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Internet Researchers' Conference 2017 (IRC17)
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc17
<b>With great pleasure we announce the second edition of the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC), an annual conference series initiated by the Researchers at Work (RAW) programme at CIS to gather researchers, academic or otherwise, studying internet in/from India to congregate, share insights and tensions, and chart the ways forward. The Internet Researchers' Conference 2017 (IRC17) will be held at the International Institute of Information Technology Bangalore (IIIT-B) campus on March 03-05, 2017. It is being organised by the Centre for Information Technology and Public Policy (CITAPP) at IIIT-B and the CIS.</b>
<p> </p>
<h4>Registration is closed now.</h4>
<h4>Propose open sessions <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC17-OpenSessionProposals">here</a>.</h4>
<h4>Agenda (final): <a href="https://github.com/cis-india/irc/raw/master/irc17/IRC17_Agenda.pdf">Download</a> (PDF)</h4>
<h4>Programme: <a href="https://github.com/cis-india/irc/raw/master/irc17/IRC17_Programme.pdf">Download</a> (PDF)</h4>
<h4>Poster (high resolution): <a href="https://github.com/cis-india/irc/raw/master/irc17/IRC17_Poster-HighRes.jpg">Download</a> (JPG)</h4>
<hr />
<img src="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc17/leadImage" alt="IRC17 Poster" height="400" />
<h3><strong>IRC17: Key Provocations</strong></h3>
<p>Two critical questions that emerged from the conversations at the previous edition of the Conference (IRC16) were about the digital objects of research, and the digital/internet experiences in Indic languages. As we discussed various aspects and challenges of 'studying internet in India', it was noted that we have not sufficiently explored how ongoing research methods, assumptions, and analytical frames are being challenged (if at all) by the becoming-digital of the objects of research across disciplines: from various artifacts and traces of human and machinic interactions, to archival entries and sites of ethnography, to practices and necessities of collaboration.</p>
<p>We found that the analyses of such digital objects of research often tend to assume either an aesthetic and functional uniqueness or sameness vis-à-vis the pre-/proto-digital objects of research, while neither of these positions are discussed in detail. Further, we tend to universalise the English-speaking user's/researcher's experience of working with such digital objects, without sufficiently considering their lives and functions in other (especially, Indic) languages.</p>
<p>These we take as the key provocations of the 2017 edition of IRC:</p>
<ul><li>
<p>How does the becoming-digital of the research objects challenge our current research practices, concerns, and assumptions?</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>How do we appreciate, study, and theorise the functioning of and meaning-making by digital objects in Indic languages?</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>What research tools and infrastructures are needed to study, document, annotate, analyse, archive, cite, and work with (in general) digital objects, especially those in Indic languages?</p>
</li></ul>
<p>This conference series is specifically driven by the following interests: 1) creating discussion spaces for researchers studying internet in India and in other comparable regions, 2) foregrounding the multiplicity, hierarchies, tensions, and urgencies of the digital sites and users in India, 3) accounting for the various layers, conceptual and material, of experiences and usages of internet and networked digital media in India, and 4) exploring and practicing new modes of research and documentation necessitated by new (digital) forms of objects of power/knowledge.</p>
<h3><strong>Dates and Venue</strong></h3>
<p>The conference is being hosted by the International Institute of Information Technology Bangalore (IIIT-B) during March 03-05, 2017.</p>
<p><strong>Address:</strong> 26/C, Electronics City, Hosur Road, Bangalore, 560100, <a href="https://goo.gl/maps/chHchxAMkrK2">location on Google Map</a>.</p>
<h3><strong>Session Details and Notes</strong></h3>
<p>Day 01, Friday, March 03</p>
<p><strong>#DigitalIdentities:</strong> <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/digitalidentities.html">Details</a> and <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC17-DigitalIdentities">Etherpad</a></p>
<p><strong>#IndicLanguagesAndInternetCohabitation:</strong> <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/indiclanguagesandinternetcohabitation.html">Details</a> and <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC17-IndicLanguagesAndInternetCohabitation">Etherpad</a></p>
<p><strong>#SelfiesFromTheField:</strong> <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/selfiesfromthefield-revised.html">Details</a> and <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC17-SelfiesFromTheField">Etherpad</a></p>
<p><strong>#HookingUp:</strong> <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/hookingup-revised.html">Details</a> and <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC17-HookingUp">Etherpad</a></p>
<p>Day 02, Saturday, March 04</p>
<p><strong>#DotBharatAdoption:</strong> <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/dotbharatadoption.html">Details</a> and <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC17-DotBharatAdoption">Etherpad</a></p>
<p><strong>#DigitalPedagogies:</strong> <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/digitalpedagogies.html">Details</a> and <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC17-DigitalPedagogies">Etherpad</a></p>
<p><strong>#MaterializingWriting:</strong> <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/materializingwriting.html">Details</a> and <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC17-MaterializingWriting">Etherpad</a></p>
<p><strong>#RenarrationWeb:</strong> <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/renarrationweb.html">Details</a> and <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC17-RenarrationWeb">Etherpad</a></p>
<p>Day 03, Sunday, March 05</p>
<p><strong>#ArchivesForStorytelling:</strong> <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/archivesforstorytelling.html">Details</a> and <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC17-ArchivesForStorytelling">Etherpad</a></p>
<p><strong>#ObjectsOfDigitalGovernance:</strong> <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/objectsofdigitalgovernance.html">Details</a> and <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC17-ObjectsOfDigitalGovernance">Etherpad</a></p>
<p><strong>#OpenAccessScholarlyPublishing:</strong> <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/openaccessscholarlypublishing.html">Details</a> and <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC17-OpenAccessScholarlyPublishing">Etherpad</a></p>
<h3><strong>Session Selection Process</strong></h3>
<p>Call for sessions: <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-call">http://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-call</a>.</p>
<p>Selected sessions: <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-selected-sessions">http://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-selected-sessions</a>.</p>
<p>Please join the <a href="https://lists.ghserv.net/mailman/listinfo/researchers">researchers@cis-india</a> mailing list to take part in pre- and post-conference conversations.</p>
<h3><strong>About the IRC Series</strong></h3>
<p>The Researchers at Work (RAW) programme at the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) initiated the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC) series to address these concerns, and to create an annual temporary space in India, for internet researchers to gather and share experiences.</p>
<p>The IRC series is driven by the following interests:</p>
<ul>
<li>
<p>creating discussion spaces for researchers and practitioners studying internet in India and in other comparable regions,</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>foregrounding the multiplicity, hierarchies, tensions, and urgencies of the digital sites and users in India,
accounting for the various layers, conceptual and material, of experiences and usages of internet and networked digital media in India, and</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>exploring and practicing new modes of research and documentation necessitated by new (digital) objects of power/knowledge.</p>
</li></ul>
<p>The first edition of the Internet Researchers' Conference series was held in <a href="https://cis-india.org/raw/cis-india.org/raw/irc16">February 2016</a>. It was hosted by the <a href="http://www.jnu.ac.in/SSS/CPS/">Centre for Political Studies</a> at Jawaharlal Nehru University, and was supported by the <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/cscs-digital-innovation-fund">CSCS Digital Innovation Fund</a>. The Conference was constituted by eleven discussion sessions (majority of which were organised around presentation of several papers), four workshop sessions (which involved group discussions, activities, and learnings), a book sprint over three sessions to develop an outline of a (re)sourcebook for internet researchers in India, and a concluding round table. The audio recordings and notes from IRC16 are now being compiled into an online Reader. A detailed <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/iirc-reflections-on-irc16">reflection note on IRC16</a> has been published.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc17'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc17</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroInternet Researcher's ConferenceFeaturedIRC17Researchers at WorkEvent2018-07-02T18:29:55ZEventInternet Researchers' Conference 2017 (IRC17) - Selected Sessions
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-selected-sessions
<b>With great pleasure we announce the eleven sessions selected for the Internet Researchers' Conference 2017 (IRC17) to be held at the IIIT Bangalore campus during March 03-05. The Conference is being organised by the Centre for Information Technology and Public Policy (CITAPP) at IIIT Bangalore and the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS).</b>
<p> </p>
<h3><strong>Session Selection Process</strong></h3>
<p>A total of 23 session proposals were submitted for IRC17, which were <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/proposed-sessions.html">published online</a>. All the session teams, as well as any interested persons, were invited on November 16 to submit comments on the initial session proposals. We closed accepting comments on December 23, and the sessions teams had up to December 30 to re-submit their proposals. On January 01, we invited each team to nominate 10 sessions to be included in the final agenda of the Conference, and this nomination process ended on January 19.</p>
<p>We received 200 nominations from 20 teams. Two teams retracted their session proposals during the selection process - <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/copyleftrightleft.html">#CopyLeftRightLeft</a> and <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/digitalisingknowledge.html">#DigitalisingKnowledge</a>. And one team proposed two sessions, and so it only submitted one set of nominations.</p>
<h3><strong>Selected Sessions</strong></h3>
<p>The following 11 sessions have received 10 or more nominations:</p>
<p><strong><a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/archivesforstorytelling.html">05. #ArchivesForStorytelling</a></strong> - 11 nominations<br />
<strong><a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/selfiesfromthefield-revised.html">06. #SelfiesFromTheField</a></strong> - 10 nominations<br />
<strong><a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/openaccessscholarlypublishing.html">07. #OpenAccessScholarlyPublishing</a></strong> - 11 nominations<br />
<strong><a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/digitalpedagogies.html">08. #DigitalPedagogies</a></strong> - 10 nominations<br />
<strong><a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/renarrationweb.html">10. #RenarrationWeb</a></strong> - 14 nominations<br />
