This week in LIS 201 (week 09)

Week 09: Social networking and online immersion

LECTURE ON TUESDAY, OCTOBER 28 

• Film: Disconnected (2008) 

READINGS TO COMPLETE BEFORE DISCUSSION

• Ramesh Srinivasan, "Bridges between cultural and digital worlds in Revolutionary Egypt," The Information Society 29 (2013), 49-60.
• S. Craig Watkins, "The very well connected: Friending, bonding, and community in the digital age," The Young and the Digital (2009).  

HOMEWORK TO COMPLETE BEFORE DISCUSSION

• If it's your turn to write a 500-word article critique, you must post this to your section blog before your section meets.
• If it's your week to give a speech, prepare and practice!  Otherwise, prepare for a possible extemporaneous speech response.
• Complete your peer reviews of your fellow students' paper #2 drafts on their pages of the discussion section wiki.

DISCUSSION MEETING

• First five minutes: QUIZ on reading terms
• Two student presentations (#13 and #14)on the readings (and two student extemporaneous responses).
• Discuss this week's lecture and required readings.
• Discuss paper #2 revision strategies.

ONLINE OVER THE WEEKEND

This week's challenge will be especially difficult. Get ready.

• Attempt to survive without using any personal digital social networking tools for the whole weekend, Friday 5pm to Sunday 5pm. Do not consult or post to Facebook or MySpace or LinkedIn or Google+ or whatever else it is that young people these days use for social networking.  Do not Tweet. Do not text. Do not instant-message. Do not Skype. Do not iChat. Do not answer personal emails (or even read them, if you can avoid it). And, yes, do not use your cell phone at all (although you may use a land-line phone or a pay phone). The only thing you are allowed to do is the minimum necessary online participation for other classes you are taking.
• Once the weekend is over (or once you've thrown in the towel if you don't make it to Sunday at 5pm), write about the experience on your discussion section blog. How do you end up communicating with people? How do you coordinate meetings with your friends? How do you survive without taking a Quiz On Your Favorite Star Wars Lego Mini-Figure every hour?
• Comment on at least one other student's write-up.
• Be thankful you weren't a college student before the early 1990s, like I was, when THERE WAS NO WORLD WIDE WEB! (Gasp!)
• You must finish this online activity before next week's lecture.

More LIS 201 extra credit opportunities

LIS 201 students: Here are three more opportunities for extra credit.  Each of these is worth 0.5 points.  You may choose to do all three, or two, or one, or none.  It is extra credit, so it is not required.

(1) Attend a Go Big Read event (see http://www.gobigread.wisc.edu).  There are lots of different events you could choose.  Document your attendance somehow and forward that documentation to your  TA.  And then post a substantive summary of and reflection on the event to your discussion section blog.

(2) Attend a 2-hour or longer Software Training for Students workshop before the end of the semester (see https://sts.doit.wisc.edu).  Document your attendance somehow and forward that documentation to your  TA.  And then post a substantive summary of and reflection on the training to your discussion section blog.

(3) Attend a 30-minute or longer tutoring session with a student mentor at the Writing Center before the end of the semester (see http://www.writing.wisc.edu).  Ideally this one should focus on your writing assignment #2, although if you attend a session for a writing assignment for a different class, I will count that too.  Document your attendance somehow and forward that documentation to your  TA.  And then email your TA with a brief summary of whether you found the tutoring section useful and what changes you made to your writing assignment as a result.

Again, each of these is worth 0.5 points.  Cheers, GREG

This week in LIS 201 (week 08)

Week 08: Big data and social surveillance

LECTURE ON TUESDAY, OCTOBER 21

• Beyond Google

READINGS TO COMPLETE BEFORE DISCUSSION

• Tarleton Gillespie, “The relevance of algorithms,” in T. Gillespie et al. eds., Media Technologies (2014).
• David Lyon, “Surveillance, power, and everyday life,” in R. Mansell et al. eds., The Oxford Handbook of Information and Communication Technologies (2007).

HOMEWORK TO COMPLETE BEFORE DISCUSSION

• If it's your turn to write a 500-word article critique, you must post this to your section blog before your section meets.
• If it's your week to give a speech, prepare and practice!  Otherwise, prepare for a possible extemporaneous speech response.
• Post your rough draft of paper #2 to your personal wiki pages (you will want to create a separate page so that your peer reviewers can just "comment" at the bottom).

DISCUSSION MEETING

• First five minutes: QUIZ on reading terms
• Two student presentations (#11 and #12) on the readings (and two student extemporaneous responses).
• Discuss this week's lecture and required readings.

ONLINE OVER THE WEEKEND

This week, you will discover how much information you can find out about yourself online.

