SLIS News Feed

Elinor Ostrom to give Networks and Complex Systems Talk 11/23/09

The upcoming Networks and Complex Systems Talk will be held on November 23, 2009 from 6:00-7:00 p.m. in the Grand Hall at Neal Marshall Center, Indiana University, Bloomington. SLIS faculty member Katy Börner is the organizer of the talk series.

The talk will be given by Elinor Ostrom (2009 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences).

Abstract:
In this presentation, I would first like to present an article recently published in Science entitled “A General Framework for Analyzing Sustainability of Social-Ecological Systems.” After presenting an overview of the published article, I will go on to discuss some of our current efforts to develop this ontological framework still further.

Bio:
Dr. Ostrom is the Arthur F. Bentley Professor of Political Science and Senior Research Director of the Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis, Indiana University, Bloomington; and Founding Director, Center for the Study of Institutional Diversity, Arizona State University. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society, and a recipient of the Reimar Lüst Award for International Scholarly and Cultural Exchange, the Elazar Distinguished Federalism Scholar Award, the Frank E. Seidman Distinguished Award in Political Economy, the Johan Skytte Prize in Political Science, the Atlas Economic Research Foundation’s Lifetime Achievement Award, and the John J. Carty Award for the Advancement of Science.

Photo courtesy of Indiana University.

New Book by Blaise Cronin

SLIS Dean Blaise Cronin has written books for both scholarly and general readership. In 2006, 2007, and 2008 he wrote a series of three books about Bloomington (town and gown). Just released is a new book titled:

Stickmen: Reflections on the Goalie's Eccentric Art

Here is a preview:
"The blunder in front of millions, sometimes literally billions, the giant stadium screen, the unfeeling cyclops on high, the instant replay, the tut-tutting of kipper-tied pundits in their glass aeries, the rolling reminders on the Web, the odium in the blogosphere, the slow-motion nightmare that won't ever go away. Post-traumatic stress syndrome is now an occupational hazard for professional goalkeepers, Prozac just what the doctor ordered. Baudrillard was on the ball when he banged on about hyper-reality, even if he wasn't thinking about soccer. Humiliating magnification of errors for those baying on the terraces and those pontificating from the depths of their La-Z-Boy sofas is the postmodern keeper's lot. Misery-in-the-round, in slow motion and from a dozen camera angles, every lapse sliced and diced in real time, digitally captured, instantly archived and forever retrievable. Your immediate past becomes your long-term future. The match-winning interventions, the ProZone statistics that don't lie and 'Saves of the Week' are all quickly forgotten; it's the blunder that lodges itself in the collective memory. We are recast ontologically, once and for all. "

All four books are available through AuthorHouse.

SLIS Network — Fall 2009

The center feature of the Fall 2009 issue of the SLIS alumni magazine celebrated the 45th anniversary of the SLIS Doctoral Program. The introduction was by SLIS faculty member Elin Jacob, Director of the SLIS Doctoral Program:

“The doctoral program at SLIS was originally established in 1964, when the Division of Library Science was still housed within the School of Education. The first two graduates of the doctoral program - Navanitaya Intrama and William Studer - defended their dissertations four years later in 1968. In the 41 years since then, SLIS has awarded 168 doctorates, and I expect as many as six students to defend their dissertations by the end of the 2010 spring semester.

The doctoral program at SLIS has evolved significantly since its inception in 1964. At that time, the program offered the Ph.D. in librarianship and the information sciences and required applicants both to have earned a master’s degree in library science from an ALA accredited school and to possess "acceptable library experience."

Today, we offer the Ph.D. in Information Science; we admit students from a wide variety of backgrounds beyond librarianship; and we accept outstanding applicants who have not yet completed a master’s degree. Our doctoral students have backgrounds in fields as diverse as computer science, instructional systems technology, music, mathematics, communications, and linguistics - in addition to library and information science - and this, for me, is a strong indication of how far we have broadened our appeal and our prestige in the academic world.

‘Diverse’ is perhaps the best single word to describe our doctoral students as a collective. There are currently 39 students from 14 different countries: Azerbaijan, China, Egypt, Greece, Hong Kong, India, Kuwait, Mauritius, Russia, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey and, of course, the US. Their minor areas (a requirement of the University Graduate School) span the university, from computer science, applied statistics and computational linguistics to business, political science and information systems to cognitive science, educational psychology and the history and philosophy of science.

The research interests of doctoral students are even broader than their minor areas, ranging from more traditional topics such as library management, music IR, intellectual freedom, scientometrics and scholarly communication to social network analysis, human-computer interaction, information visualization, and digital preservation to metadata, ontologies, and pervasive computing.

The objective of the doctoral program is to prepare outstanding graduates who will continue the SLIS tradition of innovative research and effective teaching. To this end, we are proud to provide students with an appreciation for and practical experience of scholarly research; to prepare researchers who can identify and conceptualize significant research problems; to produce scholars who have the potential to contribute new knowledge to the field; and to groom our graduates for long-term careers as researchers, teachers and consultants in both academic and non-academic settings.”

SLIS alumni have recently been mailed the Fall 2009 issue of the alumni magazine (SLIS Network, Vol.47, No.2). If you did not receive a copy, you can update your alumni address by emailing us at (slisnews@indiana.edu).