<strong><a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/indiclanguagesandinternetcohabitation.html">11. #IndicLanguagesAndInternetCoHabitation</a></strong> - 12 nominations<br />
<strong><a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/objectsofdigitalgovernance.html">14. #ObjectsofDigitalGovernance</a></strong> - 10 nominations<br />
<strong><a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/materializingwriting.html">15. #MaterializingWriting</a></strong> - 10 nominations<br />
<strong><a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/dotbharatadoption.html">16. #DotBharatAdoption</a></strong> - 14 nominations<br />
<strong><a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/hookingup-revised.html">17. #HookingUp</a></strong> - 11 nominations<br />
<strong><a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/digitalidentities.html">19. #DigitalIdentities</a></strong> - 13 nominations</p>
<h3><strong>Dates and Venue</strong></h3>
<p>The IRC17 will take place during March 03-05, 2017 at the <a href="http://iiitb.ac.in/">International Institute of Information Technology Bangalore (IIIT-B)</a> campus. It is being organised by the <a href="http://citapp.iiitb.ac.in/">Centre for Information Technology and Public Policy (CITAPP)</a> at IIIT-B and the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS).</p>
<h3><strong>Conference Programme</strong></h3>
<p>The IRC17 programme will be published in early February. Please join the <a href="https://lists.ghserv.net/mailman/listinfo/researchers">researchers@cis-india</a> mailing list to get updates about IRC17 and to take part in the pre-conference conversations.</p>
<h3><strong>Accommodation and Travel</strong></h3>
<p>Accommodation of all non-Bangalore-based team members of the selected sessions, during the days of the Conference, will be organised by CIS. We will write to the teams concerned directly regarding this.</p>
<p>Separately, CIS will offer 10 travel grants, up to Rs. 10,000 each, for within-India travel. Participants who are unemployed or semi-employed, including students, would be given priority.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-selected-sessions'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-selected-sessions</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroIRC17Internet StudiesInternet Researcher's ConferenceResearchers at Work2017-01-20T13:28:24ZBlog Entry Internet Researchers' Conference 2017 (IRC17) - Selection of Sessions
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-selection
<b>We have a wonderful range of session proposals for the second Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC17) to take place in Bengaluru on March 03-05, 2017. From the 23 submitted session proposals, we will now select 10 to be part of the final Conference agenda. The selection will be done through votes casted by the teams that have proposed the sessions. This will take place in December 2016. Before that, we invite the session teams and other contributors to share their comments and suggestions on the submitted sessions. Please share your comments by December 14, either on session pages directly, or via email (sent to raw at cis-india dot org).</b>
<p> </p>
<p>The Internet Researchers' Conference 2017 (IRC17) will be organised by the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) in partnership with the <a href="http://citapp.iiitb.ac.in/">Centre for Information Technology and Public Policy</a> at the International Institute of Information Technology Bangalore (IIIT-B).</p>
<hr />
<h3><strong>Proposed Sessions</strong></h3>
<h4>01. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/notfewnotweird.html" target="_blank">#NotFewNotWeird</a> (Surfatial: Malavika Rajnarayan, Prayas Abhinav, and Satya Gummuluri)</h4>
<h4>02. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/virtualfringe.html" target="_blank">#VirtualFringe</a> (Ritika Pant, Sagorika Singha, and Vibhushan Subba)</h4>
<h4>03. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/studentindicusageonline.html" target="_blank">#StudentIndicUsageOnline</a> (Shruti Nagpal and Sneha Verghese)</h4>
<h4>04. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/speakmylanguageinternet.html" target="_blank">#SpeakMyLanguageInternet</a> (Anubhuti Yadav, Sunetra Sen Narayan, Shalini Narayanan, Anand Pradhan, and Shashwati Goswami)</h4>
<h4>05. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/archivesforstorytelling.html" target="_blank">#ArchivesForStorytelling</a> (V Jayant, Venkat Srinivasan, Chaluvaraju, Bhanu Prakash, and Dinesh)</h4>
<h4>06. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/selfiesfromthefield.html" target="_blank">#SelfiesFromTheField</a> (Kavitha Narayanan, Oindrila Matilal and Onkar Hoysala)</h4>
<h4>07. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/openaccessscholarlypublishing.html" target="_blank">#OpenAccessScholarlyPublishing</a> (Nirmala Menon, Abhishek Shrivastava and Dibyaduti Roy)</h4>
<h4>08. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/digitalpedagogies.html" target="_blank">#DigitalPedagogies</a> (Nidhi Kalra, Ashutosh Potdar, and Ravikant Kisana)</h4>
<h4>09. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/digitalmusicanddigitalreactions.html" target="_blank">#DigitalMusicAndDigitalReactions</a> (Shivangi Narayan and Sarvpriya Raj)</h4>
<h4>10. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/renarrationweb.html" target="_blank">#RenarrationWeb</a> (Dinesh, Venkatesh Choppella, Srinath Srinivasa, and Deepak Prince)</h4>
<h4>11. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/indiclanguagesandinternetcohabitation.html" target="_blank">IndicLanguagesAndInternetCoHabitation</a> (Sreedhar Kallahalla, Ranjeet Kumar, Mohan Rao, and Anjali K. Mohan)</h4>
<h4>12. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/digitalpedagogy.html" target="_blank">#DigitalPedagogy</a> (Padmini Ray Murray and Dibyaduti Roy)</h4>
<h4>13. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/copyleftrightleft.html" target="_blank">#CopyLeftRightLeft</a> (Ravishankar Ayyakkannu and Srikanth Lakshmanan)</h4>
<h4>14. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/objectsofdigitalgovernance.html" target="_blank">#ObjectsofDigitalGovernance</a> (Marine Al Dahdah, Rajiv K. Mishra, Khetrimayum Monish Singh, and Sohan Prasad Sha)</h4>
<h4>15. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/materializingwriting.html" target="_blank">#MaterializingWriting</a> (Sneha Puthiya Purayil, Padmini Ray Murray, Dibyadyuti Roy, and Indrani Roy)</h4>
<h4>16. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/dotbharatadoption.html" target="_blank">#DotBharatAdoption</a> (V. Sridhar and Amit Prakash)</h4>
<h4>17. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/digitaldesires.html" target="_blank">#DigitalDesires</a> (Dhiren Borisa, Akhil Kang, and Dhrubo Jyoti)</h4>
<h4>18. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/thedigitalcommonplace.html" target="_blank">#TheDigitalCommonplace</a> (Ammel Sharon and Sujeet George)</h4>
<h4>19. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/digitalidentities.html" target="_blank">#DigitalIdentities</a> (Janaki Srinivasan, Savita Bailur, Emrys Schoemaker, Jonathan Donner, and Sarita Seshagiri)</h4>
<h4>20. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/toolstoamultitextuniverse.html" target="_blank">#ToolsToAMultitextUniverse</a> (Spandana Bhowmik and Sunanda Bose)</h4>
<h4>21. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/digitalisingknowledge.html" target="_blank">#DigitalisingKnowledge</a> (Sneha Ragavan)</h4>
<h4>22. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/ICTDethics.html" target="_blank">#ICTDEthics</a> (Bidisha Chaudhuri, Andy Dearden, Linus Kendall, Dorothea Kleine, and Janaki Srinivasan)</h4>
<h4>23. <a href="https://cis-india.github.io/irc/irc17/sessions/representationandpower.html" target="_blank">#RepresentationAndPower</a> (Bidisha Chaudhuri, Andy Dearden, Linus Kendall, Dorothea Kleine, and Janaki Srinivasan)</h4>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-selection'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-selection</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroInternet StudiesInternet Researcher's ConferenceResearchers at WorkFeaturedLearningIRC17Homepage2016-12-12T13:37:23ZBlog EntryInternet Researchers' Conference 2017 (IRC17) - Call for Sessions
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-call
<b>It gives us great pleasure to announce that the second Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC17) will take place in Bengaluru on March 03-05, 2017. It will be organised by the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) in partnership with the Centre for Information Technology and Public Policy at the International Institute of Information Technology Bangalore (IIIT-B). It is a free and open conference. Sessions must be proposed by teams of two or more members on or before Friday, October 28. All submitted session proposals will go though an open review process, followed by each team that has proposed a session being invited to select ten sessions of their choice to be included in the Conference agenda. Final sessions will be chosen through these votes, and be announced on January 09, 2017.</b>
<p> </p>
<h4>IRC17 Call for Sessions: <a href="https://github.com/cis-india/irc/raw/master/IRC17_Call-for-Sessions.pdf">Download</a> (PDF)</h4>
<h4>IRC17 Selection of Sessions: <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-selection">http://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-selection</a></h4>
<h4><em>Deadline for submission was Friday, October 28.</em></h4>
<hr />
<h3><strong>IRC17: Key Provocations</strong></h3>
<p>Two critical questions that emerged from the conversations at the previous edition of the Conference (IRC16) were about the <strong>digital objects of research</strong>, and the <strong>digital/internet experiences in Indic languages</strong>. As we discussed various aspects and challenges of 'studying internet in India', it was noted that we have not sufficiently explored how ongoing research methods, assumptions, and analytical frames are being challenged (if at all) by the <strong>becoming-digital</strong> of the objects of research across disciplines: from various artifacts and traces of human and machinic interactions, to archival entries and sites of ethnography, to practices and necessities of collaboration.</p>
<p>We found that the analyses of such <strong>digital objects of research</strong> often tend to assume either an aesthetic and functional <strong>uniqueness</strong> or <strong>sameness</strong> vis-à-vis the pre-/proto-digital objects of research, while neither of these positions are discussed in detail. Further, we tend to universalise the English-speaking user's/researcher's experience of working with such digital objects, without sufficiently considering their lives and functions in other (especially, Indic) languages.</p>
<p>These we take as the key provocations of the 2017 edition of IRC:</p>
<ul>
<li>How does the <strong>becoming-digital</strong> of the research objects challenge our current research practices, concerns, and assumptions?</li>
<li>How do we appreciate, study, and theorise the functioning of and meaning-making by digital objects in <strong>Indic languages</strong>?</li>
<li>What <strong>research tools and infrastructures</strong> are needed to study, document, annotate, analyse, archive, cite, and work with (in general) digital objects, especially those in Indic languages?</li></ul>
<h3><strong>Call for Sessions</strong></h3>
<p>We invite teams of two or more researchers and practitioners to propose sessions for IRC17. We do understand that finding team members for a session you have in mind might be difficult in certain cases. Please feel free to share initial sessions ideas on the <strong>researchers@cis-india</strong> mailing list <strong>[1]</strong>. Also, please keep an eye on the list to see what potential topics are being discussed.</p>
<p>All sessions will be one and half hours long, and will be fully designed and facilitated by the team concerned, including moderation (if any). The sessions are expected to drive conversations on the topic concerned. They may include presentation of research papers but this is <strong>not at all</strong> mandatory.</p>
