Fade to Play » tagging

Tagging: People Powered Metadata for the Social Web

tyfn — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 04:01:00 +0000

Gene Smith @ Northern Voice

As I have stated before, one of the benefits of attending a large (40 000+) university is that you can request any book under the sun for the library and they will not only order it for you but will hold it at the front desk of your library of choice. When I read on Gene Smith’s blog that his book had become available, I immediately requested that my library purchase it as it relates to my thesis research.

Gene Smith is a great speaker whom I met most recently at Northern Voice this year. There is a companion website for the book. I have just began reading the first chapter so I am not able to provide a valid assessment as yet, however I do recommend everyone order it from Amazon.com or ask their school library to order it as so much of web2.0 technology is built on the foundation of tags.

Relevance: Most of us tag daily whether using flickr, wordpress, or delicious, but few of us understand why we tag. This book explores the value of tagging.

Barcamp Vancouver 07

tyfn — Sat, 16 Jun 2007 06:36:45 +0000

So are you interested in meeting some of the coolest übertech people in Vancouver? Well you are in luck. Cancel that August vacation if you are living here in Vangroovy. If you are out of town, check the dates, because you’ll want to come here for Vancouver barcamp August 17-18th (includes a sleepover hopefully with S’mores).

Spaces are going fast so register today.

What is Barcamp?

Barcamp Vancouver facebook event and group.

Barcamp Vancouver wiki

Let’s get some students there (share your research — hello?)

Tagging and the Gastown Photowalk 2

tyfn — Fri, 08 Jun 2007 03:22:34 +0000

Yesterday was a busy day for me. I gave a presentation at the Media Annotations and Tagging workshop by MAGIC entitled “Playing tag in user-generated spaces” in which I discussed tagging in Facebook and Flickr.

I then attended a photowalk in Gastown (a section of Vancouver) organised by Kris Krüg that evening and afterwards we uploaded our photos to Flickr and and Facebook using appropriate tags to categorise our content. Some of us also became new friends/contacts on Flickr and Facebook.

After the walk Kris yelled out that we use a standardised tag “gastownphotowalk2″ to link our photos on flickr together. If you attend conferences, workshops, meetups, you will hear the organisers request that a common tag be used to link photos/blog entries related to the event. Although people believe in the power of the folksonomy, a little top-down intervention is very effective and sometimes necessary.

The result of using “gastownphotowalk2″ is that we are one of the hot tags of the last 24 hours on flickr. Sweet.

Check out our photos here.

Relevance: I am finding that I living what I research regarding tagging in flickr and facebook. It helps me better understand the culture of these spaces when I use these spaces daily because of my real world interactions and meetups. Having friends that live in these digital environments is quite beneficial.

Technorati Tags: gastownphotowalk2 tagging MAGIC

MAGIC Workshop — Media Annotation and Tagging

tyfn — Sun, 27 May 2007 02:43:33 +0000

I am fortunate to be invited to participate in a workshop organised by the Media and Graphics Interdisciplinary Centre (MAGIC) which is my home department. Both David Vogt and Sid Fels are knowledgeable and great to listen to, so it should be a useful session to attend if tagging interests you.

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MAGIC Workshop – Media Annotation and Tagging
June 6th, UBC Robson Square (downtown), 3-5:30pm

Directions are here.

Please distribute!

The 7th quarterly MAGIC workshop will explore the exploding area of media annotation and tagging. Please join us for 3 exciting talks:
Attendance is free but please RSVP to Lavana Lea (lavana@cs.ubc.ca)

David Vogt, CEO, CrowdTrust Technologies: Tagging technologies to make sense of everything that matters
Sid Fels, UBC: Perspectives on Human Communication Technologies, Smart Homes and Media annotation
Phillip Jeffrey, UBC: Playing tag in user-generated spaces

David Vogt, CEO, CrowdTrust Technologies ( http://www.crowdtrust.net)

“How often every day do you encounter things you know are meaningful and might need some day, yet inevitably get lost or forgotten? Think of CrowdTrust as your secure external memory drive and personal creative commons. We enable you to easily tag, keep and make sense of everything that matters in the digital blizzard of your life. Ideas, emails, places, people, images, etc, etc, – you can capture and automatically organize anything on the fly. Best of all, these ‘semantic investments’ quickly become an invaluable identity asset, allowing you to create and manage actionable representations of “you” to yourself, your networks and the general public.