The full issue is available on the SLIS website: SLIS Network (PDF)

ALA Student Chapter - Digital Libraries Panel

The SLIS American Library Association — Student Chapter (ALA-SC) held a Digital Libraries Panel on November 4, 2009. The panel took place from 5:30-7:00 p.m. in the Wells Library. IU Metadata Librarian, Jenn Riley, and Associate Director for Projects and Services, Stacy Kowalcyzk were the panel members. Both are a part of the IU Digital Library Program, and have SLIS connections. Riley graduated with a MLS from SLIS in 2003, and Kowalcyzk is a current SLIS doctoral student.

ALA-SC President Caitlin Bagley sent a summary about the panel:
• “On November 4th, Jenn Riley and Stacy Kowalcyzk met with students for the ALA Digital Libraries Panel. Each spoke about their involvement with metadata and digital libraries at IU. They stressed that they are shifting from building collections to building services that can keep going. Advice to students was that communication was a vital skill set, and that it was important to keep on top of the current literature in the field through listservs, journals, and even new media such as Twitter. An open question discussion between students and speakers followed afterwards.”

The faculty sponsors for the ALA Student Chapter are Mary Popp and Pnina Shachaf.

Join the ALA-SC on facebook to learn about future events!

See Related SLIS News Story:
• SLIS Student Chapters Fall 2009: Exciting Opportunities

Technology Manias

"Technology Manias and the Inefficient Dissemination of Information" was the most recent talk in the Rob Kling Center for Social Informatics (RKCSI) Speaker Series. The talk was given on November 13, 2009 by Andrew Odlyzko (abstract and biography below.) SLIS faculty member Alice Robbin is the Director of the RKCSI Center.

Abstract:
“A comparison of the Internet bubble with the British Railway Mania of the 1840s, the greatest technology mania in history, provides many tantalizing similarities as well as contrasts. Especially interesting is the presence in both cases of clear quantitative measures showing a priori that these manias were bound to fail financially, measures that were not considered by investors in their pursuit of 'effortless riches.' Yet even though these measures were simple and understood by at least a few people, their importance was not appreciated, even by skeptics. The role of such imperfect information dissemination in these two manias leads to speculative projections on how future technology bubbles will develop, and suggests interesting research questions on the social aspects of diffusion of knowledge.”

Bio:
“Andrew Odlyzko has had a long career in research and research management at Bell Labs, AT&T Labs, and most recently at the University of Minnesota, where he built an interdisciplinary research center and is now a Professor in the School of Mathematics. He has written over 150 technical papers in computational complexity, cryptography, number theory, combinatorics, coding theory, analysis, probability theory, and related fields. In recent years he has also been working in electronic commerce, economics of data networks, and economic history, especially on diffusion of technological innovation.”

Next Talk: November 20, 2009

• Robots in Society: Social Impacts, Mutual Shaping, and Collaborative Design
by Selma Sabanovic, School of Informatics, Indiana University Bloomington

Public Library Director - Washington, Indiana

SLIS alumna Teresa Heidenreich (MLS'08) works as the Director of the Washington Carnegie Public Library in Washington, Indiana. The WCPL main branch is in Washington (Daviess County), with a small branch in Plainville. Overall, WCPL directly serves about 19,000 citizens (taxing district and contracted townships). Teresa answered questions about her job in an email interview.

What are your key job duties?
The job duties of a library director in a small/medium sized public library covers a broad spectrum! My official job description is a page and half long but to summarize it in a sentence: I act as the CEO of the library with responsibility for managing and organizing library operations, overseeing library finances and planning and directing its program of service. What does all of that really mean? It means that on any given day I can be found implementing policy and procedure, managing the staff, overseeing technology, preparing long term plans, budgeting, giving a program about the library, writing a grant, selecting materials, working the circulation desk if someone calls in sick or filling up the paper towel dispenser in the public restroom!

What do you like most about your job?
I truly enjoy the diversity of my job, but overall my favorite part is guiding my dedicated staff in obtaining the initiatives, goals and objectives of the library’s vision. Let’s face it, a library can have the best collection of materials in the world, but without a knowledgeable and committed staff that is sensitive to the mission of the library and the needs of the community, quality library service is not going to happen.

Any advice for students?
Do not underestimate the importance of networking! For those of you who live in Bloomington, I would suggest you become involved in as many SLIS activities as possible. For those of you who commute, like I did, and do not have the available time to become involved in extracurriculars, get to know your instructors and keep in touch with guest speakers. I took S603 Grantwriting for Librarians and built camaraderie with my instructor because we shared common interests. When she completed her PhD and relocated for a job, she made a recommendation to SLIS-IUB that I fill her vacancy in teaching the grantwriting course. So now, I enjoy my continued opportunity to give back to SLIS in the way of teaching this practical summer course.

Any other comments?
Honestly, I could talk forever about libraries, librarianship and my experiences. If any of you would like to contact me, please do! theidenr@umail.iu.edu

Information Opportunities in a Pluralistic World: ASIS&T 2009

Professional associations in library and information science provide opportunities to network, and to learn about the latest research trends in the field. Associations have websites, listservs, and conferences. They provide connections that are needed for success in the field. [Note: SLIS has a student chapter of ASIS&T.]

The Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T) was held November 6-11, 2009 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. About the conference:

“We all share a world rich in cultural diversity but also one in which countries, organizations and individuals have never before been so closely linked politically, economically and socially. The theme of the 2009 Meeting, Thriving on Diversity — Information Opportunities in a Pluralistic World, recognizes this reality by offering participants the opportunity to explore how information research and practice can promote global communication while maintaining that diversity.”