<p>If you plan to organise a session structured around presentation of research papers, please note that we are exploring potential publication outlets for a collection of full-length research papers. If your session is selected for IRC17, we will notify you of guidelines to be followed for the submission and review of full-length papers prior to the conference. If you are interested in this publication possibility, <strong>please indicate</strong> that in your session proposal submission.</p>
<p>Sessions that involve collaborative work (either in group or otherwise), including discussions, interactions, documentation, learning, and making, are <strong>most welcome</strong>.</p>
<p>Further, we look forward to sessions conducted in <strong>Indic languages</strong>. The proposing team, in such a case, should consider how participants who do not understand the language can participate in it. IRC organisers and other participants will play an active role in making such engagements possible.</p>
<p>The only <strong>eligibility criteria</strong> for proposing sessions are that they must be proposed by a <strong>team of at least two members</strong>, and that they must engage with <strong>one (or more) of the three key provocations</strong> mentioned above. Further, the teams whose sessions are selected for IRC17 must commit to producing at least <strong>one post-conference essay/documentation</strong> on the topic of their session.</p>
<p>The <strong>deadline</strong> for submission of sessions proposals for IRC17 is <strong>Friday, October 28</strong>.</p>
<p>To propose a session, please send the following documents (as attached text files) to <strong>raw[at]cis-india[dot]org</strong>:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Title and Description of the Session:</strong> The session should be named in the form of a hashtag (check the IRC16 sessions for reference <strong>[2]</strong>). The description of the session should clearly state what the key focus of the session is, and which of the three central concerns it will address. The description should be approximately <strong>300 words</strong> long.</li>
<li><strong>Session plan:</strong> This should describe how the session will be conducted and moderated. Any specific requirements (technical, language support, etc.) of the session should also be noted here. This should not be more than <strong>200 words</strong> long. If your session plan involves presentation of research papers, please indicate whether you would be interested in having these papers considered for academic publication.</li>
<li><strong>Documentation plan:</strong> This should indicate how documentation will be done during the session, and more importantly what form the post-conference essay/documentation will take and what issue(s) it will address. This should not be more than <strong>100 words</strong> long.</li>
<li><strong>Short Abstracts (Only for Sessions with Paper Presentations):</strong> If your session involves presentation of research papers, please share a <strong>250 words</strong> abstract for each paper.</li>
<li><strong>Details of the Team:</strong> Please share brief biographic notes of each member of the session team, and contact details.</li></ul>
<h3><strong>Session Selection Process</strong></h3>
<p><strong>October 28:</strong> Deadline of submission of session proposals.</p>
<p><strong>October 31:</strong> All submitted sessions will be posted on the CIS website, along with the names, biographic brief, and contact details of the members of the session teams.</p>
<p><strong>November 01 - December 24:</strong> Open review period. All session teams, as well as other interested contributors, may review the submitted proposals and share comments directly with the session teams, or discuss the session on the researchers@cis-india list. The session teams may fully and continuously edit the proposal during this period, including adding/changing session teams.</p>
<p><strong>December 25:</strong> Open review ends and voting begins. All session teams will select 10 sessions to be included in the IRC17 programme. The votes will be anonymous, that is which session team has voted for which set of sessions will not be made public.</p>
<p><strong>January 05:</strong> Voting ends.</p>
<p><strong>January 09:</strong> Announcement of selected sessions.</p>
<p><strong>February 12:</strong> Deadline for selected session teams to submit a detailed session plan, information about which will be shared later. If a selected session involves presentation of papers, then the draft papers are to be submitted by this date (no need to submit a detailed session plan in that case).</p>
<h3><strong>Venue, Accommodation, and Travel</strong></h3>
<p>The conference will take place at the International Institute of Information Technology Bangalore (IIIT-B) during March 03-05, 2017 <strong>[3]</strong>.</p>
<p>The conference does <strong>not</strong> have any participation fees. The organisers will cover <strong>all</strong> costs related to accommodation and hospitality during the conference. We look forward to offer a limited number of (domestic) travel fellowships for students and other deserving applicants. We will also confirm this on <strong>January 02, 2017</strong>.</p>
<h3><strong>About the IRC Series</strong></h3>
<p>The Researchers at Work (RAW) programme <strong>[4]</strong> at the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) initiated the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC) series to address these concerns, and to create an annual temporary space in India, for internet researchers to gather and share experiences.</p>
<p>The IRC series is driven by the following interests:</p>
<ul>
<li>creating discussion spaces for researchers and practitioners studying internet in India and in other comparable regions,</li>
<li>foregrounding the multiplicity, hierarchies, tensions, and urgencies of the digital sites and users in India,
accounting for the various layers, conceptual and material, of experiences and usages of internet and networked digital media in India, and</li>
<li>exploring and practicing new modes of research and documentation necessitated by new (digital) objects of power/knowledge.</li></ul>
<p>The first edition of the Internet Researchers' Conference series was held in February 2016 <strong>[5]</strong>. It was hosted by the Centre for Political Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University <strong>[6]</strong>, and was supported by the CSCS Digital Innovation Fund <strong>[7]</strong>. The Conference was constituted by eleven discussion sessions (majority of which were organised around presentation of several papers), four workshop sessions (which involved group discussions, activities, and learnings), a book sprint over three sessions to develop an outline of a (re)sourcebook for internet researchers in India, and a concluding round table. The audio recordings and notes from IRC16 are now being compiled into an online Reader. A detailed reflection note on the IRC16 has already been published <strong>[8]</strong>.</p>
<h3><strong>Endnotes</strong></h3>
<p><strong>[1]</strong> See: <a href="https://lists.ghserv.net/mailman/listinfo/researchers">https://lists.ghserv.net/mailman/listinfo/researchers</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[2]</strong> See: <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16">http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[3]</strong> See: <a href="http://iiitb.ac.in/">http://iiitb.ac.in/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[4]</strong> See: <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/">http://cis-india.org/raw/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[5]</strong> See: <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16">http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[6]</strong> See: <a href="http://www.jnu.ac.in/SSS/CPS/">http://www.jnu.ac.in/SSS/CPS/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[7]</strong> See: <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/cscs-digital-innovation-fund">http://cis-india.org/raw/cscs-digital-innovation-fund</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[8]</strong> See: <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/iirc-reflections-on-irc16">http://cis-india.org/raw/iirc-reflections-on-irc16</a>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-call'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc17-call</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroResearchers at WorkInternet Researcher's ConferenceFeaturedLearningIRC17Homepage2016-12-12T13:40:08ZBlog EntryIIRC: Reflections on IRC16
https://cis-india.org/raw/iirc-reflections-on-irc16
<b>The first edition of the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC) series was held on February 26-28, 2016. It was hosted by the Centre for Political Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University, and was supported by the CSCS Digitial Innovation Fund. Here we share our reflections on the Conference, albeit rather delayed, and lessons towards the next edition to be held in March 2017.</b>
<p> </p>
<em><strong>Note:</strong> IIRC stands for 'if I remember correctly' in ancient internet acronym culture. Thanks to Sebastian for the inspiration.</em>
<hr />
<p>For several months, we have been trying to organise our thoughts, as well as post-conference documentation efforts, emerging from the Internet Researchers' Conference 2016. We have not been very successful in either till now. And like most unsuccessful ventures, it has been a robust learning experience. We are working on giving the IRC16 Reader a final shape, before it becomes more of an academic legend. We hope to launch the beta version of the Reader in mid-September. Here, let me quickly share my reflections on IRC16, at least what I remember of it.</p>
<h3><strong>A Game of Selections</strong></h3>
<p>The Conference departed from most other academic conferences in two obvious ways: 1) the sessions were not selected by a programme committee but through votes cast by all the teams that proposed a session, and 2) the Conference programme consisted of both panel discussions and workshop sessions, and there was no requirement for the panel discussions to be structured around papers (though some sessions did involve presentation of papers). At the feedback session of the Conference, and also in conversations afterwards, it was pointed out that this manner of session selection (not based on paper abstracts, and through voting by peers) is perhaps “too democratic / too wiki-like,” which undermines the ability to curate the Conference effectively. Several participants also presented the opposite viewpoint – that a more peer-driven selection of sessions better reflects the immediate interests and priorities of the community of internet researchers who are gathering at the Conference. As one participant articulated: “we must have faith in our ignorance.”</p>
<p>We at CIS are still confident about this mode of selection but at the same time we do recognise three key concerns in conducting the selection process:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Anonymity:</strong> The anonymous selection process breaks down since we expect the potential participants of the Conference to share early ideas about their potential sessions, and scout for potential session team members, through the mailing list (and elsewhere) before actually submitting the panel proposal. We still prefer that participants discuss the session before proposing it, so perhaps we will have to live with the incomplete anonymity when it comes to the session selection process. Perhaps we can make the votes non-anonymous too to keep parity – that is, all the proposed sessions would be published with the names of their proposers, and all the teams will publicly indicate which other sessions they are voting for.<br /><br /></li>
<li><strong>Disciplinary capture:</strong> While peer-based voting works very well when it comes to reflecting the interests of the community, it might quite easily break down if there is a concentration of teams coming from a specific disciplinary background. How we approach research objects and questions, and hence how we appreciate how exciting a research object or question is, can be quite intimately shaped by our disciplinary locations. A dominance of a specific discipline among the peer-group (that is among all the teams that have proposed sessions) can potentially lead to a 'capture' of the Conference by research objects and questions of interest to specific disciplines. This is something we have to be more aware of when casting our votes.<br /><br /></li>
