates reading, note-taking, word processing, and Internet browsing. I'd also like something that plays DVDs as this has proven invaluable for entertaining my daughter when direly needed.

Media coverage and reviews of these devices hasn't helped me choose what to buy. Fortunately, my faculty provides loaners of tablets, netbooks, and e-readers, so I have been able to take these out for a test drive.

Recently, I tried an iPad for a few days. My faculty doesn't have an iPad 2, but from what I gather iPad 2 significantly differs in offering more content creation functionality. As this isn't essential for me, the original iPad seemed like it would meet most of my needs.

Within a few moments of using the iPad, I was greatly impressed on how user-friendly and intuitive it is. I have never used touchscreen devices beyond various service kiosks or amusements, but I was able to start using it within seconds. I have seen demos and tried it on in stores so I wasn't completely new on what to do, but considering how limited my prior experience was, the ease of use is a sufficient accomplishment.

Apple's user experience (UX) status is legendary, but my prior (all bad) experiences with Mac and the cultish fervour of Apple devotees had put me off Apple for years. I didn't have an instruction manual or getting started guide (not that these have historically been particularly useful). So it did take me trial-and-error playing around to figure out some operational functions.

Overall, I found the iPad to be a great content consumption device as hyped. The display of graphics and documents are better than any other mobile device or even a regular desktop computer I've encountered. Graphics looked amazing! I was also very impressed with how quickly programs load and close. The touch interface to read documents is incredible - it is so easy to turn pages, adjust display size, or to zoom in.

The device also passed the public transit test. On a crowded bus or subway, it is impossible to use most devices except smartphones. I even found it annoying to use a netbook without a stable surface to set it on - so using it at live events or lectures is often difficult. But the iPad in contrast, due to its size, weight, and on-screen keyboard enable it to be used in the less-than-ideal environments that I frequent.

Even though the device itself was relatively easy and convenient to use, there were some serious usability problems. The iPod doesn't handle direct light well, as I found the Kobo e-reader did. I was surprised that I couldn't view at all the screen with my sunglasses on (the polarizations must not like each other) which is a real pain in sunny conditions. The omnipresent fingerprints on the screen also drove me crazy.

The device seems to have problems discerning a precise location of a user's touch. This was a huge problem when trying to edit notes as it seems impossible to direct the cursor to the middle of a word. Similarly, web-browsing was unnecessarily painful as it was often too difficult to click on links or open menus.

The two things that I most hated with the iPad were the difficulty in typing and the inability to import photos any way without an iTunes account. I read a workaround to avoid using iTunes to import photos, but really it shouldn't be necessary. I definitely would like a USB port, which would make importing photos and connecting to other devices much easier. The difficulty in typing is a major barrier as I need to regularly take notes at live events or lectures or to compose blog posts and papers. I found the on-screen keyboard lacked any way to non-visually confirm that my fingers were correctly positioned. As a result, I made more errors. Also one had to toggle to another keyboard screen for the number and other keys, which slowed me down way too much.

Other annoying things with the iPad were the lack of a spell-checker, the inability to have two programs running simultaneously, and a lack of persistent application menus (or at least an easy way to recall them).

Still of all the devices I've recently test driven, I am leaning to an iPad. Each device has its advantages, but as I can only afford one I need something with more functionality than an e-Reader offers. Netbooks are better for typing than an iPad but aren't as flexibly usable as iPods, nor is reading on them as good. I'm not considering RIM's tablet, PlayBook, as it is too small and I want to have access to the latest and most innovative apps as seems best with Apple.

Although the iPad may be the best option, I am unconvinced that the problems outweigh the cost. I find typing to be so difficult that it is a deal-breaker for me.

This all may be a moot point, however. Recently the Toronto Transit Commission has put up posters advising riders not to use electronic devices due to theft. I ride the TTC regularly and have never perceived theft problem, but it must be for the TTC to post warnings. At least no one will wants to steal my print-outs, course books, or notepads. So I'll probably have to make do with just old tech and my smartphone for awhile longer.

Elegy for Yahoo

2011-05-22T17:41:00.002-04:00

I remember when there was no Google and Yahoo ruled the roost. Google clearly dominates now in functionality and commercial success, but over the years I've maintained a devotion to Yahoo that began even before there was a Google. My experience with Yahoo, however, provides a lesson of how to lose customers and also reflects Yahoo's progressive irrelevance.

When I first signed on to the Internet in 1997 it was via Yahoo (at the public library even). I even signed up for a Yahoo email account before I even knew anyone who could email me. Over the years, I relied and loved Yahoo's calendar, notepad, document storage service, photo albums, toolbar, and of course their search directory service.

My odd email moniker for Yahoo seem destined. Even before my wife and I had Internet access, I told my wife in my sleep one day to email me. When she asked what my email address was I answered appropriately (and without irony as I was asleep): glen @ sleep. When my wife told me of my somnolent discussion, it inspired me to get an email account. Shortly thereafter, I was at the local library and when I went to create my email account, I mistyped my username. The name stuck even when I was later able to open other Yahoo usernames with more indicative usernames.

Even as bigger and better services came along I stuck with my Yahoo account. This was partly due to the time and learning curve to fully switch over to a new service, but also for sentimental and brand loyalty reasons.

As Yahoo shut down services or failed to innovate sufficiently, I was forced to switch to other services. First Yahoo shut down their photo album service and encouraged people to move over to their recently-purchased service Flickr, but with restrictive caps. So I moved to PhotoBucket and Facebook albums. Then Yahoo's document storage service, Briefcase, shut down and I moved to Google Docs. Then, as I started subscribing to more email newsletters, Yahoo did not have enough or sufficiently sophisticated filter mechanisms to prevent regular email avalanches. So I opened a Gmail account for my newsletters even though I don't like a lot of Gmail's interface.

It was just this week, however, that Yahoo dealt their own death blow with their "upgrade" to their calendar feature. As I juggle an endless barrage of events related to my studies, professional career, and my family life I rely daily on my online calendar. When I got my smartphone BlackBerry, I loved how the device's calendar synched (comparatively easily - via firewire) with the Yahoo calendar and email. I don't know how I could manage now my completely chaotic schedule without this functionality.

When Yahoo recently updated their calendar, they decided not to initially support BlackBerry synching anymore or even give an expected date for said functionality. Of course they didn't say this anywhere; I just kept getting cryptic error messages and had to spend way too long figuring out what the problem was through user forums.

Google offered full support for BlackBerry synching of calendar and email - and even does it wirelessly. Wireless synching is such a huge benefit that I can't imagine how I managed to plug in to synch.

As Yahoo compelled me to switch my calendar to Google and as I have already been using so many other Google services (such as for this blog), I figured it was easier to move all my remaining Yahoo account features over to those offered by Google.

So thus ends a relationship with a company that was so formative to my Internet experience. I'm going to miss my long-time bizarre email address (it felt odd to recreate an error to use it on Gmail). I would love to continue using Yahoo, if only to help the company maintain its David vs.Goliath status against Google and Microsoft. But ultimately user experience is more crucial than brand loyalty.

Discovering Discovery 2011

2011-05-20T19:54:00.021-04:00

Silicon Valley like its metallic namesake is shiny and alluring to those in the tech and digital media sector. In comparisson, Ontario often seems dull and staid. Although Canada has had its share of tech and Net success stories over the years, the news and blogs are saturated with coverage of the happenings in the Valley. Often Canadian tech companies are only covered in mainstream media when they sell out or move down south.

I have felt that Canada, and Ontario in particular, needs to do more to chronicle, honour, and foster our own companies and entrepreneurs. In my small way, I've attempted to help by compiling a list of Canadian Internet luminaries and success stories. I was thus happy to learn about Discovery 2011 conference and tradeshow this week in Toronto.

The conference in its sixth year is organized by Ontario Centres of Excellence. OCE's mandate is to foster innovation in Ontario and help commercialize local research. I'm glad I went to this conference as it was a refreshingly interesting and useful. Most of the tech and Internet conferences I've been to in Toronto generally suffer from being too focused on marketing and miss other crucial components. This conference had an excellent blend of presentations and demonstrations on new innovations, policy discussions, and social and business condiserations.

Due to scheduling conflicts I wasn't able to make it to all the events I would have liked (such as Bill Buxton's keynote). The conference and tradeshow represented a huge cross-section of topics from infastructure, sustainable development, healthcare, and media. It also attracted a wide range of attendees from inventors, investors, students, professors, business execs, start-up founders and representatives of government & NGO programs. I find this a good mix and led to much more interesting conversations than I usually encounter at conferences.
As a side note, it was interesting to hear from academics who have left academia for corporate research or to start their own companies. I don't have entrepreunerial drive, but it was encouraging to talk to people who were able to put their PhDs to good use outside the ivory tower. I received a lot of encouragement to build an app for my dissertation, with BumpTop frequently provided to me as an example of a fellow UofT grad student who very successfully commericialized his thesis.

The mix of topics and attendees (2600 of them) did result that in some presentations not necessarily appealing directly to the interests of all attendees. As such, there were keynotes that weren't up my alley. Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty briefly mentioned Canada's history of innovation "from Imax to pablum and insulin to goalie masks" but his talk was largely on the importance of water (the conference was held in conjunction with H20: Ontario Global Water Leadership Summit). Similarly, David G. Thomson's keynote on how to take one's company to billion dollar revenue sadly wasn't particularly applicable to me.

The Future is 3D and it's here (in Ontario)
The event also hosted the subconference Ontario Projection: Advances in 3D. I initially figured that this would also be an area not relevant to my research on mobile media, but I attended sessions nonetheless as I cannot resist the allure of 3D. But the first panel asserted that the largest growth area for 3D content will be on mobile devices (ahead of film, tv, and gaming). One panelist predicts that mobile devices will offer ubiquitous 3D functionality before televisions. Having mostly encountered 3D through the animated feature films or amusement attarctions I attended with my young daughter, I admit I hadn't taken 3D media particularly seriously nor had I considered the possible implications for my research.

What I particularly liked about the presentations at the 3D conference is the points were backed by screenings. One such example was given by contrasting a Lexus commercial in 2D and then again in 3D. I found the first version boring and nondescript. It was also visually unappealing as it largely monochromatic, i.e. a white car against a white backdrop. I am not into gimmicks (or cars for that matter) but the 3D version was a completely different experience. The shots of car interiour were really immersive - I felt I was in the driver seat (and one much higher-end than I usually drive). When the presenter, James Stewart, polled the audience on their preference, it was unamimous that the 3D vesion was superior. Steward added that this finding has been backed up by audience studies.

The defining moment for me came when Stewart screened a clip Werner Herzog's new 3D film Cave of Forgotten Dreams about France's ancient cave drawings. Stewart asked "Who wants to look at a wall in 2D?" and the clip was so remarkably rich and detailed that the answer was conclusive - we all will.

Although I do think 3D has the potential to be more immersive, realistic, and engaging than 2D, I though that much of the effect was due to the novelty of the experience. As Stewart replied however that this was also the case for HD television. Initially, we were wowed by HD nature shows and sportcasts but now we appreciate in much broader genres. This is certainly my experience from being blown away by HD coverage of Vancouver's Winter Olympics to now wanting even my sitcoms to be in HD. The conference raised a lot of the obstacles that need to be overcome before we see widespread 3D, such as removing the need for glasses, avoiding headaches and blurring for those with vision problems, and the need for artistic maturity. I am glad to see Ontario taking a leading role, including my alma mater York University's 3D FLIC project.

Mobiles - Where's the new gold rush?
The conference offered a mobile website. A mobile app or site could be a tremendous aid to getting speaker and session info, wayfinding, and networking, but in this instance the execution was rather basic and buggy. But mobile technology was well addressed by a panel on the "App Revolution" moderated by Kunal Gupta (Polar Media) with Amar Varma (Extreme Ventures), Anand Agarawala (Google, formerly BumpTop), Krista Napier (IDC), and Michele Perras (MEIC & Transcontinental). To provide proof of the recent tech revolution, Gupta presented a selection of old versus new contrasts: Mubarak vs. #egypt, Blockbuster vs. Netflix, Ken Jennings vs. Watson.

The market for mobile media is anticipated to increase as more smartphones will be shipped this year in Canada than traditional cellphones. But as Perras acknowledged the fragmentation of devices remains the biggest challenge for content developers. This point was also raised in another session where one panelist advised using a mobile website to counter this. But as a speaker stated that the market access and promotion opportunities of app stores is essential for businesses. Agarawala also credits part of his sucess on the app store model as it is a crucial way for people to learn about apps, read reviews, and facilitate downloads.

Another dimension of market access for apps was raised by Napier, highlighting research that shows that bulk of consumers do not download any apps. She thus believes that it is essential for more apps to be preinstalled on devices in order for users to gain familiarity and comfort with using apps, necessary before we see more widespread adoption of the technology. Perras also cautions that consumers are not yet sufficiently savy for "the scope of our ideas to to fit the market uptake". Although the pace of innovation is rapid, it is also "very hard to differentiate between vapourwarde and long-term products", which Perras notes makes it difficult to engage in partnerships.

As for the market opportunities in Ontario for mobile app developers - there was consensus that Toronto has been a hotbead of recent innovation in this sector, but that not enough is being done by government, citizens, or investors to foster growth here. Investors here are too traditional and short-term focused to embrace cutting edge development. Governments offer helpful capital but the process of aquiring funding is too drawn out and time-consuming. Ontarian consumers and businesses are reluctant to try out very new technology and start-ups need market proof and case studies to be able to expand. Silicon Valley, on the other hand, has much more of an experimental culture that creates this necessary testbed - as well as a more fertile investment climate.

Ontario's economic growth
In a sentiment I agree with, Varma said he cringed when the Ontario and Canadian governments bailed out the auto industry. "Our economy would be way better if the investment was in our knowledge economy" Varma commented. He believes that this is essential to our economy rather than manufacturing or resource extraction. The problem with goverment support of the new economy was addressed by a keynote by Glen Murray, Ontario Minister of Research and Innovation. He identifies the perceptual barrier among voters with government funding new economy enterprises as it is not as conventional or visible to a community as old industry smokestacks. But Murray does believe that we are not in a "typical recession so we won't have a typical recovery... the recovery will be in high-value and high knowledge".

The Ontario government, however, has been trying to foster the new economy through new grants, agencies (including the OCE), and the recently-announced Social Innovation Wiki. Ontario, Murray lauded, is the first government to open up public input to policy through such online means. Such innovation, he added, is an example of what governments should be doing to exemplify and involve citizens in the new economy and it "didn't cost us anything". With innovation replacing production as the leading soruce of wealth in Ontario, Murray emhasized the critical importance of this area.

DemoCamp
Discovery 2011 concluded for me through a DemoCamp session. DemoCamps are unconference events where start-ups have a few minutes to pitch their new product or service. The companies participating were all from Ontario with web-based services. The five pitches came from:

Epic - task management
500 Pixels - photography portfolios
Maintenance Assistance - asset management
My Legal Briefcase - personal litigation help
Wave - accounting for small biz

I was glad to have the opportunity to hear more about cool local projects, but the presentations, with the exception of My Legal Briefcase, were lacklustre. Two of the five companies had techical problems in delivering their demo. I've had similar problems and learned the hard way to have mutliple back-ups and failsafes, and to set-up before the audience arrives. At times, I found it difficult to discern the unique value proposition were for some of the companies even though they were clearly impressive products.

Agarawala who successful lead his software company BumpTop to an aquistion by Google offered tips: "Don't be a derivative start-up. Be interesting and not another check-in or social media app." He echoed other comments heard at the conference that many sectors such as healthcare and B2B direly need more innovation and offer opportunities to create new markets rather than flood existing ones. Agarawala offered the tweet test as a way to stand out. "Give people something to talk about" with your product or at least attach your project to a story or trend.

The collective tips and demos from Discovery 11 are inspiring me to consider developing an app for my dissertation research. Either way, as a citizen of Ontario, I was inspired to see so much tech innovation happening here. Considering the large tradeshow, cross-section of attendees, hot topics, and good speakers I feel that Discovery is easily Toronto's best tech conference.

The Role of Geotargetted Information Via Mobile Devices in Shaping Sense of Place

2011-05-09T13:03:00.003-04:00

Moving to the downtown core of a large city from my semi-suburban hometown, I felt impressed by - yet detached from - my urban surroundings. I enjoyed the heterogeneity of the architecture and historical roots of my new city and also appreciated the diversity of civic and citizen cultural locations – so unlike my hometown. Although I had visited the city before moving there and was familiar with the prominent buildings and main streets, I lacked a sense of the place. As a newcomer, I did not have the personal contacts to receive the insider knowledge from my neighbours.

The layers of meaning implicit in a given place include the social, historical, political, and personal. An example of these dimensions can be seen by looking at Toronto Street in downtown Toronto. It is easy to miss Toronto Street as it runs only one block, but it used to be a main thoroughfare. Today, Toronto Street is populated by a handful of generic, low and medium rise office towers. What is not immediately apparent is that this street is where Conrad Black destroyed evidence, that it has a restaurant with amazing paninis, that there is a hidden parkette providing an oasis of rose bushes and fountains, that falcons have been reintroduced nearby and often swoop and prey overhead, or that it is the former site of public executions, including leaders of the Upper Canada Rebellion.