Many SLIS faculty members from Bloomington and Indianapolis, affiliated faculty, and Ph.D. students contributed to the conference.

ASIS&T 2009 Conference Program

• People, Information Technology: The Social Analysis of Computer in a Diverse and Pluralistic World SLIS faculty members Howard Rosenbaum (moderator) and Pnina Shachaf were co-organizers of this preconference research symposium, along with colleagues Elisabeth Davenport and Kalpana Shankar.

• Information Access: Toward a More Robust Conceptualization
SLIS doctoral student Shannon Oltmann

• The Ethics of Studying Online Communities: Challenges to Research Design and Data Collection
SLIS faculty members Hsin-Liang Chen, Jean Preer, (and colleagues Sheila Denn, Kenneth Fleischmann, Barbara Wildemuth)

• Social Reference and Digital Reference: Online Question Answering Practices in Two Diverse Communities
SLIS faculty members Pnina Shachaf and Howard Rosenbaum (and colleagues Eileen Abels, Marie Redford, Lynn Connaway, Rich Gazan and Chirag Shah)

• Information Action: A Situated View
SLIS faculty member Hamid Ekbia

• Shared Personal Space: Meeting the Needs of Multiple Users and Multiple Purposes
SLIS faculty member Andrea Japzon (and colleagues Deborah Barreau, Jaime Teevan, and Kristina Spurgin)

• Student Award-Winning Papers
SLIS faculty member Howard Rosenbaum (and Barbara Wildemuth)

• Getting Started in an Academic Career
SLIS faculty member Howard Rosenbaum (and colleagues Barbara Wildemuth, Harry Bruce, Ingrid Hsieh-Yee, Barbara Kwasnik, Edie Rasmussen, Carol Tenopir, and Dietmar Wolfram)

Photo Credit:http://www.flickr.com/photos/lucassrg/ / CC BY 2.0

Librarian of the Year Award: Team Cedar Rapids

"The warning came a scant five-and-a-half hours ahead of the water June 11. Predicted to top out at 24 feet, the Cedar River crested at 31. Despite heroic efforts by the staff to move everything out of danger to 26'-high shelves, the Cedar Rapids Public Library (CRPL), IA, lost 160,000 items including large parts of its adult and youth collections, magazines, newspapers, reference materials, CDs, and DVDs. Most of its public access computers were destroyed as was its computer lab and microfilm equipment. The automatic circulation and security systems were ruined. On top of that, the 84,000 square foot Central Library was contaminated and has been closed ever since those three days in June. The work of the CRPL management team to restore service and embrace the recovery is an inspiration for Cedar Rapids and for all librarians…" — excerpt from:

Librarian of the Year 2009: Team Cedar Rapids
After the flood, CRPL buoys the community
by John N. Berry III — Library Journal, 1/15/2009

SLIS alumna Rebecca Bartlett (MLS/MA'04), was one of 11 recipients of the 2009 Librarian of the Year Award, given annually by Library Journal. Since graduating from her dual SLIS/REEI (Russian and East European Studies) degree program, Rebecca has had interesting job positions. In an email interview Rebecca described her different jobs and receiving the Librarian of the Year Award.

What jobs did you have after graduating?
“After graduating from Indiana University SLIS and REEI in 2004, I moved to Cedar Rapids, Iowa to work at the National Czech & Slovak Museum & Library. In 2007, I took a position as the Adult Services Coordinator at the Cedar Rapids Public Library. In June 2008, this 290,000-volume library was flooded with over 5 feet of water in what is now considered the worst public library disaster in history of the US. For our efforts in re-locating library services in Westdale Mall in Cedar Rapids, our 11-person management team received the 2009 Librarian of the Year award by Library Journal. At 28, I was the youngest person ever to win (share) this award.

Unfortunately, because of the declining economy and the natural disaster, I was one of seven staff members laid off from the Cedar Rapids Public Library in April 2009. I then took a job as the Head of Technical Services at St. Ambrose University in Davenport, Iowa in June 2009. I supervise the four staff members in Technical Services and serve as a reference liaison to several university departments. I have always wanted to work in an academic library, and I enjoy working with students, faculty and staff.”

Any advice for students?
“My advice for current students is not to give up if you can't find the perfect job right away. I know how difficult it is to be looking for work in the current job market. If you can, take a part-time job or an internship at the library where you want to work. It's also a good idea to have someone in the library field look over your resume and make suggestions…”

Invited Talk at STEM Enterprise - Washington, DC

Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) hosted a workshop on Wednesday, October 21, 2009 at George Washington, University, Washington, D.C. Katy Börner, the Victor H. Yngve Professor of Information Science at SLIS was an invited speaker. Her talk was titled "STEM: Individual, Local, and Global Flows and Activity Patterns."

The workshop addresses many policy issues related to information science. Below is the workshop announcement:

http://www.ieeeusa.org/calendar/conferences/stem/

"We would like to invite you to join us in a one-day workshop, STEM Enterprise: Measures for Innovation and Competitiveness, on Wednesday, 21 October 2009, at George Washington University, Washington D.C. Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) are the driving force for the U.S. and worldwide economical and social advancements. Our goal is to bring leaders to discuss important questions facing STEM and to develop policy positions based on concrete data and proven algorithms. It is prudent to develop STEM policies that are derived from incorruptible data and measures to best plan for a healthy and productive enterprise, future economic growth, and rapid innovation.

