bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
FGF23-related hypophosphatemic rickets/osteomalacia: diagnosis and new treatment
Authors: Fukumoto Seiji
Published: December 2020

FGF23 is a phosphaturic hormone produced by bone. FGF23 reduces serum phosphate by suppressing proximal tubular phosphate reabsorption and intestinal phosphate absorption. After the identification of FGF23, several kinds of hypophosphatemic rickets/osteomalacia such as X-linked hypophosphatemia (XLH) and tumor-induced osteomalacia (TIO) have been shown to be caused by excessive actions of FGF23. Circulatory FGF23 is high in patients with these hypophosphatemic diseases while FGF23 is rather low in those with chronic hypophosphatemia from other causes such as vitamin D deficiency. These results indicate that FGF23 measurement is useful for the differential diagnosis of hypophosphatemia. Chemiluminescent enzyme immunoassay for FGF23 has been approved for clinical use in Japan. The first choice treatment for patients with TIO is complete removal of responsible tumors. However, it is not always possible to find and completely remove responsible tumors. Phosphate and active vitamin D have been used for patients with hypophosphatemic diseases caused by excessive actions of FGF23 including TIO patients with unresectable tumors. However, these medications have limited effects and several adverse events. The inhibition of excessive FGF23 actions has been considered to be a novel therapy for these hypophosphatemic diseases. Human MAB for FGF23, burosumab, has been shown to improve biochemical abnormalities, roentgenological signs of rickets, growth, fracture healing and impaired mineralization in patients with XLH. Burosumab has been approved in several countries including Europe, North America and Japan. Long-term effects of burosumab need to be addressed in future studies.
Gut microbiome, endocrine control of gut barrier function and metabolic diseases
Authors: Régnier Marion , Van Hul Matthias , Knauf Claude , Cani Patrice D
Published: December 2020

Overweight and obesity are associated with several cardiometabolic risk factors, including insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, low-grade inflammation and liver diseases. The gut microbiota is a potential contributing factor regulating energy balance. However, although the scientific community acknowledges that the gut microbiota composition and its activity (e.g. production of metabolites and immune-related compounds) are different between healthy subjects and subjects with overweight/obesity, the causality remains insufficiently demonstrated. The development of low-grade inflammation and related metabolic disorders has been connected with metabolic endotoxaemia and increased gut permeability. However, the mechanisms acting on the regulation of the gut barrier and eventually cardiometabolic disorders are not fully elucidated. In this review, we debate several characteristics of the gut microbiota, gut barrier function and metabolic outcomes. We examine the role of specific dietary compounds or nutrients (e.g. prebiotics, probiotics, polyphenols, sweeteners, and a fructose-rich diet) as well as different metabolites produced by the microbiota in host metabolism, and we discuss how they control several endocrine functions and eventually have either beneficial or deleterious effects on host health.
Diseño de una metodología gerencial para proyectos de sistemas distribuidos de antenas
Authors: Bulevas Osorio Yira	Liliana
Published: December 2020

Este artículo brinda orientaciones a los gerentes de proyectos para diseñar una metodología gerencial que facilite la ejecución de sistemas distribuidos de antenas de tecnología 3G en espacios indoor. La metodología cuantitativa exploratoria permitió un análisis concreto como base para la propuesta del diseño. Así, se determinó el estándar más adecuado en la dirección de proyectos para este tipo de soluciones; teniendo como referentes los resultados del instrumento aplicado, se diseñó una metodología a la medida donde solo se intervienen las áreas críticas. El uso de esta metodología disminuye costos y tiempos en todas las fases, brinda satisfacción final al cliente y permite monitorear el progreso de cada tarea a lo largo de la implementación; en general, es una herramienta útil que facilita el seguimiento durante la ejecución y la finalización del proyecto. Se concluye que las buenas prácticas y la aplicación de una metodología gerencial permiten en gran medida el logro de los objetivos.
Bridging the Digital Divide in Dunn County, Wisconsin: A Case Study of NPO use of ICT
Authors: Bogner Elizabeth , Tharp Kevin W. , McManus Mary
Published: December 2020

Despite years of effort to bridge the digital divide in the U.S., there continues to be a skills gap affecting many not-for-profit organizations.  This paper looks at an assessment of the electronic literacy skills of individuals working or volunteering for NPOs in Dunn County, Wisconsin and remediation efforts to address the skills gap that was identified.  The Assessment conducted by an AmeriCorps* VISTA leader found literacy skills low, especially as related to social media and web publishing among the staff and volunteers of the NPOs in the study.  Remediation efforts were challenging but successful.  Follow-up efforts built local, sustainable capacity.
Drive-by Wi-Fi and digital storytelling: development and co-creation
Authors: Tacchi Jo , Kitner Kathi R , Mulenahalli Kiran
Published: December 2020