CrowdTrust approaches media tagging and annotation from a social/semantic perspective. All of our personal accounts are free; we offer identity, marketing and collective intelligence services for organizations.”
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Sid Fels: Perspectives on Human Communication Technologies, Smart Homes and Media annotation

Recent trends in human communication technologies focus on people’s relationships with each other, with computational artifacts and various environments people encounter in their daily lives. Research at MAGIC and the Human Communication Technologies laboratory are pushing this trend from the perspective of relationship aesthetics and design of experience and expresssion. Design for human experience and expression using information technology requires attention to how and why people form relationships with entities beyond themselves. An awareness of people’s different cognitive, physical and emotional capabilities provides a foundation for acquiring, analyzing, representing, storing, retrieving, transmitting, communicating and ultimately synthesizing human experience. In this presentation, I will discuss some of our current work on a context-aware multimedia project for the Winter Olympics and other related activities. This project sets the foundation to proceed to speculate on some new perspectives on how these technologies may develop in the future as we look at people’s relationship to their digital environment in the home and the new opportunities this uncovers.

Bio:

Sidney has been in the department of Electrical & Computer Engineering at the University of British Columbia since 1998. Sidney received his Ph. D. and M.Sc . in Computer Science at the University of Toronto in 1994 and 1990 respectively supervised by Dr. Geoffrey Hinton and Bill Buxton. He received his B.A.Sc. in Electrical Engineering at the
University of Waterloo in 1988. He was recognized as a Distinguished University Scholar at UBC from 2004. He was a visiting researcher at ATR Media Integration & Communications Research Laboratories in Kyoto, Japan from 1996 to 1997. He also worked at Virtual Technologies Inc. in Palo Alto, CA. He is internationally known for his work in human-computer interaction, biomechanical modeling, neural networks, intelligent
agents, new interfaces for musical expression and interactive arts with over 100 scholarly publications and exhibitions. Sidney is one of the principal investigators of the Institute of Computing, Information and Cognitive Systems through his authoring a grant to create a new $22.1M facility to house interdisciplinary research using advanced technologies. He has been the Director of MAGIC since 2001.

Sidney is currently a visiting professor at NTT Cyber Solutions laboratory at Yokosuka Research Laboratories.
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Phillip Jeffrey: Playing tag in user-generated spaces.

In today’s Web 2.0 environment, tools exist to classify and organize digital content that has been uploaded – in a sense providing users with control over information they are sharing. These technologies have value in enabling both consumers and producers of the content to easily find media such as pictures, webpages, or blog posts that have been tagged. User generated sites such as Flickr and Facebook which enable tagging attach additional information or descriptions to content. These online environments provide powerful social tools for creative expression, networking, and feedback from their audience. In this presentation, I will discuss how tagging differs within these shared spaces, how the dynamics of culture manifests itself, and shed light on how the design of these environments facilitate forms of creative expression.

Bio

Phillip Jeffrey is a Masters of Science student in the Interdisciplinary Studies program. His home department is the Media and Graphics Interdisciplinary Centre. His thesis research investigates how user-generated digital spaces are being used in social and personal ways. His broader research explores social and cultural issues that emerge within the areas of pervasive games and ubiquitous computing in everyday life. His research blog is fadetoplay.com.

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Relevance: It will be good preparation for my town hall presentation later in June.

Hiding from RFID tags: The RFID Guardian

tyfn — Fri, 04 May 2007 00:20:30 +0000

According to Ars Technica, the RFID Guardian created by Melanie Rieback is a portable device for personal RFID privacy. The device creates a firewall which will either enable or prevent RFID queries.