• First, do a geodemographic marketing analysis on yourself, by searching online for data about the place where you live which someone might ascribe to you. Here are some sites to start with: 
• http://www.whitepages.com/reverse_phone (enter your phone)
• http://factfinder.census.gov/ (enter your zip code)
• http://accessdane.co.dane.wi.us/ (enter your address)
• http://projects.nytimes.com/census/2010/ (find your hometown and explore income, education, other demographics)
• Next, do a social networking analysis on yourself, by searching for online data specifically about you on various social networking services that you might use  -- Facebook, Flickr, MySpace, LinkedIn, etc. Make sure you are not logged in to those services in order to see what an outside visitor would see (you might want to try searching your Facebook identity from a public computer, for example).
• Now do a general Google search, first using your name in different combinations ("Greg Downey," "Downey, Greg," "G Downey," etc.), then using your email address, and finally using your telephone number.
• Can you think of any other sites to search for which might provide either individual or aggregate data to help flesh out your "digital puppet"?
• When you are finished searching these sites, create a new post on your discusion section blog describing the person that a geodemographic firm would see when they look for "you". What do you think about this representation of your existence?
• Comment on at least one other student's posting for this assignment.
• You must finish this online activity before next week's lecture.

This week in LIS 201 (week 07)

Week 07: Cyberspace and hypermedia

LECTURE ON TUESDAY, OCTOBER 14

• Films: The Machine is (Changing) Us (Michael Wesch; 2009) and Revolution in Cairo (Frontline; 2011). 

READINGS TO COMPLETE BEFORE DISCUSSION

• Henry Jenkins et al., “Where Web 2.0 went wrong,” Spreadable Media (2013).
• Robert McChesney, “How can the political economy of communication help us understand the Internet?” in Digital Disconnect (2013).

HOMEWORK TO COMPLETE BEFORE DISCUSSION

• If it's your week to write a 500-word article critique, you must post this to your section blog before your section meets.
• If it's your week to give a speech, prepare and practice!  Otherwise, prepare for a possible extemporaneous speech response.

DISCUSSION MEETING

• First five minutes: QUIZ on reading terms
• Two student presentations (#9 and #10) on the readings (and two student extemporaneous responses).
• Discuss this week's lecture and required readings.
• Discuss tasks and strategies for writing assignment #2. (Rough draft due on wiki by start of next week's discussion.)
• Graded paper #1 handed back.
• Graded midterm #1 handed back.

ONLINE OVER THE WEEKEND

This week we'll explore a famous article by scientist, engineer, and wartime government administrator Vannevar Bush on hyperlinked media that many cite as an inspiration for today's World Wide Web.

• Read Bush's 1945 article entitled "As we may think," where he describes his vision of an information infrastructure he called the "Memex."
• Twenty years later, in 1967, Bush wrote a follow up article, "Memex revisited," which recast his ideas in light of the early computer revolution. Read this revised version and think about the differences from the 1945 version.
• About thirty years after this, in 1995, a symposium was held at MIT to consider Bush's Memex ideas fifty years after their original publication. (Remember, this was only a few years after the World Wide Web had appeared on the media stage.) Many of the attendees were well-known pioneers in the area of hypertext research, like Douglas Englebart (inventor of the computer mouse), Ted Nelson (author of the 1970s counterculture computer manifesto "Computer Lib!") and Tim Berners-Lee (creator of the protocols that underlie the World Wide Web itself). Read this description of their reactions to the original Vannevar Bush article.
• Finally, perform a Google search on "Memex" to find an intriguing commentary (news article, scholarly article, blog post, cartoon, video, whatever) on this subject.  ("Intriguing" here could mean that you find it very insightful or that you find it entirely uninformed.)  Then go to your discussion section blog and write a new post reacting to that commentary.  Include a link to the original commentary.  Make sure your commentary is constructive and civil, because the original author may notice and want to reply!
• Read and reply to at least one other student's blog posting.
• You must finish this online activity before next week's lecture.

This week in LIS 201 (week 06)

Week 06: FIRST MIDTERM EXAM

EXAM ON TUESDAY, OCTOBER 07

Our in-class midterm exam will be held in the normal lecture hall. Please arrive a bit early so we can start on time.

READINGS TO COMPLETE BEFORE DISCUSSION

This week's reading relates to your software training session and your multimedia assignment, not your exam.

• Garr Reynolds, "Presentation tips," http://www.garrreynolds.com/preso-tips/ (2013). 

HOMEWORK TO COMPLETE BEFORE DISCUSSION

None.

DISCUSSION MEETING

Attend software training sessions, not your regular discussion.  Rather than hold your normal discussion section, all students will attend software training sessions scheduled in various computer labs around campus, during your normal discussion section time. You will receive customized training on PowerPoint presentation software that you may use for your multimedia project. This training is offered courtesy of the DoIT Software Training for Students program.

For sections meeting Wednesday, October 8th:Location: 150 Animal Sciences
Time: During your regularly-scheduled section time 

For sections meeting Thursday, October 9th:Location: 150 Animal Sciences
Time: During your regularly-scheduled section time 

For sections meeting Friday, October 10th:Location: 150 Animal Sciences
Time: During your regularly-scheduled section time

You should feel free to bring your own laptops if you have your own copy of PowerPoint. 

