Digital Economy USRG

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Web Science Conference 2012 in Chicago #websci12

Avatar photoJune 25, 2012
by Lisa Harris

Summary of discussions and links hot off the press from Chicago:

Digital Literacies Conference #sotondiglit

Avatar photoJune 17, 2012
by Lisa Harris

Conversations from last week’s event are still ongoing, but an evolving Storify can be linked to below:

And photos continue to be posted:

And video from SUSUtv is now available on Vimeo :-)

Digital Literacies – SUSUtv from SotonCite on Vimeo.

DE Lunch Social Media in Live Events (#SMiLE) 10.07.2012

There will be three short presentations:

1. Social Media in Live Events (SMiLE)

Nicole Beale, Graeme Earl and Lisa Harris will discuss the findings so far of this action research project which is exploring the dynamics of the relationship between ‘real’ and ‘virtual’ communities in the context of a major academic conference. We monitored the use of a range of established and experimental social media tools to track how they were utilised before, during and after the event. Delegate online activities using these tools included information recording and sharing, network building, profile raising and development of a sustainable community of practice. We are now investigating how recent developments in social network visualisation and analysis can enable valuable insights to be generated from this data for the benefit of event organisers and community developers. We are also developing a code of conduct for the ethical collection, curation and archiving of social media data with Oxford e-Research Centre. Measuring the importance of social media marketing in the charitable domain

2. Chris Phethean from the Web Science DTC  will discuss his PhD research on the evaluation of social media marketing effectiveness which has recently been presented at the Web Science Conference in Chicago

3. Graeme Earl will discuss the recent AHRC Digital Transformations workshop and opportunities for DE members from this scheme.

Other forthcoming events of interest:

4th July 2pm – 4pm Digital Literacy Workshop: Social Media for Researchers, facilitated by Nicole Beale, Lisa Harris and Fiona Harvey, in 32/3077. You can book tickets here

10th August is the deadline for abstract submission to the 3rd Annual Digital Economy All Hands Conference, Aberdeen 23-25th October. We do have funding to support staff/students who wish to present a paper/workshop at this event. Please let us know if you are interested in finding out more.

 

 

 

 

Digital Literacies Conference #sotondiglit – Video and Tweets

June 13, 2012
by Sotonde

The live streaming of the Digital Literacies Conference will be accessible here. You can also follow the #sotondiglit tweets below.

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Digital Literacies Conference #sotondiglit

Avatar photoJune 5, 2012
by Lisa Harris

Due to popular demand additional tickets have now been released for the Digital Literacy Conference in Garden Court, Highfield Campus all day on 14th June. There will be un-keynote sessions led by Steve Wheeler, Cristina Costa, Sue Beckingham and Doug Belshaw, as well as contributions from a number of Southampton University staff and students who are engaged in various Digital Literacy activities.

The programme is confirmed as:

9.00 Coffee & registration

9.30 Opening – Professor Hugh Davis (Director of CITE)

10.00 First ‘unkeynote’ – Associate Professor Steve Wheeler & Cristina Costa

11.00 – Coffee

11.20 Presentations (10 minute slots)

12.30 Lunch

1.15 Second ‘unkeynote’ – Dr Doug Belshaw & Sue Beckingham

2.15 Presentations – (inc.Tools & Techniques)

3.15 – Tea

3.35 – Panel (Joy Moloney, Chair)

4.30 – Closing session

There will be extensive use of social media at this event. The Twitter tag is #sotondiglit Questions for the panel can be posted using Twitter (remember to include the #sotondiglit)

Resources will be available via Delicious

We are encouraging all participants to record their conference by using Storify.

Photographs from the event can be shared via Flickr

Can maths keep the lights burning

May 31, 2012
by Karen Woods

Mathematicians are teaming up with engineers to keep the lights on across the world. Jacek Brodzki gave fascinating account of how careful calculation could stop massive cross-border blackouts at the last must-attend Digital Economy lunch at the University of Southampton.

Dare we say it, the Professor of Pure Mathematics electrified his audience by outlining how you can come up with new ways of isolating transmission areas if the worst happens, through the ingenious use of maths. He used the example of a major power failure, which spread across the north east of USA and Canada on 14 August 2003, after a tree shorted a line. Jeremy Frey, Professor of Chemistry, told people at the lunch he had been there at the time and became stranded in Toronto.

Jacek leads a research group investigating applications of modern Pure Mathematics, especially geometry and analysis, in a variety of problems emerging in Data Science and Energy.