As the tags showed up in increasingly sensitive applications, security became more of a concern—at least to researchers and privacy advocates. Rieback was one of those people. As a graduate student searching for a Ph.D. dissertation topic, she spent eight months reading computer science research papers and discovered that the number of published works on RFID security could be counted on both hands. “It became painfully obvious that there was a deficiency in the area of RFID, and there is so much work to be done,” she says.

So Rieback turned herself into one of the foremost academic authorities on RFID security and went on to develop the first RFID virus as a proof of concept. That got the industry’s attention. As Rieback tactfully puts it, there was a “mixed reaction” that even included some personal attacks. But other companies approached her team for consulting assistance within days of publishing the paper.

After doing her part to publicize these security shortcomings of many RFID implementations, Rieback moved on to the RFID Guardian project, which would give people a measure of control over their tags. It became her Ph.D. project, and when she finalizes the next version in the next eight months or so, she should earn her doctorate. Even when that happens, though, she has no plans to drop the project. “I think this is important enough that we should finish it,” she says. “We should get it out there.”

Eventual plans call for the Guardian to be incorporated into cell phones and PDAs, but the current model is a pocket-sized device that runs on its own battery and provides a circular 1m field of control over RFID tags, jamming any tags that the user does not want read.

Relevance: Seeing how she was able to create a really cool PhD project gives me inspiration when am developing my own project in the future.

Technorati Tags: phd+project rfid privacy RFID+Guardian

Tagging in the Wild: Where are the walruses migrating?

tyfn — Fri, 13 Apr 2007 16:19:10 +0000

A BBC science/nature article discusses how walruses are being tagged using satellite devices in order to learn about their migration patterns. Rebecca Morelle, the science reporter posted a log about her time spent with the researchers as they searched for walruses to tag. There are also photos.

Until now, the Arctic animals’ migration route and destination have remained a mystery to researchers.

A Danish-Greenlandic team had to spend five days off the west Greenland coast in harsh conditions to tag the mammals.

They also hope the devices will shed light on how hunting, oil exploration and climate change affect walruses.

The tags were deployed over a period of two days by the expedition’s field leader Mikkel Villum Jensen.

The satellite data gathered by the Danish researchers will be shared with BBC news so that it can be posted on their website.

HOW WILL THE PROJECT WORK?

The researchers set out on a boat from the Arctic port of Sisimiut on Greenland

During two weeks at sea, the researchers hope to attach 10 satellite tags to walruses

Data will appear on this map, linked to from our stories, showing the animals’ day-to-day progress during the two-month project

The tags will be fired into the walruses’ 2-4cm (0.8-1.3in) thick hide using a crossbow or CO2-powered gun

Each time the tagged creatures emerge from the water, a signal will be beamed up to a satellite, allowing the animals’ coordinates to be determined

After about two months, the tags will fall out as the walruses’ hides heal

Relevance: An example about how ubicomp technology is being used to unlock some of the mysteries of life. I had recently read about how the mystery regarding the construction of the pyramids may have been solved using 3-D computer animation.

Technorati Tags: ubicomp technology walrus tagging

Mediamatic workshop Hybrid World Lab — Amsterdam May 2007

tyfn — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 17:06:47 +0000

This would be a very useful workshop to attend as it comes a number of my research interests regarding the everyday lives of people: user-generated content (tagging), ubicomp (mobile technology), pervasive games, and shared digital spaces.

In addition, Nicolas Nova will be one of the lecturers whom assisted us as we expanded a version of his Catch Bob Project here at UBC. I expect a top workshop. If only Vancouver was in The Netherlands.

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Mediamatic workshop Hybrid World Lab
7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 May 07Mediamatic organizes a new workshop in which the participants develop prototypes for hybrid world media applications.

