Tags: gradschool

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Focus

| ibm, research

My research manager told me that I've been conditionally approved for
VPN access, which would allow me to access IBM resources without
having to go all the way up to Markham (1-1.5 hour commute one way).
This access will be revoked if they feel that I'm getting distracted
by all the cool things I can do within IBM, such as organizing CASCON
2006. They asked me to promise to use the VPN only for things that are
directly related to my work.

Sounds good to me. =) In fact, it sounds like exactly what I need. For
the next few weeks—months, even—I'll be in heads-down single-tasking
mode when it comes to IBM. I'll keep a research plan somewhere
(possibly a password-protected page on this wiki) and post regular
updates on my internal blog, and at all times my research managers
will know what my next action is and what I'm waiting for.

I might need to give up a few things as part of scaling back my
involvement in IBM. I have a lot of opportunities to help define IBM
2.0 and move it forward, but the IBM Center for Advanced Studies pays
for my graduate studies, and so they have dibs on my IBM mindshare. I
can think of my research as almost a contract. If they're happy with
my proposal, then I can scope it, schedule it, do it, and be done.

I'm not too worried about missing out on opportunities. Evangelizing
social software within IBM, supporting networking at CASCON, improving
the experience of social computing: these all point to goals that I
can achieve through other means at other times. When I'm ready to take
advantage of these opportunities again, they'll reappear.

In the meantime, focusing on my work and treating it as a
time-sensitive contract allows me to separate it and free up
brainspace for a few other things I'd like to do, like writing and
establishing an external reputation. This is better for me in the long
run, too. That way, I finish my graduate studies ready to take on
problems at different scales: from 300k-person enterprises to smaller
gigs.

A minor downside is that I won't be able to claim a living allowance:
it certainly adds up, particularly if you think about compounded
interest over a long period of time. If I manage my time wisely,
though, I might be able to make it worth it in the long run. For
example, if I can convert three hours of sleepy commuting or relaxed
RSS reading into three hours of focused writing time each day, that
can lead to a lot of opportunities in the future. Getting rid of time
constraints can also mean that I'll eat better (hello, breakfast!) and
cheaper (hello, kitchen!). The opportunity to schedule coffee breaks
with people here will also help me plug further into the local tech
scene. I'm trading money for flexibility, and I think I can make it
worth it.

As for IBM networking: I can do that through the Greater IBM
initiative. They're externally hosted, so I don't need to use the VPN
for that. What about the internal networking, the real-time
collaboration I enjoyed and occasionally found useful? I'll just have
to trust that people have a good enough sense of what I'm interested
in and that I'm discoverable by people who might be interested in my
research. Personal referrals will probably do the trick.

What might I miss out on? The IBM CAS experience, I suppose: chalk
talks, lunches with random people, cups and cups of hot chocolate… I
won't be one of their face-to-face Connectors, but that's okay;
someone else can take that role. Most of the people I connect with are
scattered around the world, so VPN won't make much of a difference. I
can promise not to initiate conversations that aren't directly related
to my research, and try to minimize unrelated conversations initiated
by others.

VPN access might also include the expectation of greater availability,
the way many people assume that cellphones make other people always
reachable. To help assure my research manager that I won't get too
distracted, I'll check my e-mail once a day and I'll resist the
temptation to do anything unless I can explicity justify it.
Sure, it's less value than I can provide IBM as a whole, but it
protects the value I offer to CAS.

I could very well do most of my work downtown even now, although I'd
still like VPN so that I can share my progress internally. I don't
think I'm allowed to blog even my research proposal externally, so
unfortunately I'll have to stay dark about it here. I'll try to write
about other things I'm learning, though. If I omit IBM-specific
information, I might be able to stay out of trouble. =)

My personal blog is my call, and as long as I follow my proposal and
submit my deliverables, things should be good. I should be able to
blog about cooking or tango or DemoCamp without my developer
sponsor freaking out. =)

Sounds like a plan.