Until recently one would not have been easily able to tap into that diversity of information instantly and on the spot. To learn the above information about Toronto Street (also the site of my former workplace) and the other new places I regularly traversed, I consulted various information sources, such as periodicals, books, and walking tours. Eventually, I got to know my new city well. Not only did I develop a strong sense of the civic and social history of the place, I also developed personal relationships to the places I frequented as my life experiences grew.

Sense of place is foundational, as it not only aids individuals in developing attachments to their surroundings, but it also contributes to the formation of personal identity. It is helpful at this point to note the geographic distinction between space, the physical terrain and features of Earth - and place, the meaning humans ascribe to space. Differing from spatial cognition with a psychological focus on our perceptions of space and way-finding, scholars of sense of place often consider phenomenological aspects. Drawing upon the philosophers Husserl and Heidegger, sense of place can be defined as how an individual conceives of space and ascribes meaning to it. Having a sense of place is seen as a fundamental component of human identity from fostering community to shaping our mindful existence.

Geographic technologies such as global positioning devices and geographic information systems have introduced powerful abilities to analyze and visualize space and place. Recent market and technological developments have now given citizens access to powerful geographic tools. The convergence of distributed network access offered by the Internet, growing ubiquity of mobile devices, and open geographic information systems (such as Google Maps), have propelled increasing user functionality for location-based applications. Place is no longer a back-drop for information seeking, creation, and sharing as current mobile applications can customize information based on a user's geographic position.

Information objects from fiction to non-fiction are rich with geographic references whether as subject, setting, or - in all cases - the location of the publication or production. Due to a lack of widespread georeferencing of information sources in libraries, on the Internet, or elsewhere, my search strategies were restricted to what turned up with a key word and category search. The novels of Margaret Atwood, for example, that refer to my neighborhood never turned up in a search. Ontario's public libraries are increasingly offering local historical information in digital format, such as the Ontario Time Machine and Knowledge Ontario's OurOntario.ca projects, yet rarely are such projects georeferenced, let alone optimized for viewing on a mobile device. Although I now feel a deep sense of place, it was a delayed and haphazard process that resulted in years where I felt detached from place.

With the growing ubiquity of mobile location-based applications, I was struck by the question of whether this technology could help foster a sense of place. Although numerous human geographers have grappled with the relational, cultural, and perceptual aspects of place, few scholars appear to have examined the role of information in the development of an individual's sense of a place. Moreover, the specific nature and impact of on-the-spot geographically relevant information appears to have not been adequately examined. Although my research is still in the formation stage, I hope in my doctoral research to explore how mobile location-based information systems affect one's sense of place. Over the months as I explore this research topic, I plan to blog about my findings and the nature of sense of place and geotargetted information.

Types of Geotargetted Information

2011-04-18T13:25:00.014-04:00

Last week, I was presenting on my research on geotargetted information delivered via mobile devices. I claimed that mobile applications were revolutionary in their ability to detect a user's location and then return content about that location.

Humans have a long history of delivering information pertaining to a location at the specific location. So I was careful not to claim they were the first such medium to do this. But I do think mobile devices (including GPS devices) are only medium other than humans that can customize the content based on the user.

The scope of geotargetted information can range from the country to the building level. Generally, this type of technology strives for content geographically relevant from the exact location (footprint) of users to a few blocks in their vicinity.

Below is a list of sources both that are permanently affixed to a location (or move seldom) to one's that can pass through a location.

I've included sources still used today and some historical ones (including phone booth directories, remember those?). The messages that these media convey can range from the simple (e.g. one-word territory marker or a sale ad) to the complex (e.g. lengthy histories or narratives). Although some of my examples below are used largely for advertising and are not exclusively used for geotargetted information, they do have potential for other forms as well.

Permanently situated sources (or semi-permanent):

signs or notes (e.g. store signs, trail markers, etc.)
posters (sanctioned or non-official
graffiti
plaques (e.g. on building, in cement, on pole)
plaques directing to call specific phone numbers (e.g. per murmur project)
street signs, lamp post signs
phone directories in phone booths
info or help desks/booths people (e.g. at a mall, museum, visitor centre)
electronic directories or guides
billboards
media facades
sandwich boards
screens and monitors
sculptures
flags

Transient sources:

word of mouth
walking tours (e.g. lead by guide)
audio tours
books, e-books (e.g. guidebooks, history books, novels)
guestbooks
maps, atlases, chartspamphlet (e.g. local sites)
personal memories
newspapers (local or otherwise)
GPS devices
website (whether accessed via a mobile device or laptop)
geocoded user-generated content (e.g. photographs, tweets, reviews)

I'd love to know of any further examples, case studies, or research in this area.

Update on My Research Plans

2011-04-14T14:59:00.004-04:00

Yesterday, I presented for my faculty an update on my research status. It includes my intended research topic and plans.

I got some great feedback and even more things to read and even more angles to consider. I was originally very keen to examine how a given mobile application/site's interface and interactions affects usage and could possibly be improved. I've been encouraged to focus on advancing theory more so than any possible applied findings. But two of my panelists, both professors at iSchool encouraged me to continue with an applied focus too.

The presentation here as a stronger focus on the background theory and possible contributions therein.

To see the speaker notes, click through to the actual full presentation on Google and click to open the speaker notes pop-up.

Any suggestions thoughts would be great.

Mobile Experience Innovation Centre

2011-04-09T14:17:00.003-04:00

The Mobile Experience Innovation Centre (MEIC) held their inaugural annual general meeting this week in Toronto.

MEIC began as a research project in 2007 at OCAD University and has grown now to be an independent, non-profit organization that fosters research and industry development of mobile technology and media in Ontario.

The meeting was precided by the incomparable and apparently never-exhausting Sara Diamond, OCADU's president. She clearly takes a particular interest in the area based on her ongoing championing of MEIC and her regular presence at mobile events.

Over the years, MEIC has lead research projects, sponsored events, and supported start-ups. But it now appears poised to grow into a major force in the Canadian and international mobile sector. Other than a vision to support the sector in Ontario, MEIC has the required level of partnerships (and funding) from a variety of government, education, major corporations and start-ups to actually achieve their goals.

Personally, I'm glad to see MEIC's continued presence. I've been attending MEIC events for over a year as they have consistently offered great speakers and timely topics. There are other tech groups that meet in Toronto, but I've found that they are usually an excuse for non-stop schmoozing with no original discussion and often not even a speaker. So I have found MEIC refreshingly relevant and focused.

Socially and economically, I believe MEIC is direly need to foster Ontario and Canada's tech sector. With the lure of the larger markets and buckets of VC down south and successive indifferent governments, Canada's tech sector has not been all it could be. Mobiles really are the next BIG thing, so it is important we create an enviousness that allows academic research to see fruition and for innovation to develop and remain local.

MEIC has already had some success through their mentorship and incubator programs. The AGM offered presentations by two success stories: Guardly and Normative Labs.

Guardly has launched its mobile, security application on iPhone's App store this week (as covered by a good article in TechCrunch, Guardly Watches Your Back, From The Mean Streets Of Toronto). Guardly, in a nutshell, facilitates coordination of officials and friends in the event the mobile user has an emergency. As a parent with a daughter that will no doubt have a mobile device before even reaching highschool, I think there is tremendous value for such an application. I can also see it being popular with caregivers of seniors, the seriously ill, or cognitively disabled people.

Normative Labs also presented on their findings based on their mobile applications the game Red Rover and an app for public-monitoring of surveillance. They found some interesting observation about how people document their world and the role of game-playing in facilitating location-based app usage.

In addition to supporting start-ups, MEIC also has efforts to support the larger mobile sector. One such effort is a report on the status of Ontario's mobile sector for Canada's trade commissioners - which will be of interest more locally as well. More individually, they have events planned for skills training, such as workshops and bootcamps (not cheap, however), and conferences that examine contemporary industry trends and research.

Several working groups were set up at the AGM to cover mobile-related policy, national and international outreach, trends, programs, and start-ups. I signed up for a working group to foster and promote academic and industry research. My research clearly fits well with the goals of MEIC and it's great to have a venue for academic insight to reach beyond the fabled ivory towers, as well as to provide ties to industry that can make use of such research.

I'm hopeful that MEIC will be prove beneficial personally and provincially!

Georeferencing

2011-04-04T14:57:00.002-04:00

Place is no longer a brackdrop for our information seeking, creation, and sharing. As I have blogged about there are multiple location-based mobile apps. Such apps enable information to be customized based on a user’s geographic position. Various commercial applications and research projects have shown users value geographic relevance in their information seeking scenarios.

For location-based services to function, three components must be in place: 1) the ability to discern a mobile user’s location 2) the ability to discern the geographic footprint of desired resources 3) the ability to determine the geographic relevance of resources to the user's query (e.g. proximity).

Documents and texts from fiction to non-fiction are rich with geographic references whether as subject, setting, or - in all cases - the location of the publication or production. But the geographic details of most information is not explicitly stated - or if it is stated, it is not done so in a manner that is ideal for location-based services.

To make the geographic footprint (i.e. the location on Earth that a document references) explicit, georeferencing presents an optimal solution. Methods such as a keyword or title search, for instance, may not provide sufficient detail. Place names found in text may be ambiguous, antiquated, vague, overly broad, or implied (e.g. the capital of Canada). I believe that georeferencing is therefore essential for location-based services.

Georeferencing is the ability to relate geographic location to information. This may come from a textual reference to place in the body of a document or as a geospatial metadata. Georeferencing can be performed through automation or human effort by information professionals or users.

The online service Flickr offers both types and is a leading source of georeferenced data on the Web. Photographs can be automatically georeferenced through metadata captured by users' digital cameras or smartphone cameras. Additionally, Flickr users can georeference their photographs by adding a place name tag to their photograph or by using a map interface provided to plot the geographic coordinates.

Information professionals can manually georeference information resources adding relevant longitude and latitude metadata, yet this neither sufficiently scales nor does it captures people’s nuanced understandings of place. Existing commercial applications such as Foursquare, Facebook Places, and Gowalla offer a model of collaborative, social systems and interfaces that facilitate large-scale georeferencing.

So as one of my research areas, I'm wondering if such social model would work for digital information sources? This could apply not only to digital libraries or archives but also newspapers, Wikipedia, etc? Folksonomies have proven effective for generating this similar metadata? Would it work for georeferencing?

e-Learning Platforms in a Nutshell

2011-03-28T21:12:00.004-04:00

I've been examining e-learning methods over the past two months for a client. As a student and teaching assistant I have experience from both ends of e-learning. I've found that there are a lot of ways to online educational opportunities. But e-Learning platform appear to be gaining popularity as a comprehensive and integrated solution.

An e-learning platform (also called an online learning management system or LMS) is a website that embeds various Internet media and educational processes. The basic unit for an e-learning platform is an individual course, but a student's entire course load can be offered within the same website.

An e-learning platform comprises three main components, each with various functionality and access levels (often called a view):

1) Student view - students can read, view and/or interact with course content and communicate and collaborate with teachers and fellow students.

2) Instructor view - instructors can structure courses, post content, interact with students, receive assignments, and post grades for their designated courses.

3) Administrator view - a more technical role, administrators run the LMS, which includes both front-end decisions such as granting access rights and archiving, as well as back-end work such as ensuring the platform integrates with other necessary technology.

There are other types of access levels such as guest (i.e. can only view designated areas) and teaching assistant (i.e. similar to instructor but with reduced privileges).

Options
Most e-learning platforms have a core offering and optional additional functionality (which may be add-on or plug-in software). Within the core offering instructors choose which tools to use and how to structure their course.

Leading Products
There are two dominant leaders: Blackboard and Moodle.

Blackboard is a for-profit company. Blackboard will either enable users to install and run the system on their own servers or offer a hosted solution (i.e. that is the software and database resides on the company's servers and is maintained by them). For extensive information on Blackboard the University of Toronto's Blackboard pages are helpful.

Moodle is open-source, which means a global collective of people jointly develop and support the software and make it available to others to use for free. You can download the software and install it on your server and run and customize it for yourself. Alternatively, there are companies that will host the software for you on their servers and maintain it. To get a sense of Moodle, there is a demo that allows you to see a sample of it from a student or teacher view.

Other main LMS organizations include Desire2Learn a commercial service based in Kitchener, Ontario, Haiku, and Sakai an open-source solution.

Goals of a e-learning platforms

information - offer course material
communication - news and discussions amongst instructors and students
collaboration - jointly-authored assignments or presentations
evaluation - grading by instructors, feedback from

Product Features

Informational tools may consist of:

Lessons - instructor-supplied text or multimedia content (e.g. podcasts, videos)
Resources - instructors or students can post webpages, PDFs, images, audio, or video files
Glossary - a course-related terms appearing as links or a list

Communication tools may consist of:

Announcements - posted by instructor to the LMS homepage
Updates - course news or recent discussions received via RSS feeds or emails
Forums - threaded discussions
Chats - live text-based chat room

Collaboration tools may consist of:

Wiki - collaborative document editing
Calendar - team and/or class-based scheduling
Blogs - individual text-based articles
Groups - instructors can divide classes into smaller units

Evaluation tools may consist of:

Quizzes - with automatic grading (if multiple choice)
Assignments - allow students to upload a file and receive grade & comments
Grading - instructors assign grades and manage class averages
Surveys - poll the class on course topics or offer their evaluation of instructor
Ratings - students can provide assign their value to a lesson

Benefits of a LMS

integrated, all-in-one place solution, which allows:

connections and cross-linking of various course materials
only one interface for students and teachers to learn
simplicity of finding all course material

web-based administration
can ensure all course content follows academic institutional policies and jurisdictional regulations (e.g. accessibility, privacy, security) - if not using a hosted solution
no advertising appears (except with some free, hosted solutions)
extensive functionality
streamlined grading processes

Concerns

requires some IT knowledge and skills (if not using a hosted solution), such as

installation
integration with web server and database
quality assurance and trouble-shooting
back-ups and archiving
user tech support
customization

hosted solution may entail data being stored outside of Canada (and therefore not subject to our laws, e.g. privacy)
high cost for commercial software or for hosted solution
likely more functionality than most instructors need or students will ever use
cloistered environment, which omits participation and exposure to other interested people or ideas

Other Considerations
There are benefits (beyond financial) to using non-integrated solutions such as free web-based applications such as blogging tools, social networks (Facebook), Google Docs, Twitter, YouTube, etc. EDUCAUSE published a 2-page paper on this topic entitled 7 Things You Should Know About LMS Alternatives

e-Learning platforms cover a broad array of concerns from technological to pedagogical and from usability to feasibility. This post was meant to cover the basics.

IPTV - TV over the Internet with Bell Fibe

2011-03-24T14:57:00.019-04:00

I'm not afraid to admit it I haven't had cable tv in over 8 years - until recently that is. Partly this is due the ubiquitous crap on tv and it's partly due to the fact that I'm a horrid tv addict.

Alternatives
In Toronto, an antenna will pick up a bunch of channels, so a cable or satellite package isn't necessary. We bought a digital antenna last year and got high definition channels and US signals. But then the American channels stopped sending their signals over the air, and we definitely missed PBS. We also rented, bought, borrowed and signed out from the library a lot of DVDs. This kind of on-demand service better suited our lifestyle and viewing preferences.

When TV channels and YouTube started offering more and more content online about 3 years ago we loved being able to watch what we want without charge. But either hooking up our laptop to our tv or watching programs on the laptop was a poor experience, so we didn't do it often.

Bell Fibe
My kid and wife have been pestering me for ages to get cable. Around Christmas I was feeling generous when Bell called offering their IPTV service - Bell Fibe. The price was good - $27 a month for the basic package with 2 years free use of a personal video recorder (PVR). As an Internet fanatic, I was also intrigued by the idea of receiving my tv signal via the Net.

I'm not sure how Bell Fibe compares to other services. Still, here are my experiences for anyone considering Bell Fibe or IPTV.

Signal quality
There is occassionally buggy or no reception - this happens every few days, including during our fav shows. I never experienced this in the many years of cable nor have I seen it when watching satellite tv at others' houses, so this is a problem. If we have the fan on in the same room as our receiver the signal is a mess - this will be a huge problem in summer.

Can't surf the Net on TV
I believe the salesperson promised me the ability to surf the Net seamlessly from our TV. I was definitely promised faster download speeds for my overall surfing. Neither has happened. Bell Fibe is supposed to come with proactive monitoring to ensure that we always have highspeed, but I haven't noticed a difference. The former may have been wishful thinking on my part. We also got a Wii this Christmas and I was excited to be able to surf web on it - but the usability and viewability sucks for everything except Youtube. YouTube detects we're watching on a TV browser and offers a medium-tailored version - I wish more sites did this.

System compatibility
Before we had Bell Fibe we had a new Sony tv, an antenna, Blu-ray player, VCR (yes we still have one), and a Wii. They all played nice together and the remotes got along well. Bell Fibe needs a custom remote and has not got along well with the others. Things are hard to operate now and Bell often gets out of sync and needs annoying manual resetting.