Input to the STEM R&D enterprise is generally considered to be the funding that includes federal, state, industry, and academics. But what are the outputs, and more importantly the outcomes, from that investment? Is bibliometric data reasonable in measuring output, both quantity and quality, or are new data sources needed to quantify output? What data exists to follow interactions among the STEM enterprise sectors: federal, state, academic, and private industry? What is the outcome or impact of the R&D investment on society and quality of life? How can we measure and assess the outcomes?

The workshop will provide a forum to discuss these issues to come up with policy positions and recommendations. The workshop will have sessions on:

Input/Funding
What is the National Expenditures on R&D both in the public and private sectors with the research portion broken down by basic and applied research? What is the breakout among federal, industry, and academia and by mission, physics chemistry, engineering, etc?

Work Force
This would incorporate such data as S&T employment, un-employment, under-employment, education level of population, and breakout among the STEM enterprise by sector; federal, industry, and academia; or by

Output/Measures
This area would cover data such as scientific publication, patents awarded and other public and private data banks. Data mining from such sources as: Information Science Institute, ISI now know as Thompson Scientific, Rand’s RaDIUS Data Base, American Association for the Advancement of Science data on the S&E federal budget, the National Science Foundation’s Science and Technology Indicators, and data bases from the Department of Commerce, the Department of Labor Statistics, the Patent Offices and the Organization for Economic Co- operation and Development
Outcomes/Productivity Some examples in this area are citations, top 1% of citations measuring high quality and high impact and/or influence, rankings and prizes, etc. Given the output and measures, how to measure productivity?

There will be keynotes in the plenary session to address the broader policy issue.

Thank you for your support. — Dr. Gordon Day, 2009 IEEE-USA President"

New Analytical Lenses for New Media: Web 2.0 and CMCMC

SLIS Professor Susan Herring recently gave a research talk at the Syracuse University School of Information Studies on November 2, 2009. The talk announcement describing her presentation is included here.

Announcement from the Syracuse Website:
http://www.syr.edu/news/articles/ischool-herring-10-09.html

iSchool will host Web 2.0, computer-mediated communication, convergence scholar Susan Herring Nov. 2

posted October 29, 2009 by Margaret Spillett

"Susan C. Herring will speak at the Syracuse University School of Information Studies (iSchool) on Monday, Nov. 2, at noon in the Katzer Room, Room 347 of Hinds Hall. Her lecture, “New Analytical Lenses for New Media: Web 2.0 and CMCMC,” is part of the iSchool’s ongoing Brown Bag Presentation Series.

Herring is a professor of information science at Indiana University-Bloomington. She studied linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley, and was one of the first scholars to apply linguistic analysis to computer-mediated communication. Her early research focused on gender issues. Herring went on to create computer-mediated discourse analysis, which she has used to analyze politeness, interactional coherence and change over time in Internet communication. Her current research interests include multilingual and multimodal computer-mediated communication with an emphasis on convergent media.

Herring’s guest lecture at the iSchool will critique Web 2.0 as an analytical lens through which to view, understand and advance predictions about the Web. Herring will compare Web 2.0 to convergent media computer-mediated communication (CMCMC). CMCMC includes numerous Web 2.0 phenomena, such as blogs, wikis, social network sites and media-sharing sites, but is not limited to Web-based platforms.

Herring’s comparison reveals the advantages and biases of both Web 2.0 and CMCMC. Her comparison also presents an argument for a broader approach to understanding new media—an approach that includes technological convergence.

In addition to her role as professor of information science at Indiana University-Bloomington, Herring is an adjunct professor of linguistics. She is co-editor of “The Multilingual Internet: Language, Culture, and Communication Online,” published in May 2007 by Oxford University Press. She is also the editor in chief of Language@Internet, an open-access, peer-reviewed, scholarly electronic journal that publishes original research on language and language use mediated by the Internet, the World Wide Web and mobile technologies."

Dean’s Note – SLIS Alumni Magazine, Fall 2009

SLIS alumni have recently been mailed the Fall 2009 issue of the alumni magazine (SLIS Network, Vol.47, No.2). The theme of this issue was "SLIS Ph.D. Program Celebrates 45 Years." If you did not receive a copy, you can update your alumni address by emailing us at (slisnews@indiana.edu).

An article by SLIS Dean Blaise Cronin opened the issue:

Dean's Note:
Reflections on the SLIS Ph.D. Program: 45 Years & 168 Graduates Later

If we did not grant doctorates, there would not be a field. Or if there were, it would be a field with decidedly limited prestige and little or no academic credibility. It is not an accident that the leading library and information science schools, however you care to define leading, have doctoral programs. And it is no secret that some schools that do not have a Ph.D. program wish that they did: we like to keep up with the Joneses, too. Why should one expect academia to be immune to inflationary tendencies: remember Ronald Dore’s book, The Diploma Disease, which appeared in the mid-1970s? That said, I do feel a sense of pride when I look at the list of graduates from the SLIS Ph.D. program and, more particularly, when I think of their many contributions to the maturation of the field and its consolidation within the ranks of the nation’s major public research universities.

We graduated our first doctoral students in 1968 just as waves of French students were taking to the streets of Paris: Navanitaya Intrama and William Studer were in the vanguard; 166 have followed in their tracks since. Some have not strayed far, or if they did found the lure of Bloomington too strong to resist: Charles Davis (1969), Marilyn Irwin (1991) and Ralf Shaw (1983? - an annus mirabilis with six Ph.D.s being awarded, including one to Margaret Fung whom I last saw in Taipei) and all still very much here and integral members of the School. As I run my eye down the list I see the names of many current faculty with positions at leading institutions across the nation (Kathryn LaBarre at Illinois, Connie van Fleet at Oklahoma, Cheryl Metoyer at Washington, John Richardson at UCLA, Danny Wallace at Alabama) and others who are pursuing academic careers in countries such as Canada, Japan, Korea, Saudi Arabia, Thailand and the United Kingdom.