<li><strong>Peer-review before peer-votes:</strong> The process followed last year only allowed a session team to vote on the sessions proposed by other teams, but not to review and comment on those proposals. This review process is not only useful to infuse the session proposals with ideas and concerns coming from other disciplinary and methodological locations, but also to support the teams to revisit their articulation and structuring of the session before their peers start to cast votes. This is something we must aspire to do during the selection process for IRC17.</li></ul>
<h3><strong>A Clash of Disciplines</strong></h3>
<p>Continuing from the “disciplinary capture” point above, the presence of researchers and practitioners from various fields and disciplines was, according to me, the most exciting part of the IRC16, and also the part that led to significant frustration. I felt that we were able to gather people from various disciplinary backgrounds – academic and otherwise – but could not provide sufficient space or time for the inter-disciplinary conversations to a take more fuller form. We saw clear disagreements emerging between researchers coming from different disciplinary locations, though most of them did not have the opportunity to be developed into a detailed discussion.</p>
<p>This is quite a high ambition for a conference of this kind; that is given the conference was not focused narrowly on a set of topics. Nonetheless, this remains one of the key objectives of the IRC series, and we need to understand how better to create opportunities for participants to communicate their disciplinary concerns and create inter-disciplinary discussions.</p>
<p>One possible way to create context for more inter-disciplinary conversations is by requesting all the sessions’ teams to include members from different disciplines. Also, we can try to keep more open discussion space (but that means less selected sessions) to provide time for the discussions spilling over from the sessions. Thirdly, we can think of including “inter-disciplinary conversations” as one of the key themes for potential sessions of IRC17.</p>
<p>Further, though we experienced several clashes of disciplines, methods, and approaches, these were all limited to a completely anglophone intellectual environment. We failed substantially, as was pointed out by a participant at the feedback session, to create space at the Conference for Indic language practices and concerns – both for researchers and practitioners working in these languages, and the criticisms of anglophone academic framings and practices coming from such researchers and practitioners. This is something we must address proactively during the future editions of the Conference.</p>
<h3><strong>A Storm of Sessions</strong></h3>
<p>One of the often heard criticisms of the conference was regarding the decision to have parallel sessions. While the decision was taken purely to accommodate as many sessions as possible, this of course imposed an undesirable burden upon the participants to choose between two rather desirable sessions. We as organisers of IRC16 faced the same tough decision of choosing between sessions that should both be part of the Conference agenda, and conveniently decided to let the participants choose (instead of us choosing for them). It is quite likely that we would do this again, or at least would like to do this again – that is, we expect that for IRC17 too we would receive a lot of wonderful sessions and decide against a fully single-track conference.</p>
<p>The question of sessions, however, is not only one of tracks. It is also about formats. In the feedback session, there was a clear recognition of the value of “workshop” sessions – that is sessions that involved <em>all</em> the participants <em>doing</em> something – in a conference like this, which is explicitly interested in the conceptual and technical challenges of digital media research. There was also a demand that we have more workshop sessions in IRC17, as opposed to “discussion” sessions that involved paper presentations. While the original plan was that all the participants will primarily be <em>learning</em> or <em>doing</em> something at a workshop session, and will not be talking, as the discussion sessions were primarily meant for talking, the actual sessions in the Conference differed from each other essentially in terms of whether papers were presented or not.</p>
<p>Thus, it perhaps makes sense, for the IRC17 call for sessions, to not to separate out these session types in terms of workshop/discussion but in terms of paper-driven/non-paper-driven. Maybe this separation itself is avoidable and all that we need to say is that the Conference is fundamentally interested in sessions that drive conversations, both intra- and inter-disciplinary. While presentation of papers can surely drive conversations, they are not necessary at all.</p>
<h3><strong>A Feast for Researchers and Practitioners</strong></h3>
<p>A key objective, if not <em>the</em> key objective, of IRC16 was to build a temporary space for researchers and practitioners studying internet and society in India (though not necessarily from or located in India) to gather and share thoughts. While we felt that the conference has been quite effective in doing that, we have been rather clueless when it comes to sustaining the momentum of interactions that was achieved at the Conference, or documenting the various kinds and threads of conversations taking place there.</p>
<p>The first problem, we may say, is not something that CIS (as the organiser of the conference series) should be concerned with too much, since our aim and responsibility is to make possible this <em>temporary</em> space and not to host <em>all</em> conversations and collaborations coming out of it. In fact, we should <em>not</em> be interested in hosting and/or facilitating all such initiatives. The second problem, however, is a serious one for us. Since the Conference is not organised around pre-written papers, we will have to depend on the efforts by the participants either during, or after (or both) the Conference to produce an <em>output</em> that documents, narrates, and/or reflects on the conversations that took place. Such an approach, thus, is fundamentally based upon the trust that the participants will prepare and share these materials <em>after</em> the Conference. On a lighter note, we also hope that social embarrassment and pressure will also play a role here (but that only works when the majority of the participants are actually sharing).</p>
<p>There are two connected points here:</p>
<ul>
<li>While the majority of the documentation happens either at the Conference or after that, what kind of pre-Conference efforts (by the participants) would be useful in ensuring productive sessions?<br /><br /></li>
<li>Who all contribute to this post-Conference Reader? Should it be restricted to teams/people whose sessions were selected, or all who proposed a session, and/or took part in the Conference?</li></ul>
<p>A recommendation at the feedback session of IRC16 touched upon the first question, while the second question is derived from a critical question posed at the same session. The recommendation was that the teams whose sessions get selected for the Conference should share a more detailed session agenda note before the Conference to better inform the participants about the content and approach of the same. The critical question mentioned earlier was regarding the imagination of the <em>community</em> of researchers and practitioners being gathered at the Conference, and if it is only limited to the people whose sessions got selected. In our minds it is clear that everyone gathering at these conferences, and those who proposed sessions but could not attend, are all part of this imagined community, and thus should also contribute to the post-Conference Reader.</p>
<h3><strong>A Dance with Sustainability</strong></h3>
<p>IRC16 was supported very generously by the Centre for Political Studies at JNU (as part of an ongoing project titled <em>UPE2 Project: Politics on Social Media</em>), the CSCS Digital Innovation Fund, and CIS. The first provided us with the conference venue and accommodation, the second provided financial support towards food and travel expenses (and bit of accommodation too), and the third picked up all the remaining expenses and efforts. While we will keep doing what it takes to organise the next editions of IRC, we are dependent on academic and other institutes that are willing to host the event and accommodate the participants, and on various sources of funding that may be available to cover the miscellaneous expenses.</p>
<p>When we started planning for IRC16, we decided not to conceptualise this as part of an ongoing or future project – that is, the conference series should not itself become a <em>deliverable</em> under a project at CIS. While this gives us intellectual and functional independence, it entails serious financial limitations. We are of course open to the conference series becoming a site for developing or communicating a <em>deliverable</em> under an ongoing project at CIS or any other involved actor (especially the host and funding agencies) but such matters, we feel, are best discussed in a case-to-case basis. The bottom line remains that we need financial and human support to take this conference series forward. This is definitely something to be discussed further at IRC17.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/iirc-reflections-on-irc16'>https://cis-india.org/raw/iirc-reflections-on-irc16</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroIRC16Researchers at WorkInternet Researcher's Conference2016-09-06T09:28:51ZBlog EntryInternet Researchers' Conference 2016 (IRC16)
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16
<b>The first Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC16) will be organised at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Delhi, on February 26-28, 2016. The focus of the Conference is on the experiences, adventures, and methods of 'studying internet in India.' We are deeply grateful to the Centre for Political Studies (CPS), JNU, for hosting the Conference, and to the CSCS Digital Innovation Fund (CDIF) for the generous support. It is a free and open conference. Please use the form to register.</b>
<p> </p>
<h4>It is our great pleasure to announce the beginning of the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC), an annual conference series initiated by the Researchers at Work (RAW) programme at CIS to gather researchers, academic or otherwise, studying internet in/from India to congregate, share insights and tensions, and chart the ways forward.</h4>
<p> </p>
<h4>This conference series is specifically driven by the following interests: 1) creating discussion spaces for researchers studying internet in India and in other comparable regions, 2) foregrounding the multiplicity, hierarchies, tensions, and urgencies of the digital sites and users in India, 3) accounting for the various layers, conceptual and material, of experiences and usages of internet and networked digital media in India, and 4) exploring and practicing new modes of research and documentation necessitated by new (digital) forms of objects of power/knowledge.</h4>
<p> </p>
<h4>The first edition of the Conference, IRC16, is engaging with the theme of 'studying internet in India.' The word <em>study</em> here is a shorthand for a range of tasks, from documentation and theory-building, to measurement and representation.</h4>
<p> </p>
<h2>Dates and Venue</h2>
<p>The IRC16 will take place during <strong>February 26-28, 2016</strong>, at the Convention Centre of the <a href="http://jnu.ac.in/">Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU)</a>, Delhi. We are grateful to <a href="http://www.jnu.ac.in/SSS/CPS/">Centre for Political Studies (CPS)</a> at JNU for hosting the Conference, and to the <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/cscs-digital-innovation-fund">CSCS Digital Innovation Fund (CDIF)</a> for its generous support.</p>
<p> </p>
<iframe src="https://www.google.com/maps/embed?pb=!1m14!1m12!1m3!1d1752.512135244194!2d77.16642650602853!3d28.53899019877363!2m3!1f0!2f0!3f0!3m2!1i1024!2i768!4f13.1!5e0!3m2!1sen!2s!4v1455124383423" frameborder="0" height="300" width="600"></iframe>
