I'm writing to call your attention to the attached CFP for a minitrack at
HICSS 99, which I hope might interest you, or some of your students or
colleagues. I've gotten it pretty well distributed to the Human Computer
Interaction community, of which I am a part, but I would very much like to
have participation by folks not normally hooked into HCI. So, if you know
of appropriate people, please pass it on.
Best regards,
--Tom Erickson
IBM T.J. Watson Research Center*
* (when we last corresponded I was at Apple, but Apple has had its
troubles..)
------------------------------------
Call for Papers for
Persistent Conversation: Discourse as Document
Part of the Digital Documents Track
of the Thirty-second Annual
Hawai'i International Conference on Systems Sciences (HICSS)
Maui, HI - January 5 - 8, 1999
This mini-track will explore persistent conversation, the transposition of
ordinarily ephemeral conversation into the potentially persistent digital
medium. The phenomena of interest include conversations carried out using
email, mailing lists, news groups, bulletin board systems, textual and
graphic MUDs, chat clients, structured conversation systems, document
annotation systems, etc. Persistent conversations are interesting because
they blend the characteristics of oral conversation with those of written
text: they may be synchronous or asynchronous; their audience may be small
or vast; they may be highly structured or almost amorphous; etc. The
persistence of such conversations give them the potential to be searched,
browsed, replayed, annotated, visualized, restructured, and recontextualized,
thus opening the door to a variety of new uses and practices.
We are seeking papers that address issues such as the following:
* Understanding Practice. The burgeoning popularity of the internet (and
intranets) provides an opportunity to study and characterize new forms of
conversational practice. Questions of interest range from how various
features of conversations have adapted in response to the digital medium,
to new roles played by persistent conversation in domains such as
education, business, and entertainment.
* Analytical Tools. The effort to understand practice requires an array of
analytical tools and methods. One goal of this mini-track is to bring
together researchers from disciplines such as Anthropology, Cognitive
Science, Communications, Education, Linguistics, Literary Criticism, Media
Studies, Rhetoric, and Sociology, so as to get a better understanding of
approaches to analyzing persistent conversation.
* Design. Digital systems do not support conversation well: it is difficult
to converse with grace, clarity, depth and coherence over networks. But
this need not remain the case. To this end, this mini-track welcomes
analyses of existing systems and designs for new systems which better
support conversation. Of equal interest are inquiries into how participants
design their own conversations within the digital medium -- that is, how they
make use of system features to create, structure, and regulate their
discourse.
* Social Implications. The persistence of digital conversation -- which
permits it to be replayed, annotated, and modified -- is a sharp departure
from the transience of oral conversation. Even as this suggests intriguing
new applications, it also raises troubling issues of privacy, authenticity,
and authority. Authors are encouraged to reflect on the implications of
their observations, analyses, and designs.
* Historical Parallels. There is much to be learned with a retrospective
gaze. From the constructed dialogs of Plato to the epistolary exchanges of
the eighteenth century literati, persistent conversation is not without
precedent. How might earlier practices help us understand the new practices
evolving in the digital medium? How might they help us design new systems?
What perspectives might they offer on the social impacts of persistent
conversation?
Minitrack Chair:
Thomas Erickson
IBM T.J. Watson Research Center (remote office)
3136 Irving Ave S.
Minneapolis, MN 55408-2515 USA
(612) 823-3663 (voice)
(612) 823-1576 (fax)
snowfall who-is-at acm.org (preferred)
snowfall who-is-at us.ibm.com (alternate)
http://www.pliant.org/personal/Tom_Erickson
Deadlines:
March 15, 1998: 300-word abstract submitted to track chairs or
minitrack chairs for guidance and indication of appropriate
content (email submission preferred).
June 1, 1998: Full papers submitted to the appropriate
minitrack chair
Aug. 31, 1998: Notification of accepted papers mailed to
authors.
Oct. 1, 1998: Accepted manuscripts, camera-ready, sent to
minitrack chair; author(s) must register by this time.
Nov. 15, 1998: All other registrations must be received.
Registrations received after this deadline may not be accepted
due to space limitations.
HICSS-32 consists of eight tracks:
Collaboration Systems and Technology Track
Digital Documents Track
Emerging Technologies Track
Health Care Track
Internet and the Digital Economy
Modeling Technologies and Intelligent Systems
Organizational Systems and Technology Track
Software Technology Track
For more information about these tracks and a list of
minitracks each consist of, please check the HICSS web page for
full listing of the minitracks:
http://www.cba.hawaii.edu/hicss
Or contact the Track Administrator, Eileen Dennis, at
edennis who-is-at uga.edu
-----------------------------------------------
Tom Erickson
IBM T.J. Watson Research Center
Email: snowfall who-is-at acm.org (preferred); snowfall@us.ibm.com (IBM confidential)
http://www.pliant.org/personal/Tom_Erickson
Minneapolis Home/Office (most of the time)
3136 Irving Ave. S.
Minneapolis, MN 55408-2515 USA
vox: (612) 823-3663 fax: (612) 823-1576
IBM/NewYork Office (6 days a month)
IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, H1-M09
30 Sawmill River Rd. Rt. 9A
Hawthorn, NY 10532 USA
vox: (914) 784-7577 or 7279 (lab) fax: (914) 784-7279