The list also contains the names of many current and recent practitioners of note, including William Crowe (1986), James Mullins (1984), Pamela Sandstrom (1998) and Gary Wiggins (1985), individuals whose career contributions have left an indelible mark on the field. As you imagine, there has been a broadening of subject focus. Many of the early Ph.D. dissertations had a specific concern with library materials, operations or processes, so unlike today: “The classified catalogs of German university libraries…” vs. “Identifying gender ideology in Web content…”. Reading the titles is a good way of refreshing one’s knowledge of the recent history of the field: at a glance one can see just how much the field has developed in a matter of generations and how certain concepts and issues are invariant. Last but not least it brought home to me once again the enormity of the contributions made by Distinguished Professor Emeritus David Kaser, who during his 18 years on the SLIS faculty, directed more dissertations than most of us have had hot dinners. Long may the program flourish!

• SLIS Network - Fall 2009 (PDF)

Information and Communication Technology-facilitated Social Movements

This year's 4S (Society for Social Studies of Science) Annual Meeting was held at the Hyatt Regency-Crystal City in Arlington, VA from October 28 to November 1, 2009. SLIS faculty member Noriko Hara gave a presentation on her research (see abstract below) as a part of session #190 - "Online Worlds."

Abstract:
Information and Communication Technology-facilitated Social Movements

The Internet has long been recognized for its ability to reduce initial barriers to transnational collective action, thus making it easier for the general public to participate (e.g., McCaughey & Ayers, 2003). Although social and political scientists have widely studied social movements for a number of years (Hess, Breyman, Campbell, & Martin, 2008), investigation of technologies to support the activities of these movements has just begun. Historically, technology has constructively influenced social movements; perhaps most compelling is the use of the printing press by European social movements in the late eighteenth century (Tarrow, 1998). With the press, social movement organizers were able to widely distribute their ideas and better coordinate their activities. More recently, telephones, direct mailings, fax machines, and e-mails have commonly been used to disseminate information as well as mobilize a critical mass (McCarthy & Zald, 1977; Porta & Diani, 1999). In a similar vein, Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) have had a major impact on numerous recent social movements. While participation in social movements has traditionally been limited to so-called activists, today general citizens who may not consider themselves activists are participating in online mobilization (e.g. Hara, 2008).

This paper first reviews a series of articles that question whether ICTs make a difference in social movements and, if so, in what ways. On one hand, some authors, especially in the early literature about online activism (e.g., Arquilla & Ronfeldt, 2001; Castells, Fernandez-Ardevol, Qiu, & Sey, 2007, Danitz & Strobel, 1999; Kahn & Kellner, 2004), support an ‘equalization’ thesis whose argument is that online tools will distribute powers relatively equally, especially in terms of communication channels—access to and dissemination of information. In this view, technologies are a significant factor to drive the change. On the other hand, according to the ‘normalization’ thesis, the Internet and online campaigns have certain limits in reshaping social movements. In this perspective, online social movements are mere reflections of offline environments and will fail to overcome the existing social structure (e.g., Norris, 2000; Stromer—Galley, 2000). While traditional media are accessible to ordinary people, the influence of the Internet depends on the accessibility and the willingness to find information on Web sites (Norris, 2001; van Dijk and Hacker, 2003). Second, the paper examines three types of ICT use in social movements: resources, framing devices, and mobilization tools. Whereas many interesting cases examining ICT’s role in social movements have emerged in recent years, research in this area appears to be focusing on case studies, e.g., the anti-WTO movement (e.g., Kahn & Kellner, 2004), Zapatista movement (e.g., Arquilla and Ronfeldt, 2001), and Indymedia (e.g., Kidd, 2003; Pickard, 2006). The paper provides a synthesis of the literature by presenting a framework to categorize the studies on ICT-facilitated social movements. As such, the contribution of the paper to the science and technology studies literature is to offer an overview of the landscape of online social movement literature.

References

Arquilla, J., & Ronfeldt, D. (2001). Emergence and influence of the Zapatista social netwar. In D. Ronfeldt and J. Arquilla (Eds). Networks and netwars: The future of terror, crime, and militancy (pp. 171-199). Santa Monica, CA: RAND.

Castells, M., Fernandez-Ardevol, M., Qiu, J. L., & Sey, A. (2007). Mobile communication and society: A global perspective. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Danitz., T., & Strobel, W. P. (1999). The Interet’s impact on activism: The case of Burma. Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, 22, 257-269.

Hara, N. (2008). The Internet use for political mobilization: Voices of the participants. First Monday, 13(7). http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/2123/1976

Hess, D., Breyman, S., Campbell, N., & Martin, B. (2008). Science, technology and social movements. In E. J. Hackett, O. Amsterdamska, M. Lynch, & J. Wajcman (Eds.), The Handbook of Science and Technology Studies (3rd ed.) (pp.273-498). Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.

Kahn, R., & Kellner, D. (2004). New media and internet activism: From the ‘Battle of Seattle’ to blogging. New Media and Society. 6(1), 87-95.

