Tweeting,re-tweeting,and commenting: microblogging and social movements in China

With increased research attention being paid to the relationship between information and communication technologies (ICTs) and social movements during the Arab Spring, the role of new and social media in promoting social movements in China is examined in depth. Focusing on the most popular social media platform in China, Weibo, this research includes a review of new scholarship about ICTs and social movements, analysis of Chinese grassroots social movements organized via Weibo, and the limitations of these social movements. The guiding question here is how individual Chinese citizens strategically used Weibo to facilitate social movements.     

Rewiring the DMCA’s history: 20th-century new media and the expanding imaginary for infringement

This article analyzes the Digital Millennium Copyright Act as a refinement of governmental techniques developed for technologies such as piano rolls, reprography, DAT, and VCRs. The technological history recontextualizes legal transitions in copyrights during the 20th century and builds on poststructuralist work on law, technology, and government. Building on Kittler’s understanding of symbolic/technical media and storage/processing, I develop a framework for disentangling the relationship among copyright, DRM, and media technologies. The case studies indicate ICTs are vectors for extending copyright into previously unimagined territories. I argue cultural practices become problematized as they are remediated in new technologies. The evidence suggests the shift from governing storage to processing corresponds to broader rearrangements in power, binding our rituals and means of perception ever more tightly to articulations of industry and state.     

Technology in government: How organizational culture mediates information and communication technology outcomes

The adoption of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in public organizations promises to better connect managers with citizens, increase public participation in government decision making, improve the efficiency of service delivery, decrease uncertainty, and improve information dissemination. While each of these outcomes is important for both public managers and citizens, we know little about how organizational culture mediates the effectiveness of ICTs on producing these outcomes. This research, using data from two points in time, investigates the relationships between ICTs and managerial outcomes (e.g. improved decision making and public participation) and how they are mediated by organizational culture such as centralization and routineness. Technology variables include technology use and capacity. Models will control for other organizational and technological factors such as size, structure, task and department to investigate the mediating effects of organizational culture on ICT outcomes for local governments. The data come from two national surveys of 2500 local government managers in the United States in 2010 and 2012. The results are important for understanding how organizational mechanisms, in particular organization culture, mobilize ICTs in ways that affect managerial outcomes.     

Identity and Technology: Organizational Control of Knowledge-Intensive Work

Much has been written about the functioning of managerial ideologies in identity-based organizational control. However, less attention has been given to the role of information and communication technologies (ICTs) and identity defined by a technological discourse in regulating knowledge-intensive work. The purpose of this research is to examine the roles of identity and ICTs in the control of knowledge-intensive work. A case study of a technology service organization reveals that the construction and consumption of a technologist identity operate as organizational control, and that ICTs enable the functioning of a dialectic of technological control. This study also demonstrates the paradoxical nature of work knowledge that both empowers and controls knowledge-workers.     

Gatekeeping in a Digital Era

The original concept of gatekeeping within journalism was based on a particular research method, a particular sub-profession within the news media, and a particular—now extinct—technological platform. This article describes and discusses what has happened to the function of gatekeeping as new technologies have developed, and it suggests that three models of gatekeeping are present in the digital era. The first model is based on a process of information, the second model is based on a process of communication, and the third and last model is based on a process of elimination, where the function of gatekeeping is taken over by people outside the newsrooms. All three models have been part of the history of journalism from the very beginning, but their importance for news reporters and the news media have changed with the invention of new technological means, methods and tools. This reassessment of the principles, practices and new technological platforms for gatekeeping concludes by discussing the ways in which our models of journalism can affect not only researchers but also news reporters and audiences.     

The use of information and communication technologies in public libraries in South Africa as tools for bridging the digital divide: the case of the Kempton Park public library

ABSTRACT

The information and knowledge society has resulted in the exponential growth of information and communication technologies (ICTs), thus creating a gap between those who use ICTs and those who do not; hence the emergence of the term “digital divide” in the 1990s. One of the milestones of South Africa’s National Development Plan, a policy that charts the country’s development up until 2030, is to ensure that high-speed broadband internet is universally available at competitive prices. Notwithstanding the importance of ICTs in public libraries, the provision of such is still taking place on a limited scale in South Africa. This article investigates the use of ICTs in public libraries in South Africa as a tool in bridging the digital divide. It also examines the inequalities in access and use and suggests ways in which ICTs may be used to reduce the digital divide. A qualitative research methodology was adopted. In order for public libraries to function as an important tool in bridging the digital divide, there is a need to standardize the provision of public library services with regard to the digital divide.     