Search & guide features
The promo material for Bell Fibe hypes their unique search capability as one of their main distinguishing traits. Users can search by program or actor up to two weeks in advance. At first, I thought this was great, but it doesn't take long to get to know when and which network a fav show is on. It was more useful when we had a free trial with a gazillion channels as I could quickly find Xena playing somewhere at any given moment. A serious flaw, however, is that the actor info for shows only lists up to four actors. And the actors listed may not necessarily be the leads or stars. Frankly stars are the only ones who anyone would search for, so this often negates the value of this feature.

Their tv guide feature seems standard to all tv services now. Listings include title, plot synopsis, date of production, rating, and cast. The guide allows one to add and then browse by favourites. A feature they don't have that I have seen and like is colour coding of channels based on channels one gets and doesn't. We have to manually remove the channels we don't get up from our guide, but this means they don't show up at all so we don't know when a channel is offering a free preview.

Split-screens - I like the ability to have the main screen stay open and have another mini-screen appear on the bottom. Also, one can browse the guide and see a mini-screen of a channel without actually having to go to that channel. I'm not sure if these features are standard on other services but they are definitely great for channel surfers such as myself.

Family friendly
I'm not sure if satellite or cable offer this feature, but I really like Bell Fibe's parental controls. I can quickly set the tv to block my kid from seeing inappropriate stuff while we channel surf. The blocking is based on ratings, however, so they are not foolproof. We can easily unlock by show or for a block of hours by entering our four digit passcode. It also blocks the pay-per-view and video-on-demand service, which is great as my six-year-old already knows how to pull these up and is enthralled by them.

At Christmas Bell had a special channel with games, music, countdown, and links to holiday programs. We loved this, but they haven't had anything else like it subsequently.

Price
Bell Fibe's pricing structures does not appear to be significantly different than other services. One cannot completely custom order channels despite Bell's claims of this. One has to get a certain high and expensive tiered service before being able to order a-la-carte. Their channel packages, as with other services, are ridiculously expensive and bundle a ton of crap with a few good channels. Video-on-demand is also crazily expensive at $12 for a new release or $7 for really, really old movies. Their VOD offerings, and preview functionality, however is impressive.

Interactive television? Not yet
One thing that does seem awesome - but is nothin yet is the "Interactive" and "Learn" buttons on remote. They don't currently do anything but apparently their our plans for this. Interactive tv - wow, I'm not holding my breath for that as it's been much-promised but little delivered for years now.

I've seen commercials that with Bell Fibe one can program the PVR via the Internet from any location. This would be great when travelling or if one forgot or suddenly heard of a must-see program. I have no idea if this service actually exists yet and I can't find any mention of it on Bell's website.

Final thoughts
Currently, Bell Fibe is only in Toronto and Montreal. They aren't the only, or first, IPTV service in Canada, as it appears to be Saskatchewan's Sasktel, offered the service since 2006. BTW - Sasktel is the first company in North America to offer HD channels over the Internet (according to the Leader-Post).

I like the price of the service and the PVR (the true game-changer). But problems with reception, particularly when our fan is on, is a definite drawback. I'm interested in possible future innovations resulting from IPTV. But I'm not completely sold on it, at least until reception is as good as - if not better - than cable or satellite.

Return of Electronic Brainstorming

2011-03-19T14:05:00.022-04:00

Using computers to facilitate brainstorming sessions has been (occassionally) talked about in academic and management fields for the last two decades, but I have never heard of it actually implemented in a real-life scenario. Back in 2008, I blogged about the potential and problems of electronic brainstorming, but I haven't encountered the topic subsequently.

Until last month, when I was invited to participate in an electronic brainstorming session for my faculty's IT department. Granted, this project was in an academic setting and was part of a research study, otherwise it was a real organizational project. The goal was to help provide ideas and prioritization for future IT projects.

Description of Electronic Brainstorming Session
The software used was SAP's Streamwork, which from a user perspective was easy to use and worked flawlessly. It probably wouldn't be difficult, however, to build such a system or make use of existing online tools to do this as the functionality is fairly simple.

The first part of the electronic brainstorming session involved using a web-based interface to generate ideas. Participants were instructed to add as many ideas as they wanted to. The software was a standard web form that allowed one to enter free-form text.

The second part of the session occurred a couple of weeks later. Using the same software, we were then asked to prioritize everyone's items. Duplicates were manually filtered out by the project coordinator, but I believe no other contributions were censored (certainly none of mine were altered). All items appeared as unordered group with no indication of the contributor. There were approximately 40 items which we then individually dragged and dropped each item and placed from top to bottom to reflect our priority order.

Pros & Cons

Volume of idea generation
In real-life scenarios there are time limits and group dynamics that make it difficult for everyone to offer their ideas. One of the benefits of electronic brainstorming is that participation can be opened up to a much larger number of participants than is feasibly possible in real-life environments. The project I participated in seemed to have a small number of people participating (i.e. under 20), but this seems a deliberate intention to use a Delphi Decision-Making process, which uses selective recruitment. If there is no management requirement to participate or incentive offered - it is possible that only the usual suspects of keeners and malcontents will volunteer. Increasing volume is not necessarily a great idea, as when it came time to prioritize I found the 40 items I had to examine was my limit of what I could keep track of and handle. Nonetheless, I have been in real-life brainstorming sessions where after a few initial ideas, it was painfully difficult to get contributions. So by opening up participation to a larger and more geographically dispersed group (if applicable) and allowing people to participate when and where they choose, it is likely that a greater number of contributions will result.

Duplication of ideas
In real-life group brainstorming sessions, participants will have seen and heard others' contributions, so there is little concern of duplication of ideas, as there is with electronic brainstorming. This can be a serious limitation as I witnessed with the Canadian government's Digital Economy Consultation last year. The government asked citizens to generate and vote on ideas. But there was so much repetition and overlap - and no means to filter or merge - that it undermined the ability to read all the items let alone vote meaningfully on specific ideas. (Not that I believe the government had a sincere desire to harvest these ideas generated anyway.) I'm not aware of a good way to automatically purge or merge duplicates. In the case of the project I participated in, someone manually had to do this. For large-scale projects this could be time-consuming, but the benefits to users are substantial.

Value of anonymity
Anonymity is a central concept of electronic brainstorming (although not a system requirement). I believe it is essential to allow free participation. Without anonymity people may not want to offer ideas for fear of being judged or challenging organizational sacred cows. Thus real-life sessions tend to be dominated by a few people, and in my experience generate ideas that are fairly safe and banal. When it comes to prioritzing ideas, anonymity is even more important as it is difficult to give a low priority to ideas from one's supervisors or befriended co-workers.

In contrast electronic brainstorming, there is no fear of real or perceived judgment or reprisals. I felt like I could say whatever I wanted to free of repercussions and could also offer ideas that I would otherwise have felt were too trivial or personally relevant. Anonymity has its downsides in that it does allow people to offer offensive ideas or unhelpful, possibly insane, rants (as per trolls and flaming on open online forums). But in a workplace setting, this hopefully won't be an issue. All the 40 ideas I encountered were valid and coherent.

Quality of ideas
Although the contributions were legit, there were some ideas that needed clarification or persuasion. There was no way to follow up with an idea originator for more information, thus the ideas must stand on their own - and some didn't. As anonymity was promised, I'm not sure if even the project facilitators were able to request a contributor to refine a contribution. It would be possible for a system to allow a facilitator to receive all contributions unidentified and then submit clarification requests via the system and consequently not identify the person. In real-life sessions, it is easy to ask someone to explain or defend their idea. If the goal is only idea generation, then this step might not be important. But when it comes time to prioritize ideas, it is essential that participants understand what they are voting on. Perhaps a step could be built into the process allowing participants or facilitators to ask for clarification prior to the prioritization.

Overall
My biggest complaint with the electronic brainstorming session I participated also applies to real-life scenarios and that is that there is no mechanism to indicate which items are to be followed up on. An ideal step of any brainstorming project would be for every item to have an official response from management on their plans on how to address it or why they are unable to. Such transparency would show participants that their input is truly valued and useful to the organization.

I feel electronic brainstorming was a better method for me. In my experience, real-life meetings tend to be dominated by a handful of people or a lot of time is wasted with group dynamics (e.g. turn-taking, social niceties, idle chit-chat). This approach not only afforded me more opportunity for me to share my ideas, it was also more time efficient.

Location-based Mobile Apps

2011-03-11T17:38:00.063-05:00

Below is a list of location-based service (LBS) mobile applications, that is the apps are able to able to determine users' physical location and then either allow them to upload content referenced to that place or to receive content relevant to that location. I categorized them based on what appears to be the applications leading purpose. However, many applications - of which Foursquare is certainly a prime example - offer overlapping functionality.

I haven't tried these all out - some of them are not available on BlackBerry (which is my only device), so I'd love to hear others' experience.

The descriptions in quotation marks are taken from that application's website.

Coordination & Safety

Crowdmap by Ushahidi - open-source hosted solution to present location-specific crowdsourced info whether for activism, crises, or community projects
Groundcrew - "coordinates on-the-ground action with your people. Use location, availability, and skills to mobilize in realtime."
Guardly - "When an emergency occurs, your personal safety network will always know where you're located....we can pin-point your exact GPS location and provide you with valuable information about what's located around you, and how it can aid your situation."

Geoannotation

Flickr - upload & search for geotagged or georeferenced photos (also the ZoneTag tool from Yahoo appears to facilitate this)
Geoloqi - "securely shari[e] location data, with features such as Geonotes, proximal notification, and sharing real-time GPS maps with friends."
Historypin - enables users to add old photographs and text narratives to locations
Murmur - recorded oral histories of place, uses old cellphone tech as users see plaque and call specific number to hear targetted message
Tagwhat - "create and share location based messages... Tag what matters to you in your personal map from your desk or mobile. Add text, urls, photos, phone numbers, or videos to your tags. Find people, companies, and causes to follow"
Task Ave - "location-aware reminders. Magically get alerts when you're nearby a task."
Voxora - "voicemail for places", integrates with Foursquare

Geosocial Networking

CheckIn+ - "all-in-one check-in app with augmented reality"
Facebook Places - "Share where you are. Connect with friends nearby. Find local deals"
Google Latitude - "See where your friends are right now"
Gowalla - "Keep up with your friends, share the places you go, and discover the extraordinary in the world around you"
Hurricane Party - "helps friends find, share, and create spontaneous parties"
Loopt - connects with Facebook to see what and where friends are - also facilitates financial incentives
Plazes - seems like basic friend finding
Skout -"find interesting singles close-by, strike up a conversation, maybe grab a drink or share a cup of coffee"

Local Discovery and Hyperlocal Information

Around Me - find business near your location by biz type (similar for gas is GasBuddy)
Google Places - "an ultimate pocket guide - personalized for you. Find, rate and share places around you"
Layar - augmented reality browser
Local Books by Library Thing "It shows you local bookstores, libraries and bookish events wherever you are or plan to be."
Nearest Wiki - "AR view, with a synopsis against points of interest near you. Tapping on the place you wish to learn more about will give you more in-depth information on the location with images" content from Wikipedia
Poynt - local search with proximity based reviews and mapping
Twitter Places - search for tweets within a specified area or tag places in your tweets
YellowPages - detects your location or enter one to retrieve nearby businesses or people
Zeitag - historical photographs

Local Recommendation

DontEat.at - Foursquare-based and only in NYC it sends "a text message when you check into a NYC restaurant that is at risk of being closed for health code violations"
Goby - suggests "fun things to do" based on your location or category (US only)
Wikitude - offers A.R., map, or list view of various types of proximal content (reviews, deals, and Wikipedia entries)
Yelp and Citysearch - user-generated local reviews combined with local search engine

Location-based Games

Booyah - they make a variety of games, including MyTown and Nightclub City
Hidden Park - "iPhone adventure game created especially for young families...lead(s) children into a fantasy world of trolls, fairies and tree genies - right in their local park"
My Town - "built around your local shops, restaurants, and hangouts. Level-up, unlock items, and earn cash to buy your favorite real-life locations."
SCVNGR - "share where you are & what you're up to with your friends. Do challenges to earn points and unlock badges & real-world rewards."
Red Rocket - Toronto transit maps, routes, schedules, and nearest stop
TapCity - "play with friends as you build and defend your very own city made up of your favorite places in the real world."

Navigation

BlackBerry Traffic by RIM uses GPS and customized maps to "establish your estimated time of arrival, find out if a road is closed, or decide to take a faster, alternate route"
MyCar Park - "capture your parking location on a map, add a photo, and comments... Then built in maps direct you to your car from your current location."
Nearest Subway - locates nearest subway station for New York, Chicago, Tokyo, Paris, Madrid, etc.

Shopping

MapDing - hyperlocal classifieds
Realtor.ca - allows a user to search and receive info and pix on properties for sale in their vicinity or across Canada. Also offers proximity-based new listings and open houses.
Shopkick - "gives you rewards and offers simply for walking into stores, for scanning products, and for signing up friends

Travel

Ask a Nomad - answered on your travel questions from fellow travellers
Compass by Lonely Planet - "plot itineraries on dynamic, GPS-enabled map. Grab practical information and useful tips using our augmented reality camera view"
MobilyTrip - social networking travel diary app
mTrip - "automatically customizes your trip itinerary...guides you to each tourist attraction with directions, uses augmented reality to display tourist attractions in your area, and allows you to share your trip with personalized e-postcards"
Ski & Snow Report - detailed ski info snow amounts, traffic volume, weather, lift times, etc)
Ski Tracks - a GPS-enabled ski log of your routes, velocity, etc. with ability to geotag your pix
Trippy - get trip advice from your social network

Early LBS applications:

Brightkite - a pioneer in place check-ins
Dodgeball - SMS, pre-cursor to Foursquare bought by Google and eventually shut down (See CNET eulogy)
Magitti - local recommendation, from PARC (see ReadWriteWeb article)
Whrrl - users joined interest and brand based groups to get recommendations, tips, and deals

I realize this list can't be exhaustive (Blackberry App world has 334 apps in their maps and navigation category alone). But it gives a sense of the range of apps that offer location-based services.

Please let me know of any corrections or ones you recommend be added to this list.

Updated December 2011

User-Generated Map & Meaning Making via Foursquare

2011-03-09T15:20:00.002-05:00

I recently presented at the conference Boundaries, Frontiers & Gatekeepers on some of my Foursquare research.

I've embedded this as a Slideshare presentation. It doesn't offer an elegant way to display the speaker notes so I had to include them as comments (if anyone knows a better way, please let me know). To view my notes, you'll need to click to Slideshare's website.

My research on location-based services, georeferencing, and mobile applications is still in the very early stages, but this presentation gives a sense of the area of my exploration.

User-Generated Map and Meaning Making via Foursquare

View more presentations from Glen Farrelly

QR Codes Tried Quite Recently

2011-03-08T00:38:00.018-05:00

On the diffusion of innovations curve, I admit I'm not the quickest adopter. Tech has to prove its value to me in a unique (and affordable) way before I'll dive in. And the positives have to outweigh the negatives. The latter point was why I waited so long to get a mobile phone - the downside of my work being able to call me whenever and wherever (without remuneration) was not worth the benefit of being able to call my wife and find out what movie to rent.

I've seen QR codes (those odd black and white box-shaped symbols) on posters and in print magazines before. I never felt the benefit of being quickly directed to a webpage while reading a magazine outweighed the effort of downloading the special software required for QR codes to function on my mobile. And as for advertisements on posters, why would I waste my highly-overcharged data for an ad?

It was just this weekend that I finally saw a use of QR codes compelling enough for me to give them a try. We were at the Tim Burton exhibit at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival). I'm a huge fan of Tim Burton (although he may have peaked at Big Fish) so I was excited to see props from his movies and learn more about his work. The exhibit did not disappoint - it was amazing!

I noticed there were QR codes interspersed throughout the exhibit. I've read about QR codes used in libraries, art galleries, museums, etc. but I have never seen them used this way in Toronto yet. A similar audio project in Toronto called Murmur for cellphones made good use of mobile-facilitated audio content. I am intrigued, however, by the opportunity that QR codes afford for quickly-delivered audio and video.

In theory, anyway.

I decided to download the software for my mobile (BlackBerry Curve) to read the codes. I chose ScanLife 2D Code Reader as it was free and came up early on the results page ofBlackBerry app world. It downloaded quickly and installed easily. The interface is incredibly easy to use.

The first time I tried it, it worked beautiful. I simply clicked on the ScanLife software icon, chose capture, took a picture, and an introduction on YouTube of the Burton installation loaded fairly quickly.

Subsequent scans did not work so well - or at all. The software doesn't show me guide lines in my camera, so I'm not sure how to best position my camera. Several times I was not able to get the software to recognize a QR code. Taking another picture of the code usually worked, but not always. Also, some times the QR software would only take a picture of the code and nothing else.

I'm not sure if the glitches are the result of the Scanlife software or my BlackBerry? My mobile is not yet 2 years old but already seems obsolete.