Kidd, D. (2003). Indymedia.org: A new communications commons. In M. McCaughey and M.D. Ayers (Eds). Cyberactivism: Online activism in theory and practice (pp. 47–70). London: Routledge.

McCarthy, J. D., & Zald, M. N. (1977). Resource mobilization and social movements: A partial theory. American Journal of Sociology, 82(May), 1212–1239.

McCaughey, M., & Ayers, M. D. (Eds.) (2003). Cyberactivism: Online activism in theory and practice. New York: Routledge.

Norris, P. (2000). Virtuous circle: Political communication in postindustrial societies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Norris, P. (2001). Digital divide: Civic engagement, information poverty, and the Internet worldwide. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Pickard, V. W. (2006). United yet autonomous: Indymedia and the struggle to sustain a radical democratic network. Media, Culture & Society, 28(3), 315-336.

Porta, D. D. & Diani, M. (1999). Social movements: An introduction. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.

Stromer–Galley, J. (2000). Online interaction and why candidates avoid it. Journal of Communication, 50(4), 111–132.

Tarrow, S. (1998). Power in movement: Social movements and contentious politics (2nd ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

van Dijk, J., & Hacker, K. (2003). The digital divide as a complex and dynamic phenomena. The Information Society, 19(4), 315–326.

Director of Reference and Information Services - Laurel County, KY

SLIS alumna, Jennifer Daugherty (MLS'07), is employed at Laurel County Public Library in London, KY, which serves a user population of about 57,000. Jennifer is the Director of Reference and Information Services. In an email interview Jennifer highlighted her job duties and offered tips for current students.

What are your key job duties?
“I supervise the reference staff and the ILL manager. In addition, I am responsible for collection development of reference, westerns, romances, science fiction/fantasy, and genealogy collections. Since coming to the library, I have worked to expand the Genealogy and Local History collection and have translated this into a Digital project. We have digitized the yearbooks of a local 2 year college that closed its doors several years ago. We are also digitizing several yearbooks from historic community high schools that closed their doors to make way for the central county high school system. My job is unique in that I also serve as the reference librarian for the local community college campus. They have a partnership with our library for us to provide services and instruction to their students. So, I am a public as well as an academic librarian. I also manage the electronic services at the library including database subscriptions, downloadable media, and computer class instruction.”

What do you like most about your job?
“I like that my director is open to new ideas. The library had never done any kind of digital project before I came and she was open to us trying it out. I also enjoy genealogy and I get to my share my passion for research with my patrons. A major plus is that I have been able to attend the last two ALA conferences with other library staff. These conferences are very beneficial and not only help us grow as professionals, but also as a library team.”

Do you have any advice for students?
“I would advise current students to get as much experience as they can while they are in school. I think the libraries at IU are very eager to hire library students, even if they may not have that much experience. When I first came to SLIS, I had never worked in a library. I was able to find several positions that allowed me to work in different aspects of library service. I think that this has helped me become a better, more well-rounded, librarian.

Try different aspects of library work. You might end up doing something you never thought would interest you. You also might find out early on what you don’t want to do.”

ASIS&T Student Chapter - "Tech Talk"

The American Society for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T) – Student Chapter recently held its first Fall “Tech Talk.” The talk took place on October 21, 2009 in the Wells Library, Room E-174. The speaker was Cairril Mills of Cairril.com Design & Marketing. Her company provides web design and development, graphic design, and brand development on a nationwide client base.

SLIS Master of Information Science student China Williams is the current president of the ASIS&T Student Chapter. She provided a summary of the talk.

Cairril Mills started the talk by giving a brief history of the companies and jobs she held before she started her own business. She discussed the reasons why she decided to become a business owner. Then she discussed her business philosophy and her business model. She explained what she does at Cairril.com and how she organizes her design projects. Throughout the lecture she answered questions from attendees about owning her own business as well as her thoughts on web page design and her ideas about what constitutes an effective web page experience. She finished by giving advice to those who are interested in owning their own business as well as advice for those interested in going into web site design.

SLIS Associate Dean Howard Rosenbaum is the faculty sponsor for the ASIS&T Student Chapter. He stated: "These are valuable talks for students. They give an insider's view of what it is like to work in the IS [information science] field. This talk addressed practical concerns of running a small web-based business. And, it gave insights into the life of an entrepreneur developing a marketing/design company."

For more information on the student chapter, visit their Facebook page.

See Related Links:

SLIS Student Chapters Fall 2009: Exciting Opportunities

ASIS&T National Conference - November 2009

2009 American Association of School Librarians Conference

The 14th National Conference and Exhibition of the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) will be held November 5-8, 2009 in Charlotte, North Carolina.

SLIS Executive Associate Dean Marilyn Irwin announced that faculty members Annette Lamb and Larry Johnson will be giving presentations (see abstracts below). Lamb and Johnson are both teach at SLIS Indianapolis, and they manage the eduScapes website: "a site for life-long learners."

About eduScapes: "Annette Lamb and Larry Johnson have designed this website to share a love of learning with others. As authors and educators, we work with teachers, parents, and children around the world to effectively integrate technology into teaching and learning environments. This eduScapes website was started in August, 1998."

Abstracts:

Get Graphic! Visuals for Deep Thinking, Inquiry, and Learning (Lamb)

We live in a high-tech, multimedia world, yet most classroom activities still emphasize print communication. Let's explore the potential of graphic inquiry in teaching and learning. This visually rich session provides numerous, standards-based inquiry activities and projects that incorporate traditional materials as well as emerging social and collaborative technologies. Learn to use free and inexpensive tools and resources to promote inquiry, collaboration, and communication across the curriculum to address the Standards for the 21st-Century Learner.