Call for participation: 2006 International Symposium on Wikis

| conference, research

This is totally, totally, totally sweet. I _must_ get into this.
Personal information management with wikis?

CALL FOR PARTICIPATION

2006 International Symposium on Wikis (WikiSym 2006)

August 21-23, 2006, Odense, Denmark
Co-located with ACM Hypertext 2006
Sponsored by ACM SIGWEB

See http://www.wikisym.org/ws2006

Research paper submission deadline: April 15, 2006



OVERVIEW

The 2006 International Symposium on Wikis brings
together wiki researchers, practitioners, and
users. The goal of the symposium is to explore
and extend our growing community. The symposium
has a rigorously reviewed research paper track as
well as plenty of space for practitioner reports,
demonstrations, and discussions. Anyone who is
involved in using, researching, or developing
wikis is invited to WikiSym 2006! To learn more
about the Wiki Symposium, feel free to browse
last year's program
(http://www.wikisym.org/ws2005/program.html), the
proceedings
(http://www.wikisym.org/ws2005/proceedings), and
its wiki (http://ws2005.wikisym.org). Information
about the 2006 program will be available at
http://www.wikisym.org/ws2006.

We are seeking submissions for

 - research papers
 - practitioner reports
 - demonstrations
 - workshops
 - panels

Research paper and practitioner report
submissions as well as workshop proposals are due

 - April 15, 2006

Panel and demonstration submissions are due

 - May 1, 2006

Topics of interest to the symposium include, but are not limited to:

 - wikis as social software
 - wiki user behavior, user dynamics
 - wiki user experiences, usability
 - information dynamics in wikis
 - work group processes, wiki-based collaboration
 - reputation systems, quality assurance processes
 - wiki implementation experiences and technology
 - wiki administration, processes, dealing with abuse
 - wiki scalability, social and technical
 - wikis and the semantic web/ontologies, semantic wikis
 - domain-specific/special-purpose wikis
 - wikis in education



SUBMISSION DETAILS

Research papers will be reviewed by the committee
to meet rigorous academic standards of
publication. Research papers are expected to
advance the state of the art by describing
substantiated new research or novel technical
results or by reporting on significant experience
or experimentation. They are reviewed both with
respect to conceptual quality and clarity of presentation.

Accepted research papers will be provided as part
of the conference proceedings. They will be put
into the ACM Digital Library and can be
referenced as papers that appeared in the
Proceedings of the 2006 International Symposium
on Wikis. At the symposium, the presenter will be
given a 25min + 5min Q&A presentation slot.
Research papers should not be longer than 10000
words and 20 pages and should meet the ACM SIG
Proceedings Format, see
http://www.acm.org/sigs/pubs/proceed/template.html.

Practitioner reports will be reviewed for
suitability of presentation to the community. The
primary evaluation criterion is the interest to
the community. Practitioner reports will be
provided as part of the conference proceedings
handed out at the symposium and can be referenced
as papers that appeared in the Proceedings of the
2006 International Symposium on Wikis as well.
Practitioner reports should not be longer than
6000 words and 12 pages and should meet the ACM SIG
Proceedings Format.

Demonstration, workshop, and panel submissions
will be reviewed for their interest to the
community. A submission should consist of two
pages describing what you intend to do and how
you meet this criterion. It should include a
100-word abstract and one-paragraph bios of all
people relevant to the submission. Demonstrations
will be presented in a joint demonstration
session, workshops will get a half-day or a
full-day and a room of their own (depending on
your request), and panels will get a 90min slot at the symposium.

Please submit your papers or proposals in PDF
format by the respective deadline through our
submission system, which will be available
through the WikiSym website. Questions should be
directed respectively at papers@wikisym.org
(research papers and practitioner reports),
workshops@wikisym.org (workshops),
panels@wikisym.org (panels), or demos@wikisym.org (demonstrations).