As for the content, I think that it needs to be more compelling than the TIFF offered. The commentary by Burton or others was interesting but appeared to be only audio. That might make downloading quicker, but the content should be more fun, unique, and tailored to the medium. At least it would have been fun to have clips from his movies.

I felt like this was just audio guide content reposted to YouTube. I don't like audio guides as they prevent me from interacting with the people I'm with (which is one of the best qualities of going to such events). Audio guides also don't offer the user much control, as in the ability to skip parts or fast forward.

Another problem was that it is difficult to hear audio content unless one wears headphones (which I never carry with me). The exhibit was crowded and noisy, so it was extremely difficult to hear the content unless I put it right against my ear - which then defeats the purpose of having visual content.

The use of QR codes at TIFF was good for specifying what users would get if they scanned the code. But I have often seen them used without any sense of what lies on the other side - so why would I bother? I also see them all the time on the subways, but as my route is mostly underground - they'll never work for me - should be some way to cache the experience and load it when in an area with data access. Or better yet TTC should have 3G or (even better free WiFi) access.

Everyone suffers from Canada's ridiculously over-priced bandwidth costs, so I'm dubious about the role of multimedia via QR codes, as it consumes so much. I think the most viable uses will be things like coupons, third-party reviews, or exclusive content. As the medium matures and the technical power of mobiles improves, I can, however, imagine QR codes facilitating some incredible experiences. It would be great to have interactive capabilities to display content tailored to your specific interests. Or for art installations, it would be great to be able to interact with digital versions of the art or to add your own inputs and make a new art piece. At the very least, QR codes could be used to facilitate sending digital postcards to friends or subscribing to an email list.

Now that I have the software installed, I'm looking forward to seeing innovative uses of QR codes. It just better be compelling enough to use up my precious, costly bandwidth though.

Staying Home for an Online Conference

2011-02-24T22:49:00.007-05:00

It was chilly today so I didn't feel like getting out of bed to attend the conference I registered for. So I didn't. I just turned on my computer and laid back in cozy warmness. Yes, the Internet has truly allowed me to not only stay in my pajamas while working, but now to not even get out of bed. Most enjoyable conference experience ever.

I attended the Handheld Librarian Online Conference today. As someone noted on Twitter, the title sounds like a diminutive librarian that we can hold in our hand. Sounds like the plot for an educational show with a bun-haired, straight-laced reference librarian magically appearing on kids’ hands when they need to find important information. Well, with current mobile and Internet technology there may not be such a need for real life experts, Lilliputian or otherwise.

This is the second librarian conference I've attended this month and ever (see my post on the Ontario Library Association conference). It's also my first ever online conference. I've attended webinars and webconferencing discussions before, but nothing that billed itself as a virtual conference. Aside from not having to leave one's house on a cold Canadian morning or occurring horrific travel costs and jet lag, I was curious if online conferences had other benefits.

Rather than cover the key take-away messages from the conference, which one can get from the Twitter feed, I'm more interested in the structure and issues of an online conference.

Adobe Connect
The webconferencing system used was Adobe Connect. I've been investigating Adobe Connect recently for an online training session I'm hosting. It is web-based software that allows live and canned:

presentation and screen sharing
text-based Q&A
text-based chats
interactive polls
audio or video integration

The presenters at the Handheld Librarian conference generally made good use of all these features. Someone told me that playing a video via Adobe Connect can crash the system, but this didn't happen. The polls used were a fun way to solicit audience feedback, but weren't used to shape the direction of a presentation which would be preferable (if daunting for presenters).

Obstacles
There are always technical challenges and other obstacles with real-life (RL) conferences (like presentations that won’t load, microphones that don’t work, overcrowded rooms, horrid caterers, etc.). So glitches are to be expected. Registration didn’t work seamlessly for me and others – but I got access at the last minute. The conferencing system worked quite well. There were occasional audio quality issues – blips and cut-outs – but for two days of conferences it worked most of the time.

I wasn't fond of how the conference organizers structured the accompanying text chats. Adobe Connect allows a text chat window for Q&A and one for general chat. Often the amount of chat for an event like this can be onerous so distinguishing genuine questions from commentary or banter is difficult for the audience let alone presenters. Separating these by window would help.
As would using Adobe Connect's features to distinguish the type of comment and to direct messages – but these features weren't consistently enabled.

I was mystified by Adobe Connect’s various “status options” (i.e. emoticons) feature. It seemed perpetually set at “Raise Hand” and even when I clicked on “Laughter”, “Applause,” or “Agree” (they also have options for speed, volume, etc.) nothing seemed to happen.

In addition to the live web conference each session had an associated discussion area. Only two comments were posted, however. For some reasons none of the keynotes had a discussion board – this is odd as they naturally attract more attention and interest. Discussions might also have been fostered more if they were seeded with 1-2 topics arising from the session. Or the presenters could be asked to answer questions posted there for a set time afterwards. These discussion boards are a great idea though as they are unique to the Web medium and a great way to encourage and extend further and deeper discussion (in theory).

Benefits
The reduced costs for hosting an online event were reflected in the very reasonable conference fee. Normally the multiple hundred dollars registration fees of most RL conferences are a huge barrier. Travel costs and time constraints of international conferences also prevent me from attending many that I would like to. The online format allowed me to afford attending and balance personal obligations. I'm looking forward to the sessions that I had to miss being archived and posted.

The online conference format also allowed me to multitask. The benefit of a constant access to a computer and Internet connection (something lacking more often than not) meant that I was able to follow up on leads mentioned by presenters. I was able to instantly investigate if an online tool mentioned was suitable or to google unfamiliar terms and concepts (I hadn’t heard of JPEG 2000 until today). I also got non-conference related work done too (dishes done during the lunch break, for example).

Perhaps because I was on my computer for the entire time, I was able to use Twitter much more effectively than at RL conferences. The conference was very supportive of the backchannel conversations both during the sessions (via the accompanying chat windows) and promoting the Twitter hashtag. (The Twitter feed was integrated on the homepage, but I believe it had to be removed as the volume crashed the site). The backchannel conversations can be the most valuable part of a conference, so it was good to be able to fully benefit from them.

It seems standard nowadays for every conference, particularly ones relating to the Internet or digital media, to promote and integrate the event with Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter. The Handheld Librarian conference didn’t do this as I would have liked, but they did offer a discussion area for participant introductions. This page has a lot of posts so I think it demonstrates the value of online conference networking. Considering that an online conference lacks some of the ways to meet and get to know fellow participants of RL, these techniques are more important. The conference did offer two online “Happy Hour” sessions. I wasn’t able to attend, but it sounds like a cool way to facilitate discussion and networking.

Overall, it was an excellent conference experience. The speakers were really good and the topics interesting. The online format has distinct advantages, as mentioned. With a few glitches resolved and more support for fostering online discussion, I would be happy to attend all future conferences this way.

Pondering Effects of Foursquare

2011-02-24T17:13:00.008-05:00

Over the last year, I have been researching and contemplating usage of the location-based mobile application Foursquare. A one-time avid user, my own usage has lessened significantly over the last few months. This is due to the loss of novelty for me, a lack of critical mass of my friends using it, almost non-existent financial incentives, and Foursquare's interface limitations.

My interest has perked up recently, however, when I got my first real-world reward for using it (a free, yumlicious gelato from Toronto's Hotel Gelato). I believe in the potential of the location-based services are great and will continue to watch them.

So I was intrigued when I was recently contacted by a fellow PhD student, Leighton Evans, who is also studying location-based services.

Leighton describes his research:

I'm interested in the effects of using location-based services and mobile phones as navigational devices. Traditional maps imposed one kind of spatial and cognitive orientation with regards to physical space, my research asks questions of whether mobile devices are offering a new type of reasoning of this kind, and what the implications of any change might be for the future.

I was similarly drawn to Foursquare as I believe it has the power (if yet, often unrealized) to help citizens define and annotate their space for themselves, so I find his work to augur at the profound changes that will results from location-based changes.

Leighton is looking for Foursquare users to be interviewed via email. If you are interested in participating or want more information please contact him.

Here are his questions with my corresponding answers.

Question #1: How has using Foursquare (or any other location based service) made you aware of, or more aware of, the places around you?

Answer #1: Foursquare was the first location-based service I used or had experience with, so initially I found it very useful to discover new places around me particularly restaurants. Foursquare's interface is not well suited to specific searches by type of place or even for nearby venues (seems to get proximity wrong a lot and miss tons of key places), so when I heard about the YellowPages app, I switched to that for finding businesses and associated contact info.

I was hoping that Foursquare would provide richer understanding of places I am in. Other than finding a hidden washroom at a subway station I frequent, this generally has not happened. Most of the comments on place are quite superficial, well-known, or narcissistic.

Question #2. Do you feel that in using your location services through your mobile device, that device has in effect become a tool for navigating your way through the world? If so, would being denied that tool affect your ability or desire to explore new places?

Answer #2: I would like to say that LBS has significantly affected my wayfinding or relationship to place - and I think it has the potential to. Other than finding businesses in a geotargetted fashion, however, LBS has not done this. That said, when I was recently on a personal vacation to Chicago (see my blog post), I was impressed at how much the city was embracing Foursquare and using it as a tourism tool. Due to the exorbitant roaming charges by my carrier, I wasn't able to make use of this. But I constantly felt that there was so much that my mobile could do to greatly enhance my visit there.

Question #3: Do you have any experiences of using the tips left by other users and them actively being involved in the choices you make, either visiting a place or checking-in to a place?

Answer #3: Yes, I tried a restaurant that I had not previously heard of based on seeing various check-ins for it on Foursquare. Also, at a restaurant I have chosen a menu item based on a prior customer's tip. I really appreciate this feature but have found that as Foursquare grows the amount of noise and the lack of ability to sift through this has made finding valuable info like this very difficult and not worth the effort as other sites do this better (e.g. OurFaves).

Question #4: Has using Foursquare (and using GPS) changed the importance of your mobile device compared to other phones or PDAs you used in the past? Does the device feel more integral to your everyday life than previously?

Answer #4: Location based services have been a nice-to-have functionality of my mobile and I think will eventually become integral functionality for me. Currently, however, it has not provided completely new, crucial functionality for me. I can get the same functionality through other, often easier, means.

Question #5: How aware are you of your check-ins and activity on Foursquare being a means of providing information and feedback to the application and software itself? Does any such awareness influence your usage and choices with the software?

Answer #5: I have ambivalent feelings towards user-generated services that make their money on the free labour of their users (I like how an author referred to this as "loser generated content"). But services such as Foursquare and Facebook do provide the infrastructure that offer me significant value such that I don't mind this potential exploitation. Regarding privacy, I have no concerns about the application knowing my whereabouts - I am not overly concerned with privacy and generally don't check-in anywhere that I would not be willing for anyone in the entire world to know.

Question #6: Given that Foursquare is a social application, and social networks involve a measure of impression management, are you someone that checks-in to places with an awareness of how that contributes to an image your online friends have of you or that you are trying to create?

Answer #6: I have been acutely aware of how Foursquare helps project identity. I noticed that many people only check in at hip, high-status locations or their work. I have never seen a check-in with anyone I know at a big box store or fast-food chain. Because of this I found it fun to deliberately check into Burger King and Walmart, for example, to make a point. Everyone goes to these types of places but why the reluctance to check in there? This trendiness that Foursquare seems to provoke appears superficial and contrived to me. I am guilty of this as well as I am definitely more apt to check into a place that I - and my friends - perceive as interesting or cool.

Question #7: How has using location services changed your perception of the world?

Answer #7: There were a couple moments when Foursquare strongly affected my relationship to space and others in it. The first one was when Toronto had its worst earthquake in over a hundred years. It wasn't a big one, but it was an odd, bewildering experience. I turned on my mobile and noticed that others had been checking into the earthquake (the location was the entire city). I felt much more connected to my fellow city inhabitants somehow through that. I also watched virtually the locations and people of Toronto's G20 protests. Even though these were extensively covered by the media, using Foursquare somehow made it feel more real and nearby opposed to TV that feels distant and foreign even when it is local coverage. In general, Foursquare does allow one (i.e. me) to leave my imprint on a place that does connect one more tangibly to a place. This feeling is magnified when one gets a "mayor" title, which I admit at first was quite rewarding to get. I feel these feelings less so now that I've been using Foursquare for almost a year, so perhaps novelty was a key factor in this.

Please share your feelings towards Foursquare here and if you can please contact Leighton to participate.

e-Learning in 2011

2011-02-22T12:31:00.000-05:00

A friend recently tweeted (posted to Twitter) a bunch of interesting articles about the state of e-Learning. I thought they were interesting to share, but as they are rather lengthy (one report is 40 pages) I excerpted key points.

1) 2011 Horizon Report
By EDUCAUSE
Covers how and which technologies are affecting education in currently and in the future. Among their findings (quoted from the report):

The abundance of resources and relationships made easily accessible via the Internet is increasingly challenging us to revisit our roles as educators in sense-making, coaching, and credentialing.
People expect to be able to work, learn, and study whenever and wherever they want.
The world of work is increasingly collaborative, giving rise to reflection about the way student projects are structured.
Digital media literacy continues its rise in importance as a key skill in every discipline and profession.
Keeping pace with the rapid proliferation of information, software tools, and devices is challenging for students and teachers alike.

Their technologies to watch for this year are electronic books and mobiles, with augmented reality and game-based learning expected to gain prominence in the next 2-3 years.

2) 2011 Outlook for Online Learning & Distance Education
By T. Bates, Contact North
Covers trends, barriers, and opportunities. The author found that enrollment in fully online courses grew by 20% last year (in the US) are found major barriers (quoted from the report):

Faculty resistance to online learning and/or distance education, which remains strong in many institutions;
Lack of training in teaching, which limits instructors’ ability to imagine effective alternative technology-based models to face-to- face classroom teaching;
Unambitious institutional goals for technology-based teaching, focused more on enhancing the classroom model than finding new designs that allow for more flexible access and that use the affordances of new technology to develop skills needed in the 21st century;
Failure to develop appropriate methods for costing online learning; the costs are often unknown, as are the costs of face-to-face teaching, but generally technology is an added cost rather than used to replace less effective activities; and
Lack of a system wide approach to online learning and distance education

He also predicts opportunities for 2011

Course redesign [integrating new models]
The future is mobile: ‘the notion of class time as separate from non-class time will vanish.’
Open educational resources are a development that still falls far short of its promise.
Multimedia materials, such as short video clips, animations, and simulations will increasingly be developed as part of online course materials,
Learning analytics will provide instructors and course directors with tools that will enable decisions to be made
Shared [IT] services

3) Online Courses, Still Lacking That Third Dimension
By R. Stross, NY Times
The irrelevance of teachers won't happen any time soon, and even less likely in the humanities and social sciences. Here are quoted excerpts:

When colleges and universities finally decide to make full use of the Internet, most professors will lose their jobs.

A genuine online course would be nothing but the software and would handle all the grading, too. No living, breathing instructor would be needed for oversight.

Candace Thille, the director of Carnegie Mellon’s program, put it this way: “There is something motivating about the student’s relationship with the instructor — and with the student’s relationship with other students in the class — that would be absent if each took the course in a software-only environment.”

Those relationships — with humans in the flesh — help students to persevere. Online courses are notorious for high dropout rates.

Much, of course, depends on the subject being taught. An introductory statistics class taught to 600 students in a lecture hall won’t offer much of a relationship with the professor. Moving it into a self-contained, adaptive software package — Carnegie Mellon’s online program offers two statistics classes — would arguably offer a superior learning experience. But in this case, the subject matter is distillable into a handful of concepts, and the exams use questions with only a single correct answer. That’s not an option for just about all of the humanities and vast swaths of the social sciences.

Wendy Brown, the Heller professor of political science at the Berkeley campus, spoke witheringly of the idea at a campus forum in October: “What is sacrificed when classrooms disappear, the place where good teachers do not merely ‘deliver content’ to students but wake them up, throw them on their feet and pull the chair away? Where ideas can become intoxicating, where an instructor’s ardor for a subject or a dimension of the world can be contagious? Where scientific, literary, ethical or political passions are ignited?”

Geo-Terminology

2011-02-18T17:16:00.005-05:00

The topic of location-aware mobile applications are certainly a growing area. Whether an application used more for fun and reviews such as Foursquare or to find nearby businesses such as the Yellow Pages app, I believe this type of technology will become increasingly ubiquitous and embedded in an increasing number of applications and online services.

My research has been examine how these applications function and are constructed. I've encountered a lot of jargon and key terms to the area that I find it useful to clear up. So I spent some time on Wikipedia (an invaluable source).

So here are a few terms that comprise or are a form of a mobile location-aware application. All definitions are for the most part from Wikipedia, unless otherwise noted. My comments are in curly parentheses {}.