<p> </p>
<h2>Registration and Programme</h2>
<p>Conference programme: <a href="https://github.com/cis-india/IRC16/raw/master/IRC16_Programme-v.2.2.pdf">Download</a> (PDF).</p>
<p>Programme booklet: <a href="https://github.com/cis-india/IRC16/raw/master/IRC16_Programme-Booklet.pdf">Download</a> (PDF).</p>
<p><strong>[Important]</strong> Invitation letter to help you enter JNU campus: <a href="https://github.com/cis-india/IRC16/raw/master/IRC16_Invitation-Letter.pdf">Download</a> (PDF).</p>
<p>Please register for the Conference here: <a href="http://goo.gl/forms/uu0HjXWbxK" target="_blank">Form</a> (Google).</p>
<p>We apologise for not being able to provide travel or accommodation support.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Etherpads</h2>
<p>#Methods&ToolsForInternetResearch : <a class="external-link" href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-InternetResearch">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-InternetResearch</a></p>
<p>#DigitalDesires: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-DigitalDesires">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-DigitalDesires</a>.</p>
<p>#InternetMovements: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-InternetMovements">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-InternetMovements</a>.</p>
<p>#WebOfGenealogies: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-WebOfGenealogies">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-WebOfGenealogies</a>.</p>
<p>#MinimalComputing: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-MinimalComputing">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-MinimalComputing</a>.</p>
<p>#STSDebates: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-STSDebates">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-STSDebates</a>.</p>
<p>#ArchiveAnarchy: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-ArchiveAnarchy">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-ArchiveAnarchy</a>.</p>
<p>#ManyPublicsOfInternet: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-ManyPublicsOfInternet">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-ManyPublicsOfInternet</a>.</p>
<p>#DigitalLiteraciesAtTheMargins: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-DigitalLiteraciesAtTheMargins">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-DigitalLiteraciesAtTheMargins</a>.</p>
<p>#FutureBazaars: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-FutureBazaars">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-FutureBazaars</a>.</p>
<p>#PoliticsOnSocialMedia: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-PoliticsOnSocialMedia">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-PoliticsOnSocialMedia</a>.</p>
<p>#SpottingData: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-SpottingData">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-SpottingData</a>.</p>
<p>#WikiShadows: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-WikiShadows">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-WikiShadows</a>.</p>
<p>#FollowTheMedium: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-FollowTheMedium">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-FollowTheMedium</a>.</p>
<p>#AFCinema2.0: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-AFCinema2.0">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-AFCinema2.0</a>.</p>
<p>#LiterarySpaces: <a href="https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-LiterarySpaces">https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/IRC16-LiterarySpaces</a>.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Resources</h2>
<p>Call for sessions: <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-call" target="_blank">http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-call</a>.</p>
<p>Proposed sessions: <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-sessions" target="_blank">http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-sessions</a>.</p>
<p>Selected sessions: <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-selected-sessions" target="_blank">http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-selected-sessions</a>.</p>
<p>Please join the <a href="https://lists.ghserv.net/mailman/listinfo/researchers">researchers@cis-india</a> mailing list to take part in pre- and post-conference conversations.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroConferenceCDIFInternet Researcher's ConferenceFeaturedLearningIRC16Researchers at WorkEvent2016-02-27T06:19:33ZEventInternet Researchers' Conference 2016 (IRC16) - Selected Sessions
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-selected-sessions
<b>We are proud to announce that the first Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC16), organised around the theme of 'studying internet in India,' will be held on February 26-28, 2016, at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Delhi. We are deeply grateful to the Centre for Political Studies (CPS) at JNU for hosting the Conference, and to the CSCS Digital Innovation Fund (CDIF) for generously supporting it. Here are the details about the session selection process, the selected sessions, the Conference programme (draft), the pre-Conference discussions, accommodation, and travel grants. The Conference will include a book sprint to produce an open handbook on 'methods and tools for internet research.'</b>
<p> </p>
<h2>Session Selection Process</h2>
<p>We received 23 superb session proposals for the IRC16. All the teams that submitted sessions were invited to vote for their eight favourite session in a double-blind manner - the teams did not know the names of the people who proposed other sessions, and we at CIS did not know which team has voted for which particular set of sessions. After receiving all the votes, we could not help but change the format of the Conference (as planned earlier) to accommodate 15 sessions in total. All Discussion and Workshop sessions of the Conference are double track, except for the three Discussion sessions that received most number of votes.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Selected Sessions</h2>
<ol>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-digitaldesires"><strong>#DigitalDesires</strong></a>: Received 8.15% votes. Proposed by Silpa Mukherjee, Ankita Deb, and Rahul Kumar.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-followthemedium"><strong>#FollowTheMedium</strong></a>: Received 7.60% votes. Proposed by Zeenab Aneez and Neha Mujumdar.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-stsdebates"><strong>#STSDebates</strong></a>: Received 7.60% votes. Proposed by Sumandro Chattapadhyay and Jahnavi Phalkey.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-digitalliteraciesatthemargins"><strong>#DigitalLiteraciesAtTheMargins</strong></a>: Received 7.06% votes. Proposed by Aakash Solanki, Sandeep Mertia, and Rashmi M.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-internetmovements"><strong>#InternetMovements</strong></a>: Received 7.06% votes. Proposed by Becca Savory, Sarah McKeever, and Shaunak Sen.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-futurebazaars"><strong>#FutureBazaars</strong></a>: Received 5.97% votes. Proposed by Maitrayee Deka, Adam Arvidsson, Rohini Lakshané, and Ravi Sundaram.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-minimalcomputing"><strong>#MinimalComputing</strong></a>: Received 5.97% votes. Proposed by Padmini Ray Murray and Sebastian Lütgert.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-webofgenealogies"><strong>#WebOfGenealogies</strong></a>: Received 5.97% votes. Proposed by Ishita Tiwary, Sandeep Mertia, and Siddharth Narrain.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-wikishadows"><strong>#WikiShadows</strong></a>: Received 5.97% votes. Proposed by Tanveer Hasan and Rahmanuddin Shaik.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-literaryspaces"><strong>#LiterarySpaces</strong></a>: Received 5.43% votes. Proposed by P.P. Sneha and Arup Chatterjee.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-archiveanarchy"><strong>#ArchiveAnarchy</strong></a>: Received 4.34% votes. Proposed by Ranjani M Prasad and Farah Yameen.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-afcinema2.0"><strong>#AFCinema2.0</strong></a>: Received 3.80% votes. Proposed by Akriti Rastogi and Ishani Dey.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-manypublicsofinternet"><strong>#ManyPublicsOfInternet</strong></a>: Received 3.80% votes. Proposed by Sailen Routray and Khetrimayum Monish.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-politicsonsocialmedia"><strong>#PoliticsOnSocialMedia</strong></a>: Received 3.80% votes. Proposed by Rinku Lamba and Rajarshi Dasgupta.</li>
<li><a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-spottingdata"><strong>#SpottingData</strong></a>: Received 3.80% votes. Proposed by Dibyajyoti Ghosh and Purbasha Auddy.</li></ol>
<p> </p>
<h2>Dates and Venue</h2>
<p>The IRC16 will take place during <strong>February 26-28, 2016</strong>, at the <a href="http://jnu.ac.in/"><strong>Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU)</strong></a>, Delhi. We are delighted to announce that the Conference will be hosted by the <a href="http://www.jnu.ac.in/SSS/CPS/"><strong>Centre for Political Studies (CPS)</strong></a> at JNU, and will be generously supported by the <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/cscs-digital-innovation-fund"><strong>CSCS Digital Innovation Fund (CDIF)</strong></a>.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Conference Programme</h2>
<p>Access the draft programme (v.2.1): <a href="https://github.com/cis-india/IRC16/raw/master/IRC16_Programme-v.2.1.pdf">Download</a> (PDF).</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Pre-Conference Conversations</h2>
<p>Please join the researchers@cis-india mailing list to take part in the pre-conference conversations: <a href="https://lists.ghserv.net/mailman/listinfo/researchers">https://lists.ghserv.net/mailman/listinfo/researchers</a>.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Accommodation</h2>
<p>CPS and CIS will provide accommodation to all non-Delhi-based team members of the selected sessions, during the days of the Conference.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Travel Grants</h2>
<p>We will offer 10 travel grants, up to Rs. 10,000 each, for within-India travel. The following non-Delhi-based team members of the selected sessions have been selected for travel grants: Aakash Solanki, Dibyajyoti Ghosh, Neha Mujumdar, Purbasha Auddy, Rahmanuddin Shaik, Rashmi M, Rohini Lakshané, Sailen Routray, P.P. Sneha, and Zeenab Aneez.</p>
<p>The travel grants are made possible by the <a href="http://cis-india.org/raw/cscs-digital-innovation-fund">CSCS Digital Innovation Fund (CDIF)</a>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-selected-sessions'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-selected-sessions</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroInternet Researcher's ConferenceFeaturedLearningIRC16Researchers at Work2016-01-18T09:23:06ZBlog EntryIRC16 - Proposed Session - #PoliticsOnSocialMedia
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-politicsonsocialmedia
<b>This is a session proposed for the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC) 2016 by Dr. Rinku Lamba and Dr. Rajarshi Dasgupta, with Dr. Mohinder Singh, Professor Valerian Rodrigues and Professor Shefali Jha as co-members.</b>
<p> </p>
<h2>Session</h2>
<p>Indian politics had witnessed the entry of new social movements in the 1970s, adding a whole set of new issues, actors, and ways of activism to the older nationalist tradition. We suggest a similar change is now taking place, as different ways of governance and interventions aided by latest technologies are emerging in the social media. Websites, blogs, tweets, emails and online petitions are creating a new virtual space for politics, through information, propaganda, debates, appeals and mobilizations.</p>
<p>The proposed session will discuss this emerging field of power, critically considering its democratic potential and interrogating the political issues and ideas at stake in it. The aim is to tackle the new forms of civic and