Student Digital Champions build social media presence for #PianoHAWK

Avatar photoMay 28, 2012
by Lisa Harris

The PianoHAWK launch event took place on 16th May 2012 at the Bluthner Piano Showroom in London’s Berkeley Square.

One of the major goals for the promotion of this event was raising awareness about the actual event and the PianoHAWK technology on several digital platforms. Considering that the main target audience interested in the technology could be found on social networks, such as Twitter and Facebook, the decision to create an online buzz on these media was obvious.

Digital Literacy Student Champions, Marina Sakipi and Panos Grimanellis were responsible for setting up and managing the social media accounts created.

First step was using the #PianoHAWK hashtag on Twitter in order to link together all relevant tweets, creating a ‘trending’ topic around the event and engaging users in using the hashtag before, during and after the event.

Here are a few sample tweets on #PianoHAWK:

 

 

Second step was the creation of the PianoHAWK Facebook page which immediately took off with many people ‘liking’ it.

On the day of the event, during its first part a science presentation took place by Dr Cheryl Metcalf where she explained everything about HAWK technology and provided scientific evidence of her research on how H.A.W.K technology can apply in various fields.

During the second part of the event, a music programme took place organised by Professor David Owen Norris with 11 Bluthner pianos playing simultaneously by students from School of Music and Cantores Michaelis choir singing.

In the meantime, Marina and Panos were live tweeting and uploading photos of the event:

As a whole, the event was very successful, and mentioned also in the University of Southampton Vice Chancellor’s blog post and as proved by the improved ranking of the PianoHAWK webpage on Google organic search results.

Social media in the business world

May 21, 2012
by Karen Woods

The next generation of sophisticated digital marketing professionals are learning their trade at the University of Southampton. And many of them look set for glittering careers, if you ask me!

Slightly nervous third year students have been trying their hands at being social media consultants, thanks to an innovative module at the Management School. But all deserved hearty rounds of applause after their presentations!

Marketing Lecturer, Lisa Harris had challenged them to work in groups to raise awareness of clubs, organisations and companies through digital marketing techniques based on social media platforms including Facebook, Twitter and You Tube. They were also encouraged to write blogs to help with the promotion.

Eleven groups gave presentations about their experiences to marketing academics which were assessed as part of their final mark.

One group worked with the Southampton University Riding Club. The team, Emilie Prior, Laura Sensecall, Charlie Hilder, Charlotte Sanders and Kate Smith, set up an online community for members. They used several media to convey information, share photos and encourage dialogue with members such as voting for annual awards. The site even attracted attention from professional rider Lucinda Green. Other projects included Student Chic for online discounts and fashion and beauty tips, Soton Digest for local restaurant reviews, Gradbuddy to highlight internships and placements and Southampton Student Accommodation Support.

“This is a great opportunity for our students to find out what it’s really like to put the principles of social media to the test,” says Lisa. “Hopefully they have enjoyed the experience of working with ‘clients’ to get their messages across and developed skills which will be invaluable in their careers.”

Link

http://www.southampton.ac.uk/~riding/index.html

How can you tweet in Chinese?

May 21, 2012
by Karen Woods

Management School PhD student Ring Xu fascinated university staff and students interested in developments in the digital economy with her presentation on what’s happening now in social media in China. More than 513 million people use the internet in her country. But that impressive figure is dwarfed by China’s total population of 1.4 billion and means around a third of Chinese people are currently online. Most are under the age of 30.

What are they doing? Ring presents compelling evidence that many of them, just like young people around the world, are obsessed with social media. The statistics are compelling. A quarter of all social media users in the world are Chinese. And material in the Chinese language now makes up 24 percent of the Internet.

Ring has four reasons for this explosion in Chinese social media. Many families are forced to live apart, as many young people may work or study away from home, good broadband links are affordable, China’s one child policy means many young people turn to friends rather than siblings and there is suspicion of mainstream government-controlled media.

As Ring explains, there are no Facebook, Twitter and You Tube in China, but their Chinese equivalents are better in some ways, not second best. Sina Weibo, the phenomenally popular Chinese website most similar to Twitter has a facility for users to re-post adding comments and pictures to the original message. And, of course, 140 characters in the Chinese language convey far more meaning than 140 letters.

She says many young people enjoy receiving and passing on discount vouchers and codes so they can snap up top fashion items at bargain prices. “I haven’t bought anything at full price online after I followed those Weibo accounts which broadcast discount codes every day,” she declares.

Link

DE USRG on Weibo

Creative Digifest #SxSC

Avatar photoMay 20, 2012
by Lisa Harris

This was an all-day informal event on 18 May 2012 at the University of Southampton Students Union building for anyone involved in the region’s creative industries.

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