Device Level

- Context awareness - "computers can both sense, and react based on their environment" {e.g. time of day, light level, noise level, location hence "location awareness}

- Geolocation - "identification of the real-world geographic location of an object, such as a cell phone or an Internet-connected computer terminal. Geolocation may refer to the practice of assessing the location, or to the actual assessed location"

Application Level

- Location-based service (LBS) - "information or entertainment service, accessible with mobile devices through the mobile network and utilizing the ability to make use of the geographical position of the mobile device"

- Locative media - "media of communication functionally bound to a location. Locative media are digital media applied to real places and thus triggering real social interactions.... Many locative media projects have a social, critical or personal (memory) background"

- Local search - " specialized Internet search engines that allow users to submit geographically constrained searches against a structured database of local business listings. Typical local search queries include not only information about 'what' the site visitor is searching for (such as keywords, a business category, or the name of a consumer product) but also 'where' information, such as a street address, city name, postal code, or geographic coordinates"

- Geotargeting - "delivering different content {e.g. advertising} to that visitor based on his or her location"

- Augmented reality (AR) - "live direct or indirect view of a physical, real-world environment whose elements are augmented by computer-generated sensory input, such as sound or graphics" {and increasingly text-based data are being considered AR too}

User Level

- Geosocial networking - "social networking in which geographic services and capabilities such as geocoding and geotagging are used to enable additional social dynamics" {e.g. Foursquare}

- Geographic information retrieval (GIR) - "augmentation of information retrieval with geographic metadata. Information retrieval generally views documents as a collection or `bag' of words. In contrast Geographic Information Retrieval requires a small amount of semantic data to be present (namely a location or geographic feature associated with a document)"

- Geographic relevance - "relevance denotes how well a retrieved document or set of documents meets the information need of the user" {in geographic terms, relevance most often would relate to proximity of the document/object to the user, but other forms would be temporal proximity (travel time) and the visibility of desired resource}

- Geofence - "virtual perimeter for a real-world geographic area. A geo-fence could be dynamically generated - as in a radius around a store or point location.... When the location-aware device of a location-based service (LBS) user enters or exits a geo-fence, the device receives a generated notification" {this could be used to block users from accessing user-generated or non-sanctioned georeferenced information about that location/business}

- Geomessaging - not in Wikipedia but here's my take - user messages (either delivered via email, SMS, or application-based) to friends or themselves georeferenced to a specific space that can only be received when at that designated space

Data Level

- Hyperlocal - "Oriented around a well defined, community scale area with primary focus being directed towards the concerns of its residents.... Hyperlocal content, often referred to as hyperlocal news, is characterized by three major elements. First, it refers to entities and events that are located within a well defined, community scale area. Secondly, it is intended primarily for consumption by residents of that area. Thirdly, it is created by a resident of the location"

- Georeferencing - "establishing {an object or document} location in terms of map projections or coordinate systems"

- Geospatial metadata - "metadata that is applicable to objects that have an explicit or implicit geographic extent, in other words, are associated with some position on the surface of the globe"

- Geocoding - "finding associated geographic coordinates (often expressed as latitude and longitude) from other geographic data, such as street addresses, or zip codes (postal codes)"

- Geotagging - "adding geographical identification metadata to various media" {implies user-generated tags & folksonomies, per Flickr}

- Geoparsing - "assigning geographic identifiers (e.g., codes or geographic coordinates expressed as latitude-longitude) to textual words and phrases that occur in unstructured content, such as "twenty miles north east of Jalalabad".... Two primary uses of the geographic coordinates derived from unstructured content are to plot portions of the content on maps and to search the content using a map as a filter. Geoparsing goes beyond geocoding. Geocoding analyzes unambiguous structured location references, such as postal addresses and rigorously formatted numerical coordinates. Geoparsing handles ambiguous references in unstructured discourse"

- ISO 19115 - "standards for Geospatial metadata. ISO 19115 defines how to describe geographical information and associated services, including contents, spatial-temporal purchases, data quality, access and rights to use."

- GeoRSS - Wikipedia's definition was lacking, so I went to the GeoRSS website for this: "As RSS and Atom become more prevalent as a way to publish and share information, it becomes increasingly important that location is described in an interoperable manner so that applications can request, aggregate, share and map geographically tagged feeds."

- Keyhole Markup Language (KML) - "XML schema for expressing geographic annotation and visualization within Internet-based, two-dimensional maps and three-dimensional Earth browsers"

System Level

- Geographic information system (GIS) - "any system that captures, stores, analyzes, manages, and presents data that are linked to location(s)"

- Global positioning system (GPS) - "space-based global navigation satellite system that provides reliable location and time information in all weather and at all times and anywhere on or near the Earth when and where there is an unobstructed line of sight to four or more GPS satellites"

- Local positioning system - "Unlike GPS or other global navigation satellite systems, which are positioning systems with a global coverage, local positioning systems don't use technology that has global coverage; they use local technology or technology that has local coverage. Examples of this local technology include cellular base stations, Wi-Fi access points, and broadcast towers"

- Gazetteer - "geographical dictionary or directory, an important reference for information about places and place names, used in conjunction with a map or a full atlas"

- Geo-block - Wikipedia doesn't have this term, but Michael Geist covers the topic well in his article Geo-Blocking Sites a Business Rather Than Legal Issue. Essentially, as it applies to the Internet, a geo-block identifies a user's IP address and restricts access to content if the user is not in a pre-approved zone. In contrast, geo-authentication can allow a user entry into an online system or site based on their IP location.

- Location-based advertising {similar to proximity marketing} - "advertising that uses location-tracking technology in mobile networks to target consumers with location-specific advertising on their mobile devices.

Finally two good parting concepts:

- Space vs. place - "Geographic space is the space that encircles the planet, through which biological life moves. It is differentiated from 'outer space" and 'inner space' (inside the mind). One definition of place, proposed by Tuan, is that a place comes into existence when humans give meaning to a part of the larger, undifferentiated space. Any time a location is identified or given a name, it is separated from the undefined space that surrounds it. Some places, however, have been given stronger meanings, names or definitions by society than others. These are the places that are said to have a strong 'Sense of Place'"

Geospatial Web or Geoweb - "merging of geographical (location-based) information with the abstract information that currently dominates the Internet. This would create an environment where one could search for things based on location instead of by keyword only – e.g. 'What is Here?...The geoweb also promises to make geographical information much more ubiquitous, opening geoinformation up to the mass market."

What Exactly is a Mobile?

2011-02-16T13:32:00.004-05:00

The term "mobile" is used all the time in media, business, academia, and by users without a common and precise definition of the term.

A definitive sense of the terms is complicated by the rapid expansion and evolution of portable devices connected to the Internet. Smura, Kivi, and Toyli (2009) believe a mobile device must meet three criteria:

ability to make voice calls
physical size of device (they do not specify exact dimensions but the implication is the size of a thin laptop or smaller)
the operating system.

Their definition, however, already appears to be outdated. They focus on voice-enabled networks rather than Internet access, the latter appearing now to be the defining point in distinguishing mobiles from cellphones or personal digital assistants (PDAs).

Indeed, mobile voice telephony has been decreasing in volume and duration since 2007 (Thompson, 2010). People are instead increasingly using their devices for text messaging (SMS), emailing, and accessing Internet-enabled apps or sites. Smura et al.'s definition of mobile would also exclude the immensely popular iPod Touch, which allows users to interact with Internet content but does not offer the ability to make phone calls.

Size criterion is a critical determinant as the portability and ease of access in multiple environments is a core difference between mobile devices and other portable, Internet-enabled devices such as laptops and netbooks. Smura et al.'s definition does include laptops and netbooks, but their inclusion precludes the essential degree of speed, ease and flexibility of access that entails being "mobile".

Additionally, a key difference is that online content for a mobile often must be formatted or coded specifically for that device compared to the relative universality of online content displayable on browsers on PCs, netbooks, and laptops.

Smura et al. do foresee complications arising from other devices increasingly blurring distinctions. The inclusion of operating system as a defining trait helps distinguish between devices that are “limited, for specific purpose” (p. 58). Digital cameras, e-readers, and game consoles now are able to allow Internet connection and online interaction (to a limited extent), but the primary goal of this is to support the core functionality (i.e., photography, reading, or gaming). Mobile devices, on the other hand, are portable computing devices running multiple software (e.g., contacts, calendars, document processing, file management, etc.) and offering a range of multi-modal inputs and outputs, including text/SMS, email, instant messaging/chat, voice telephony, photography, video, applications, and mobile Web browsing. Hence, the operating system is not a central characteristic; rather the key difference is between devices with single versus multiple functionalities.

There are overlaps across technologies, but to clarify future discussion, I offer the definition of a mobile device as a device that has:

the ability to connect to the Internet
supports user input and interaction,
offers multiple functionality
and has the physical size of a tablet computer or smaller

Consequently a mobile device includes smartphones (e.g. BlackBerry, iPhones, Androids, Nokia.), tablets, (e.g. iPad, PlayBook, etc..) and networked portable media player and personal digital assistants (e.g. iPod).

Agree or disagree?

References:
Smura, T., Kivi, A., & Toyli, J. (2009). A framework for analysing the usage of mobile services. Info, 11(4), 53-67.

Thompson, C. (2010, August). On the death of the phone call. Wired. Retrieved from http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/07/st_thompson_deadphone/

How Not To Do a Flash Mob

2011-02-15T17:59:00.003-05:00

I don't like flash mobs. It's not because of their inanity. It's that they are neither done in a flash nor are they a mob. Flash mobs can happen, but they are not orchestrated with the sole intent to become "viral" via YouTube and picked up by traditional media infatuated with the shiny.

A genuine flash mob happens organically and with little pre-planning. If they are heavily organized they are then by definition not a mob, but rather a group. If it takes days of pre-planning, it does not happen in a flash. So for these things, let's call them what they are: group events. The fact that the group is doing something bizarre or incongruous with the setting does not de facto make it a flash mob - we can call these "wacky group events".

All the ones I've seen hyped have been just wacky group events. But flash mobs can happen. Protests organized via Twitter would count in my books as a flash mob. And as we've seen they can powerfully contribute to huge political changes. On a more individual level flash mobs can foster a strong sense of communal bonds and collective emotion. As happens when a local team wins a big game and people run to major urban centres to celebrate. I've been involved in a few of these when Canada won gold in Olympics hockey or way back when the Blue Jays won the World Series.

I've experienced the more wacky and organic sort too. One night after staying out until a night club closed (back in my days of legend) I remarked to my group of friends that we stayed so late it is almost tomorrow. I started singing Tomorrow from Annie and then my friends joined. Others in the crowd joined, and eventually we had about 20-40 people belting out the song on the street. I also saw a mass pillow fight staged at Yonge & Eglinton in Toronto that looked like a lot of fun.

Recently, I was at an event that tried to get a "flash mob" going. People had gathered in a very large conference room to hear a speaker. The organizers wanted the crowd to spontaneously join together in a song. They had a professional choir come in to act as plants for the event, but it didn't catch on. Instead the event felt like a performance at best and like some sort of odd, awkward moment at worst.

Seeing how I can't stop these types of wacky group events from happening - as much as I would like to - I felt I'd share my thoughts on how not to make these things be painful flops.

What not to do

1) Don't make it too difficult to participate.
Have the song, dance, or other desired group action be something that is already known or can be learned quickly.

2) Don't have plants look like plants.
Although I'm not a big fan of deception (not only is it not nice, but if a "flash mob" is so contrived how can it be legit?), nonetheless having people in-the-know on the event planted in the crowd is a good way to get a crowd to notice and join in. But have your plants look and act like the crowd or it will seem like a performance.

3) Don't hold event in a space too big - or at least plan for this.
The failed flash mob I witnessed was in a huge area so much of the crowd could not see what was happening in other parts of the room. If you must do this in a huge space, make sure you position the event so that it is visible to all those who you want to join in.

4) Don't keep all your plants in one area.
If you use plants, do so effectively. Spread them out and diffuse them among the crowd. The failed event had almost all the plants in one core area (invisible to much of the room) and then towards the end they had a couple plants move out towards the crowd. It was too little, too late. It would have been much more powerful if they were all initially positioned equally throughout the space. If these events appear to emerge throughout the entire crowd, they are more powerful than someone walking over and trying to act as a pep leader.

5) Don't seem like a performance.
Don't have your plants be too professional or polished. The idea is not to stage a performance, so the plants should seem average. I'm not so sure hiring professionals to act as plants is a great idea - although it will attract attention, pros seem too good and everyone then watches in wonder rather than joining in. The singers at the failed event were operatic, flawless and were microphoned, so it was a performance - who is going to would want to singalong and "ruin" an amazing show? Same logic applies to dancing. If the group action is kept simple, any one should be able to act as a facilitator.

6) Don't not tell people.
Wacky group events are not organic, so get over the idea that the group action needs to happen
spontaneously and unbidden. Don't be afraid to let people know what is happening. Go ahead and let the crowd know they can join in (and that it is not a performance). Twitter is extremely effective at spreading this news, but even old tech like announcing out loud to the crowd to join in will do the trick.

7) Don't be irrelevant.
Consider your group and do something appropriate for them. It's great to be fun, even wacky. But make it applicable to the crowd gathered and they'll be more likely to care about what is happening and join in.

I think there have been enough wacky group events covered by the media that hopefully the future ones that will be hyped are either more clever, more relevant, or, at the very least, more participatory.

Challenges with e-Learning

2011-02-11T13:58:00.002-05:00

In addition to my doctoral studies, I'm also consulting with clients on how to implement new e-Learning mechanisms. I set up a blog to share our discussions. I'm reposting a post from this blog here as I think it captures some of the challenges I've encountered with e-Learning.

Having been a student at both an online-only and a blended program, I can relate challenges I experienced:

1) Time zones
One of the benefits often touted for e-Learning is that it removes physical barriers. Instead of geography being dead, it still presents challenges to classes with students in different time zones. If a course requires interaction or collaboration, divergent time zones can be difficult to overcome. Challenges arise not only in trying to find mutually feasible times for real-time communication (e.g. text-chats, webinars, Skype calls, etc.) but can also present challenges for asynchronous work. Depending on the extremity of students' time zones, there can be as much as a day's lag to allow for all students to receive and respond to a given message. This lag can draw out a collaborative efforts considerably.

2) Managing volume
e-Learning often relies heavily on required postings to discussion boards or blogs. With even more than a few students posting, it can making reading and responding to posts overwhelmingly time-consuming. Breaking classes into smaller teams or limiting posts to 100-300 words can help. Live chats with instructors can also present volume challenges if guidelines are not in place. One professor I had attempted to do Q&As via Skype. At first, there were no rules and students simultaneously besieged the professor and chaos naturally ensued. Even with established procedures in place, there were still students who joined late or weren’t following the conversation and asked questions already answered or off topic.

3) Presence of the instructor
The volume of postings can also affect an instructor’s ability to participate in class discussion. Instructors must either spend a sizable amount time of time reading and replying to everything or they must selectively respond. This diminished role of instructors (compared to in-person classes) combined with the lack of their physical presences can make e-Learning seem like distance education in more ways than one.

4) Learning the subject and the technology
In addition to learning the topic at hand, students using e-Learning must engage in possibly-unfamiliar technology. Some technology requires more effort to install, learn, and operate than others. Learning the full suite of options with mediating-technology can present obstacles or delays to even more technically-savvy users, let alone those new to e-Learning.

There are other challenges surrounding e-Learning (including a frequent over reliance on text-based communication and establishing student presence) but many limitations can be addressed by selecting appropriate methods and establishing suitable structures and guidelines.

Internet Society Membership Drive

2011-02-07T12:33:00.006-05:00

I've been a member of the Internet Society for a few years. They sponsored my participation in the Internet Governance Forum at Hyderabad, India. The Internet Society (ISOC) is a non-profit, international organization that helps develop and promote Internet standards and policy. They work actively with governments to ensure that the Internet remains free and open.

Here is a description of ISOC from their website:

The Internet Society is a cause-based organisation that works to ensure the open development, evolution and use of the Internet for the benefit of people throughout the world. The Internet Society works with help from its members and Chapters to provide leadership in Internet related standards, education, and policy. As the Internet continues to evolve, both technically and politically, the Internet’s unprecedented success is due to a decentralized, open, multi-stakeholder model, which relies on processes and products that are local, bottom-up and accessible to users around the world. The Internet Society's key initiatives target the critical issues that affect all aspects of Internet development and growth. They embody the Internet Society philosophy that the Internet is for everyone and they provide the organization with a solid foundation from which to positively influence standards development, access, business practices, and government policies.

Although, there is not a national chapter for Canada or one for Ontario (Quebec is the only region with a chapter), ISOC does offer the opportunity to join for free as a "global member". I have wanted to help start an Ontario chapter for the past two years. As my research focus is increasingly moving away from policy and standards (for example web accessibility guidelines) and my professional and personal life is rather over-taxed at present, I have been hoping someone would lead the charge to start an Ontario chapter.

Currently, the Internet Society is hoping to recruit more members. For those who work in the Internet field or digital media, I believe it is important to join, as well as for those who are concerned about protecting the central role the Internet has in our lives. ISOC offers ten tips on why to join that note the collective and individual benefits of joining such as more powerfully influencing Canadian policy and having a personal role in important developments.

I would love to see more people join from Ontario as I hope this could propel a chapter formation here. Also, ISOC is offering tech gadgets for prizes (which I'll donate to a local charity in the unlikely event I win).