文件的概念及其在数字环境中的演变:InterPARES观点

InterPARES是一个长达12年的致力于电子/数字文件研究的国际项目,其研究点之一的文件概念在这12年的研究中始终占据着一个主导和核心的地位。本文追溯该概念在快速变化的技术环境中的演变历史,并由此呈现由项目研究成果转化而来的概念深化及扩展。     

Cyber state capacity: A model of authoritarian durability,ICTs, and emerging media

In this article, I developed the theoretical concept of cyber state capacity (CSC). Advancing Gobel's (2013) theoretical model of information and communication technologies (ICTs) and authoritarian consolidation, I introduced the theoretical propositions of CSC, which help explain how governments use information and communication technological systems to maintain stability, development, and stay in power. Well established, durable regimes have implemented ICT infrastructures that rival advanced democracies, yet the wave of liberalization that was expected to occur has not. After lying out the theoretical concepts, I conducted a qualitative case illustration to analyze the state enhancing or weakening ICT environments in Egypt and Saudi Arabia in the years leading up to, and at the time of, the Arab Spring. Developed ICT systems can bolster government power through sophisticated surveillance and propaganda operations, as well as providing economic and entertainment benefits that may contribute to placating individuals' motivations for increased political concessions.     

基于社会网络的图书馆学术研究平台构建

当前的学术研究环境需要图书馆为科研机构提供一个新型信息服务平台以满足科研人员的需求。针对传统图书馆服务的局限,文章构建了基于社会网络架构的学术研究平台,整合科研人员、研究工具与图书馆资源及网络信息资源于一体,为科研人员个人、群体和学科领域提供不同层次的应用,延伸图书馆的服务空间和内容,以期提高图书馆信息服务能力。     

Convergence,connectivity, ephemeral and performed: new characteristics of digital photographs

The recent convergence of digital cameras into mobile phones with Internet connectivity has provided the opportunity for individuals and organisations to adopt new image-making practices. The widespread use of photo-sharing and social networking platforms for sharing, accessing and storing digital photographs is presenting scholars in the social sciences with new areas of research that address the nature of digital photography. By examining the technological, social and cultural factors involved in contemporary image-making practices, scholars are presenting new concepts regarding the characteristics of digital photographs that impact archival activities aimed at managing and preserving trustworthy digital records. This article identifies and discusses the key concepts emerging from social science research on digital photography that are most relevant to the archival field. Analysis of the findings of these studies suggests that new technologies and social practices are changing how people use digital photographs and their expectations of permanence. Therefore, archivists need to be engaged in interdisciplinary discussions regarding the evolution of photographic practices and emerging characteristics of digital photographs in order to anticipate the management and preservation activities required to protect contemporary visual records for future use.     

Implications of technological advances for access to the cultural heritage of selected countries in sub-Saharan Africa

Public records and archives constitute a valuable part of sub-Saharan Africa's (SSA) cultural heritage. However, technological advances threaten long-term access to public records and archives. The computer (and its associated technologies) is the major driving force behind the technological changes affecting access to information. The use of information technologies has led to the proliferation of digital information. There are significant challenges associated with ensuring access to digital materials into the future as compared with traditionally paper-based information. A recent survey of selected countries from SSA revealed that long-term access to records and archives is going to be hampered by lack of resources and plans for ensuring access to information resulting from the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs). The development of strategies for managing digital documents over time is key to accessing the cultural heritage of SSA by the present and future generations.     

Assessing e-government capacity to increase voter participation: Evidence from the U.S.

