An interesting story I found about blogging in Iran amidst the upcoming parliamentary elections. Check out the links to the blogs at the bottom of the article
Here's an excerpt:
Initially created to defy the nation's tight control on media, these Web journals have turned into a cyber-sanctuary — part salon, part therapist's couch — for the vast pool of educated, young and computer-savvy Iranians.
As Friday's parliamentary elections approach, however, there's a distinct tone of worry that conservatives expected to regain control of parliament would step up pressure to censor the Internet.
"It will be the end of the blog era in Iran," said a Tehran-based blogger who operates pinkfloydish.com, the name indicative of her love of Western music.
But thus far, the Internet has managed to avoid the hard-liners' choke hold on media, which has silenced dozens of pro-reform newspapers and publications since the late 1990s.
Mynatt, O'Day, Adler, Ito
This 1998 paper discusses the genre of 'network communities' which are described as "...robust and persistent communities based on a sense of locality that spans both the virtual and physical worlds of their users." The authors' discussion is based on diverse experience and insight gained from the prolonged use of four systems: the Pueblo MUD; the Jupiter hybrid MUD/media space; the PARC/EuroPARC analog media space; and the Georgia Tech digital media space.
The title is word-play which alludes to a prevalent sub-text running throughout the paper that network communities are an amalgam of old, new and borrowed aspects of culture and techology.
The methodologies employed include participation, use, and ethnographic techniques. The analytic perspective is grounded in practice and the familiar tenets of participatory design and action research.
Among the important concepts utilized are affordance, persistence, periodicity, boundaries, engagement, and authoring. The imagined design space is concerned with the relationship between the 'real' and the 'virtual'; the rhythms or temporal patterns of use; and the evolution of technology and social practice in response to and in anticipation of participation in a network community.
Anticipating the conversation on network communities.
From the website: "Who are we? We're local citizens, business persons, educators, school children, senior citizens, and volunteers. It's the diversity of our villagers that make the BEV an exciting place to be!" and "As an outreach project of Virginia Tech, the Blacksburg Electronic Village serves the local community....For more information about starting a community network, telecommunications infrastructure planning and to develop 21st economic development initiatives, visit the BEV Digital Library to download papers and reports."