public-political engagements witnessed in the domain of social media, and analyze their implications for the theory and practice of democracy. In the process our papers would explore conceptual notions such as agency, political act and participation as well as notions of selfhood and subjectivity.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Plan</h2>
<p>We will present four papers, with a question-answer and discussion session at the end. The papers will be addressing broadly three kinds of concerns.</p>
<ul><li>The first concern is to identify novel understandings of the political and political acts in the social media. We ask the following questions in this regard: What are the political issues and ideas at stake and how do they affect conventional understandings of democracy? Who are the new actors outside the fray of party-centered politics and how do they see what is political in the acts of internet-users? How are political institutions including parties reacting to the phenomena?<br /><br /></li>
<li>The second concern relates to probing the new forms of political subjectivity that are emerging in this process. The questions here include: What kind of political actor is getting shaped by the forms of political participation engendered by the social media? How does the virtual nature of practice impact on questions of location and identity as determinants of political membership and political action? Is this nature of virtual participation too fluid for the state to control?<br /><br /></li>
<li>The third concern relates to the forms of exclusion and inclusion that virtual participation entails. This involves questions like: What kind of social capital is necessary for talking part in the process and does it cut across cultural and economic divisions? What kinds of interest drive the social media? How does it shape the meaning of political concepts like representation and rights, accountability and political agency?</li></ul>
<p>It is likely that we will raise more questions than we can answer at this point. However, we think it is important to raise them all the more in keeping with the questions that make up the focus of the conference,
especially, the first question of how do we conceptualize, as an intellectual and political task, the mediation and transformation of social, cultural, political, and economic processes, forces, and sites through internet and digital media technologies in contemporary India.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Readings</h2>
<p>None.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-politicsonsocialmedia'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-politicsonsocialmedia</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroIRC16Proposed SessionsInternet Researcher's Conference2016-01-03T06:51:03ZBlog EntryIRC16 - Proposed Session - #KnowledgeCommunity (Computing, Community and Knowledge Production: Problems and Prospects)
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-knowledgecommunity
<b>This is a session proposed for the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC) 2016 by Ravikant.</b>
<p> </p>
<h2>Session</h2>
<p>Our session will approach the history of digital knowledge production and dissemination in India from the standpoint of community-oriented experiments and practices in tool making and resource-sharing in the vernacular domain, mainly Hindi. It will attempt to demonstrate that Hindi public domain represents a depth and diversity that is normally not visible to the monolingually-trained, English-only mode of cognition. We wish to argue that the diversity of content is symptomatic of a culture of deeply-ingrained culture of sharing in South Asia. Free software movement, especially its localisation units, Wikipedia and Web 2.0 platforms in general have played a stellar role in handing us the tools of creation, consumption and sharing beyond scripts. But the full potential of how much we can produce and share has not been realised.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Plan</h2>
<p>We will try and present successful and unsuccessful cases in order to understand why certian efforts worked and not others, and try and suggest a few possible strategies of creative engagement with bhasha communities in general.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Readings</h2>
<p>None.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-knowledgecommunity'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-knowledgecommunity</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroIRC16Proposed SessionsInternet Researcher's Conference2016-01-03T06:54:54ZBlog EntryIRC16 - Proposed Session - #WikiShadows (Techno-Political Contours of Knowledge Production on Wikipedia)
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-wikishadows
<b> This is a session proposed for the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC) 2016 by Tanveer Hasan and Rahmanuddin Shaik.</b>
<p> </p>
<h2>Session</h2>
<p>Wikipedia is a group project, and people in the group need to have separate pages to discuss changes and improvements to Wikipedia's content, be that an article, a policy, a help page, or something anything else. Reading these discussion pages is a vastly rewarding, slightly addictive, experience. Sometimes reading Wikipedia can ruffle feathers.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>E.g. 1:</p>
<p>The song, Jana-gana-mana, composed originally in Bengali by Rabindranath Tagore, was adopted in its Hindi version by the Constituent Assembly as the National Anthem of India on January 24, 1950. It was first sung on December 27, 1911 at the Calcutta session of the Indian National Congress. [1]</p>
<p>Whereas Wikipedia entry of National anthem mentions thus:</p>
<p>"<em>Jana Gana Mana</em> is the national anthem of India. Written in highly Sanskritised (Tatsama) Bengali." [2]</p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>E.g. 2:</p>
<p>Are these beautiful waterfalls on the Kaveri River located in Tamil Nadu – or on the border between Tamil Nadu and Karnataka – or in Tamil Nadu on its border with Karnataka? Or is it really the Cauvery river, and Hogenakal Falls? [3]</p>
<p><em>Whatever you believe, be sure to bring a (Google) map to the debate, and point out that your opponent's sources are not RS or NPOV!</em></p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>E.g. 3:</p>
<p>Born of Serbian parents in a part of the Austrian Empire, which a short time later became a part of the Hungarian half of Austria-Hungary and is now in Croatia. He eventually became a naturalized citizen of the US. [4]</p>
<p><em>So was he Serbian? Croatian? Austrian? Austro-Hungarian? Istro-Romanian? Jewish? American? Martian? You decide! But don't forget to leave an edit summary saying how pathetic it is to choose any other version. (Guess who are we talking about?) Clue: He is inventor par excellence.</em></p>
</blockquote>
<p>In this day and age where information is often a touch and go process, a forgotten mode, a solitary quest towards creating knowledge sounds romantic (almost). Networked collaborations (such as Wikipedia) which have created Knowledge sites have led to democratic interpretation and assimilation of such knowledge. They also as a basic necessity have sprung up various modes of annotation, verifiability of the Knowledge thus produced and utility quotient of the same. After all, why create and hold on to information that no body really cares about.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Plan</h2>
<p>In this discussion session, the co-leaders of the session shall attempt to peel out the benign face of the visible Wikipedia page(there is a hidden world out there) and discuss the political, technological and social contours of information available on Wikipedia. We shall take the participants through the various stages of discussion about a Wikipedia page and how discussions tend to alter the course of an article. How false consensus is proposed, consent is manufactured and how these efforts are usually defeated by 'Answer People' and 'Vandal Fighters'. It is no less of a war than the one between information and mis-information. The discussion on, calculus, for instance, was host to some sparring over whether the concept of "limit," central to calculus, should be better explained as an "average."</p>
<p>This discussion session brings to the table questions of legitimisation of knowledge and the inherent hierarchies that operate even within open networks of collaboration and offers a critique on consumption oriented knowledge production. The session also aims to ask questions around knowledge as an agent that has levelled some of the earlier existing contours but has introduced some of its own and how that has changed our usages and shapes our experiences.</p>
<p>The session will involve an edit-a-thon on a topic that will be selected by the co-leaders of the session and live commentary on the discussion pages will be tracked for further analysis. The session intends to build a dialogue towards attempting to problematise the questions of the starkly hierarchical and segmented experiences that have played a significant role in production of knowledge in the era of new knowledge practices. The session also will question the 'best practices' in building consent in the present global techno-economic contours of the internet, and its effect on academic spaces, creative practice and intervention.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Readings</h2>
<ol><li> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Using_talk_pages">Using Talk Pages</a></li><li><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Talk_page_guidelines">Talk page guidelines</a></li><li><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Tutorial/Talk_pages">Tutorial on Wikipedia talk pages</a></li><li><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Introduction_to_talk_pages/1">Introduction to talk pages</a></li><li><a href="https://cis-india.org/raw/www.networkcultures.org/_uploads/%237reader_Wikipedia.pdf">A Wikipedia Reader (pdf, 6.6 MB)</a><br /></li></ol>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-wikishadows'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-wikishadows</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroIRC16Proposed SessionsInternet Researcher's Conference2016-01-03T06:57:02ZBlog EntryIRC16 - Proposed Session - #MinimalComputing
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-minimalcomputing
<b>This is a session proposed for the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC) 2016 by Padmini Ray Murray and Sebastian Lütgert.</b>
<p> </p>
<h2>Session</h2>
<p>The triumphal mythic narrative of India’s relatively high and rapid rates of Internet penetration is underpinned by the country’s access to data via mobile devices. The black box proprietary technology of the iPhone, or the less explicitly restrictive nexus (pun unintended) between the Android OS with device manufacturers, has meant we have large swathes of technology users whose only encounter with online content has been via these closed ecosystems.
Minimal computing is both an intellectual intention and pragmatic response that seeks to disrupt these systems by subverting existing frameworks and creating new infrastructures, acknowledging the ground realities that exist in India, such as lack of resources and access. This position essentially privileges “ease of use, ease of creation, increased access and reductions in computing—and by extension, electricity” (Gil). The intention of this workshop is to explore, discover, discuss and build resources that observe these tenets, under different heads, such as physical computing, archives, interface, database.</p>
<p>One of the obvious outcomes of the growth of digital technology in the region is the increasing intersection with the scholarly record – be that a theorizing of these new contexts, as is the case at this conference, or in the building of dissemination tools for memory institutions or academic scholarship. As such scholarship (which would be considered under the rubric of the digital humanities) is still in its early stages, it is incumbent upon us to set an example for other scholars when we build these resources; fast to load, easy to build and administer, which can function in low-bandwidth areas – especially as we embark on larger scale projects that are now possible through advances in digitization of different forms of content, as well as of Indic language character sets.
