[Sigia-l] i-Conference 2005

[Steven L. MacCall]

Peter:

An immediate answer to your question ("...but what is this i-field about?")
can be gleaned from your own CHI2003 trip report, which I scanned on your
web site. In that report, you comment favorably on the Flamenco Image
Browser, a faceted approach to browsing large-scale collections of images.
Flamenco is a project of faculty members at one of the founding "i-schools"
... the School of Information Management (SIMS) at Berkeley. Predictably,
the "snoozefest" contributed paper session that you discovered the Flamenco
Project was on the general theme of "Searching and Organizing."

This leads to a longer answer, which I can only touch on briefly. Faceted
classification was initially devised by the Indian mathematician turned
librarian/theoretician S.R. Ranganathan
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S._R._Ranganathan). It just so happens that
SIMS at Berkeley was one of the first library schools to renounce its ALA
accreditation and move toward an independent existence as a school that was
unencumbered by MLIS accreditation requirements (this happened in the
1990's). However, many SIMS researchers retain important roots in library
theory and are now extending many of these principles to the Web IR space.
Most of the rest of the "i-schools" have in various ways, shapes, and forms,
either totally, partially, or minimally "moved on" from being library
schools to being "information schools." (I say "minimally," because many of
the schools on the list have retained their ALA accreditation and have
either MLIS or MLIS-like degrees that are ALA accredited). One last note,
some of the i-schools in the list on their web site has never had an
ALA-accredited MLIS degree program. 

In short, the i-school field is partially rooted in librarianship.

Hope this helps...

slm

-----Original Message-----
From: sigia-l-bounces at asis.org [mailto:sigia-l-bounces at asis.org] On Behalf
Of Peter Boersma
Sent: Saturday, July 30, 2005 2:50 PM
To: sigia-l at asis.org
Subject: Re: [Sigia-l] i-Conference 2005

Peter Morville wrote:
>
> I just noticed an announcement for the first i-conference of the
> i-school community:

Oh, dear...from the Conference Overview
(http://iconference.ist.psu.edu/content/view/26/41/):

"The most vibrant research and curricular scholarship in the information
community represent showcases of multi- and interdisciplinary perspectives
on information technologies and the contexts in which they reside [but
there's absolutely no guarantee that this "most vibrant research" will be
part of the conference, PB]. Indeed, as a field [sorry, what field? PB], we
engage our research and education efforts around the creation,
implementation, and impact of IT by drawing from multiple theories, methods,
disciplines, and perspectives. By embracing this philosophy [what philosophy
was that again?] and being able to leverage the power of this synergistic
approach, we are able to both articulate and engage the grand challenges
that envelop  [Bingo!(*)] our increasingly digital, global society."

Maybe I am missing something, but what is this i-field about?

Peter
(*) http://www.perkigoth.com/home/kermit/stuff/bullshitbingo/
-- 
Peter Boersma | Consultant User Experience | www.UserIntelligence.com
Vlaardingenlaan 9 | 1059 GL | Amsterdam | The Netherlands
p:+31(0)204084296 | f:+31(0)204084298 | m:+31(0)615072747
mailto:peter at peterboersma.com | http://www.peterboersma.com/blog/


------------
When replying, please *trim your post* as much as possible.
*Plain text, please; NO Attachments

Searchable Archive at http://www.info-arch.org/lists/sigia-l/

IA 06 Summit.  Mark your calendar.  March 23-27, Vancouver, BC


________________________________________
Sigia-l mailing list -- post to: Sigia-l at asis.org
Changes to subscription: http://mail.asis.org/mailman/listinfo/sigia-l