One of the great promises of e-democracy is the potential it holds for increasing citizen participation. Much of the research related to this topic has focused on inputs, identifying the tools and technologies of e-democracy, or factors associated with adoption and/or diffusion of these technologies across units of governments or public organizations. By contrast there has been less research examining how these inputs translate into outcomes, or impacts that e-democracy has on changes in civic behavior or citizen engagement. Our study helps fill this knowledge gap by examining the impact that a specific set of information communication technologies (ICTs) have on a common form of civic engagement: voting. This research creates and tests two unique measures, the online election information index (OEII) and the e-registration service index (ERSI) to examine the extent to which local governments offer online information and utilities that help to educate voters and promote turnout. The index is tested on a sample of 396 county governments in the US to examine the extent to which governments' use of voting ICTs impacts voter participation, while accounting for other institutional and demographic factors that are known to shape voter turnout. We find that voter turnout is indeed higher in communities where local governments offer more voting ICTs, and the availability of these online resources may be particularly influential in boosting turnout in places where state policies serve to constrain or limit turnout.     

ICT's impact on family solidarity and upward mobility in translocal China

Information communication technologies (ICTs) create new channels and repertoires for mediated communication among parents and their children in mobile locations, thus playing a special role in reinvigorating intergenerational family solidarity in contemporary translocal China. For China's rapid, uneven economic development since 1978, social mobility has been fast growing and many family members are separated into different locations for seeking upward mobility as reciprocal aspirations. Some cases of translocal Chinese, studying, working, and living apart from their elderly parents were studied to investigate ICT's impact on family solidarity within the new dynamics of more symbolic and symmetrical family obligations and interactions. Their demonstrations of redefined sociability and intergenerational relationships via connected presence provide a promising new direction for social support and knowledge exchanges in translocal China with a special attention to the multifacets of mobilities and localities in the lives of the contemporary Chinese. A new model of family solidarity is proposed by the proper use of ICTs as new channels for intergenerational communication to supplement but not to replace the traditional ways of ‘togetherness’ by face-to-face interaction among the elderly Chinese parents and their adult children in remote locations. And this is deployed to reinvigorate parent–child relationships of the ‘relational families’ characterized by ‘autonomy of the generations’ in a balance of individualism and collectivism for seeking upward mobility and social cohesion in order to partly solve the social pressure of aging population and rural–urban divide, especially under the special conditions of China's one-child policy and jumping scale of economic development.     

Empowering Development Through E-Governance: Creating Smart Communities In Small Island States

An attempt is made in this paper to gain an understanding of the current and potential impact of the new information and communication technologies (ICTs) on the Small Island Sates of the Caribbean, in particular those populations living in rural communities. The introduction briefly examines the impact of ICTs on society and calls for alternative channels for government to serve rural communities through the use of Multi-Community Access Centres (MCACs) or information kiosks available at libraries, police stations, tourist information centres and post offices, as an e-governance initiative in the creation of “smart communities” and as a grassroots effort. No analysis of ICTs on government's functions would be complete if we did not address the growing debate on the digital divide. In this paper a section is devoted to this and it summarily addresses the growing divide between the developed and the developing world and the potential of these islands to leap–frog barriers to information flows and access. The heart of the paper examines the impact of the Internet on small island economies and the growing use of the Internet in key sectors of each economy. Since this paper is about governments’ use of ICTs to transfer business transactions onto the Internet to service their populace, some discussion is undertaken and considers ways in which innovation has impacted on governments’ services and the early attempts by some Caribbean administrations to implement e-governance. E-Voices illustrates how certain government measures affect some vulnerable groups in society and ways in which they can broker power to participate in the process. Some key policy directions are proposed for Caribbean states and other developing countries to pursue.     

Exploring the Application of Information and Communication Technologies in the Acquisition of Information Resources in Three Academic Libraries in North-West Nigeria: Preliminary Findings

Abstract

Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) incursion has brought a lot of changes to libraries activities. ICTs are used to manage libraries more efficiently and in meeting customers’ demands more appropriately at the right time. Despite the contribution of ICTs to library and information work, many libraries are yet to adopt these technologies especially in the acquisitions of library materials. This study was carried out in three selected university libraries in North West Nigeria. The objectives of the study were to: determine the influence of performance expectancy on academic librarians’ intention to use ICT for acquisition; establish the influence of effort expectancy on academic librarians’ intention to use ICT for acquisition; find out the extent of social influence and facilitating conditions on academic librarians’ intention to use ICT for acquisition and lastly to proffer recommendations. This study adopted a positivistic approach and used a questionnaire administered to 224 librarians to collect data in the three selected libraries. The study is guided by the Unified Theory Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) developed by Venkatesh. Findings from the study reveals that academic librarians are supportive on the use of ICT in their work; ICTs are significantly important, trainings were organized mainly for librarians on general use of ICT not only on acquisition, but also on the general issues related to library activities; librarians also have the knowledge necessary to use ICT for acquisition in their libraries. The study recommends among others that the parent universities should increase the funding of their libraries with adequate supervision, so that such funds are well utilized for ICTs application; university libraries should continually sponsor their academic staff on modern computerized ways of using ICTs to source for materials and the acquisition of information resources in academic libraries should be given all the seriousness it deserves by enacting legislation to allocate a reasonable percentage of the university’s budget to it.     