This paper offers a critique of two examples of innovative uses of information and communication technologies that seek to build social, economic and cultural connections in India. We compare and contrast the development approaches that underpin these projects and explore their consequences on the ground. The first approach follows a Bottom of the Pyramid model, while the other adheres to a Human Development and Capabilities Approach. While both examples use ICT innovatively, their underlying conceptions of development, notions of participation, and their project goals are fundamentally different. We explore these differences in terms of what constitutes participation and co-creation in order to think critically about the role of ICT in development.
Information and Communication Technology for Education in an Algonquin First Nation in Quebec
Authors: Lockhart Emily , Tenasco Anita , Whiteduck Tim , O'Donnell Susan
Published: December 2020

Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg First Nation is an innovative rural community in Quebec. Located 130 kilometers north of Ottawa, it is the closest First Nation to the Canadian capital. In both population and territory, Kitigan Zibi is the largest of the ten Algonquin communities. Broadband connectivity and information and communication technologies (ICT) are important to the community and incorporated into everyday operations. This paper explores the use of technology in the education sector in Kitigan Zibi, in particular the situation of having technology readily available at school and less so at home. This transition from a technology-filled classroom to limited or no ICT access at home is a challenge, not only for individual students and their families but also for the community as a whole.
Smart Cities vs. Smart Communities: Empowering Citizens not Market Economics
Authors: Gurstein Michael
Published: December 2020

Editorial
Expanded Urban Planning as a Vehicle for Understanding and Shaping Smart, Liveable Cities
Authors: Staffans Aija , Horelli Liisa
Published: December 2020

Smart city is currently a trendy concept that has been promoted by many international companies, universities and cities, such as IBM, CISCO, MIT, Shanghai, as well as the European Union.  This top down, technocratic approach has been severely criticized in many academic publications. Concurrently there is an increasing buzz emerging from citizens – women and men, who are involved in the application of community informatics for self-organization in urban settings. Consequently, the smart city as a contested concept and an initiative is under social and political construction. We argue that the smart city can be better understood and implemented, when framed from a holistic and integrative perspective as a multi-scalar and multi-dimensional endeavor that is approached through “expanded urban planning”. The aim of the article is to present and discuss the expanded urban planning approach as an alternative story to smart cities. The relevance of this approach is assessed in the light of a case study of Designing for the Smart City, a course for future architects and planners, at the Politecnico di Milano, Italy.
Augmented Reality at the Service of Participatory Urban Planning and Community Informatics – a case study from Vienna
Authors: Reinwald Florian , Berger Martin , Stoik Christop , Platzer Mario , Damyanovic Doris
Published: December 2020

Based on the analysis of two field tests in the City of Vienna, this article describes the advantages and disadvantages of using an augmented reality app in participation processes. Using the results of an applied research project “ways2gether – target group-specific use of AR and web 2.0 in participative traffic planning processes”, the possibilities of implementing AR in planning and participation processes are discussed. The article points out that augmented reality tools expand the repertoire of methods used in participation procedures and that they have the potential to support many phases of a planning and participation process.
Exploring the use of PPGIS in self-organizing urban development: Case softGIS in Pacific Beach
Authors: Schmidt-Thome Kaisa , Wallin Sirkku , Laatikainen Tiina , Kangasoja Jonna , Kyttä Marketta
Published: December 2020

The paper seeks to identify prerequisites for introducing an established PPGIS tool in the field of self-organizing urban development. On the basis of a SoftGIS study in Pacific Beach, San Diego, we argue that despite PPGIS applications’ close connection to formal urban planning processes, PPGIS tools can support local interaction and facilitate self-organizing urban development. We could identify three facilitating roles for softGIS. It functioned, firstly, as a tool with respect to the interplay of various community organizations; secondly, as a catalyst of the process foregrounding the citizen perspective in Pacific Beach, and thirdly, as a provider of legitimacy for the responsible community organization aiming at concrete interventions in the physical environment. This was possible as the community organization and the research team had a shared interest and related expertise, and agreed about the resulting spatial analysis. In the light of this study we welcome further experiments using advanced PPGIS tools with community organizations, and call for a closer scholarly dialogue between PPGIS and Community Informatics.
The ‘Urban Spacebook’ experimental process: Co-designing a Platform for Participation
Authors: Baibarac Corelia Elena
Published: December 2020

