[Air-L] Google to Sponsor JITP 2010: The Politics of Open Source - Call for Papers - Full paper submissions are due January 10, 2010

[Stuart Shulman]

JITP 2010: The Politics of Open Source
A two-day University of Massachusetts Amherst conference jointly sponsored
by:

Google
Department of Political Science
Science, Technology, and Society Initiative (STS)
Journal of Information Technology & Politics (JITP)
Qualitative Data Analysis Program (QDAP)
National Center for Digital Government (NCDG)

KEYNOTE & DISTINGUISHED SPEAKERS
Eric von Hippel is Professor and Head of the Innovation and Entrepreneurship
Group at the Sloan School of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology and Fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at
Harvard Law School.  He specializes in research related to the nature and
economics of distributed and open innovation. He also develops and teaches
about practical methods that firms can use to improve their product and
service development processes. He is the author of Democratizing Innovation
(MIT Press, 2005) and The Sources of Innovation (Oxford, 1988).

Clay Johnson is Director of Sunlight Labs. Prior joining Sunlight, Clay was
one of the four founders of Blue State Digital, the progressive left's
premier technology and online strategy firm. This firm, which was born out
of the Howard Dean campaign, was also responsible for Barack Obama's Web
presence. At Blue State Digital, Clay was responsible for developing the
organization's brand and building its initial client roster. He also had a
hand at building some of the company's early technical tools. Before joining
Blue State, Johnson was the lead programmer for Dean for America in 2004,
overseeing the development of grassroots tools like GetLocal, DeanLink and
Project Commons. Prior to entering politics, Johnson was a technologist at
Ask Jeeves (now Ask.com) where he helped to develop the company's Web
syndication product. He also started the first Internet Knowledge Exchange,
KnowPost.com, and worked as an entrepreneur-in-residence at a Venture
Capital firm, but still claims that he learned the most from his first job
-- as a waiter at Waffle House in Atlanta, Georgia.

Christopher M. Kelty is an associate professor at the University of
California, Los Angeles. He has a joint appointment in the Center for
Society and Genetics and in the department of Information Studies. His
research focuses on the cultural significance of information technology,
especially in science and engineering. He is the author most recently of Two
Bits: The Cultural Significance of Free Software (Duke University Press,
2008), as well as numerous articles on open source and free software,
including its impact on education, nanotechnology, the life sciences, and
issues of peer review and research process in the sciences and in the
humanities.

APPROACH
Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FOSS) has made significant advances,
both technically and organizationally, since its emergence in the mid-1980s.
Over the last decade, it has moved from a software development approach
involving mostly volunteers to a more complex ecology where firms, nonprofit
organizations, government agencies and volunteers may be involved. Moreover,
the production paradigm continues to expand to other areas of digital
content (e.g., Creative Commons, Wikipedia, Connexions, etc.). In this
conference we use the phrase “open source” to capture this broader
phenomenon. The Program Committee encourages disciplinary and
interdisciplinary approaches to the study of open source, broadly defined.

"Politics" in the conference title, can have many interpretations. Political
issues closely tied to the free and open source software movement(s)
include: national government policies related to the adoption of open source
technologies or questions related to interoperability and open standards,
software patents, vendor lock-in, and copyright. These are central themes we
expect may be discussed in this forum. In this context, we welcome
international submissions since differences in the political perspective
appear in international contexts. However, topics related to how the concept
of openness has led to various interpretations, adaptations, and
applications of “open source” in other domains, and political issues that
surround these broader innovations, are also welcome. Specific topics might
include, but are not limited to:

General topics related to the politics of open source

•    How open source software or its principles are changing politics
•    Emerging transparencies in software, systems and society
•    Open source in the developing world and other international contexts
•    The political economy of open source
•    Digital divides and open source

Open source and the public sector

•    Open source software and transparency in government
•    Government policies toward open source and open standards
•    Regulation and open source

Open source and democracy

•    Open source and democratic engagement
•    Open source voting systems
•    Activism, political mobilization and open source

The expansion of open source into other domains

•    Understanding how open source collaboration works and how it can be
extended into other areas of collective action
•    Policy areas, such as the effects of free textbooks on education policy
or the politics of "One Laptop Per Child"
•    The political implications of open source in other cultural domains

PAPER SUBMISSIONS
Authors are invited to prepare and submit to JITP a manuscript following one
of the six submission formats by January 10, 2010. These formats include
research papers, policy viewpoints, workbench notes, review essays, book
reviews, and papers on teaching innovation. Proposals for full panel
presentations will also be accepted. The goal is to produce a special issue,
or double issue, of JITP with a wide variety of approaches to the broad
theme of "The Politics of Open Source."

Everything you need to know about how to prepare and submit a strong JITP
paper is documented at http://www.jitp.net/. Papers will be put through an
expedited blind peer review process by the Program Committee, and authors
will be notified about a decision by March 10, 2010. A small number of
papers will be accepted for presentation at the conference. Other paper
authors will be invited to present a poster during the Friday evening
reception. All posters must include a "YouTube" version of their research
findings.

BEST PAPER AND POSTER CASH PRIZES
The author (or authors) of the best research paper will receive a single
$1,000 prize. The creator (or creators) of the best poster/research
presentation will also receive a single prize of $1,000.

PROGRAM COMMITTEE
Ezendu Ariwa, London Metropolitan University
M.V. Lee Badgett, University of Massachusetts Amherst
Paul M.A. Baker, Georgia Institute of Technology
Deborah Bryant, Oregon State University Open Source Lab
Andrea Calderaro, European University Institute
Mark Cassell, Kent State University
Edward Cherlin, Earth Treasury
Gabriella Coleman, New York University
Doug Downham, University of Massachusetts Amherst
Robert English, Daystar Computing & University of Massachusetts Amherst
Joseph Feller, University College Cork
Jelena Karanovic, Rutgers University
Dave Karpf, University of Pennsylvania/Miller Center for Public Affairs
Andrea Kavanaugh, Virginia Tech
Jose Marichal, California Lutheran University
Jens Hardings Perl, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile
Charlie Schweik, University of Massachusetts Amherst, co-chair
Stuart Shulman, University of Massachusetts Amherst, co-chair
Megan Squire, Elon University
Krishna Ravi Srinivas, Research Information System For Developing Nations
Louis Suarez-Potts, Sun Microsystems, Inc. & OpenOffice.org
Anas Tawileh, Cardiff University & Meedan.net