IR11 (Internet Research 11.0) – Page 2

Approaches to Internet Research (& My Paper)

This is the session where I will also present my paper, Public Transformations: Adult Learners Who Use Social Media to Express and Understand Their Identities as Developing Researchers.

Alas, the room was just changed, and I fear many people do not know it was changed as not everybody looks on the notification board or follow Twitter. That is ok, we will go with the flow.

As my paper is not about liveblogging, and I need to get into the frame for this presentation, I will not liveblog my own session, sign off, and focus on my research at hand.

Constructing Narratives of Self and Community in the Age of the Internet

Glad I was able to make the first session this morning; thankfully today began at 9:00 instead of the 8:30 yesterday.

This morning’s session is about digital storytelling, something I have never been able to get my mind around as a research methodology / process / strategy.

Much of this work started and was supported from the California-based Center for Digital Storytelling. It was intended to give a voice to the author by the use of computer tools. It is a method and a movement and can be understood as a distinct media genre.

The identity of the narrator is present in the story, and this was individualistic but prescriptive, being used to represent the self. It has developed into something that is moving to institutional use. It originally helped to create communities through capturing the lives of individuals. This moving from the development from narrativing selves to narrating community signaled a shift from individual to the institutional to capture life by telling stories.

Mediatized stories and narratives of media ambivalence as identity markers are both concepts discussed by presenters.

One of the classic works in this area is Story Circle, which is about digital storytelling throughout the world.

With changes in Web 2.0, digital storytelling continues to change dramatically.

Interesting affordances for self-representation comparing digital storytelling and Facebook. #ir11

Ahh, now onto community identity construction through apologetics; religious use and how constructed narratives are established to form and support communities.

The last presenter is not using slides. Seems fitting for a presentation on stroytelling, though it is rather heavy theory and I am struggling to keep up as I do not have a widde background in this. Would have been nice to have a visual agenda of the argument at least, and I am right now lost.

Nice discussion about this storytelling.

I asked a question — have you studied any communities or use of digital storytelling to control populations, rather than just continue to promote community or continue emphasizing mainstream religions or communities, rather than something that may not be as widely accepted (such as a cult or terrorist cell). Alas, only based on “good community.”

IR11 Pre-Conference: Academic Career Development Workshop

I did something I have not done in some time at a conference; I took notes by hand during the wonderful “Academic Career Development Workshop for Research Students and Early Career Academics” pre-conference session. I did not want to hear tap tap tap, nor did I want to have the possibility of multitasking, so I used a new notebook I bought during a recent holiday in Paris. The notebook is thick, solid leather with a great pad of unlined paper (though I often prefer graph paper with the boxes), though this is fine, thick paper that was a strange pleasure to write on. Reminds me, I owe somebody a physical letter . . .

The pre-conference sesion was organized by Marcus Foth, who could not attend at the last minute, and Jaz Hee-jeong Choi (who did a wonderful job facilitating the entire session). The 15 or so of us spent the entire day discussing our work, our interests, our questions, our concerns, and our best practices to help one another. An international bunch, I felt quite comfortable with them all after the first round of introductions when it became apparent that my concerns and worries and struggles were often shared by others.

There were other learners who are also considering academe as a second career. Teaching internationally means that the same terms are used, though often in very different ways. Funding is a persistent problem. The importance of building and fostering a network. Even the value of presenting at conferences and then expanding to publish. All valuable for us to know.

Overall, I got what I came for, in that I feel a little more informed and expect that my challenges are similar enough to other early career researcher that my confidence was bolstered. Kudos.

The Internet Omnopticon: Mutual Surveillance in Social Media

Jacob Linaa Jensen (who I spoke with last for the first time in the conference) began with a background of this topic.

Seems norms of privacy are not uniform, based 0n age and values and norms and such. Some people feel more confortable sharing everything, while others are more concerned about various things.

Jesper Taekke is now speaking about problems for the social constructino of personal identity. He tried to study Facebook from a community vs. a network perspective. Social identity.

Charles Ess is now speaking about new ethical challenges. Fascinating content that is just too rich for those who are uninitiated. Lots more things for me to learn; what a useful experience to attend a conference session (again) and leave with more tantalizing questions than answers!!

Another presentation that is now focusing on Real ID and the World of Warcraft. Seems there is an interest in anonymity within the WoW community.

Lars Holmgaard Christensen is now speaking about Facebook, especially about dataveillance. Interesting table on the Self-Assertive I, the Social We, and the Self-transcendent Other. I really need to know more about surveillance studies.

Facebook is an Omnopticon — a mutual surveillance. Manuel Castells talked about the thing that everyone can watch now.

Now, questions and comments.

Tweeting it Out: Twitter and Sociality

Quite fitting that there is a session on Twitter here at AoIR, even given the number of Tweets coming from #ir11.

Axel Maireder is speaking now about Twitter for transnational public discourses in Europe. Quite interesting how much research is now being done using Twitter, and how it is much more of just a microblogging medium. Hmm, I think I told people this a few years ago when I first started to tweet. I think I need to read his paper, as I am struggling to understand how he is using some of his terms (demos, public sphere). I do like his use of slides. Large text, blocks of color, and not too many (or any) bullet lists.

Musing about the variety of presentation skills I have seen here at the conference. Perhaps conference organizers can suggest guidelines for providing slide development and presentation guidelines. The first presentation has a wonderful slide deck. Large block type, few words, solid color backgrounds, etc. Perhaps I am focused on this as I teach management communication, and perhaps because I get paid for learning design, but there is such value in having good presentation skills to convey the many valuable messages that people have to share.

David Houghton is now presenting on Linguistic markers to self-disclosure of sensitive information on Twitter. Humorous Tweets are being shared with the question about linguistic differences on how people disclose things about themselves. Nice considerations of privacy issues.

Privacy and social networks, around informational or accessibility privacy. Juicy. Makes me think about identity development (yet again, how do I define myself or present myself usuig Twitter). Hmm, a reference for an online service, Secret Tweet. Have to explore that a bit.

Interesting linguistic markers. I wonder how these were developed? Yes, more papers I want to read. Wonder what is leading to David’s passion in this area? davidhoughton.info

Just heard about a cool website that everybody but me seems to know about, prezi.com.

Interesting session by Theo Plothe about Twitter feeds with NFL players. What a novel idea to bring various passions and interests together into novel research streams. I am struggling to follow some of the football references (surprised?), but really like to hear the down and dirty of the research methods used in this research. Really good model for presenting — engaging, examples, clear methods, research questions, and such.

I had no idea so many NFL players use Twitter in strategic ways. Interesting insight.

It is clear that Twitter research will increase, as the limited research that has already been done raises all sorts of new issues.

Sweet reference to Marcuse in a question about repressive tolerance.

I am beginning to think about liveblogging more directly through Twitter rather than here. Hmm, wonder if I should consider that for the next session?