So please consider joining. Please run any questions or comments by me here or by email.

Join the Internet Society today, it's free!

What a Non-Librarian Learned from a Librarian Conference

2011-02-05T18:44:00.024-05:00

The Ontario Library Association (OLA) conference wrapped up today. As I mentioned in my prior post, it was somewhat odd to find myself at this conference. My interests do not pertain strictly to libraries so much as information in whatever form or repository it may take. There is overlap, with my interests and the conference program. but, as I learned, the conference is decidedly for professional librarians with a constant focus on how to implement best practices and innovation into public and school libraries (I heard no mention of corporate libraries, BTW). Still, I did get a lot out of attending.

Inspiring keynotes
As a large conference they could afford stellar keynote speakers. Atom Egoyan, Jian Ghomeshi, and Michael Wesch were insightful and inspirational. There weren't a lot of take-aways points from their addresses, but they did powerfully highlight the importance for our schools, libraries, media, governments, and culture of collaboration, access, diversity, and an egalitarian treatment of new and popular culture.

Conference gripes
If an army marches on its stomach, then conference delegates survive on their coffees. Yet not only was there no coffee provided there wasn't even attainable access to coffee! There was only a sole Timothy's with untenable lines. The lunch breaks were way too long (2 hours) yet the session breaks were only 10-15 minutes. Not long enough to get a coffee let alone visit the bathroom. I did have the an advantage of being a male in a crowd where women outnumber men about 1 to 20 and women's bathroom lines were long and winding. These gripes seem trivial but they greatly affect attendees experience and they are puzzling and perturbing when they occur at large and established events.

I wanted to live blog this conference but the organizers cheaped out on providing wifi. I've heard that the Metro Toronto Convention Centre charges exorbitant rates for delegates to have wifi. Still what does it say about the OLA and libraries in general when they apparently do not think Internet access is important?

It's not just the lack of wifi that was rather luddite of the OLA, but their conference website and online offerings were paltry. It would have been great to have some social networking and/or attendee profiles posted pre-conference (and not just a link to a Facebook page that was used as another channel to post messages). I only encountered one speaker who mentioned they would be posting their presentation online. The location for this was never specified and it doesn't seem like there is one yet. It is so simple and free to post links to presentations to sites such as SlideShare. There was mention of a companion "virtual conference" with live and archived webcasting, but details on this, such as a URL, are still lacking.

Sessions
If the technical sophistication of the conference itself was lacking, it was not reflected in the speakers - as I found the speakers to be among the most insightful, topical, and understandable of any conference I have been to.

Unfortunately, my own tech savy was lacking. I signed out a netbook from my school to test drive it (and the plan was to live blog, as mentioned). I still haven't decided whether I want to buy a tablet or a netbook, so this was a good chance to put it to a field trial. BTW, I talked to a major academic publisher on their plans for smartphones and tablets and they indicated that they officially have zero intention of supporting BlackBerry - just Apple and Android. So I won't wait for RIM PlayBook to come to Canada after all. I took copious notes of the presentations (as it didn't seem like they were going to be shared afterward, also as mentioned). When transferring my files from the netbook to a USB stick (as I couldn't upload or email them due to the lack of wifi) most of my notes mysteriously disappeared.

Luckily, I was able to gather the key points of a couple sessions from the conference tweets. It was painful going through all the crap tagged as relevant to the conference (why do so many people pollute a collective feed with their narcissist posts or insane retweets of someone else's narcissist posts?). But I gathered the salient points. One speaker who was particularly incredible and whose session notes I lost is Fiacre O'Duinn. I hope to get his presentation somehow as it merits a post of its own.

Great Web 2.0 Face-off
This was a fun and action-packed panel panel where speakers went through an amazing amount of new web technology and how it can be used in education and libraries. Luckily, they posted a website with their list so I was able to get some - yes some - of their recommendations. Here is my simplified description of my favs (all appear to be free):

Bitstrips - online comic creation
Diigo - online bookmarking & annotating, collaborating info sharing
Evernote - annotation & notes service
FreeRealms- kid-friendly virtual world
Glogster - seems like MySpace but have education version
Google Apps - rough equivalent of MS Office
Google Apps Marketplace - free or cheap biz software integrated with Google
Kaywa - QR Code generator
MyStoryMaker - online picture book creator
Piclets - image poetry facilitator
Popplet - social, information visualization
Quora - collaborative Q&A
SpringNote - wiki-based notebook
Voicethread - collaborative multimedia presentations & commenting
Voki - speaking & embeddable avatar creation
Wallwisher - public or private webpages with commenting
Worldlet - word cloud generator
Zotero - reference & citation manager

I have never seen so much stuff covered so quickly and - for the most part - quite clearly. They really should get an award for this.

Top Tech Trends
The speakers at this panel were also incredible and delved into more detailed consideration of the issues resulting from new and emerging technology. There was significant discussion on the familiar topics of the digital divide, net neutrality, and privacy - which I won't recap.

There was an interesting debate on the need for libraries to experiment and innovate. Dorothea Salo advised that through experiments is how we innovate even if projects are a failure, but Roger Nevin cautioned on the problems of failed technology decreasing partner buy-in.

Salo raised the growing role of personal data management and preservation. She cited Yahoo's announced closure of Delicious (something that has worried me greatly) and how would people react if they similarly shut down Flickr? As she alerted "We are now investing our digital content into the cloud, but... where's the backup for the cloud?"

Aaron Schmidt noted that in general "library interfaces are too hard to use. Why does this matter? Because easy trumps free". People will pay for applications that make it easy to fulfill their needs rather than invest in the learning curve of free, library apps. He suggested that library interfaces should be optimized for the demands of a mobile device as this will help us strip out extraneous features that can also be removed on the main web interfaces to improve usability. Schmidt noted libraries need more user testing to discover and rectify these problems.

In considering the new tech services libraries could provide, Schmidt cautioned that too often libraries try to provide the same offerings as commercial organizations (such as Amazon) or become a "book mausoleum". Libraries, he added, should facilitate experiences and help people to gather around content. Building upon this Salo noted that libraries could solicit and record local information, so that a library can become a commuty's "ambassador to the world".

This later points is acutely relevant to my research interests and an area that I hope is ripe for future discussion and exploration.

Finding My Way at a Library Conference

2011-02-03T23:10:00.007-05:00

From grade 5 to grade 9 I was a "student librarian" (in grade 5 and 6 the term was "Bookie Monster"). In grade 7 and 8, I even won the award for top student librarian. This is particularly odd as I never really liked reading anything other than comic books and Choose Your Own Adventures. I guess I was drawn to allure of systemic organization. But as I became involved in the school newspaper, drama club, and the debate team (don't say anything), I became enamored of communications and media and left behind my librarianship.

So finding myself first at a program to train librarians last year and now at the Ontario Library Association Conference, is perhaps not such a strange life twist as a culmination.

I decided to attend the OLA "Super" conference as there were sessions covering areas related to my research interests, specifically how people can use mobile devices to access information and the social creation of information (particular info related to place). The conference earns its super moniker in that it is huge. It has occupied most of the north building of the Metro Toronto Convention Centre and the Intercontinental Hotel's conference rooms. With up twelve concurrent sessions and a trade expo occupying all of the exhibition space of the Centre, it is likely the largest librarian conference in Canada (hence the national scope of topics, speakers and participants). It is not super, however, in its hospitality: no wifi, no snacks, no swag, no lunch, and no COFFEE!

This conference is decidedly for practitioners. It focuses on applied presentations of novel and significant issues, more so than fine-tuned examinations of topics or underlying theoretical findings. Judging from the first day and program, the conference offers case studies and best practices track sessions combined with motivational plenaries. I also found that to accommodate the range of background knowledge of attendees, speakers spend a lot of time covering the basics. In addition, speakers focus on the program implementation, change management, and funding issues.

My first session was on geoauthentication, that is facilitating access to secure sites through automatic detection of a visitor's geographic location through their IP address. This process eliminates the hassle and memory burden of having to remember logins and passwords. Knowledge Ontario is using geoauthentication to open their databases of copyrighted content to anyone in or from Ontario. The speaker noted that using IP identification, automatic authentication could also be done at a city or carrier level. If one is outside the region, authentication must then be done through more traditional means (i.e. a user enters their login id and password.) It is possible that people could hack access via a proxy server, but the speaker advises that it is possible to block this.

The final session of the day dealt with an project to aid Ontario communities to digitize and publish online historical objects and documents. There were a few points I found particularly interesting. For one, a process of determining what objects are a priority to add to the online collection. The project team developed a checklist of criteria for this that also allows them to catalogue lower priority items. I was also interested in a feature they built that allows people to comment on digitized, online objects by adding comments. I think this becomes a fascinating way to capture collective memory and encourage discussion.

In between these two track sessions was a plenary by Michael Wesch. I encountered him from his YouTube videos, including the popular A Vision of Students Today. His speech was a call to arms for librarians and educators to redefine what learning is and how we facilitate this. He notes that currently schools and library are structured under the assumptions that information is scare, to learn is to acquire information, information comes from an authority figure, trust authority figures, and follow along - they are not structured to facilitate collaborative learning. He argues that we can help learners to use social media to make a better world. Although he did acknowledge that digital media can and has been used for nefarious purposes. It is those with a passion who figure out how to use tools effectively (such as social media) to propagate their message. Thus by helping students harness their passion, it can lead to positive social change. To demonstrate his message, he shared examples of how others have used social and/or mobile effectively and walked attendees through creating a video mashup in a few minutes to show how "ridiculously easy" to use these tools. I found Wesch's assertion that we can move from focusing on discussions of information literacy and technological familiarity to fostering digital citizenship. This seems like a lofty goal for the librarian profession and researchers alike.

Chicago Is My Kind of Town

2011-01-28T20:33:00.008-05:00

I got back this week from a trip to Chicago to celebrate a milestone birthday. After reviewing my trip to Disneyworld in December through the perspective of my interactions with technology, I thought it would be enjoyable to relate here how digital media affected my Chicago trip.

For years, Chicago was the Second City, in that I wanted to go for many years but it was always my second choice. Several years ago when I was thinking of going I signed up for their tourist board's email newsletter. Over the years, I haven't read all their emails sent to me, but I did read some of them. More importantly, it kept the city as a tourist destination on the top of my mind so that when circumstances were right we did think of Chicago. This demonstrates that there is long-term value in online outreach efforts. With email it is easy to measure the click-throughs and response rates for short-term goals, but it is harder to measure the long-term impact such efforts have - but they are effective.

Chicago also captured my interest through their innovative and highly-entertaining project with Foursquare and Facebook last June. They offered special Foursquare badges for people checking into locations from the John Hughes' movie "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" (set and filmed in Chicago). They also offered a contest to people who supplied details via Facebook of their favourite Bueller location (I entered for the police station where Jennifer Grey and Charlie Sheen are arrested and Sheen has the memorable "Drugs" line.)

Before determining whether or not to go to Chicago, my wife and I did a lot of research online. This has been par for the course for all our trip planning for years now. In addition to googling Chicago, I posted a request for info from my Facebook friends. These efforts were successful in helping us determine that the city would be a great destination and that there was lots there for our specific interests (e.g. family attractions, culture, pizza). My wife is the expert in finding hotel deals online. We've stayed downtown Manhattan, Banff, Prague, Hong Kong,Disney, and now Chicago all for under $100. She also cross references TripAdvisor (a traveller's best friend) to make sure we know what we're getting into. Also, as usual, we booked our flight, hotel, and airport shuttle online.

When thinking about a trip and planning it, I always visit the official tourism website. They are not usually the most definitive source of information, but they usually present the main attractions in an engaging and succinct manner. This is certainly the case with Chicago's official tourism website Explore Chicago. The website had a lot of what I was looking for, but overall I was disappointed with it. It is extremely difficult to find specific locations and even when I did, it was hard to find them again. Their search page is horribly overcomplicated and even when one figures out how to use it, the results presented are awful. I just now tried a search for "stained glass" as the stained glass museum there was one of my favourites. The museum, however, doesn't even appear on this first page of the results and instead a lot of seemingly unrelated stuff is. Even once you find a specific site, the information presented is overly brief and not particularly enticing (and in the case of this museum completely lacking in even one photo). Another bad user experience with the Explore Chicago website is their "Trip Planner" tool. The tool sounds awesome - an interactive, customized trip planner - how useful would that be! In reality, however, if one can find a location to enter into their trip planner and hits the button provided to add it, the site makes a user go through the process of logging in each and every time. It doesn't store log-in information even during an active session. The process of logging in every time I want to add an item is way too cumbersome. Once locations are added it is possible to make a schedule of the items, but that is not a particularly useful functionality. What I wanted and I believe would be the most useful, is to have the locations plotted onto a map so I can determine the vicinity of locations. This functionality would greatly help me determine a schedule and let me visit more stuff - and probably spend more money - so there is a financial incentive for the City to offer this functionality. I stopped using this website early on as it was so unhelpful. Suffice it to say, user experience is crucial and the website can be an enticement or it can be a complete roadblock.

As we were on a budget with this trip, we had to plan our usage of pubic transit. I've yet to find a city yet that had a user-friendly transit system or even barely-adequate way-finding aids. Chicago earns its nickname the windy city and even despite the heat lamps on the L-train stations, we did not want to be out in the cold more than we had to. My wife consulted Chicago's transit website and found it most helpful in linking directly to Google Maps for directions. The city's transfer policy is not properly explained on their website (as it is too complicated to begin with) but the site was useful in presenting basic info such as fares and where to buy passes (not a given with other transit websites, ie. Toronto's).

Once we arrived in Chicago, my interactions with digital media were less frequent than usual as I did not bring my BlackBerry because my carrier (Bell) charges too much for foreign data access. There were many times we really could have used it. It would have been much easier for directions or information on specific locations - instead we had to rely on tourist pamphlets and maps and helpful citizens. I would also have loved my BlackBerry to use Foursquare. I haven’t used Foursquare in weeks as the novelty has worn off and the home-based utility is lacking for me, but when in a new city Foursquare would be invaluable. It would be great to gettargeted tips on restaurants, sites, history, etc. Also, Chicago's tourism industry appears to be embracing Foursquare. I saw posters for Foursquare at various sites encouraging people to check in and offering special deals (which I would have loved).

We did interact with digital media in some cool and helpful ways. Interactive on-the-spot maps (e.g. at the Water Tower Place or the Art Institute) helped us find specific spots. We walked past "The Oprah Store" at least ten times before an interactive map helped us determine it was actually a tiny kiosk. Once there they didn't have the postcards I wanted and the friendly clerk advised me to go to the online store to order them. (I did get to see Oprah's shoes and shirt at least). We noticed interactive maps outside, but considering how hellishly cold it was in Chicago, we weren't inclined to pause long enough to check them out.

There was some cool use of digital media at some of the museums and attractions, but not as cutting edge as I'd like. The Children’s Museum, for instance, was lacking in innovative use of digital media (although outstanding in every other way). The Children’s Museum did have one digital experience that both my daughter and I loved. In their nature section, there are computers and a giant screen. One has their picture taken by a camera and his/her face is transposed onto the body of a bee or butterfly. Then using a bug-shaped controller you can fly your insect-self around the city of Chicago. It was really fun and well executed.

The maze at Navy Pier seemed like an expensive tourist trap, but it was surprisingly really good(unlike most of their counterparts in other cities, such as Niagara Falls). The maze used references from Chicago's history and tied them into immersive audio-visual, spatial experiences and interactive media. For example, images of the great Chicago fire are projected onto a large floor space and guests must stomp out the fire. I've encountered interactive floor media before (Ontario's Science Center makes great use of it) but this was a lot of fun and appropriately-tied to Chicago. They also had a Bears football game on the floor, which was also a lot of fun ("Go Bears").

Another cool use of digital media was at the John Hancock Observatory. We decided to go to there rather than the Sears Tower as I saw on the Explore Chicago that a skating rink had just opened up on the top. I couldn't resist skating at 94 stories high. The multimedia tours seemed interesting rather than just the now obligatory audio tours that everyone still offers. Even though they were included we didn't do them as they require earphones and make the experience too isolating. They have yet to make an automated tour that allows guests to interact with each other - something people travelling together generally want to do. We did enjoy their new interactive telescopes. Made by a Montreal company, they are only available in North America at this location. The telescopes offer the standard functionality of panning and zooming, but where they were really cool is they embed textual and photographic information on top of what you're seeing live - so by touching the screen you can see and learn more than otherwise possible. The telescopes also allow the viewer to change the view to a non-live view of the same thing at different times of day or seasons. My daughter choose the Spanish language version for some reason which detracted from our experience - but otherwise the telescopes were among the most interesting, fun, useful and user-friendly tech I've encountered. There is a lot of hype of augmented reality but very little real application; judging from these telescopes though the functionality is incredible.