While the internet is still thought of as a virtual space, it is quickly gaining foot in the physical world. An Internet-of-Things is under construction, with RFID as a key technology. Unique digital identification and GPS tracking devices link digital media to places and objects. Mobile phones and urban screens allow the media to be where people are.

This workshop explores the role of media makers (‘content creators’) in the context of this increasingly intimate fusion of digital and physical space.

WORKSHOP SET_UP AND TOOLS
The workshop kicks-off with four free public lectures on Hybrid world themes and issues.

The workshop is an intense process in which the participants design projects (applications, services, games, programmes, formats) that use the physical world as interface to online media: location based media, everyday objects as media interfaces, urban screens, and cultural application of RFID technology.
As practical research tools the participants can use the Symbolic Table 2.0 : a networked, RFID powered media player. See: http://www.mediamatic.net/symbolictable Nokia 3220 with NFC shell: mobile phone enabled with a RFID reader and writer, with the necessary tags to explore locative RFID projects. See www.elasticspace.com

A collection of various RFID readers, tags, for projects that need more basic coding, and Arduino kits are also available for those who have experience with them.

TARGET GROUP
The workshop is designed for a maximum of 16 media makers, artists, designers and producers. All participants are assisted personally in realizing their workshop projects. Participants are not required to have specific technical knowledge of new media, but experience with developing content for interactive media is recommended.

TRAINERS & LECTURERS
We are happy to announce that two of the leading researchers in this field, Timo Arnall (Norway) and Nicolas Nova (Switzerland), are confirmed trainers and lecturers in this workshop.

Two other international specialists: Matt Adams of British hybrid world theatre group BlastTheory and urban screens researcher Mirjam Struppek are still to be confirmed.

INFORMATION AND REGISTRATION
More information on the content of this workshop can be
found at:
http://www.mediamatic.net/hybridworldlab
and in the workshop reader:
http://www.mediamatic.net/article-9691-en.html

The price for this workshop is EUR 360,-. This includes VAT, lunch, technical support, equipment and a person page in the www.mediamatic.net website

You can register for this workshop at
http://www.mediamatic.net/workshopregistration
Please include a short bio and and your reason for joining the workshop.

LINKS
http://www.itu.int/osg/spu/publications/internetofthings/
http://www.mediamatic.net/person-14618-en.html
http://www.mediamatic.net/person-10379-nl.html
http://www.mediamatic.net/person-4709-nl.html
http://www.urbanscreens.org/

This workshop is made possible with the support of the MEDIA PLUS PROGRAMME of the European Community and the Ministry of OCW

found via Mediamatic mailing list.

Relevance: Mediamatic organises a number of relevant workshops throughout the year. I hope to be able to attend one sometime as they are research-related. What are the social and cultural issues that are important to discuss as technology becomes more pervasive in our everyday life?

Technorati Tags: workshop mediamatic digital+spaces Locative car+navigation+systems GPS mobile+phones geotagging

Semapedia tagging and the Ghana technology connnection

tyfn — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 20:01:12 +0000

Although I had read about Semapedia before and even blogged about it in September 2005, I was unaware of its connection with a Ghana software developer named Guido Sohne through its use of Semacode technology.

Semapedia is a project that links real world objects and places in the physical world with a corresponding digital world in Wikipedia via tagging. The process works by taking a picture of a patterned square sign using a mobile camera photo that is Internet-enabled. One is then taken to a Wikipedia page displaying information about one’s location (e.g. the University of Ghana), the location displayed in the photo.

Because it is based on such a simple gesture, its co-founder, New York-based Stan Wiechers, believes it will be picked up by children who will adapt it to their needs.

“Show them what they can do with a mobile phone and how they can hack reality,” he says.

He also thinks the project has particular resonance in Africa since buildings and streets are frequently renamed.

“They used to say the internet renders location irrelevant, but they failed to take into account that more than 80% of all human knowledge has a spatial reference,” he muses.

“I was born in one place but I have lived in many cities. There are places I love.”