This article presents an experimental co-design approach carried out in Dublin, Ireland, which expands user participation to the design of digital technology employed in participatory e-planning initiatives. The approach focuses on city inhabitants’ everyday life experiences of urban space, uses a dynamic mobility lens and includes three spatial/technological experiments. This innovative co-design process informs an ICTs prototype platform for participation entitled ‘Urban Spacebook’. The platform provides viable opportunities for sharing everyday life experiences of urban space and also for enhancing the co-governance of such spaces, thus making a significant contribution in the area of participatory e-planning.
(Re)Prioritizing Citizens in Smart Cities Governance: Examples of Smart Citizenship from Urban India
Authors: Sadoway David , Shekhar Satyarupa
Published: December 2020

By examining the community-focused informatics work of Transparent Chennai (TC) (India) we seek to contrast the Smart Cities agenda — with its focus on the consumption and commercialization of digital technologies and infrastructure — to citizen-driven approaches, what we term, Smart Citizenship. A Smart Citizenship approach engages citizens in complementary digitally mediated and face-to-face processes that respect local knowledge systems. We devise a framework for understanding Smart Citizenship and link this to our case study of Transparent Chennai. Our research identifies how information and communication technologies (ICTs) can serve to spotlight overlooked or undervalued urban infrastructural, planning and environmental issues — such as the need for access to safe and clean public toilets; road safety and pro-pedestrian planning. We conclude by suggesting that a locally grounded Smart Citizenship agenda can reprioritize the needs and interests of local communities and neighbourhoods in urban governance, rather than those of exclusivist private commercial interests.
The Right(s) to the Hybrid City and the Role of DIY Networking
Authors: Antoniadis Panayotis , Apostol Ileana
Published: December 2020

We reconsider the concept of “the right to the city”, introduced by French philosopher  Henri Lefebvre, in the light of the new information space that ICTs create in contemporary urban environments. Such spaces include the use of global online social networks, locative media, e-participation platforms, online neighbourhood communities and so forth. Unlike the physical urban space that it overlays, this new and rapidly emerging virtual space has practically no capacity constraints. However, it is subject to inequalities in terms of access, representation, participation, and ownership. In this research note—an interdisciplinary collaboration between a computer scientist and an urban planner—we wish to study the role of wireless technology, which enables the easy deployment of local networks operating outside the public Internet, and the role of the free and open source social software, which facilitates the easy development of customized local applications, allowing citizens to shape their emerging hybrid space. We suggest that this sort of do-it-yourself (DIY) networking can be realised according to citizens’ values, objectives and the particularities of the environment, and could ultimately enable them to compete with large ICT corporations such as Google and Facebook for their “right(s) to the hybrid city”. We employ the urban sidewalk metaphor as an application that is subject to hybrid design and can profit significantly from the special characteristics of DIY networks.
Information Kiosk Based Indian E-Governance Service Delivery: Value Chain Based Measurement Modelling
Authors: Misra Harekrishna
Published: December 2020

Globally, e-governance systems are evolving towards wider acceptance.  Almost all the countries have embraced e-governance as part of their long term policy. Contemporary e-governance implementation efforts however, are not free from challenges. While some argue in favour of convergence among business, government, civil society etc., many feel citizen acceptance needs to be the primary objective. In cases like European Union (EU), citizen acceptance of e-governance services has become very important because of member-driven benefits. In developing countries, this challenge is enormous despite having prolific growth in e-governance infrastructure. In Indian context, e-governance infrastructure has evolved to a stage of consolidation. National e-Governance Plan (NeGP), National Knowledge Network (NKN) and Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) etc., provide the scope for such consolidation. In this paper, it is argued that value chain management approach is necessary to consolidate the efforts made so far. Consolidation needs wider citizen acceptance and value added services are the basic imperatives. This consolidation phase needs to ensure e-governance efforts having longer life cycles, better convergence and connected e-governance. A measurement and acceptance model is presented in this paper with two case studies drawn from India for validation.
Book Review: Digital Dead End: Fighting for Social Justice in the Information Age
Authors: Nemer David
Published: December 2020

Digital Dead End: Fighting for Social Justice in the Information Age, by Virginia Eubanks. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011. 232 pp. $28.00 / £19.95 (hardcover). ISBN 978-0-262-01498-4
From Digital Divide to Digital Inclusion and Beyond
Authors: Nemer David
Published: December 2020

This literature review examines how scholars approached issues around the digital divide and moves on to analyzing initiatives to use digital technology to decrease the inequalities that exist between groups of different socioeconomic backgrounds. The intention is to highlight some useful references that are relevant in addressing how Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are used in different socioeconomic contexts. It presents references that follow several ideologies when approaching digital divide and digital inclusion. These ideologies go from providing physical access to a multifaceted approach of access that involves cognitive, economic, cultural and social factors, as well as differentiated uses of the internet.
Local Ownership, Exercise of Ownership and Moving from Passive to Active Entitlement: A practice-led inquiry on a rural community network
Authors: Rey-Moreno Carlos , Sabiescu Amalia G. , Siya Masbulele J. , Tucker William D.
Published: December 2020