Graphic Novels, Photo Essays and Illuminated Term Papers: Communicating Deep Understandings (Lamb)

From math comics to history e-scrapbooks, bring class assignments, student projects, and instructional materials alive with 21st century approaches across the curriculum. Learn how free and inexpensive technologies are used to produce graphic mini-novels and digital comics, illuminated term papers, visual science reports, photo essays, and other engaging alternatives to traditional student projects. Explore innovative ways to address the Standards for the 21st-Century Learner while motivating reluctant students and promoting a love of reading and writing.

Let's Go! Google Earth and GIS Resources Across the Curriculum (Johnson)

From virtual hikes to global investigations, learn to design content area activities that infuse relevant real-world data sources using Google Earth and Geographic Information Systems. Bring literature alive through visualizing the settings of picture books and novels. Add relevance to social studies, science, and math activities with access to endless real-world data sources. Enrich cultural and language studies with geography and travel. Connect place-based learning with global exploration for an engaging, interdisciplinary, standards-based approach.

Volume 44: ARIST Looks Ahead

• "Metrics are à la mode. Once it was plain old bibliometrics, now we have scientometrics, informetrics, webometrics, cybermetrics, digimetrics, tagometrics. Neologisms abound. The widespread availability of Web log files affords unprecedented opportunity for assessing the visibility, productivity, and performance of individual scholars, research groups, institutions, and nation states…

• Of course, information science has long been concerned with the quantitative analysis of scholarly communication and publishing behaviors. Latterly, however, there has been a renaissance of sorts and we are witnessing spectacular growth in the volume and variety of bibliometric research and experimentation, not just within information science but also in other disciplines.

• As I observed some years ago, there 'will soon be a critical mass of Web-based digital objects and usage statistics on which to model scholars' communication behaviors - publishing, posting, blogging, scanning, reading, downloading, glossing, linking, citing, recommending, acknowledging - and with which to track their scholarly influence and impact, broadly conceived and broadly felt' (Cronin, 2005, p. 196). What, then, are the implications of these developments?..."

The excerpts above are from the Introduction to Volume 44 (2010) of the Annual Review of Information Science and Technology (ARIST). The Introduction was by SLIS Dean Blaise Cronin - the editor of ARIST. SLIS faculty member Debora Shaw is the associate editor of ARIST, and SLIS faculty member Hamid Ekbia contributed a chapter titled "Fifty Years of Research in Artificial Intelligence" (see excerpt below.)

ARIST is published by the American Society of Information Science and Technology and Information Today.

Excerpt from "Fifty Years of Research in Artificial Intelligence" by Hamid Ekbia

Artificial Intelligence has come of age. The year MMVI marked the fiftieth anniversary of the Dartmouth Conference, where the term Artificial Intelligence was accepted as the official label of a new discipline that seemed to hold great promise in the pursuit of understanding the human mind. AI, as the nascent discipline came to be known in public and academic discourse, has accomplished a lot during this period, breaking new grounds and providing deep insights into our minds, our technologies, and the relationship between them. But AI has also failed tremendously, making false promises and often manifesting a kind of unbridled enthusiasm that is emblematic of Hollywood-style pecuniary projects. This review seeks to capture both of these aspects: AI's successes, accomplishments, and contributions to science, technology, and intellectual inquiry, on one hand, and its failures, fallacies, and shortcomings, on the other.

Facebook for Scientists: Map Your Expertise

SLIS faculty members Katy Börner and Ying Ding were featured in a press release from the Indiana University News Room for their participation in a National Institutes of Health research collaboration. The subtitle of the article is "IU information scientists receive $1.8 million in ARRA funding." The release and story photographs are reposted here with permission.

Facebook for scientists: Map your expertise

IU information scientists receive $1.8 million in ARRA funding

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Oct. 26, 2009

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — Indiana University has received more than $1.8 million from the National Institutes of Health to collaborate on a $12.2 million, seven-university project designed to network researchers around the country.

While the proposed new networking system will contain authentication mechanisms to protect sensitive data and intellectual property, it is being described as a Facebook for scientists.

IU's portion of the project is led by Katy Börner, Victor H. Yngve Professor of Information Science and director of the Cyberinfrastructure for Network Science Center at IU. Co-investigators with Börner at IU are Ying Ding, an assistant professor of Information Science, and Robert McDonald, associate dean for library technologies at IU and associate director for the Data to Insight Center at the Pervasive Technology Institute.

Börner's team at the Cyberinfrastructure for Network Science Center will conduct research and development on data analysis and visualization, Ding will be responsible for ontology development and McDonald will be responsible for implementation at IU of VIVO, a networking template currently in place at Cornell University that brings together publicly available information on the people, departments, graduate fields, facilities and other resources that collectively make up the research and scholarship environment in all disciplines at Cornell.

Ding explained that ontology is a formally represented community consensus that enables data integration into a form that allows for machine involvement for information understanding and processing.

"One of the major VIVO ontologies models the scholarly activities of research communities, where paper, grant, teaching, research interest, organization and event are interlinked and formally represented," she said. "This could gather all the related information for one researcher into one place and further links to any other related semantic datasets. Linking and formal representation generate great power to realize more intelligent knowledge discovery."

