Internet Research 12 » Pre-Conference Workshops

Pre-Conference Workshops

The IR12 Pre-Conference Workshops have been announced. All pre-conference workshops take place on Monday, October 10, 2011 from 12 noon to 5 pm. There are two pre-conference workshops:

Paradox in the Net: Agency Versus Control and the Struggle for Performance and Participation
IXmaps – Do you know where your packets go?

IXmaps – Do you know where your packets go?

Association of Internet Researchers Internet Research 12.0 Pre-Conference Workshop

Monday, October 10, 2011 from 12-5 p.m.

West Room

Nancy Paterson & Andrew Clement

IXmaps [http://www.ixmaps.ca] presents a geographic visualization of paths or routes taken by information requests over the internet – presenting information about internet data exchange points along the way. This internet visualization platform uses geographic mapping and other techniques to reveal in an easy to understand and graphically compelling fashion, key features of internet routing and cloud computing that impact personal privacy. The IXmaps installation utilizes two large display screens, allowing users to browse the IXmaps website on one display screen while another screen displays a map of North America (Google Earth) on which is rendered the data route and information about interconnection points, carrier hotels and nearby data centres along the communications path.

IXmaps debuted at ‘Securing the Cyber Commons: A Global Dialogue’, a cyber security forum, March 2011 at the Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto. IXmaps presented at ‘CSIEL: Cyber Surveillance in Everyday Life’, May 2011 at the University of Toronto Art Centre Gallery. IXmaps is a collaborative project between Nancy Paterson, Faculty of Art, OCADU and Andrew Clement, Coordinator of the Information Policy Research Program (IPRP) at the Faculty of Information, University of Toronto.

Nancy Paterson,

PhD OCAD University
100 McCaul Street Toronto, Ontario M5T 1T1
npaterson@faculty.ocad.ca

Nancy Paterson is an established electronic media artist [http://www.vacuumwoman.com] who has worked on numerous artistic projects incorporating a wide variety of hardware and software components to enable user interactivity. Her work has appeared in numerous publications and she has exhibited internationally at many international media art festivals and events. Nancy is an Associate Professor at OCADU in Toronto.

Andrew Clement, PhD Faculty of Information
45 Willcocks Street, 3rd floor Toronto, Ontario, M5S 1C7
andrew.clement@utoronto.ca

Andrew Clement is founding Director of the Collaborative Graduate Program in Knowledge Media Design and a co-founder of the Identity Privacy and Security Institute. He is coordinator of the Information Policy Research Program (IPRP) at the Faculty of Information. Commencing in 1995, IPRP has been serving as the organizational hub for a series of Canadian policy research projects, each with its own research focus, team members and funders. Clement is also co-investigator in The New Transparency: Surveillance and Social Sorting research project.

Paradox in the Net: Agency Versus Control and the Struggle for Performance and Participation

Association of Internet Researchers Internet Research 12.0 Pre-Conference Workshop

Monday, October 10, 2011 from 12-5 p.m.

North Room

People’s participation is shaped in large part by the environment within which that activity is enacted. In turn, dominant, sustained reproduced performance with and within a space shapes the nature and character of that space. Initially the Internet was celebrated as a technology of freedom; a modern day western frontier with an endless expanse of open, liberating, egalitarian, boundless space; a novel, revolutionary entity distinct from our physical environment. Yet, as the online space was colonized and the euphoric promise met the reality of performance and participation, diverse and contesting practices, boundaries, and ties to real world settings were revealed. And, too, as the Internet has matured and evolved, users have increasingly taken on and performed the role of creators of content, manipulators and appropriators of technology, and governors and police in virtual spaces while real world society struggles to negotiate the “appropriate” content and conduct for the medium.

The topic of this workshop is that paradox and tension inherent in the Internet and its impact. In particular, we explore the nexus of online agency and individual freedom as it interacts and conflicts with virtual and real world norms, authority, and efforts at control (e.g., where individuals or groups have used the Internet for power and participation in ways that conflict with the status quo and some authority in turn has tried to maintain and/or impose control). Themes that emerge might, for instance, include the blurring of boundaries on- and offline and the dynamic nature and constantly changing dimensions of the interplay of influence between offline life and life online, as well as any other ideas registered workshop participants find relevant.

As thought-provoking starting points, a series of expert speakers will provide presentations on a broad range of contexts, circumstances, and paradigms of performance and participation with regard to the topic of the workshop, the subjects examined each providing unique insight and perspective on the issues as well as implications and suggestions for the future. The presentations, which will each be followed by a discussion session with participants, include:

online and offline advocacy and activism in the struggle for labor rights and community Internet access
controversies over student expression and use of the Internet off school grounds
the battle over limiting Internet content, access to information, and conduct by imposing federal and state online censorship laws and filtering software in public government funded institutions
the extent to which Internet usage and participation is constrained by our relationship with all-powerful ISPs
the contested metamorphosis and struggle for control of scholarship and scholarly communication in the Internet Age
resistance and the social media that powered the Egyptian revolution
the clash of whistle blowing, transparency, and law in WikiLeaks
the performance of hacktivism in virtual worlds, disguised under the cloak of grief play, that results in political activism and influences policy making in those spaces

Taken together, and augmented by subjects raised by workshop participants, the trajectory of expanding complexity, increasing reach and scale, and mounting impact of the Internet will be illuminated, as well as the corresponding difficulties and dwindling ability to exert effective control over Internet content and conduct. We will use the workshop to explore the issues, the challenges and the opportunities, the promise and the reality, in-depth from various perspectives.

Throughout the workshop, participants will share their expertise and actively engage in discussion and networking. Please register and join us to share your knowledge and insights and catalyze a rich, robust, productive, and forward-thinking dialogue.

For further information, please contact the Organizer and Chair of this pre-conference workshop Susan B. Kretchmer, susankretchmer@yahoo.com.