The Art Institute of Chicago lacked innovative or creative digital media. Overall, it is one of the best art galleries I have been to in the world. Their collection is really strong in modern and contemporary art, but had no digital media that I could detect. Digital artists are doing creative things online, and it would be great to see a major cultural institution recognize this officially on-site and online. The Art Institute does have a cool feature that allows one to make a "collection" of their favourite works to annotate and share with friends (here's my collection). There are significant usability problems with this feature, but it does make a great souvenir and online conversation starter (I posted it to Facebook).

As we were leaving our hotel, I noticed a poster in the elevator asking guests to friend the hotel. I want to friend Beyonce and Shakira, maybe even the Cheesecake Factory but I'm not sure I have such a close personal bond with a hotel. I do feel that way with the city. We loved our trip to Chicago as it is a rich cultural center. Compared to other cities, it seems Chicago is making better use of digital media. Cities are missing out on how the effective and innovative use of digital media can not only enhance a traveller's visit but offer the city financial benefits as well.

Is Privacy an Outdated Concept?

2011-01-26T23:56:00.001-05:00

I attended a talk tonight at UofT's iSchool Institute by Canadian science fiction author Robert Sawyer. He spoke on his belief of the outdated notion of privacy. In writing this blog post a paradox of privacy of mine occurred to me - I was hesitant to use his name as whenever I name a person or company on this blog, I inevitably receive an email or comment from them (okay this hasn't always proven the case as with my mentions of Beyonce or Shakira). Even though I publish this article in a public space, it still feels like an invasion when I hear from the people I'm talking about. I often find myself censoring myself so that I can maintain my sense of broadcasting my private thoughts.

I realize this behaviour is at odds with itself - but as raised in tonight's talk we (particularly my generation) are in a transitional phase from a having sense of privacy to the realization that privacy is dead. Sawyer argued that we only ever protected our privacy for two reasons: shame and wrong-doing. When societal values were more restrictive we guarded our personal lives to fit in and prevent societal repercussions. As more things become tolerable in our society this is no longer necessary. The latter point is where Sawyer mostly focused. He noted that with destructive weaponry becoming more powerful and harder to detect, it will become increasingly possible for those full of hate or for mad scientists to annihilate humanity. So notions of privacy must be put aside for our protection and preservation. He asked, can we now truly afford privacy?

Sawyer noted, however, that this is largely a moot point anyway as corporations already have access to extensive information about us. And moreover we have willing given companies our privacy (whether or not we were beguiled to do so).

An audience member objected that people do not in fact wittingly give up their privacy. I wanted to chime in that this was not necessarily true as I have given up a lot of private info about myself to the mobile app Foursquare fully knowing what I was giving up. Hell, I was even hopeful that giving up this info would result in more corporate invasion of my "private space" to offer me even paltry deals. Air Miles knows tons about me, and I LOVE all the free trips I've gotten from them.

Some of the audience were rankled by Sawyer's provocative assertion that privacy is dead (or rather reassertion as he and other technologists have noted this for years). Sawyer noted that already the boat has sailed on this (or as he said the "aircraft carrier") and it is impossible now to stop people from releasing info to companies. Instead he argued that we need to learn how to live with this new reality and to enact policy against the misuse of personal info.

I agree with Sawyer that people are too busy and too impressed with using tech like Facebook or Google to start en masse to recapture and to assert their privacy. Some believe that caring about protecting privacy is a generational one - as witness to the tons of Facebook users who don't ever change their default settings and then publish the most intimate details of their lives. I don't feel that this is generational. I may not post drunken photos of myself but in general I don't really care about privacy discussions or policy.

The only reason I went to see Sawyer speak on this topic tonight is that I loved the TV series based on his book FlashForward and that my wife recommended him as a speaker after hearing him speak on the human rights of clones and robots.

Still the privacy session was interesting and Sawyer read amply from his works. Including a new trilogy (begins with Wake) on what happens when the world wide web gains intelligence. Now that is a topic I care about.

Collecting or Hoarding?

2011-01-11T16:10:00.005-05:00

My school has an exhibit on the practice of collecting and is displaying a sample of some of my collections. The exhibit closes this week, but there's still time to see my and others oddities displayed. For more information on the exhibit read the University of Toronto's news item: Faculty of Information’s 'cabinets of curiosities' on display.

The event organizers wanted the collectors to write about their collection and name it. For the first time I actually thought of my stuff as a collection. I thought of calling it "The Eccentric, Eclectic Hoard" but figured that "Saving Weird Stuff" was more accurate. I hadn't really thought about my collecting process or motivations before. I realized that I do have a propensity to save and organize stuff, whether it is souvenirs, books, objet d'art, or digital resources. I've written before about how my Delicious bookmarks provided a sense of control and satisfaction, but hadn't looked at my collecting more holistically.

Am I collector or hoarder? I'm not ready to go on TLC's “Hoarding: Buried Alive” (I hope) but I am a serial saver. Over the years, I've amassed many collections: comic books, fridge magnets, old books about the Internet, pins, postcards, Toronto history books, socks, sunglasses, View Master disks, etc.

A few years ago I realized my collecting was more pathology than hobby, so I started pruning. I now maintain most collections only passively. Collections like mine, however, have a way of never dying as friends and family continue to donate items and I continue to stumble upon irresistible acquisitions. In reexamining my collections, however, I was struck that the intrinsic qualities of an item are now often secondary to the memories they evoke – and thus worthy of saving/hoarding. But possibly in a more selective manner.

Assessment of Quality and Personal Suitability in Peer-Review Journals

2011-01-10T16:23:00.002-05:00

This post relates the process I went through to find and assess relevant leading academic journals. There are a lot of peer-reviewed journals, but not all are created equal - some are more topically suitable but less esteemed - finding a balance is crucial. This post relates my specific process, but could be applied to others in any other academic field seeking to find journals suitable to their work.

Determining a suitable venue for academic publication is challenging for new scholars. One must consider both a journal’s suitability of content and approach as well as its potential influence. Although there are metrics to help determine the perceived esteem of a journal, gauging its overall value can be difficult. For example, journals rated highly by traditional metrics might be more inclined towards conservative methods and topics, which may ill suit emerging scholars pursuing innovative approaches and emerging topics. In addition, highly-rated journals often have lower acceptance rates decreasing the likelihood of publication. The delays of resubmitting to alternative journals may result work loosing its timeliness or being the first to publish on a given topic. This paper aims to explore the process I developed to ascertain suitable journals for publication of my chosen research area (i.e. the use of mobile social media in libraries or information repositories). I will also briefly address journal bibliometrics.

To initially select journals for inclusion, I compiled a list from personal sources. My personal selections were based upon my favoured sources for reading, recently cited journals, and those encountered during a recent literature review. Using this list, I then was able to determine the suitable categories of Australian Research Council (ARC) ranked journals, which were “Information Systems” (category #0806) and “Library and Information Studies” (#0807). Downloading the full ARC ranked outlets list enabled me to sort by category. I was quickly able to cull unsuitable journals based on their titles; others required an examination of the specific journal to determine its topical suitability. This resulted in 62 possible journals to consider. I then examined the editorial aims and scope of the 62 journals by reviewing the issues from the past two to three years. This review allowed me to filter out results based on an inappropriate scope (e.g. engineering) and to then reduce viable journals to 31.

To determine the perceived esteem and influence of a journal, I compiled various established bibliometrics, specifically the ARC’s assigned score, the five year impact factor, SCImago Journal Rank (SJR), and Source Normalized Impact per Paper (SNIP). Bibliometrics have individual strengths and weaknesses. The ARC score is based on the subjective assessment of Australian academics, and no specific formula appears to be made public. Critics of ARC rankings note that it overly favours coverage of Australian topics and unfairly allocates top grades based on a fixed, subjective percentage (i.e. the top five percent of journals in the given field) which penalizes journals in specialized or emerging fields. ARC rankings do allow a more holistic assessment of a journal, acknowledging the importance of more than just resulting citations. The impact factor measurements (both one and five year) rely solely on citations. Although this can result in a more objective metric, it has limitations. Impact factors do not account for differing citation behaviour and volume in different fields, nor do they consider the quality of the citing source or filter out author or journal self-citations. Furthermore, the Institute for Scientific Information index that impact factors are drawn from does not include open-source journals and does include citation sources that are not original research (e.g. review articles). The one year timeframe of the standard impact factor, I feel, does not adequately suit the citation behaviour of the information field. Consequently, I chose to use the five year impact factor. The SCImago Journal Rank (SJR) indicator and Source Normalized Impact per Paper (SNIP) score, I believe, are more transparent and suitable metrics for evaluation, both of which are provided by Scopus. Scopus, to begin, has a much larger database than Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) and includes open-source journals. SJR considers the prestige of a citation source in its formula (similar to Google’s Page Rank) and has a larger citation window (three years) than the impact factor. SNIP assesses the citation patterns of a given field to determine a field-specific score. For example, medical fields tend to cite work more quickly and frequently compared to humanities research.

Having compiled these four metrics per journal, I then weighed each equally to attempt to smooth out biases. My assessment assigned a potential three marks per each journal’s ranking per metric, for a maximum potential score of 12. One point was assigned for the approximate lowest third of rankings and three points assigned for the top third ranking. A key limitation with this approach is that if a journal does not appear in either ISI or Scopus index or have an associated bibliometric, they are given the lowest possible score regardless of the reason for their absence. Nonetheless, this system is useful to give a list of top-ranking, topically-suitable journals.

To determine suitability of editorial content, I assigned a five-point score, with five being deemed the most relevance to my research area and one the least. This was based on a review of the past three years of the journals issues. I looked for articles exploring similar topics to my interests and with a similar epistemological viewpoint to mine.

To attempt to wed journals with deemed high esteem with relevance to my personal areas of interest, I performed a comparison between both lists. I wanted to choose journals with a high overall ranking (i.e. my composite score) and thus determined a score of ten or higher was an acceptable level (twelve journals attained this level). I also wanted to choose journals with a high level of relevance to my research area and thus chose a score of four or higher (ten journals met this level). Any journals that met these criteria were determined to be high-ranking and personally-relevant. The journals that qualified (with their associated composite and relevance scores) are, Internet Research (11, 5), Interacting with Computers (11, 4), Journal of Academic Librarianship (11, 4), and Information Technology and Libraries (10, 4).

From this list of four journals, I attempted to find the acceptance rates of publication. This information would be useful to determine the likelihood of being published in the journal. I was unable to find this information for the above journals (in general, it seems this information is a insider secret)

This overall process has been useful in identifying new publication sources and in gaining a richer understanding of the perceived esteem of various journals. I believe this process has also resulted in a list of the most suitable journals for me to consider when I am ready to publish my research.

Unique Aspects of Mobile Usage

2010-12-21T14:38:00.006-05:00

Still working on the paper on mobile devices, social media and information seeking and sharing. I hate writing papers this time of year. Whomever made academic terms end in late December is a real Grinch that has stolen my Christmas for way too many years!

Anyway, in my research I think I have found three ways that mobile usage is unique from other media technology. I'd love to get some feedback (hopefully in time to incorporate into my paper!) on these, so I thought I'd share them here.

1) Ubiquity of access
Mobiles allow and encourage always-on, anywhere and anytime access.

Repercussions: nomadic information access; attention deficit; information capture to read later; changing sense of personal, work, and social spaces

Needs: speed of access; atomized content; file syncing and version control

Innovations: cloud computing; proactive search; automated metadata

2) Unique design
Mobile devices not only entail smaller screens than PCs but also have a variety of (smaller) input mechanisms (touch screen, trackball, keyboards, etc.) modalities (text, speech, photography, video) and platforms .

Repercussions: multi-platform support

Needs: small scale design; multimedia content; touch screen input; limited user input (based on difficulty in entering large amounts of text)

Innovations: QR Codes; automated linking and integration with native applications; actions based on various input methods, e.g. user shaking device (iPhone); clustered browsing

3) Contextual awareness

Mobile devices are aware of a user's time and location and as mobiles tend to be single-user devices can draw upon automated or supplied profile data. The aspect most unique to mobile devices is the ability to determine a user's geographic location.

Repercussions: participatory surveillance; privacy concerns; geographic relevance

Needs: geotagged resources, GPS; precise location determination; widespread network access (incl. basements, rural, etc.)

Innovations: location-based applications and advertising; location sensitive maps and wayfinding aids; augmented reality; personalized content

Favourite Webslinger Posts of 2010

2010-12-21T14:22:00.006-05:00

As the year draws to the close, I find it interesting to go over my blog posts to find the subjects I found interesting or topical. Having reviewed the Webslinger blog for 2010, I have compiled my favourite blog posts.

January
Political Participation Online in Canada
I love this post as it was so gratifying to see the involvement Canadians had in reaction to Harper proroguing parliament. I joined the Facebook protest group early and it was exciting to see it grow and turn to nation wide in-the-street movement. This blog post also examined Canada lagging use of digital media in government.

February
Short month, no posts

March
Conference Presentation on Web Accessibility Challenges
I presented the main finding from my research on web accessibility diffusion and implementation challenges. Overall, I found that the onus to implement accessibility falls on web practitioners yet there is insufficient support and promotion.

April
Facebook and the Problem of Collapsed Identity
Privacy and Facebook seem to be much discussed, but the ability to segment different facets of one's life online (and one's online life) in Facebook are not adequately addressed.

May
Participate in Shaping Canada's Digital Economy
Last spring, the Canadian government opened up discussions on Canada's "digital economy". I was glad to see government recognizing the need to improve here and allowing various ways for citizens to send feedback. In addition to voting and commenting on ideas raised by others on the government's website, I participated in a group wiki for the UofT to submit their report

June
Canada's Cyber Celebs - 2010
It is great to see that so many Canadians (as loosely as that is defined by me) having achieved such significant results to the development and culture of the Internet. This was an update to a prior list, but I doubled it.

July
Delicious Numbers
I find it so sad to hear about Delicious probable demise. It is now bittersweet to reread this post where I itemize my great devotion to Delicious.

August
Foursquare User Types
My ethnographic research into Foursquare users resulted in a paper and some findings that I rolled up into this and another post. I thought Foursquare was the bees knees, but sadly over the last two months I haven't checked into Foursquare once. Their value proposition could not extend beyond novelty - although I think it's annotated space functionality will still come in handy if looking for restaurants. For specific information I now use the Yellow Pages app - which truly is the bees knees, if less sexy.

September
Canada's Role in a Mobile Media World and Canada and the Role of Location - Mobile Media World Conference
This was one of the best conferences I attended in 2010. It has interesting speakers raising some good points. It reaffirmed my decision to segue to mobile Internet - even if the caterer did give me food poisoning.

October
Another Thing to Blog Home About
On the fourth anniversary of this blog, I started my second ever blog. It reminded me of the invaluable role blogging can play individually and collectively.

November
Lessons From In-the-Trenches Webcasting
The trenches can be a bloody mess but a real eye-opener. I got an in-depth, crash course on the latest developments for webcasting and gained best practices (mostly from learning the hard way) which I share in this post.

December
Disney World - From Analog to Digital
I've started looking at my stats over the past few months and found out that this blog is read by more than just me and my wife. Someone else loved this post and sent me a decent amount of traffic. I think this posts captures the cultural shift from analog to digital media as epitomized by Disney.

My blog has been including more coverage of non-Internet topics that address my growing academic transitions. So an honourable mentions go to my posts on how to get Canadian graduate research grants, which is the most popular blog post of all time.

Here's to an interesting, eventful 2011!

2010 the Year of Mobile

2010-12-20T15:18:00.007-05:00

I'm writing a paper on trends on the use of mobile social media apps and sites for information seeking and sharing. I was trying to support the claim that 2010 was the year of mobile as definitely appeared to be judging from the rapid uptake and development of devices and applications. I saw this video from Mobile Future and it makes my complete case for me.

Although the stats presented are American, I'm sure they apply equally well in Canada (with the exception of carrier choice and prices - we suck in that area). I think I'm definitely studying the right area!

Klick! Holiday Video

2010-12-16T15:06:00.001-05:00

Over the years I have received numerous corporate holiday e-cards and videos. Some were cool, most lame, and none memorable.

Except this one.

This one is hilarious! From Toronto-based communications agency Klick, this holiday video looks like the results of an open bar hours after the office holiday party. It's also a contest to spot the various viral media references.

Disney World - From Analog to Digital

2010-12-14T21:29:00.003-05:00

I got back last week from a week-long family vacation at Walt Disney World Resort in Florida. My first trip there was when it first opened in 1971. We were the first family in the small town where I was born to go to Disney World, so that family trip made it into the local paper (complete with a picture of me in a highchair happily sporting the trademark mouse-ears). Since that visit I have been back to Disney at least once every decade.

Disney World has always made use of cutting-edge technology to deliver entertainment. It was just this past trip, however, that the dramatic technological shift with their attractions became apparent to me. Analog may still remain supreme there, but the future appears to be digital.

Analog experiences are still aplenty at Disney. My daughter's favourite experiences were the theatrical shows, costumed characters, decorations, and dark rides . She also loved the log flume ride and I loved the rollercoasters. But rollercoasters are still rollercoasters (albeit greatly enhanced at Disney by special effects and art direction). Although the motion simulator and immersive experience of Mission: Space is an experience completely unique (and the only ride ever to almost make me vomit).

