1

CUWiN & Informatics: Early ideas

October 1, 2009

2

1. What is Community Informatics

• CI: the study or practice regarding the continuity of local, historical communities meeting the transformation of information technologies

• Libraries by reinventing themselves (I&R, job centers, OPACs) invented community networks (made of silicon-plus-carbon)

• From social informatics comes three key ideas: network society, hacker ethic, and digital divide

…the LOCAL community is the central focus here

3

2. Community: ‘Race’, place and history

1.Science says, One race, the human race. Our species has always migrated, our differences are within group not between group. No one trait is found across a group.

2.Racism is real … What to do? Stay educated (on past, present, future) … Practice diversity in curriculum, profession, library

3.Class: an emergent phenomenon, as well as a categorical or positional reality, thanks to techno-economic changes

4.Root Shock: Severing people’s connections to places. “The traumatic stress reaction to destruction of one’s emotional ecosystem.” Mass upheavals have ripple effect. Solution: Acknowledge. Create healing places. Displacement the 21st C problem.

5.‘Damned by ourselves, saved by community.’

4

3. Dig Div, Community as network

1. Dig Div: a fxn of the information revolution. Persistent, multidimensional & changing. CI solutions mean a) communities not individuals b) seeking sustainability

2. Society ≠ Individuals … Society = Ties !

3. Wellman/Leighton: Urbanization brings… • Community found/strong nhood networks?

• Community lost/no networks?

• Community liberated/metropolitan networks?

• [Q: where do space and time go in SN theory?]

4. Coleman: Closed networks build social capital• So do open networks! e.g. Murchison Center

5

groups as nodes

strong & weak ties…dense and sparse networks

3a. Network models

6

4. UC2B• UC2B: 36 million in stimulus/other funds. 2 cities + univ. Fiber laid

across cities, 100 Mbps to 137 critical anchor institutions, 5 Mbps to 2500+ homes in 12 low-broadband census tracts. Above ground, support for broadband adoption.

• UC2B Above Ground, 3+ years, guided by GSLIS:1. 45 + 1 public computing centers boosted or established2. Mad Lab in N Champaign (Music Access Digitization), HQ for community

helpdesk, 14 outreach/support staff3. 17 cybernavigators serving 46 ctrs + 12 sectors serving low income people

(health, ed, libs, homeless, seniors, women, disabled, safety, churches, comm ctrs, media/culture)

4. Three course sequence for 50 UI/Parkland/high school students, public video• Broadband 101 spring: what’s it all about• Broadband 102 summer: paid broadband internships• Broadband 103 fall: community-serving bband entrepreneurship, $50K in awards

5. UC2B’s community helpdesk6. Community advisory committee, research advisory committee, PCCNet 7. Community first, technology second (CI approach)

• Similarly nationwide 2010-2012; nat’l bband plan by Feb 2010; broadband.gov

7

4a. Community and disaster: recap to come

Link to entire UC2B applicationon City of Champaign site:

http://tinyurl.com/completeUC2B

8

5. Search for bband data, and virtual community

• BTOP grant specs released within weeks of due date … had to prove “underserved,” but how? … ATLAS stepped forward, led community survey … 40+ helped … 4 day campaign for numbers proved 12 census block groups eligible … will AT&T challenge? Find out next month…

• From the bbs: The curse of grants and the challenge of inequality and difference

• WELL: report from the info rev: virtual comm is possible, personal, gotta feel it

– Virtual community as family & friend support network stands on and builds FTF

• Wikipedia: social norms and technical design enable virtual community growth from 200 to 200,000 people … to … build an encyclopedia!?!

– A culture e.g. simple rules for people like “Be Bold,” “NPOV” “Nice to newbies” “sofixit”

– A technology e.g. software features like talk page … history … translation

– What should people know about Wikipedia? [commons based peer production,

– What can we learn for real-world communities? crowdsourcing]

• PS: comm vs .com (Spaniards walk & WELLites share vs SN sites as corporations)

9

5. Search for bband data, and virtual community

• A campaign: campus mobilized, structured reachout to community, 40 volunteersNavigating the complexities of the grant competitionFound higher rate of broadband take-up 12 block groups eligiblecommunity campus / corporations (telecoms)

• From the bbs: The curse of grants and the challenge of inequality and difference

• WELL: report from the info rev: virtual comm is possible, personal, gotta feel it– Virtual community as family & friend support network stands on and builds

FTF• Wikipedia: social norms and technical design enable virtual community

growth from 200 to 200,000 people … to … build an encyclopedia!?!– A culture e.g. simple rules for people like “Be Bold,” “NPOV” “Nice to

newbies” “sofixit”– A technology e.g. software features like talk page … history … translation – What should people know about Wikipedia? [commons based peer

production,– What can we learn for real-world communities?

crowdsourcing]• PS: comm vs .com (Spaniards walk & WELLites share vs SN sites as

corporations)

10

Agenda

• ‘judy olson time managenment.ppt’ online• Working the class/Making the class work for you

– Writing? Now … theory, ideas, discussion– The curse of grants– The challenge of community organization / turtle

metaphor

• Computer Learning Month / how does it look?• Informatics: Early ideas

– Bush– Kling– Mitchell