First Monday December 2005

Dear Reader,

The December 2005 issue of First Monday (volume 10, number 12) is now 
available at http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_12/

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Table of Contents

Volume 10, Number 12 - December 5th 2005

Ringtones, or the auditory logic of globalization
by Sumanth Gopinath
http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_12/gopinath/

Abstract:
This essay attempts to provide a description of the global ringtone 
industry, to determine and assess the numerous cultural consequences 
of the ringtone's appearance and development, and to situate the 
ringtone within the context of contemporary capitalism. At its 
broadest, my assertion is that the development of the ringtone is a 
powerful lens through which we might clearly view some of the 
dynamics of present day (or "late") capitalist cultural production, 
including the development of new rentier economies within 
oligopolistic sectors of production and consumption, and a long-term 
shift in global productive dominance from North America to the 
Pacific Rim. The ringtone is also a remarkable cultural phenomenon 
that is demonstrating a high degree of popularity and is undergoing 
rapid transformation; therefore, its short, continuing lifetime 
already needs to be assessed historically.

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Just how international is my Web site? Estimating reach through 
analysis of hourly demand
by Dirk H.R. Spennemann
http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_12/spennemann/

Abstract:
The increased commercialisation of Internet domain sales created the 
unanticipated side effect that domain extensions no longer signify 
the residence of the domain user. As a result, the analysis of the 
domain attributes in Web access logs no longer provides accurate 
information on the origin of the users and thus of the geographical 
'reach' of a given site. This study provides an alternative method to 
assess the geographical 'reach' by calculating the average demand for 
Web pages in hourly intervals originating from each time zone. The 
resulting analysis tool, which relates to Greenwich Mean Time, is 
location independent and can be applied to Web sites world wide.

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Finding information on the World Wide Web: A specialty meta-search 
engine for the academic community
by Yaffa Aharoni, Ariel J. Frank, and Snunith Shoham
http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_12/aharoni/

Abstract:
The Web is continuing to grow rapidly and search engine technologies 
are evolving fast. Despite these developments, some problems still 
remain, mainly, difficulties in finding relevant, dependable 
information. This problem is exacerbated in the case of the academic 
community, which requires reliable scientific materials in various 
specialized research areas.

We propose that a solution for the academic community might be a 
meta-search engine which would allow search queries to be sent to 
several specialty search engines that are most relevant for the 
information needs of the academic community. The basic premise is 
that since the material indexed in the repositories of specialty 
search engines is usually controlled, it is more reliable and of 
better quality.

A database selection algorithm for a specialty meta-search engine was 
developed, taking into consideration search patterns of the academic 
community, features of specialty search engines and the dynamic 
nature of the Web.

This algorithm was implemented in a prototype of a specialty 
meta-search engine for the medical community called AcadeME. 
AcadeME's performance was compared to that of a general search engine 
- represented by Google, a highly regarded and widely used search 
engine - and to that of a single specialty search engine - 
represented by the medical Queryserver. From the comparison to Google 
it was found that AcadeME contributed to the quality of the results 
from the point of view of the academic user. From the comparison to 
the medical Queryserver it was found that AcadeMe contributed to 
relevancy and to the variety of the results as well.

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 From Eleanor Rigby to Nannanet: The greying of the World Wide Web
by Tara Brabazon
http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_12/brabazon/

Abstract:
The proportion and number of wired seniors is small. A grey gap 
punctuates in the digital divide. The World Wide Web is not a panacea 
or salve for the isolation and ageism that confronts senior citizens. 
Yet a proactive and political desire to wire those who are living, 
dancing, talking and thinking in God's Waiting Rooms around the world 
provide one more safety net and social safeguard to collectivize the 
dispersed and dispossessed. This article uses quantitative and 
qualitative studies to investigate how and why older populations 
dis/connect from the digital environment. Commencing with 
international surveys monitoring Web users, the study then drills 
down to regions with a high proportion of older residents, exploring 
if and then how seniors use the World Wide Web.

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Web of lies? Historical knowledge on the Internet
by Daniel J. Cohen and Roy Rosenzweig
http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_12/cohen/

Abstract:
Scholars in history (as well as other fields in the humanities) have 
generally taken a dim view of the state of knowledge on the Web, 
pointing to the many inaccuracies on Web pages written by amateurs. A 
new software agent called H-Bot scans the Web for historical facts, 
and shows how the Web may indeed include many such inaccuracies - 
while at the same time being extremely accurate when assessed as a 
whole through statistical means that are alien to the discipline of 
history. These mathematical methods and other algorithms drawn from 
the computational sciences also suggest new techniques for historical 
research and new approaches to teaching history in an age in which an 
increasingly significant portion of the past has been digitized.