Repertoires of collective action in an “IT City”: Urban civil society negotiations of offline and online spaces in Bangalore

This paper examines the ways in which two Internet-based civil society groups, Hasiru Usiru and Praja, negotiate online and offline spaces of collective action in Bangalore, India’s “IT City.” Based on ethnographic research, the study extends collective action theory through an examination of communicative interactions and experiences of urban civil society actors in a developing country. The paper highlight factors that impede and support collective actions, including attitudes toward the Internet as a tool for democratic engagement, ideological motivations, and perceptions of identity and membership, among others. Such a line of inquiry is significant in highlighting the possibilities of ICTs for collective action, while simultaneously avoiding the tendency to inflate and overestimate their capacity to produce social change.     

Trust,norms and networks in social media environmental mobilization: a social capital analysis of Under the Dome in China

After the Spring Festival of 2015, an environmental documentary called Under the Dome in which Chai Jing acted as a narrator has caused the public opinion to boom in social media in China. Why could a documentary released by internet attract so much attention and spark such a heated discussion? What are the factors that have influence on the information dissemination of social media environmental mobilization? This paper employed case study and semi-structure interviews to reveal these questions. It turned out that individual trust, group norms and information networks of the social capital played an important role in the social media environmental mobilization. The reason why Under the Dome became a hot issue was that it made full use of the social media users’ trust on the mobilizer, aroused the mobilized’s emotions and combined the network channels of social relationships.     

It's not just what you know but who you know: Social capital theory and academic library outreach

The concept of social capital and its contribution to success and well-being in a variety of settings has potential for academic library outreach. Research has found that those with extensive and varied networks of social relationships can benefit in myriad ways, including academic and professional achievement. A connection has also been found between lower levels of social capital and negative effects on individuals as well as communities generally. Academic libraries are strategically positioned to enhance the social capital of their users, effecting positive differences in engagement, retention, and success after graduation.     

NEW TECHNOLOGIES AND OLD-FASHIONED ECONOMICS:: Creating a Brave New World for U.S. Government Information Distribution and Use

New technologies, including the ability to distribute government information globally across the Internet, are creating a need for new ways to view the U.S. Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP). The changing needs and roles of government information’s five stakeholders: federal agencies, the Government Printing Office (GPO), the depository libraries, the commercial sector, and the American public will need to change drastically in reaction to improved technologies and to the pure economics of information dissemination. The concept of the FDLP network may have outlived its relevance. Experiments should begin to explore new ways to provide users with assistance in locating government information in a timely and economically feasible manner. Shoring up a program that has outlived its relevance in today’s world is not an option.     

The Structuration of Information and Communication Technologies and Work–Life Interrelationships: Shared Organizational and Family Rules and Resources and Implications for Work in a High-Technology Organization

Research is equivocal about whether, in the context of work–life interrelationships, newer information and communication technologies (ICTs) primarily increase individuals' control over work and mitigate work–life conflict or help organizations extend the work-day and their control over employees. Informed by social theory and empirical research that views employees and their families as dynamic shapers of technological practices, this study presents empirical evidence of these practices in relation to ICT-mediated work–life management. Using a structurationally informed technologies-in-practice perspective as a boundary spanning framework, the study approaches ICTs as emergent from the interconnected practices and values of employing organizations, employees, and their families. Five forms of recursive structuring are identified that describe ways in which technologically mediated work-at-home and home-at-work (re)produce and transform rules and resources from both home and work at both home and work. Implications for employing organizations, employees, and family members are discussed.