This paper examines the build up of local ownership in an externally-initiated community network in rural South Africa. Based on this analysis, and in constant dialogue with the community informatics and social science literatures, the paper makes two contributions. First, it clarifies the meaning of the concept, and shows how it relates to other key concepts in community informatics scholarship. Second, it provides an outline of the factors found to be positively correlated with the build up of ownership, elicited from the analysis of the design and deployment of a rural community network.
Embedding Digital Advantage: A Five-Stage Maturity Model for Digital Communities
Authors: Williamson Andy
Published: December 2020

Information and Communications Technology (ICT) has the potential to offer citizens new ways with which to engage in the process of democracy. It is not sufficient that communities and citizens have access to ICT for the digital divide to be bridged; such communities need to also become literate in the new technologies. Resources need to be made available that are useful, interesting and relevant. Ultimately, communities need to be empowered to become more than receivers of information and services via technology; they must become producers of new knowledge and information. Such publications are then able to represent a community’s unique viewpoint to a wider audience.   This paper describes a five stage model for community ICT engagement and maturity. This model is non-linear and temporal and can be used as an audit of current community technology capability for assessing maturity and for establishing clear milestones within a community ICT framework. Such a model is useful for assessing and developing eDemocracy issues within individual groups and communities and as a way of mapping progress within a wider community, city or regional setting.
From Exploration to Design: Aligning Intentionality in Community Informatics Projects
Authors: Halabi Ammar , Sabiescu Amalia , David Salomão , Vannini Sara , Nemer David
Published: December 2020

This article focuses on a particular aspect of research and design processes in community-based projects: the transition from exploratory stages, concerned with knowledge production, to design stages, in which goals for action-taking are formulated and desired directions for change are envisioned. This paper offers a reflection about the methodological processes that underpin this transition, in response to the questions: How are design goals formulated in community informatics interventions that rely on data-intensive exploratory methodologies, and what factors and dynamics shape them? Guided by these questions, we shed light on various issues related to this transition by recounting and analysing cases taken from field experiences within three different community projects in Syria, Brazil and Mozambique. The article proposes that the transition is associated with shifts in intentionality, which are elusive and hard to grasp, particularly in participatory approaches. Three analytical categories are put forward to illuminate the dynamics of intentionality shifts along the continuum of transitioning from exploration to design. Reflections based on the empirical cases are contributed.
Cooperating community connections: A changing political reality
Authors: Graham Garth
Published: December 2020

Community Informatics has declared that the global is a federation of locals.  James Quilligan has written an essay to the effect that applying such a definition of global requires a world institution of democratic governance.  Some members of the community of community informatics researchers have come to a similar conclusion.  This essay outlines an alternative interpretation based on complex adaptive systems theory, and with consequent results for a different definition of the individual, the community and their interdependence.  It asks the question – where does the predominance of opinion in community informatics about the changing nature of governance and community reside?
Government Public Access Centres (PACs): A beacon of hope for marginalised communities
Authors: Uys Corrie , Pather Shaun
Published: December 2020

Notwithstanding massive injections into broadband infrastructure, large sectors of the world’s population remain without access to the internet.  One of the strategies employed by Government and the private sector to address the digital divide has been to provide basic computing services and internet access to communities in the form of public access centres (PACs) or otherwise known as telecentres.  Over the years PAC related interventions have been subjected to much introspection, and critique, given a number of examples of failures.  This paper examines a PAC program in South Africa which has been running with success for ten years.   The paper reports on a study which includes data collected from more than two thousand four hundred users of PACs.  The findings provide critical insights into the value proposition of PACs for communities in impoverished areas and whether this is still relevant from a policy perspective to tackle the digital divide.  The findings also provide insights into the profile of users; the factors which impact on their choice of a PAC as an internet access point; and the extent to which there is a reliance on PACs.  The most revealing finding from the study indicates that PACS provided the average user with something more than just an internet access point.  The study has determined that PACs have a significant effect on the hopefulness a citizen has for his or her self, community and country.
Open Data and Evidence-based Socio-economic Policy Research in India: An overview
Authors: Larquemin Aurelie , Mukhopadhyay Jyoti Prasad , Buteau Sharon
Published: December 2020