A Semapedia sticker allows some of that history – buried somewhere on the internet – to leak out into reality.

“African content needs to take its place in the global constellation,” Sohne says. “We need more African content – so tag something today.”

Relevance: The article further looks at what can be done to help Africa become more integrated into this digital age. This is an excellent idea, but how common are internet-based mobile camera phones in Africa?

found/photo via April – June 2007 edition of BBC Focus on Africa Magazine.

Technorati Tags: mobile+phone africa wikipedia semapedia ghana tagging

cfp: Public Practices, Social Software: Examining social practices in networked publics

tyfn — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 19:31:52 +0000

This workshop would be excellent to attend for those interested in digital spaces, and social software. danah boyd and Scott Golder whom I personally know will do an exceptional job.

This full-day workshop proposes to bring together researchers interested in studying social software. We use this term loosely to include social network sites (e.g., Cyworld, MySpace, orkut, and Facebook), contemporary online dating services (e.g., Friendster, Spring Street Personals, Match.com), blogging services (e.g., LiveJournal, Xanga, Blogger), tagging tools (e.g. del.icio.us, Digg) and media sharing sites (e.g., YouTube, Flickr). Although the functionality of these sites differs greatly, there are some common features: a user-generated profile, visible linkages between users, public communication forums (such as message boards or comments), and persistent traces of user behavior.

To submit an application:

Please send the following to all three organizers (dmb [at] sims.berkeley.edu , nellison [at] msu.edu , scott.golder [at] hp.com).

A brief biography of approximately 150 words

A 400-500 word research statement addressing your research project, methods, findings, and future research questions and goals

3 research questions about social software which you find especially provocative and engaging. These should be questions that you’d like to discuss with other researchers and practitioners.

The deadline for submissions is April 23, 2007. We will let you know if you have been chosen to participate by May 18, 2007.

Relevance: A great workshop, but lack of funds will prevent me from presenting research this time around. (:

Technorati Tags: del.icio.us facebook cfp digital communities

The Horizon Report 2007 Edition

tyfn — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 22:32:58 +0000

The Horizon Report 2007 Edition, a collaboration between The New Media Consortium (NMC) and the Educause Learning Initiative is now available.

This report identifies and describes 6 emerging technologies that are expected to have a significant influence on higher education over the next 1-5 years. They break them down into likely timeframes for widespread adoption on university campuses.

Time to Adoption Horizon: One year or less

user-created content (e.g. tagging, YouTube, Flickr)
social networking (e.g. Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn)

Time to Adoption Horizon: Two to Three Years

mobile phones
virtual worlds (e.g. Second Life)

Time to Adoption Horizon: Four to Five Years

New forms of scholarship/emerging forms of publication (e.g. online books)
Massively Multiplayer Educational Gaming (e.g. serious games, World of Warcraft)

Of interest is the section on mobile phones which includes an excellent list of links to related articles and projects.

For example, the ability of phones to record datahas tremendous applications in fieldwork for many disciplines. In the UK, students in a grade-school geography class use cell phones to record data (text and pictures) in the field and submit it to the teacher, who remains in the classroom. Students can create mini-documentaries easily and cheaply with their phones; online tutorials for phone-based moviemaking offer tips and techniques. In Australia, a grant-funded project invited filmmakers to write and shoot five-minute movies specifically for the mobile phone platform (see www.abc.net.au/miniseries), a
technique that has been used in visual literacy and cinema courses.

Photo by David Cooper, Toronto Star

Relevance: The benefits of mobile phones for learning, education, and creativity has been outlined in this section along with examples of schools/universities that have incorporated these devices into their curriculum. It is interesting that some school districts within Canada (e.g. Brampton catholic schools) have either banned or are looking at restricting mobile phone use on school property (e.g. Toronto school board). How may these actions affect the ability to create cutting edge curriculum with these emerging technologies?

Tech Tags: mobilephone ubicomp learning education technology tagging digitalspace