But, I love how old school tech still holds up well at Disney. Haunted Mansion is a great example of the excellent use of projectors, smoke, and mirrors. Disney perfected the dark ride (a term I didn't know until recently either, according to Wikipedia it is a enclosed ride with animatronics, manequins in tableaux, and special lighting and sound effects) and they are still crowd-pleasers. Haunted Mansion was my daughter's second favourite ride as it was mine when I was a kid (her favourite was Splash Mountain, mine was, and still is, Space Mountain).

Our two favourite parts of Haunted Mansion were ghostly apparitions both achieved via mirrors (including a technique called "Pepper's Ghost" from the 1850s). Okay, I had no idea what Pepper's Ghost was before reading it on Wikipedia but my point is the analog techniques are still effective. (Less so with Country Bear Jamboree and Tiki Room as the animatronics seem like something from the old scifi flick Westworld).

It was my 1992 visit, that I noticed a big switch in entertainment styles at Disney World. A year earlier MuppetVision opened at Hollywood Studios. MuppetVision was my first effective 3D experience (the ones on TV in the 80s didn't really cut it) and it was my first experience with 4D (i.e. combining 3D film with physical events in the theatre). It was Disney's second 4D experience (Michael Jackson's Captain Eo in 1986 was the first). The technology worked incredibly for me. I had never seen such a vivid 3D film before and I hadn't even conceived of 4D (although putting buzzers in people's seats to shock them during pivotal scenes was done in the 60s). 4D was so new to me that when a bubble smacked me in the face, when explosions went off in the theatre, and when a costumed-actor burst into the crowd - it rocked my world!

4D still rocks but is now getting less thrilling with its ubiquity. There is one per Disney park, i.e. Mickey's PhilharMagic in Magic Kingdom, It's Tough to Be a Bug at Animal Kingdom, and Soarin' at Epcot) and we've encountered them at Ontario Place and Niagara Falls. (BTW, I'd like to start a campaign to use the Ontario 4D film at Ontario Place to replace the dreadful show at the Canada pavilion at Epcot.)

3D/4D may use computers in production and digital projection, but it still seems like an analog experience. The real fundamental switch to a completely different type of experience was Toy Story Midway Mania! - a completely digital experience.

There were digital predecessors at Disney. The dark ride Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin (opened in 1998) allowed riders to shoot lazers at targets with scores tabulated instantly on the rider's car. And the lame-o ride Spaceship Earth had a redo in 2008 that added interactive, digital components. The traditional dark ride components (the lame-o part) is augmented by an interactive component that uses a photograph of the rider and user-supplied choices to create a customized, futuristic vision video (which can then be emailed).

The epitome of digital at Disney World, however, is Toy Story Midway Mania. It opened 2008 at a cost of $80M. It is much-hyped and immensely popular - by noon at their slowest time of year they ran out of fast passes and the queue was well over an hour. Basically, the attraction is a series of 3D shooting games (modelled on old-style midway attractions such as darts and ring toss). Riders are transported from game to game in a vehicle and a running score is displayed in the car. There are 4D special effects such as wind blowing at you if you pop a balloon, but they are infrequent and minor.

According to some Disney travel writers, they believe this type of attraction is the future. I can see its appeal to the company as updating them is much simpler and cheaper. Instead of tearing down existing structures and scenes and building new ones, they can just install a new program. Despite the hype, however, it didn't seem that much better than at-home games. It seemed frenetic and lacked the charm or immersiveness of other Disney attractions.

A Disney attraction that I do think has tremendous potential and I believe will be more common among amusement parks and tourist destinations is the Kim Possible World Showcase Adventure. Guests pick up a mobile device from a mission kiosk and then go to one of the country pavillons to unravel a mystery. The mobile plays clue videos and allows individual input based on the players' real-world findings. It also makes use of the device's camera and positioning functionality. Based on successful gamer responses, it triggers real-world action, such as sound effects and the motion of sets or statues. Overall, I loved it! But it wasn't a tremendous hit with my daughter. The storyline was a little too complicated, long and hard to hear. Still I think the Kim Possible game combines analog and digital experiences in a really vivid, interactive and compelling way.

My family already wants to go back to Disney, but it may be awhile before we actually return. When I do return, I'll be eager to see whether digital has indeed taken over or whether analog holds strong.

Tips for Writing a SSHRC Program of Study

2010-11-23T17:57:00.004-05:00

I've previously blogged about on getting Canadian graduate grants including my top ten tips. This year, I had the opportunity to look at several prospective masters programs of study. Below are common concerns that I noticed.

Common SSHRC program of study issues:

- good storytelling is important - proposals must engage the reader and entice them to read on (and not instantly discard), so don't start with "I am in my first year of a MA..."

- if including one's personal background it should be related to the program of study so specify this relationship. Don't include one's life story or a laundry list of classes taken

- acknowledge ethical concerns - if your proposed research is low risk,then once sentence will probably suffice to acknowledge your intention to follow university process here. I read some students proposals that dealt with sensitive populations or were proposing research that may actually result (indirectly) in harm to participants - in these cases it's important to deal with this.

- watch the scope is not too broad or suffers from Miss Universe syndrome (i.e. my research will save the world)

- mention (even briefly) sampling, access, and data analysis

- don't use of the term "subjects" or other dehumanizing labels for research participants

- define key terms and/or operationalize central concepts

- a clearly articulated research question is important

- explain how the research fits into your current area of study. I read some programs of study that appeared as if the student was in the wrong program as they referred exclusively to the concepts of other disciplines. It is important to fit one's research into one's current discipline not only to show that you are on a logical, appropriate academic path, but also applications are vetted by one's department so don't alienate them

- include a good title

- cite sources correctly!

I believe addressing these issues will make a program of study read better and be more academically appropriate.

Lessons From In-the-Trenches Webcasting

2010-11-17T15:19:00.003-05:00

I recently finished three days of orchestrating webcasts for a local social media conference. Prior to this, I had participated in the back-end production and front-end participation of webcasts, but hadn't gotten deep into the trenches of overseeing all aspects of the webcasts. It was a learning experience, to say the least. Without getting into the details of the decision whether or not to webcast or the event management details, I'll outline my experience to offer tips and caveats for anyone considering webcasting.

Background
I had four days to find a video recording and webcasting solution. Fortunately, the IT guys at my department already had a solution in place and were incredibly helpful. I would not have been able to do this without technical support and an integrated solution. So my first tip for anyone attempting this is to make sure they have experienced technical help in place before even embarking on such a project.

As the conference relied on volunteer labour, it meant that I didn't know whom exactly was helping out until the day of the event. Ideally, a meeting and some training beforehand would help - but I realize this isn't always feasible. Considering the uncertainty of volunteer expertise and availability, it was essential to keep everything simple and operable by one person.

It also helps to see the environment one will be working in to figure out what are going to be any camera, audio, power, and network issues. We didn't get to see all the rooms, so we packed extra power bars, extension cords, and cable extenders (another great idea).

The webcasting system
Considering the circumstances and availability of equipment and expertise, I decided that the integrated solution my department provided was ideal. They had already purchased a subscription to webcasting software. This includes web-based recording management software and desktop recording software. We had fairly small webcams that had a omni-directional microphone, auto focus, and automatic light and colour correction. This makes operation of the camera and microphone incredibly easy. The webcams have a stand/clamp that makes positioning it easy. The webcams fed into a netbook. The software can also record the speaker's PowerPoint presentation if it is preloaded onto the computer - this would then be seen with the webcam via a split screen during the webcast. The cameras capture the session and then upload to server. We used both the wireless and wired network connection. Once on the Web, sessions can be managed, edited, and shared.

The set-up
Our job was to cover 3 break-out conference panels for the 3 days of the conference (15 sessions in total). Including myself, we had 3 volunteers. I had about one hour to meet with the volunteers to set-up equipment and train them how to use the software.

Technical problems
As to be expected, there are always problems that arise - some that cannot be anticipated. Of the three days of the conference, I had a new batch of problems come up suddenly and dramatically every day. These include:

wireless network connection unstable and slow and wired connection didn't seem to always work either
camera stand tips easily
camera or microphones can't zoom in - so people sitting far away from the camera aren't seen or heard particularly well
camera can't capture details of a presentation screen well-enough to be able to read it
backlight from windows or projector beam light overwhelms camera
webcasting software would mysteriously uninstall itself and need reinstalling
one of the netbooks died

Having back-up netbooks minimized problems with hardware and having lots of powerbars and cable extenders also helped.

Human issues

problems would come up and volunteers would have to leave recording to resolve them
speakers refused (for various reasons) to be recorded
pre-loading presentations onto netbooks takes too long if doing multiple speakers
locks on equipment didn't work, so room would have to be locked and unlocked regularly
no tech support available on weekends
attendees and speakers needed help with various things (e.g. getting onto Internet, where's washroom, projectors, etc.) and in doing this it takes time away from recording set-up
speakers that read their papers (often in a monotone) make for incredibly boring webcasts
real-time communication between volunteers and conference organizers across buildings and rooms was a problem

Having more volunteers to act as a float and resolve the other non-webcasting issues would have help - as would have a technical expert on stand-by (even if only available via telephone).

Benefits
Considering all the problems, I would be tempted to say it was an ideal solution. If we had access to high-def cameras, tripods, and full suite of microphoness it would have certainly provided a better quality recording. But these are more difficult to operate and the use of various microphones would have meant we would have fed things into an audio board. Certainly, not something one, untrained person could feasibly do alone. To cover this many sessions, it would have also required lots of computer memory - not cheap. This type of equipment tends to be bigger and require more space and cords for set-up.

The webcams and netbooks are highly portable and don't take up much space - considering the small size of some of the rooms this is an asset. This system is also easy to set-up and fast to upload. As quality wasn't as essential as making use of existing resources (both technical and labour), it was a good solution. I believe most of the problems would be addressed with better real-time communication and at least 1-2 more volunteers.

Why I Really Love Delicious

2010-11-02T17:19:00.002-04:00

As a daily web surfer since 1998, I have encountered almost innumerable webpages, many of which I wish to record or revisit. Without a robust and scalable solution, I would not be able to easily store and retrieve online resources essential to my career and personal life. For the past four years, I have used Delicious for my web bookmarks.

I use Delicious almost exclusively for my bookmarks as it offers me superior classification flexibility compared to tree-based bookmarking systems and it offers memory aids unequaled by search engines. I previously blogged about my Delicious usage. But in short, I tend to create 75 bookmarks a month on Delicious and visit their website about 2-3 times a week. Less frequently, I also use it to aid my sharing of webpages, to connect with similar bookmarkers, and to find new information.

But it is not just the utility or social networking that has garnered such devotion in me. I was wondering why I really love Delicious, so I tried to think more consciously and reflectively of my usage for a few days.

I noticed that I bookmarked not only for future retrieval but also as a form of nostalgic memory aid. I bookmark to recall life events such as family vacations, conferences attended and experiences, such as humourous findings and my bizarre interests. My bookmarks are my version of photo album and diary.

My Delicious bookmarking also fosters a sense of control. Not only are there seemingly infinite numbers of webpages to manage, but I also have many topics my career requires me to master. Faithfully bookmarking allows me to feel that these resources and the information contained therein is within my domain, readily within my grasp.

Delicious' interface is certainly simple and their browser plug-in makes using it even simpler. But it is Delicious' functionality that hooks me by being so well-suited to allowing me to obsessively grow (over 3400 bookmarks) and control this element of my life.

Thinking of Studying Mobile Social Media for Libraries

2010-10-20T14:41:00.004-04:00

Okay, I'm in my second year of PhD studies and I still haven't settled on my exact research area let alone the research question.

So I need your - anybody's really - help in finding a good research area. So I'm wondering if anyone can provide me an example of mobile social media apps/sites. I'll get into the specifics...

Part of my problem is I have a lot of research interests, many of which fit well within the auspices of an Information program. The overall themes of my interests are user experience (including usability and accessibility), user participation (i.e. social media), and mobile media (specifically either a mobile website or mobile app.).

Within these areas I'm starting to look for a research problem. One domain that I think needs research is the user experience of mobile social media for libraries.

At this point, I'm defining my terms fairly broadly.

Mobile - I'm using it to indicate a device with Internet connection and input functionality. This includes smartphones (BlackBerry, iPhones, Androids, Nokia, etc.) and tablets (iPad, Blackberry's tablet.) I do not include e-Readers (eg.Kindle) as they have limited input functionality. I am not planning to include netbooks or laptops as although they can be quite small and portable they do not yet have the easy and quick access that mobile devices allow.

Social media - I'm defining this problem as any online content that allows users to add, edit, or share collectively. I'm not including tools that allow for individual customization.

Library - due to the newness of this area, I'm opening up my initial exploration from the now-common digital library to any bounded body of information on resources. Resources can be books, movies, journals, magazines, tv shows, bookmarks, etc.

So I would love to hear of any examples - and your opinions and experiences - with any mobile social media apps/sites for "libraries". (BTW, I'm not looking for libraries that have mobile apps/sites unless they have a social media component.)

I'm aware of (and love) some web library examples - such as LibraryThing, Zotero, Delicious, IMDB, Google Books, etc. But haven't encountered great examples in the mobile space. Any help in hastening my PhD studies would be greatly appreciated!

My Presentation to Prospective PhD Students at Royal Roads

2010-10-18T16:39:00.003-04:00

This is the visuals for my presentation today. The content of what I said is in my earlier post here.

Check out the presentation slides here or see my notes on SlideShare.

View more presentations from glenfarrelly.

The Many Considerations for Considering Doing a PhD

2010-10-13T19:14:00.006-04:00

I was asked to speak to my masters alma mater on doing a PhD. There are many factors to consider both academic and lifestyle. Assuming you have already decided that a PhD is right for you, you are willing to make the sacrifices, and can't be convinced not to do a PhD, then here are the key considerations.

Choosing a Program
Try to have an open mind when exploring and evaluating PhD programs. It's important that you feel that you will fit into the program (trust your hunches) but no program will be perfect. Here is the process I went through, in order:

1) Consider disciplines
Communication majors might want to consider related fields like information, journalism, English, etc. Also consider various different names for essential similar programs, so communication can also be very similar to Media Studies and Cultural Studies. Also think about ones programs covering topics you like but from different approaches, for example sociology, anthropology, engineering (if you go too far afield, however, you may need extra time to learn the basics of the field).

2) Consider programs
Once you have a sense of the academic discipline, check out specific programs. The best way to start is by reading their websites. Websites have the official material for prospective students, but check out their recent course list (if there is nothing offered that interests you in the last couple years, that's a good warning). Also ask your social network for their thoughts or experience. Once you have a handful of programs that interest you, contact the admissions officer to ask them your specific questions. Another good way to get a sense of a program is to look at all their recent graduates (say for the past five years) dissertations (via ProQuest). If the program is not graduating any students doing anything remotely up your alley, that's another warning sign.

3) Consider the university
As there are a glut of PhD grads every year and only a handful of tenure-track position, the reputation of your university does matter. There are various lists of top universities, but also consider the standing of the program as well. Also consider the location (commute time, aesthetics, etc.) and facilities (office space, library, labs) of the university as well.

4) Consider the faculty
PhD programs require students to work very closely with a handful of professors. So it is essential that you find permanent faculty (i.e. tenure-track) who will support you and your research interests. If you already know of a professor whose work you admire, arrange to talk to them and tell them your plans. Otherwise, go over faculty biographies (usually published on the website) and check their background and research interests. Read their recent publications.

You need to find at least one faculty member who could feasibly be your advisor, but I recommend having more than one person that you can see yourself working for. Professors frequently leave for various reasons (e.g. denied tenure, better job opportunity, sabbatical leaves, retirement, death). You will also need professors to serve on your committee so while not everyone has to have similar interests to you, there should be others that will not be diametrically opposed to your work.

To make sure there is a good fit with your potential advisor or committee members and to improve your chances of acceptance, arrange to meet with faculty.

Paying For Your PhD
A good thing to keep in mind is that you shouldn't have to pay to do your PhD. Most programs will offer some sort of funding (however minuscule it may be). If you can't find any program, anywhere willing to cover your tuition and a share of your living expenses, then that may be a sign to reconsider doing a PhD.

There are various sources of PhD funding, including:

grants (offerred by the university, province, country, or a company)
teaching assistantships
research assistantships

Also consider the benefits you'd qualify for such as health care, dental plans, daycare reimbursement, etc. These may come from a graduate students union or a TA union.

How To Do Well
Consider your career goals and work towards from day one. Many people doing a PhD aspire to be a full professor. I heard that only 1/3 PhD graduates in Canada will work in academia - and this may mean adjunct faculty or non-teaching roles. If you do desire a tenure-track position, from the first year you should be building your record of:

publishing in peer-reviewed journals
awards
presenting at conferences
teaching portfolio
service

Considering the lack of tenure-track positions, I continue to develop my Plan B. This could be a career in professional research, consulting, non-university teaching, etc. PhD students don't have a lot of free time, but I do think it is worthwhile to do some work to keep viable alternatives.

PhD is a life sentence, so making the choices right for you are crucial.