Public entities are one of the main producers of socio-economic data around the world. The Open Government Data (OGD) movement encourages these entities to make their data publicly available in order to improve transparency and accountability, which may lead to good governance. Thus, OGD can promote evidence-based public policy by supporting empirical research through making quality data available. Hence, in this paper we discuss the current status of OGD initiative in India, how its principles are considered and applied by the public authorities, and the feedback of the research community about OGD in India.   Les institutions publiques sont parmi les principaux producteurs de données socio-économiques. Le mouvement « Données Gouvernementales ouvertes » les encourage et assiste parfois dans la mise à disposition de leurs données au public, pour améliorer la transparence, ce qui peut conduire à une meilleure gouvernance. Ainsi, les données ouvertes gouvernementales peuvent conduire à de meilleures politiques publiques basées sur leurs résultats en soutenant la recherche par la publication de données de qualité. Ce document traite de la situation des données ouvertes en Inde, leur publication et usage par les institutions publiques et par la communauté de recherche.   Las instituciones públicas son los principales productores de datos socio-económicos. El movimiento de " datos gubernamentales abiertos" alienta estas entidades de poner sus datos a disposición del público para mejorar la transparencia, y la gobernanza. Por lo tanto los datos gubernamentales abiertos pueden promover políticas públicas basadas en evidencia, mediante el apoyo a la investigación empírica a través de hacer datos de calidad disponibles.  En este trabajo se discute lo que es la realidad de los datos gubernamentales abiertos en la India, cómo sus principios están consideradas y aplicadas por las autoridades públicas y la comunidad de investigación.
To the Cloud: Big Data in a Turbulent World by Vincent Mosco
Authors: Fink Alexander
Published: December 2020

Vincent Mosco begins and ends To The Cloud: Big Data in a Turbulent World by exploring metaphors about clouds and applying them to cloud computing. These metaphors offer a way into understanding the history of cloud computing: where it came from, why it began, how its evolved, and the ways it works in our everyday lives. He draws on literature, including a book entitled The Cloud of Unknowing by a medieval English monk (pg. 13). As I write this, I switch over to my streaming music service momentarily and discover it playing a song of the same name, this time by a contemporary artist, James Blackshaw. Given that I’d heard of neither the song nor artist until this very moment, this makes me a bit suspicious about how closely I’m being watched by my music player. Was it reading my email? Did it discover my notes, uploaded to the cloud on Evernote? Does it know this book was shipped to me? It’s almost difficult to believe it is complete coincidence.  And yet this is one of the promises of the cloud and big data - a world where what we want (even when we didn’t know we wanted it) is at our finger tips exactly when we want it.
Urban Data in the primary classroom: bringing data literacy to the UK curriculum
Authors: Wolff Annika , Cavero Montaner Jose J , Kortuem Gerd
Published: December 2020

As data becomes established as part of everyday life, the ability for the average citizen to have some level of data literacy is increasingly important.  This paper describes an approach to teaching data skills in schools using real life, complex, urban data sets collected as part of a smart city project. The approach is founded on the premise that young learners have the ability to work with complex data sets if they are supported in the right way and if the tasks are grounded in a real life context. Narrative principles are used to frame the task, to assist interpretation and tell stories from data and to structure queries of datasets. An inquiry-based methodology organises the activities.  This paper describes the initial trial in a UK primary school in which twelve students aged 9-10 years learnt about home energy consumption and the generation of solar energy from home solar PV, by interpreting existing visualisations of smart meter data and data obtained from aerial survey. Additional trials are scheduled with older learners which will evaluate learners on more challenging data handling tasks. The trials are informing the development of the Urban Data School, a web-based platform designed to support teaching data skills in schools in order to improve data literacy among school leavers.
Contributions of Paulo Freire for a Critical Data Literacy: a Popular Education Approach
Authors: Tygel Alan Freihof , Kirsch Rosana
Published: December 2020

Paulo Freire is the patron of education in Brazil. His main work - the Popular Education pedagogy - influences many educators all over the world who believe in education as a way of liberating poor oppressed people. One of the outcomes of Freire's work is a literacy method, developed in the 1960's. In this paper, we propose the adoption of elements of Freire's Literacy Method for use in a pedagogical pathway towards data literacy. After tracing some parallels between literacy education and data literacy, we suggest some data literacy strategies inspired on Freire's method. We also derive from it a definition for critical data literacy.
DataBasic: Design Principles, Tools and Activities for Data Literacy Learners
Authors: D'Ignazio Catherine , Bhargava Rahul
Published: December 2020

The growing number of tools for data novices are not designed with the goal of learning in mind. This paper proposes a set of pedagogical design principles for tool development to support data literacy learners.  We document their use in the creation of three digital tools and activities that help learners build data literacy, showing design decisions driven by our pedagogy. Sketches students created during the activities reflect their adeptness with key data literacy skills. Based on early results, we suggest that tool designers and educators should orient their work from the outset around strong pedagogical principles.
MobiSAM: Reflections from a four year case study using technology to increase public participation in local government in South Africa
Authors: Thinyane Hannah , Siebörger Ingrid
Published: December 2020