ONLINE OVER THE WEEKEND

This week your online activity will involve the selection of the book that you are going to read and review.  Each student in your discussion section must choose a different book to read, so if you fear someone else will pick the same book as you, finish this assignment early!  And as a final challenge, the book must have been published in the last two years  --”  which narrows the field of candidates considerably!

• Think about some search terms or phrases which might quickly and effectively lead you to interesting books on "the information society." Will using the term "information" suffice? What will using the search term "information society" leave out? Be creative.
• Using an online bookstore like Amazon.com, do a search for a book related to the information society that you would like to read. (We are starting in an online book store in order to make sure that the book is still in print.) Narrow your choice down to three candidates that have been published within the last two years. Which book has the most pages? Which costs the most? Which has the best reviews?
• Once you have found three possible books, look each of them up through the public web interface of WorldCat. This is a meta-catalog of all US public and university library catalogs. Which book is held by more libraries? What are the subject classifications of each book? Do they differ? Do they suggest further, more interesting search terms? (You may want to go back to step #2 with these terms.)
• Look each book up on Google Books. Which book seems to have generated the most chatter on the Web? Which has more reviews available through Google? Are any of them in the public domain?
• Finally, look up each book on Library Thing. (You may have to create a free account on this service in order to search, but it's worth it.) Which book has been read by more users of this social networking service? Which book seems to match best with other books that you think you might like?
• Decide which book you want to read at this point.
• Now do a search of your chosen book on two academic journal databases: ProQuest and Project Muse. What journals have reviewed your book? Who are the reviewers? What books have the reviewers themselves written? Read and then print out or otherwise save these book reviews (you will use them in your final paper).
• Create a new post on your discussion section blog that describes the candidate books you considered, the book you ended up choosing, and the process you took to choose it. Include an image of the cover (from Amazon.com) and a citation to any academic reviews you found.
• Comment on another student's chosen book. (Has anyone chosen the same book as you? If they posted their choice to the blog before you did, then you need to start over and pick a different book!)
• You must finish this online activity before next week's lecture.

Crossing the Digital Divide

Thanks guys for an awesome discussion this week in 303 and 308! And major shout outs to Ella and Will for sending me two great resources to continue our examination of the "digital divide"!

First from Ella, what the city of Madison is doing to combat the digital divide:

City works to solve achievement gap, close the ‘digital divide’

October 2nd: The Badger Herald  

Madison is looking to close the “digital divide” by providing high-speed internet to low-income residents and students of those families who cannot afford it. Ald. Scott Resnick, District 8, proposed a $100,000 amendment that passed at Tuesday’s Board of Estimates meeting that will go towards a feasibility study to provide internet throughout Madison using a high-speed Long Term Evolution network.  

The goal of the study is to find a way to create a city co-op utility that would provide wireless internet to low-income neighborhoods and families. “If you think about students in the Madison School District, there are still students who don’t have access within their homes,” Resnick said. “When they try and compete in the classroom it becomes a huge disadvantage. 

The answer of ‘you can go to the library’ is no longer a satisfactory solution,” he said. Resnick said the LTE network would be similar to getting a library Wi-Fi connection a mile and a half away at home. He has said previously that for many students in Madison, when the library closes, places like McDonald’s becomes their library.  

Resnick has focused on the digital divide since he took office in 2011. At the Board of Estimates meeting, Mayor Paul Soglin said that they are working off of national studies that show that about one-third of households do not have high-speed internet access. 

Many alders at the meeting agreed on the necessity to combat this divide. “We have to take some risk and if we’re serious about doing something about the divide in this community, if we’re serious about what’s going on in low-income households. This is one mechanism which is relatively cheap given the way we’re spending money to get some really significant outcomes, not just in terms of education, but also in terms of job opportunity,” Soglin said. 

Some alders were concerned that, if accepted, the proposed budget amendment would make the previous amendment, concerning putting in a optic fiber high-speed cable near community centers, redundant. Resnick disagreed, noting the fiber cable is still necessary for the LTE network.  

Both budget amendments are focused on closing the digital divide, providing a space at home as well as other places in the community to access high-speed internet. Resnick said the biggest benefit to providing internet would be that it would serve students as an additional tool. “Having internet access doesn’t guarantee you success in the classroom,” he said. ”It is, though, another tool that allows students to remain competitive in the classroom.”  

Now that the proposed amendment has passed, Resnick said the next steps are to start the study and begin putting together the infrastructure. The council will hire a consulting organization to help gather input, and talk to community leaders to look at how they can leverage the current fiber optic network. “We need to make sure that we’re going to close the achievement gap in Madison,” Resnick said. ”We need to work together with our partners to make sure the internet is in the homes of our students.”

And then, check out this great spoken word conversation on our digital insanity provided by Will:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9s0ukQGLXQ4#t=17

If you liked this, you would check out our very own socially minded, spoken word performing arts organization on campus, First Wave. They have an awesome festival coming up on October 16th-19th where all of their poetry is inspired by the Wisconsin Race to the Top education and inequalities study from 2013. Talk about combating access to literacy with literacy! The link to their facebook page is below.

First Wave