Uses of technology in India are often anarchic, and the digital is constantly imbricated with the analogue and these grassroots, informal practices could usefully inform scholarship in this area, and possibly be transposed to other similar environments, such as those found in the global south.</p>
<p>The other crucial exploration that will be undertaken in this workshop will be how to use guerilla computing and other methods to safeguard our fundamental human rights both online and offline, strategies increasingly essential in a country where censorship against individuals and misuse of personal data is rapidly on the rise. The online citizen must be encouraged to think about the virtual space in which s/he works and plays, and learn how to navigate it responsibly, by being alert to the dangers of the networked world being overly regulated, and this workshop will also discuss surveillance and collection of personal data by governments, corporations, advertisers, and hackers, and how to circumvent it using relatively simple methods.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Plan</h2>
<p>At the outset of the workshop, participants will be introduced by the co-leaders to some examples and concepts in #minimalcomputing, and then to a range of tools and resources such as Markdown, Jekyll, Pan.do/ra, Pandoc etc., as well as simple encrypting methods. Participants will also be encouraged to share examples of good practice that they might have encountered in their own contexts.</p>
<p>Participants will then be asked to consider a digital project that they might be in the process of building, or envisioning, or to reflect on their personal digital footprint and be facilitated by the co-leaders on how to rebuild and reimagine these using a minimal computing perspective, and to document these ideas so they might be shared with the rest of the group, and promote more discussion.</p>
<p>The aim of the workshop is to draw upon collective expertise to create a handbook of sustainable, scalable resources that can be created without over reliance on third party infrastructures, in order to retain agency over projects initiatives and digital identities; and provide a roadmap for an alternative Internet that meets the needs of users in both personal and professional contexts.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Readings</h2>
<p>Budish, Ryan and West, Sarah Myers and Gasser, Urs. Designing Successful Governance Groups: Lessons for Leaders from Real-World Examples (August 2015). Berkman Center Research Publication No. 2015-11. Available at SSRN: <a href="http://ssrn.com/abstract=2638006" target="_blank">http://ssrn.com/abstract=2638006</a>.</p>
<p><em>This reading sets out how an effective multistakeholder governance group might be structured, convened and operate and its stated values of inclusiveness, transparency, accountability, legitimacy, and effectiveness might serve as a useful guide to how we might envision a #minimalcomputing community.</em></p>
<p>Gil, Alex. The User, the Learner and the Machines We Make. Minimal Computing website. (May 2015). Available at: <a href="https://go-dh.github.io/mincomp/thoughts/2015/05/21/user-vs-learner/">https://go-dh.github.io/mincomp/thoughts/2015/05/21/user-vs-learner/</a>.</p>
<p><em>This reading sets out some of the underlying concepts of #minimalcomputing and raises important questions that might be flagged up for discussion during the workshop.</em></p>
<p><a href="https://github.com/xpmethod/dhnotes/">https://github.com/xpmethod/dhnotes/</a></p>
<p><em>A growing resource for relevant material and information on #minimalcomputing – start here.</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-minimalcomputing'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-minimalcomputing</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroIRC16Proposed SessionsInternet Researcher's Conference2016-01-03T06:57:20ZBlog EntryIRC16 - Proposed Session - #SmartThings (Conceptualizing Internet/Digital Technologies in the Age of "Smartness")
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-smartthings
<b>This is a session proposed for the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC) 2016 by Ravi Shukla and Bharath Palavalli.</b>
<p> </p>
<h2>Session</h2>
<p>With the increasing focus on making things - devices, services, cities, even planets - smart, there is a need to engage with the idea of smartness. What constitutes it? Who decides? Is there a need to re-conceptualize our understanding of these increasingly pervasive technologies and if so, how do we begin to do so?</p>
<p>The session engages with two inter-related questions - a) What constitutes a smart city? and b) How can we approach internet/digital technologies as enablers of basic, urban public services?</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Plan</h2>
<p>The session is broken up into three sections of half an hour each.</p>
<p><strong>Content Overview</strong></p>
<p>The first section involves the presentation of the findings of a survey across different social groups of what constitutes a "smart city". This is followed by a Q & A session with the audience.</p>
<p>The second section involves presenting the findings of a pilot project using SMS technology as an enabler for public services within a community. This is followed by a Q & A session with the audience.</p>
<p>The third section involves asking people in the audience to list 5 characteristics that constitute (or in some cases, *don't* constitute) public services in a "smart" city. Depending on the size of the audience, either these responses can be collected individually or it can be broken into groups of 3-5 people. The responses are then collected and shared with the audience - either during the session (if time allows) or over email/website.</p>
<p><strong>Expected Outcomes</strong></p>
<p>At the end of the session we expect a set of responses on what characterizes public services in a "smart" city. These are seen as helping in drawing out a research/practice agenda on how internet/digital technologies may act as enablers of public services.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Readings</h2>
<p>None.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-smartthings'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-smartthings</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroIRC16Proposed SessionsInternet Researcher's Conference2016-01-03T06:59:58ZBlog EntryIRC16 - Proposed Session - #LiterarySpaces (Online Literary Spaces in India)
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-literaryspaces
<b>This is a session proposed for the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC) 2016 by P.P. Sneha and Arup Chatterjee.</b>
<p> </p>
<h2>Session</h2>
<p>The last decade has seen a slow but steady emergence of online literary spaces in India, marked by the ubiquitous nature of the internet and digital technologies, growing mobile phone penetration and increased access to devices such as tablets and e-readers. By literary spaces we refer to online journals, magazines and blogs, as well as reading groups and discussion spaces focused on writing in English and Indian languages. These range from those exclusively focusing on contemporary literature to others that feature writing on news, culture and arts. These spaces raise some intriguing questions about the growth a new online or digital literary culture, which may be mapped through the evolution of reading and writing practices as very explicitly technologized practices, and the changes in the notion of text and textuality, scholarship and pedagogy, among other things.</p>
<p>Some examples of such spaces that have come up in the recent years are <em>The Little Magazine</em> <strong>[1]</strong>, <em>Muse India</em> <strong>[2]</strong>, <em>Kritya</em> <strong>[3]</strong>, <em>Coldnoon: Travel Poetics</em> <strong>[4]</strong>, <em>Kindle</em> <strong>[5]</strong>, <em>Almost Island</em> <strong>[6]</strong>, <em>The Indian Quarterly</em> <strong>[7]</strong> and among several others. Many of these journals have both an online and print presence, while some are purely online and seek to reach a diverse audience featuring different genres of writing. While many carry an eclectic mix of creative and critical writing, perceptions about readership on the internet often dictate the form and manner of writing that is featured. The much anticipated and debated ‘disappearance’ of long form writing is one of the questions that may be asked of the emergence of these literary journals, which have in some way re-imagined this form in the digital sphere and have been instrumental in its growth. So even as there are books on twitterature <strong>[8]</strong>, there are interesting ways in which online literary journals have tried to define the space of contemporary writing on the internet in India.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Plan</h2>
<p>This panel discussion proposes to examine this phenomenon of the growth of online literary journals to understand the imagination of the ‘digital’ in their practices of writing and publication, whether as medium, content or context, as a way to explore how writing and reading practices today have been shaped by these changes. This also includes questions on methods of literary analysis that may have changed with the advent of the digital, and from a broader perspective, the production of literary scholarship and pedagogy in India. Some questions that could be points of discussion are as follows:</p>
<ol>
<li>What is the pedagogical role, if any of digital/online journals? Are they simply cost-effective modes of production of knowledge or are they indicative of some other form discrimination? Perhaps a discrimination between what gets read and what does not? Is a voluminous archive of nineteenth century writings of the same pedagogical merit as a list of 100 Hollywood romantic comedies? If the former is arguably much more educational, why then is the latter the source of the greatest traffic? Is pedagogy then a misnomer, and a non-entity in the world of online magazines?<br /><br /></li>
<li>Can the rise of online magazines be related with the rise of print culture and the subsequent rise of the novel? The novel was educational and, while English was still a very evolving language in the 17th and 18th centuries, the form helped both shape the language and educate the masses, bourgeoisie, and the aristocracy about the nuances of the still-nascent English language. Can a similar function be said to have been fulfilled by online journals? Or have they failed in playing this radical role of disseminating new language and new vocabulary, which is required to articulate new modes and conflicts within modernity--sexualities, queerness, televised elections, middle-eastern (Syrian, Palestinian, Israeli, Iraqi) mayhem in times of democracy, globalization, urbanization, travel, genocide, partition, terrorism, and so on? Are there any exceptions among the journals in being able to somehow fulfil the criteria of engendering a new language? What are the examples, if any? How popular are they?<br /><br /></li>
<li>Is online literature less literary than print? Is it more amenable to news, while print continues to be literary? Or is this only a misconception? Is online literature prone to non-serious, or populist sources of pedagogy, which serve more to titillate through trolling, humour, half-baked information, gossip, or is it playing a serious role too in portions? Apart from those newspapers and journals/magazines which also have print components, which are possibly the portals that create viable, meritorious, and universal categories of knowledge? Or, invocation of 'merit' and 'universal' essentially a flawed mechanism to judge online literatures?</li></ol>
<p>Addressing some of above questions through a study of two or more online journals, this session will attempt to open them up to a broader discussion on the nature and growth of an online literary culture in India, and the need for and significance of research in this area.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Readings</h2>
<p>None.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Notes</h2>
<p><strong>[1]</strong> See: <a href="http://www.littlemag.com/" target="_blank">http://www.littlemag.com/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[2]</strong> See: <a href="http://www.museindia.com/" target="_blank">http://www.museindia.com/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[3]</strong> See: <a href="http://www.kritya.in/" target="_blank">http://www.kritya.in/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[4]</strong> See: <a href="http://coldnoon.com/" target="_blank">http://coldnoon.com/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[5]</strong> See: <a href="http://kindlemag.in/" target="_blank">http://kindlemag.in/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[6]</strong> See: <a href="http://almostisland.com/" target="_blank">http://almostisland.com/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[7]</strong> See: <a href="http://indianquarterly.com/" target="_blank">http://indianquarterly.com/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[8]</strong> See: <a href="http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/307055/twitterature-by-alexander-aciman/9780143117322/" target="_blank">http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/307055/twitterature-by-alexander-aciman/9780143117322/</a>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-literaryspaces'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-literaryspaces</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroIRC16Proposed SessionsInternet Researcher's Conference2016-01-03T06:59:25ZBlog EntryIRC16 - Proposed Session - #DisruptiveTransport (Aggregators, Ownership, Tracking, Space, Internet Models)