Research Associate - Indiana University Foundation

SLIS graduate Emily Heinlen (MLS'07) is working as a Research Associate for the Indiana University Foundation here in Bloomington. Her position is an example of non-traditional career paths that SLIS graduates can pursue.

Emily answered questions about her job in a recent email interview.

What are your key job duties?
My job duties are three-fold. First, I research potential IU donors. These donors fall into three categories: individual, corporate and foundation. Then, I analyze the information and write a profile and analysis of the potential donor. This information is then used by a variety of individuals during meetings and other donor contacts.

What do you like most about your job?
I love being able to research all day long. Not only is it incredibly fun, but the results of my research have the potential of helping to identify new donors to the university, which makes it extremely exciting!

Any advice for current students?
My advice is to find an area in which your interest is drawn and focus your studies in that area. I found that I was interested in research and reference and, therefore, focused the majority of my studies in those areas.

Any other comments?
I owe a great deal of gratitude to Professors Lokman Meho and Pnina Shachaf, who helped guide my research, both during their traditional courses and my independent study courses.

Analyzing Users' Retrieval Behaviors

SLIS faculty member Hsin-liang (Oliver) Chen gave an invited talk at the School of Informatics Colloquium, Indianapolis Campus, on October 23, 2009. The talk title and abstract are included here:

Analyzing Users' Retrieval Behaviors and Image Queries of a Photojournalism Image Database and Beyond

Research to enhance the quality of metadata elements and system functions of a photojournalism image archive web site, the Pictures of the Year International (POYi), was conducted using Google Analytics. Visitor activities were collected over a six-month period and findings indicate that visitors tend to browse the website rather than to launch a specific search query. When conducting image searches, users mainly populated the basic search function with single- and multiple-word queries. Advanced search functions represented a mere 0.70% of searches compared to total visits. Collected search terms were classified according to Jorgensen's (1998) twelve attribute classes and specific attributes. The most popular attributes were the interpretive attributes of artist, theme, and people and the perceptual attribute of setting. The most popular attribute classes were art historical information, abstract concepts, content/story, and people. The popularity of these attribute types may suggest potential modifications to the metadata elements for a photojournalism image database.

Edsel and Eleanor Ford House - Applegate Workshop

SLIS faculty member Rachel Applegate gave an in-house workshop for the staff of the Edsel and Eleanor Ford House. This historic house museum is located in Gross Pointe Shores, Michigan (outside of Detroit). In an email interview, Applegate gave some details about the workshop (given October 21, 2009):

I gave an in-house workshop for about 16 staff of the Ford House. This was based on the Shaping Outcomes approach to "outcomes-based planning and evaluation." Staff worked in groups to learn and apply concepts such as audience orientation, needs assessment and results desired, and concrete, observable indicators of outcomes. An outcomes-based approach can be used with projects that any museum or library could do: internal such as effective signage, single-institution such as effective tours for children, and multiple-institution such as partnering with another museum, or library, or educational institution, for programs of mutual benefits.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/naokomc/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

SLIS News Feed

Elinor Ostrom to give Networks and Complex Systems Talk 11/23/09

New Book by Blaise Cronin

Stickmen: Reflections on the Goalie's Eccentric Art

SLIS Network — Fall 2009

ALA Student Chapter - Digital Libraries Panel

Technology Manias

Next Talk: November 20, 2009

Public Library Director - Washington, Indiana

Information Opportunities in a Pluralistic World: ASIS&T 2009

ASIS&T 2009 Conference Program

Librarian of the Year Award: Team Cedar Rapids

Librarian of the Year 2009: Team Cedar Rapids After the flood, CRPL buoys the community by John N. Berry III — Library Journal, 1/15/2009

Invited Talk at STEM Enterprise - Washington, DC

http://www.ieeeusa.org/calendar/conferences/stem/

New Analytical Lenses for New Media: Web 2.0 and CMCMC

iSchool will host Web 2.0, computer-mediated communication, convergence scholar Susan Herring Nov. 2

Dean’s Note – SLIS Alumni Magazine, Fall 2009

Dean's Note: Reflections on the SLIS Ph.D. Program: 45 Years & 168 Graduates Later

Information and Communication Technology-facilitated Social Movements

Abstract: Information and Communication Technology-facilitated Social Movements

References

Director of Reference and Information Services - Laurel County, KY

ASIS&T Student Chapter - "Tech Talk"

2009 American Association of School Librarians Conference

Abstracts:

Get Graphic! Visuals for Deep Thinking, Inquiry, and Learning (Lamb)

Graphic Novels, Photo Essays and Illuminated Term Papers: Communicating Deep Understandings (Lamb)

Let's Go! Google Earth and GIS Resources Across the Curriculum (Johnson)

Volume 44: ARIST Looks Ahead

Excerpt from "Fifty Years of Research in Artificial Intelligence" by Hamid Ekbia

Facebook for Scientists: Map Your Expertise

Facebook for scientists: Map your expertise

Research Associate - Indiana University Foundation

Analyzing Users' Retrieval Behaviors

Analyzing Users' Retrieval Behaviors and Image Queries of a Photojournalism Image Database and Beyond

Edsel and Eleanor Ford House - Applegate Workshop

Librarian of the Year 2009: Team Cedar Rapids
After the flood, CRPL buoys the community
by John N. Berry III — Library Journal, 1/15/2009

Dean's Note:
Reflections on the SLIS Ph.D. Program: 45 Years & 168 Graduates Later

Abstract:
Information and Communication Technology-facilitated Social Movements