Blog Archive archive

Online Community Self-Moderation

Katy Pearce — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 07:51:22 -0700

"The amount of time it would take for the community to self-regulate -- I don't think it could sustain itself in the meantime. Anyway, I can't think of any successful online community where the nice, quiet, reasonable voices defeat the loud, angry ones on their own." - Heather Champ, Director of Community at Flickr, in the San Francisco Gate.

Surveillance of Skype Messages in China Documented

Katy Pearce — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 12:24:43 -0700

The Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto released a report this week on SkypeSkype in China. [NYT Coverage] The report found that text chat messages of Skype users are "regularly" scanned for sensitive keywords (Falun Gong, etc.), and if present, the resulting data are uploaded and stored on insecure servers in China.

Twittering the Presidential Debate

Katy Pearce — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 15:45:14 -0700

Twitter is a "free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows its users to send and read other users' updates (otherwise known as tweets), which are text-based posts of up to 140 characters in length" (Wikipedia ).

Unlike a blog, Twitter users frequently update through short posts. Many Twitter users "tweet" through their mobile devices.

Judy Estrin will speak October 27, 2008

Jennifer Earl — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 09:24:12 -0700

Judy Estrin, long-time technology leader and former CTO of Cisco, will be speaking as part of the CITS Distinguished Speaker Series on October 27, 2008 at UCSB. Next week we will post an event flyer with full location and timing details as we blog more about her new book, due out on Tuesday, Closing the Innovation Gap.

But, to wet your appetite, here is a , New York Times Bits post from today on her new book.

Literacy Debate: Online, R U Really Reading?

Rob Patton — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 07:41:47 -0700

The New York Times today published "The Future of Reading Digital Versus Print" the first in a series of articles that will look at how the Internet and other technological and social forces are changing the way people read. The article is an informative piece on the on-going debate of the effects of web activity that at face value is reading but in some circles is not considered "true" reading because it doesn't involve paper text or the great works.

Text Messaging in Yosemite

Jennifer Earl — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 07:24:32 -0700

Over the July 4th holiday weekend, I went to Yosemite National Park for the better part of a day. While taking the short walk from a parking and bus area to the majestic lower falls, I saw a college-aged woman totally engaged in text messaging while sitting on a rock fence on the side of the trail.

Thanks Rob-- We Will Miss You

Jennifer Earl — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 21:47:17 -0700

Rob Patton, the CITS Program Manager since 2002, had his last day with CITS yesterday. Rob and his family are moving this summer and thus he is moving on from CITS. Rob will be missed—he was a large part of the growth and development of CITS. We thank Rob for his service and hard work and wish him the best of luck on his next adventure!

World Information Access Project 2008 Report

Jennifer Earl — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 07:39:50 -0700

The World Information Access (WIA) project has just published a report that includes data on the arrest and prosecution of political bloggers around the world. According to the report, arrests of political bloggers have been on the rise over recent years, with a dramatic uptick in 2007, even though levels overall remain relatively low with 64 bloggers being prosecuted since 2003.

Rob Patton's Talk Online Now

Jennifer Earl — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 15:51:19 -0700

UCTV Version of Lawrence Lessig Lecture Now Online

Rob Patton — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 22:10:44 -0700