SYMPOSIUM LOGISTICS

The 2006 International Symposium on Wikis will be
held at the Radisson SAS H.C. Andersen Hotel in
Odense, Denmark, August 21-23, 2006. A special
(reduced) hotel rate has been negotiated. WikiSym
2006 will be co-located with the ACM Hypertext
2006 conference (back-to-back), and participants
may register for the symposium alone, or may
jointly register for WikiSym and Hypertext 2006.
Registration is handled through the ACM Hypertext website.

If you have any questions, please contact Dirk
Riehle through chair@wikisym.org.



SYMPOSIUM COMMITTEE

Dirk Riehle, Bayave Software GmbH, Germany (Symposium Chair)

Ward Cunningham, Eclipse Foundation, U.S.A.
Kouichirou Eto, AIST, Japan (Publicity Co-Chair)
Richard P. Gabriel, Sun Microsystems, U.S.A.
Beat Doebeli Honegger, UAS Northwestern Switzerland (Workshop
Chair) Matthias L. Jugel, Fraunhofer FIRST, Germany (Panel
Chair) Samuel J. Klein, Harvard University, U.S.A. Helmut
Leitner, HLS Software, Austria (Publicity Co-Chair) James
Noble, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand
(Program Chair) Sebastien Paquet, Socialtext, U.S.A.
(Demonstrations Chair) Sunir Shah, University of Toronto,
Canada (Publicity Co-Chair)



PROGRAM COMMITTEE

James Noble, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand
(Program Chair)

Ademar Aguiar, Universidade do Porto, Portugal
Robert Biddle, Carleton University, Canada
Amy Bruckman, Georgia Institute of Technology, U.S.A.
Alain Désilet, NRC, CNRC, Canada
Ann Majchrzak, University of Southern California, U.S.A.
Frank Fuchs-Kittowski, Fraunhofer ISST, Germany
Mark Guzdial, Georgia Institute of Technology, U.S.A.
Dirk Riehle, Bayave Software GmbH, Germany
Robert Tolksdorf, Freie Universität Berlin, Germany

E-Mail from Mark Chignell

Teaching assistant for Praxis II! =)

| teaching

Whee! I was offered the Praxis II teaching assistantship!
It was just _perfect_ for my interests. I'll get to set up wikis, blogs, and other fun things to help the students manage and publish their thoughts. Whee!

Interesting clubs

Won't join all of them, but these look interesting

Research

Business

Outreach

Misc

You know you're done packing when…

Posted: - Modified: | canada

… you're sick and tired of figuring out better space usage and
decide that a few cubic inches of wasted space is not going to kill
you.

GOT MY VISA! Despedida details

| canada, party

The Canadian Embassy approved my student visa! I'm really going to go
to Canada on July 15, 2005! Yay!

I'll be holding my despedida and advanced birthday party on July 9,
2005 (Saturday). Sorry about the short notice, but it was so hard to
plan anything not knowing if I'd actually be leaving.

Sacha's 22nd birthday party and 2nd despedida

Date July 9, 2005
Time 1 – 5 PM, program starts at 3
Place See map below, or go to my house first for directions
Attire Casual. Geeky, if you can manage it

http://www.adphoto.com.ph/uploads/Main/map.gif

Don't bring gifts. My baggage allowance is too small. ;) I would,
however, really really appreciate it if you could write me a letter
telling me what you've been up to this last year (or last N years,
depending on when we last talked). We're also going to talk about our
plans for the next two years, so spend some time thinking about your
two-year plan (what you want to do) and be prepared to share it with
everyone in a speech of maybe a minute or two.

Come and hang out. I want to know what you're interested in, and I
want you to get to meet other people I know just in case you find that
you've got similar interests and goals.

Light snacks will be served.

This is pretty much an open party, so if you know people who know me
and don't mind talking about their goals and giving advice or whatever
for about a minute or two, drag them along. =)

COME!

I can move in after office hours

Yay! I don't have to worry about not being able to make it to office
hours! I can move into the Graduate House in the evening!

That's a relief. Now I just need to get that darn visa and sort the
rest of the stuff out…

E-Mail from Tara Bunting