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-disruptivetransport
<b>This is a session proposed for the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC) 2016 by Srinivas Kodali and William F. Stafford Jr.</b>
<p> </p>
<h2>Session</h2>
<p>Transportation has been seeing disruptions through Internet aggregators using complex models which nobody understands in detail. This is primarily being seen in the space of urban transport, but is not limited to them alone. 1960`s saw disruptions in airline industry when each airline was fighting for it's own space in flight reservations and aggregations. This disruptive trend is now being observed globally in other transport modes. Aggregators are playing an important role in transporting people and disrupting markets globally. Internet Models are varying within aggregators who are not limiting themselves to ticket reservation, but are also providing information about the availability of transportation options. With increasing demand and surge pricing taking up the market, what is the role of the state. What are the ownership rights of an aggregator? What are licensing/lease models of a provider? What about un-fair practices and consumer rights? What forms of labour and regulation are imagined? What is the role of state run aggregators like IRCTC in this changing landscape?</p>
<p>Many of the platforms that have been created, primarily in the beginning concerning tracking or making complaints, were accessed through websites and have since been migrated either to a combined website/ app structure, or wholly to smartphone apps. This raises interesting and important questions concerning the imagination of an increased reliability and accesibility of services, as well as a power to hold public institutions accountable, as they relate to the question of access to these technologies and the habits of their use, especially demographically and linked to class.</p>
<p>Furthermore, both the near and far future promise an reworking of the internet as a system with which commuters and others interface to consume or deliver a service, to transport as one part of a mobility ecosystem, which is currently being tooled (both in regulatory frameworks and industrial planning) as a microcosm of the internet of things. With internet being connected to personal transport at every intersection of the road, what is the scope of
privacy and accountability, the role of encryption layer and also the importance of governance in the fragile/disrupting space. How will the internet impact personal transport of citizens and the economy? Cashless payments, driver-less cars, surge-congestion pricing with disruptive internet models need regulation before they
over-run and create chaos with the system.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Plan</h2>
<p>The session will focus on Delhi as a case study.</p>
<p>Discussants will present their current work around these questions, and then open a discussion among those present on the issues raised therein.</p>
<p>The first discussant will present on the changing architecture of the auto-rickshaw meter as a regulatory platform, from the recent introduction of GPS to the creation of various surveillance and business models which either exploit its native GPS or duplicate and substitute it through the use of smartphones, and the folding
of autos into the emerging e-hailing environment and the possible implications of changes being sought in the regulatory framework for connected vehicles. These include technological treatments of questions of class, trust and accountability, as well as significant policy and material changes in the classification of what is owned, by whom, and its conditions of transfer.</p>
<p>Srinivas will continue the presentation on transport data by showing use cases and potential harms about the data. How big data is changing the landscape of transportation systems and privacy concerns with the future of autonomous vehicles and intelligent traffic management systems. Data driven decisions are a big concern when data can also be used to lie at a scale. Data ownership and rights are a challenge the state and the citizen need to think about before forcibly submitting data.</p>
<p>The discussion will be primarily around:</p>
<ol>
<li>Digital Ownership and Physical Ownership</li>
<li>Scope of Internet Governance on Aggregators</li>
<li>Pricing Models and Service Availability</li>
<li>Future of On-Demand Transportation Services vs Public Transportation</li></ol>
<p> </p>
<h2>Readings</h2>
<p>None.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-disruptivetransport'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-disruptivetransport</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroIRC16Proposed SessionsInternet Researcher's Conference2016-01-03T07:00:57ZBlog EntryIRC16 - Proposed Session - #DigitalLiteraciesAtTheMargins
https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-digitalliteraciesatthemargins
<b>This is a session proposed for the Internet Researchers' Conference (IRC) 2016 by Aakash Solanki, Sandeep Mertia, and Rashmi M.</b>
<p> </p>
<h2>Session</h2>
<p>The session intends to initiate a discussion on digital literacies in the wake of ‘Digital India’ programme drawing on the empirical insights from three different field situations. The discussion will be anchored in the social and material context of Digital India but will not be limited to it. The questions we raise in this specific context may be extended to understand the current conceptual as well as practical deployment of many ICT4D programmes as envisioned by both government and non-government actors. The idea of digital literacy is central to both the conceptualization and the execution of such programmes, and the actors in charge work with their own understanding of the context and needs of the people they aim to empower. There have been very few attempts to systematically understand the concept of digital literacy which leave much scope for either lenient contextual interpretations or context insensitive one-size-fits-all approach towards technological interventions. This session is an effort to begin one such discussion which we hope will refine the prevalent understanding of digital literacy/literacies in India.</p>
<p>From a glance at the structure of Digital India programme, it is apparent that the programme is designed to achieve digital inclusion and is primarily directed towards the digitally marginalized in spite of having a more comprehensive agenda. The schemes such as National Digital Literacy Mission (NDLM) and the way they are conceived are indexical of the kind of target groups which the programme plans to address. A key concern for us is to think through the mismatches between the frameworks of the digital literacy initiatives and the local socio-technical contexts which we observed in our field sites. The objective of the session is not as much to arrive at the definitional fixity of the concept of digital literacy as it is to complicate and problematize the prevalent definitions of digital literacy implicit in both visualization and execution of such initiatives. We plan to meet this objective through empirical insights we have on three different field sites.</p>
<p>The session will also focus on certain methodological questions that might help us better understand digital literacy. This part of the session addresses questions such as: how can we conceptually define digital literacy/literacies? What parameters should go into the measuring of digital literacy? How should we theoretically understand it – as technical skills or knowledge or some higher cognitive ability? How can we best pedagogically achieve it given the complexity of ground reality? The questions will be directed towards encouraging thought in this area rather than providing answers. The session will also try and discuss various kinds of policy and pedagogical documentation available on digital literacy and critically debate their conceptualization and execution by juxtaposing them against various uses of ICTs on the ground by specific groups of users. This part of the discussion will draw upon scholarly and other kinds of documentation available on the topic and use them to evaluate various government and corporate initiatives to achieve digital literacy in India.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Plan</h2>
<p>In keeping with the spirit of the conference, the three discussants’ will try to put forth empirical insights from their respective field situations and frame nuanced research and discussion questions on digital literacies at the margins of techno-cultural capital and/or access. Further the discussion will be aided by specific readings and the insights drawn from them. The idea is to have a symmetrical, reciprocatory and anthropologically comparative conversation on questions of technology, materiality, access, meaning making, development and literacy, by moving back and forth between different fieldsites and interpretive frameworks.</p>
<p><strong>Field Note I</strong></p>
<p>The first discussant's work on social media use in rural Rajasthan discusses socio-technical changes instituted by the introduction of ICTs despite their developmental failures. He claims that these changes have been often viewed from technologically or socially deterministic positions and that there are significant empirical gaps between such technocratic discourses and the grassroots experiences of technology. There is a growing usage of social and digital media in rural areas where ICT4D and e-Governance pilot projects have failed to meet their goals. Based on an ethnographic study of ICTs in two villages of Rajasthan, his work aims to situate social and digital media in a complex rural society and media ecology using co-constructivist approach. Focusing on context sensitive meaning making of ICTs, it will seek to contribute to an empirically sound discourse on media, technology and rural society in India.</p>
<p><strong>Field Note II</strong></p>
<p>The second discussant's work on mobile phones and multimedia consumption among the digitally marginalized users in Bangalore brings into focus the popular usage of ICTs, specifically mobile phones, among the subaltern users. While such popular usage indicates a certain level of literacy already achieved by the digitally marginal groups by mere exposure and peer learning, it is not sufficient to do away with all kinds of guided training required to make such users participate in informationalized environments. Her observations on the mobile phone usage among the subaltern users in Bangalore problematize the notion of digital literacy and invite us to think about it as a more layered and stratified concept. They raise questions such as ‘what constitutes digital literacy?’ – some complex use of gadgets learnt by mere exposure and peer knowledge or an awareness about the social relevance of the technologies and knowledge about their appropriate deployment in different social contexts? While mere access and some nominal training might be helpful in equipping people with some knowledge about gadget-use, her study points out that such initiatives are far from achieving the right degree of digital literacy needed to make these people participate in new media ecologies. Thus it contends the claims of 1. Organic literacy attained by mere exposure and peer sharing of technological knowledge and 2. Literacy attained by current training programmes which might equip the digitally marginalized with knowledge of technological use but not necessarily inform them about the context relevant knowledge needed for their appropriate deployment.</p>
<p><strong>Field Note III</strong></p>
<p>The third discussant's work on e-governance initiatives in an Indian state plans to return the gaze on to the bureaucracy itself and takes the conversation from the margins back to the centre. His work moves away from the target groups generally alluded to in programs such as the NDLM. It takes into accounts the struggles, anxieties, hopes and promises of/for a bureaucracy in coming to terms with a gradual but seemingly eventual shift from paper work to digital paper work. The users in this case are staff members tasked by the higher-level bureaucracy-who have little or no clue about it themselves- to learn a new tool and migrate all paper work to the digital domain. Many of e-governance projects are spearheaded by corporate organizations, which in turn dictate the terms of the conversation on Digital Literacy even within the government. What impact does this have on how Digital Literacy is understood, articulated and executed in ICT4D programs within and without the government.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Readings</h2>
<p>Terranova, Tiziana. 2004. Chapter 5: Communication Biopower, 131-157. <em>Network Culture: Politics for the Information Age</em>. London: Pluto Press.</p>
<p>Mazzarella, William. 2010. Beautiful Balloon: the Digital Divide and the Charisma of New Media in India. <em>American Ethnologist</em>, 37(4), 783-804.</p>
<p>Smith, Richard Saumarez. 1985. Rule-by-Records and Rule-by-Reports: Complementary Aspects of the British Imperial Rule of Law. <em>Contributions to Indian Sociology</em> 19(1): 153–176.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-digitalliteraciesatthemargins'>https://cis-india.org/raw/irc16-proposed-digitalliteraciesatthemargins</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroIRC16Proposed SessionsInternet Researcher's Conference2016-01-03T07:20:26ZBlog Entry