This paper reflects on a four year evaluation on the use of a mobile platform, MobiSAM, to support increased public participation in local government.  It describes the lessons learnt in the design, development and evaluation of the initiative.  MobiSAM uses a community based co-design methodology, emphasizing the importance of community’s voices throughout the design and evaluation of the project.  Attention is drawn to the education and awareness raising interventions undertaken in order to scaffold the deployment of the system.  A discussion of the findings of the project is also provided in order for other actors in the field to learn from MobiSAM’s successes and failures.  Special attention is focused on the political stability and communication capacity required to successfully undertake initiatives such as this.
CommunitySensor: towards a participatory community network mapping methodology
Authors: De Moor Aldo
Published: December 2020

Participatory community network mapping can support collaborative sensemaking within and across communities and their surrounding stakeholder networks. We introduce the CommunitySensor methodology under construction. After summarizing earlier work, we show how the methodology uses a cyclical approach by adopting a Community Network Development Cycle that embeds a Community Network Sensemaking Cycle. We list some observations from practice about using community network mapping for making inter-communal sense. We discuss how extending the methodology with a pattern-driven approach benefits the building of bridges across networked communities, as well as the sharing of generalized lessons learnt. To this purpose, a community collaboration pattern language is essential. We show initial work in developing and using such a language by examining the cross-case evolution of core community network interaction patterns.
A sustainability framework for mobile technology integration in schools: The case of resource-constrained environments in South Africa
Authors: Mabila Jabulisiwe , Van Biljon Judy , Herselman Marlien
Published: December 2020

The application of mobile technology integration in schools has been widely researched. However, only a few studies have extensively examined the sustainability of mobile technology integration in resource-constrained environments. Diverse contexts and devices complicate the construction of a consolidated view of how to sustain the pedagogical practice of learning with mobile devices in these environments. The purpose of this article is to indicate how feedback from teachers and district officials informed the development of a sustainability framework for mobile technology integration in schools (SFMTIS), which originated following a literature review. Employing design science research as methodology, a sustainability framework was synthesized from the existing literature. Teachers’ views were obtained regarding the integration of mobile technology in their schools and were subsequently processed to inform the further development of the framework. Teachers who had previously participated in an initiative which introduced mobile tablet use, trained those teachers, and provided information and communication technology infrastructure to their schools, were purposively selected for the study. Department of Basic Education officials based at district offices were also interviewed for their views on sustainable integration. The findings form the basis for the proposed SFMTIS in resource-constrained environments in South Africa. Besides the refined sustainability framework, the research contributes novel insights into the differing perspectives of the teachers and the district officials, and how those can impact the sustainability of mobile technology integration in resource-constrained environments.
An empirical study on the effects of mobile telephony usage on livelihoods in Brong Ahafo region of Ghana
Authors: Bekoe Stephen , Ayoung Daniel Azerikatoa , Boadu Paul , Folitse Benjamin
Published: December 2020

Meaningful use of mobile telephony can enhance human development and capabilities thereby empowering people to lead lives they value. They are enabling technologies to deliver human-centred development. This article explores the effects of mobile phone use on livelihoods of users in eight districts in Brong Ahafo region of Ghana. A mixed method approach was employed and qualitative research was used as a dominant paradigm. Interview questionnaires, focus group discussions and observation were used.  The study showed that mobile phone ownership was high and their uses were characterised by greater uniformity across socio-economic groups and gender. Mobile phones enhanced traditional structures, facilitated business links, and face-to-face interactions as well as strengthening community ties. Users acknowledged the impact of mobile phones in their ability to deal with family emergencies. Poor network connectivity and power outages were major obstacles to mobile phone usage. The study makes original contributions to the knowledge of practical relevance in the ICT4D field as well as with respect to these under-researched Ghanaian regions and provides evidence for policy formulation to improve quality of services in Ghana and elsewhere. The participatory Field Research also provided space for in-depth engagement with local people to understand the technology in social and development contexts.
Mobilities of the Community Health Work Practice: Mobile Health system Mediated Work
Authors: Namatovu Esther , Sæbø Johan Ivar , Kaasbøll Jens Johan
Published: December 2020

New technologies have been implicated in various forms of mobilities creating new realities and questioning normative categories and the order in contexts where they are applied. Our study argues that through understanding technology mobilities, we uniquely bring to light new forms of social phenomena that materialize with interactions between mHealth systems and the work of Community Health workers in Malawi. Through the analysis, we also elaborate the role of both human and non-human actants in work transformations. This is important in managing technological innovations and theorizing electronically supported work practices.
Women in Iran: The effect of marital status and the presence of family dependents at home on their use of the internet
Authors: Al-Saggaf Yeslam , Shariati Saeed , Morrison Mark
Published: December 2020

