On the day before AoIR2006, I presented at the Online Learning and Teaching conference at QUT. I'm happy to report that the two conference papers for OLT2006 that I was involved in have now been published on the conference Website - here are the references:

Rachel Cobcroft, Stephen Towers, Judith Smith, and Axel Bruns. "Mobile Learning in Review: Opportunities and Challenges for Learners, Teachers, and Institutions." In Proceedings of the Online Learning and Teaching Conference 2006, Brisbane: Queensland University of Technology.

Tartu
We're now in the preliminary summary session for the second day at CATaC 2006. By the way, in the meantime the CATaC wiki has also been revived, with some additional materials on the presentations also posted up there. In terms of the session I chaired, I found the combination of theory and practice, and of development and definition of collaborative, productive online environments particularly interesting - the direct practical engagement of researchers in the tools and communities they study appears to have a number of benefits. Other session chairs right now seem to present more of a summary of their sessions - but for example, Laurel Dyson points once again to the importance of alternatives to traditional forms of copyright, as well as to the associated traditional view of content producers as individuals: perhaps there is a need for computer technology which also provides for multiple participants, similar to the way computer games already do. Anne Hewling notes the shift in e-learning from a technological to a cultural focus, and a recognition of learning environments as culturally complex and in need of further study.

Dresden
Finally, then, there was the panel I participated in, on participatory journalism. Obviously I didn't get around to blogging it, but I made an audio recording - and if it turned out OK I'll try and put it up here soon. Some very interesting international perspectives on the challenges for journalism brought on by participatory media - and I thank my co-presenters Christoph Neuberger, Jane Singer, and David Domingo, as well as Mark Deuze who proposed the panel and brought us all together. Let's see if we can do some more follow-up work on these issues. Here's our abstract for the panel:

Dresden
The last day of ICA2006 starts with a panel on Weblogs. The first speaker, Jae Kook Lee, couldn't be here, but there's a video message and a recorded presentation by him instead. The first question is whether the blogosphere is a public sphere - to analyse this, the structural and functional mechanisms of the blogosphere, the contentions surrounding the concept of the public sphere, and the possibiity of the blogosphere as a public sphere need to be examined.

To begin with, the blogosphere is the network of blogs connected by hyperlinks. It enables direct audience participation by posting and searching for relevant information, and has grown exponentially in recent times. The public sphere is a space where informed citizens exchange rational discourse, but there are questions over whether it has ever existed, whether it excludes certain groups, and whether rational discourse is actually functional. Thus, the public sphere is really more an ideal form rather than a reality. But how closely can the blogosphere approximate the public sphere? Yardstick requirements are inclusivity: whether all individuals can participate (and on the Net, there is a low barrier of entry and a minimal cost for participation in the blogosphere, and high interconnectedness); equality for all partricipants: retrieving and disclosing information without revealing their identities, and free expression and exchange of opinions are possible (but elites may dominate exchange in the blogosphere); rationality: the blogophere is a knowledge repository and enables the process of meaning-building (but inappropriate behaviours, production quality, self-segregation tendencies, and skewed distribution of attention in the blogophere are problems); and autonomy from state and economic power: no-one is fully independent, but low barriers mean there is no need for advertising to support blogs, and there is no intervention from state at least in democracies (but publicity is distributed unevenly and some commercial models are emerging).

Dresden
The first session of the 56th annual International Communication Association conference has started now - and as always I'll do my best to report what I see. There may be some delays in getting this out, though - surprisingly, it looks as if the only Internet access made available here to conference delegates is by way of a handful of machines in the Cybercafe. No wireless - a very disappointing start to this event... I should also note that of course there's a plethora of papers being presented here - so what I cover may not at all be representative for the conference as such.