Online Deliberation 2005

Democracy online

Will online forums help foster an informed citizenry, ready to participate in the democratic process? The world’s experts in deliberative democracy and human-computer interaction came together this past spring at Stanford University (CA) to discuss how technology can change the way people interact and, ultimately, make collective decisions. In an opening plenary panel session, Carnegie Mellon University (PA) ethicist and philosophy professor Robert Cavalier described PICOLA, a Public Informed Citizens Online Assembly that uses software developed at CMU. His project’s goal is to create a high-telepresence environment for online deliberation into which the user is easily immersed in the virtual world.

The ‘crucible’ of deliberation

New York Law School professor Beth Simone Noveck examined the nature of deliberation and the role of technology. “We are witnessing the emerging phenomenon of decentralized groups that are able to take action using the new tools that are available to them. If only we can better figure out how to make the shift from the ‘interface’ to the ‘deliberative interface.’”

Augmenting intellect

Special guest lecturer Douglas Engelbart (best known as the inventor of the computer mouse) elaborated on his talk, “Bootstrapping: Accelerating the Evolution of Collective IQ,” during an informal evening discussion group. “Humans’ capabilities depend upon their augmentation system,” explained the humancomputer interaction pioneer.

DIAC-2005 INBOX 2005—The E-Mail Event

Thinking inside the box

Industry groups are working hard to make e-mail technology straightforward for campus users. At this summer’s INBOX in San Jose, industry leaders met to discuss anti-phishing, compliance, best practices, mobile apps, and more. Sessions like this Executive Roundtable included top leadership from companies like CipherTrust (www.ciphertrust.com), Cloudmark , Iron- Port , MailFrontier , and Sendmail .

Higher education on the list

After a high-level plenary discussion with industry leaders, CipherTrust CTO Paul Judge stopped to tell CT: “There is still a lack of fundamental knowledge about the e-mail ecosystem and how e-mails move around the Internet. In academia, there has been lots of work looking at Web or DNS traffic. But there is a huge opportunity for research around e-mail…room not only for new research, but for partnerships between universities and companies, to have data and information-sharing relationships—to create new research and employment opportunities for students.”

An exchange about e-mail

Companies dealing with spam filtering and other e-mail administration issues lined the aisles of the INBOX exhibit floor. Most of the companies serve higher education as well as corporate customers—especially service providers like AppRiver (www.appriver.com), whose reps told Campus Technology that they feel their higher ed customers are responding well to their hosted antispam service model.