Few studies have analyzed how women in Iranian communities use the internet. Our study investigates the effect of marital status and the presence of family dependents at home on their extent of internet use. Our analysis found that while higher incomes, having internet at home, being a student, and having higher qualifications can all increase Iranian women’s chances of using the internet more regularly, looking after a husband or having family dependants at home can have a significant and negative effect on their ability to use the internet on a regular basis. The findings from our small study suggest that less time to access the internet may mean less opportunities for Iranian women to contribute to their communities such as by voicing their opinions and concerns about societal issues that matter to them and by petitioning for change. It may mean less opportunities for participating in political events such as elections.
The Circles of Connections
Authors: Soltani-Panah Arezou , De Cotta Tracy , Farmer Jane , Aryani Amir
Published: December 2020

In modernity, there is a growing obsession with tracking various aspects of an individual’s life, that is the ‘quantified self’. The latest trends in technology have made it much easier to track many elements of life such as heart rate, weight loss, fitness activity, and sleep patterns. The list can be extended by collecting data on others as well (such as a baby or pet), leading to the notion of the ‘quantified other’. This new wave in quantified self/other data has an impact on social and behavioural science research as well, moving the field away from a focus on survey studies towards more complex data-driven approaches. However, feasible ways of measuring the more intangible aspects of life such as connectedness, feelings, and resilience are rarely on offer in the self-quantified market. To address this, in partnership with Red Cross Australia, we have developed a social visualisation tool that helps people to assess their social connections, and understand how these connections contribute to aspects of social capital such as participation, support, feelings of safety and trust. We believe having such a tool to self-quantify an individual’s social connections offers the potential for better public health outcomes. The greater impact can be made at a community level to understand and facilitate social connections of diverse communities and raise awareness about their needs. Enriching such information with other spatial or sociodemographic data can help organisations like the Red Cross for provision of targeted supports particularly around areas of disaster management and engaging marginalised or vulnerable populations, and thus to build more resilient communities.
Social Fringe Dwellers: Can chat-bots combat bullies to improve participation for children with autism?
Authors: Ireland David , Bradford Dana , Farr-Wharton Geremy
Published: December 2020

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) can cause a gulf in communication that casts children with autism to the fringes of social and family life, despite the best efforts of their carers. These children often struggle with social interaction, lack of interest and empathy, and require intensive therapy to improve their ability to communicate with others. Improvements in social interaction are often hampered by experiences in which children with autism are more susceptible to being bullied. Social and communication technologies (e.g. smartphones and tablets), which children with autism tend to gravitate toward, and to which many families have access, may play a significant future role in building resilience and improving social interaction. Based on technology reviews and stakeholder interviews, we are developing modules for a machine learning artificial intelligence platform (a chat-bot) that assists children attending an Australian mainstream school to recognise and respond to social bullying and sarcasm, allowing bullied autistic children to develop the social prowess to withstand their aggressors.
Wider Worlds of Research for Health Equity: Public Health NGOs as Stakeholders in Open Access Ecosystems
Authors: Holzmeyer Cheryl
Published: December 2020

This article examines research uses and knowledge stakeholder politics that emerged in an exploratory study of the relevance of open access policies to a spectrum of U.S.-based public health non-governmental organizations (NGOs). This study demonstrated the clear relevance to public health NGOs of open access to peer-reviewed articles, as one form of community informatics. Though not always visible to those oriented toward academic knowledge ecosystems, public health NGOs utilize and conduct a wide range of research, both peer-reviewed and otherwise. Hence, findings indicate that public health NGOs should be more fully recognized, by researchers and policymakers in other contexts, as key stakeholders in knowledge, research, and open access ecosystems. These findings contribute to examination of community information seeking and use in the public health field, with an eye to leveraging community informatics on behalf of health equity.
Social movement theory and the Italian radical community archives: A question of valence?
Authors: Howard Mark
Published: December 2020

The theory and practice of the radical community, and a capacity for self-organisation, demonstrates the ability to control the symbols and language of society, to define new conventions of meaning, and to offer alternative reasons and explanations for action. However, the predominant sociological account of Italian social movements of the 1960s and 1970s censures potentially relevant discursive practices of the radical community. This is evidenced by the lack of diversity amongst the epistemic sources of Anglo American Social Movement Theory (SMT). The assumptions in play in disciplinary thought disqualify the practice and theory of radical social movements as a credible mode of analysis of the social and political condition. Ultimately, this discounts the radical subject as knowledge producer. By reflecting on my personal experience of conducting doctoral research at three key community archives in Italy I contemplate an alternative approach, which considers the valence of these radical communities as essentially epistemological and not simply ‘political’, or social.
May They Reminisce Over You: On The Potential of Archives as Homespace
Authors: Margolis Robin
Published: December 2020