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Agenda-setting, opinion leadership, and the world of Web logs
by Aaron Delwiche
http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_12/delwiche/

Abstract:
More than 350 studies have explored the agenda-setting hypothesis, 
but most of this research assumes a clear distinction between 
reporters and their readers. Web logs erode this distinction, 
facilitating participatory media behavior on the part of audiences 
(Blood, 2003). The activities of journalistically focused Web log 
authors give us new ways to understand and measure the agenda-setting 
process. While previous researchers have explored issue salience by 
focusing on audience recall and public opinion, Web logs invite us to 
consider hyperlinks as behavioral indicators of an issue's perceived 
importance. This paper tracks news stories most often linked to by 
Web log authors in 2003, comparing the results to stories favored by 
traditional media. Arguing that Web log authors construct an 
alternative agenda within the admittedly limited realm of the 
blogosphere, I note that their focus has shifted from technology to 
broader political issues. My findings support Chaffee and Metzger's 
(2001) prediction that "the key problem for agenda-setting theory 
will change from what issues the media tell people to think about to 
what issues people tell the media they want to think about."

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The use of the Internet to activate latent ties in scholarly communities
by Paul Genoni, Helen Merrick, and Michele Willson
http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_12/genoni/

Abstract:
This paper presents the results of a survey on the use of the 
Internet by university-based scholars to contact unknown peers. These 
contacts are considered as examples of the activation of "latent 
ties" which are said to exist within communities with associated 
interests. The research indicates that the Internet facilitates the 
activation of these ties and that the degree to which it is used for 
this purpose is associated with academic rank.

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Academic home pages: Reconstruction of the self
by Lesley Thoms and Mike Thelwall
http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_12/thoms/

Abstract:
Previous literature within the postmodern movement typically finds 
the Internet to be a tool for surveillance and restriction. This is 
particularly identified in the personal homepages of academics, where 
the university is considered to marginalise staff through the 
coercive governing of their identity construction. Using a 
Foucauldian framework in which to analyse twenty academic homepages, 
this study looks specifically at identity construction on the 
Internet via the differences of link inclusion between academics 
whose homepages have been university-constructed and those whose 
homepages have been self-constructed, both dependent and independent 
of the university site. A Foucauldian discourse analysis identifies 
the marginalisation of academics in all conditions, wherein 
discursive positions were typically those of disempowerment. A 
typology of homepages and hence identities of academics is proposed 
based on the Web sites examined, concluding that whether the homepage 
is constructed by the academic or by the university, the identities 
of the individual are ultimately lost to the governmentality of the 
university.

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 From libraries to 'libratories'
by Leo Waaijers
http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_12/waaijers/

Abstract:
While the eighties of the last century were a time of local 
automation for libraries and the nineties the decade in which 
libraries embraced the Internet and the Web, now is the age in which 
the big search engines and institutional repositories are gaining a 
firm footing. This heralds a new era in both the evolution of 
scholarly communication and its agencies themselves, i.e. the 
libraries.

Until now libraries and publishers have developed a digital variant 
of existing processes and products,i.e. catalogues posted on the Web, 
scanned copies of articles, e-mail notification about acquisitions or 
expired lending periods, or traditional journals in a digital jacket. 
However, the new OAI repositories and services based upon them have 
given rise to entirely new processes and products, libraries 
transforming themselves into partners in setting up virtual learning 
environments, building an institution's digital showcase, maintaining 
academics' personal Web sites, designing refereed portals and - 
further into the future - taking part in organising virtual research 
environments or collaboratories. Libraries are set to metamorphose 
into 'libratories', an imaginary word to express their combined 
functions of library, repository and collaboratory. In such 
environments scholarly communication will be liberated from its 
current copyright bridle while its coverage will be both broader - 
including primary data, audiovisuals and dynamic models - and deeper, 
with cross-disciplinary analyses of methodologies and applications of 
instruments. Universities will make it compulsory to store in their 
institutional repositories the results of research conducted within 
their walls for purposes of academic reporting, review committees, 
and other modes of clarification and explanation. Big search engines 
will provide access to this profusion of information and organise its 
mass customization.

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Book reviews
http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_12/reviews/

Books reviewed:
Kathy Bowrey.
Law & Internet Cultures.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
Reviewed by Matthew Rimmer.

Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner.
Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything.
New York: William Morrow, 2005.
Reviewed by Greg Stinson.

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