For archives preserving the cultural heritage of artists and marginalized groups, community memories entangle with memories of community displacement . How can we as memory workers promote the potential of our collections to serve as hermeneutic aids in the transmission of cultural and social heritage? This paper weighs the turn toward participatory archives as form of liberation against the liberatory work located within Black Feminist scholar bell hooks conception of “homeplace as a site of resistance,” where “all black people [can] strive to be subjects, not objects.” (hooks, 1999) To investigate the potential of archives to act as homeplace, this paper explores the author’s design of a proposed community research project of a collection at La MaMa Archives. It argues for transforming the process of digitizing cultural heritage into an opportunity to reshape the collection in accordance with principles of participatory archiving. It theorizes methods of engaging and partnering with Jeannette Bastian’s “community of records” connected to different performances held by La MaMa, taking up the call by Anne Gilliland and Sue McKemmish to “reposition the subjects of records and all others involved or affected by the events documented in them as participatory agents.” (Bastian, 2003; Cox, 2015) By taking up the call for participatory archives, it advocates for the benefits of the practices of reminiscing and oral history to complement web-driven or more technologically oriented solutions often linked with participatory efforts. Anticipating the needs of the artists and community elders implicated within and involved as co-creators of these records, it integrates aspects of emerging models of continuum informatics and participatory appraisal with the professional practices of oral history and reminiscing work. It examines possibilities for integrating Leisa Gibbons Mediated Recordkeeping model with Jeffrey Dean Webster’s Heuristic Model of Reminiscing.
Connecting with Youth at Risk: Indigenous Organizations Use of Facebook
Authors: Intahchomphoo Channarong , Vellino André , Gundersen Odd Erik
Published: December 2020

A qualitative study in which we conducted four interviews with two communication managers and two youth program managers of three indigenous organizations with offices in Ottawa, the data generated from the interviews were coded based on factors identified through thematic analysis. Indigenous organizations use Facebook for two main reasons. The first reason is to promote the work of these organizations to the public and for them, in turn to listen to the public’s opinions about news related to indigenous peoples’ wellbeing. Secondly, Facebook is also used to engage urban indigenous youth at risk with indigenous organizations that provide social programs and outreach. Indigenous organizations use Facebook because many urban indigenous youth in Ottawa are using Facebook and it is the fastest way to connect with them when they are or feel at risk.
Editorial: Welcome to the Journal of Community Informatics
Authors: Gurstein Michael B.
Published: December 2020

Welcome to the Journal of Community Informatics
Local Learnings: An Essay on Designing to Facilitate Effective Use of ICT s
Authors: Salvador Tony , Sherry John
Published: December 2020

In this essay, we explore some of the details of what it takes to own, use and derive benefit from information and communication technologies, with a focus on regions where ICT adoption and use is especially low. We begin with a fairly meticulous description from our ethnographic work to which we'll refer throughout the paper. Though we consider this particular instance, we note that it represents of a wide range of instances from our ethnographic work in homes and businesses over several years in Brazil, Costa Rica, Chile, Ecuador, Bolivia, Peru, Korea and India. Our goal in this paper, however, is to change the conversation from discussions of infrastructure and capacity building to considerations of local, lived conditions in actual homes and actual businesses to suggest design alternatives that make effective use of ICTs more amenable to various locales. We offer two design directions especially for high tech corporations: Designing for Locus of Control and Designing for Local Participation. Along the way, we'll argue to re-frame of the current conception of "digital divide", putting the burden not on those with limited access, but on limited understanding within the high tech industry.
Online communities sustainability: some economic issues
Authors: Ripamonti Laura Anna , De Cindio Fiorella , Benassi Mario
Published: December 2020

Nowadays a growing attention is put on community networking and community informatics, due to the role both can play in building the Information Society through the active involvement of citizens and local communities. Hence, the issue of online communities sustainability becomes more and more relevant: multiple aspects  social, institutional and economical  have to be jointly analyzed to understand how and if a project is really worth.

In this paper we address the economic sustainability aspect, a key component still not deeply investigated. Actually, survival and growth are common themes in organizational and businesses literature since the beginning of the 60s, nevertheless, online communities only partly comply with the existing available frameworks and we are left with a panorama where communities emerge and evolve as if they were either completely bottom-up, unplanned entities or rational top down quasi-organizations. Hence, our aim is to offer a first attempt to define several theoretical propositions on economical sustainability, mainly derived from our ongoing experience and research on online communities.
Open letter to Prime Minister Paul Martin: Broadband connectivity in aboriginal communities
Authors: Kakepetum Geordi
Published: December 2020

Open letter to Prime Minister Paul Martin: Broadband connectivity in aboriginal communities