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Call for Papers : European Journal of Information Systems (EJIS) Special Issue on Information Systems, Identity and Identification

Research into the role of 'identity' in organizations has become increasingly popular in recent years.  Scholars from different organizational and management disciplines have applied the concept to address a wide variety of issues.  Lyon (2009) emphasizes that the topic can include both technological issues of identification and social issues of organizational and personal identity.  The European Journal of Information Systems has published a number of papers in each of these areas in recent years.

The purpose of this special issue is to solicit original research in information systems that studies questions of identity / identification.
Of particular interest will be papers that critically explore the inter-dependencies between technical issues of identification and social issues of identity.  For example, how pseudonymous authentication methods for social networks or organizational intranets can shape what information individuals choose to disclose in these environments, or how attitudes to personalised mobile devices are affected by identification technologies like biometrics, global positioning or RFID.  Furthermore, we encourage submissions that examine the interrelationships between organizational practices, change, information systems, and the shaping and articulation of personal and social identities.

Topics may include, but are not limited to, the following:

• The interrelationship of technology and identity in the context of IS implementation;
• The role of identity in enabling collaboration and coordination across groups and organizations;
• The relationship between identity, power and organizational politics;
• Information systems research issues created by the study of identity;
• Implementation, acceptance and ongoing challenges of access management;
• The role of organizational identity in enabling organizational sustainability;
• The influence of the presentation and perception of identity on information technology use;
• Public sector usage of identity technologies;
• Anonymity, pseudonymity, privacy and security concerns about technologies for identification.

Prospective authors are encouraged to contact the guest editors to discuss their proposals before submission.

Guest Editors for the Special Issue
Uri Gal, Copenhagen Business School, Denmark (ug.caict@cbs.dk) Edgar A.
Whitley, London School of Economics and Political Science, UK
(e.a.whitley@lse.ac.uk)

Deadline for submissions 15 January 2011

For more details see here.

Cory Doctorow has an excellent take on the hype surrounding cloud computing.  Doctorow's analysis shows that technological determinism remains alive and well in popular discourse about technology:

The tech press is full of people who want to tell you how completely awesome life is going to be when everything moves to "the cloud" - that is, when all your important storage, processing and other needs are handled by vast, professionally managed data-centres.

Here's something you won't see mentioned, though: the main attraction of the cloud to investors and entrepreneurs is the idea of making money from you, on a recurring, perpetual basis, for something you currently get for a flat rate or for free without having to give up the money or privacy that cloud companies hope to leverage into fortunes.

The Wall Street Journal online edition has an article about how parents are using Facebook and other social networking websites to track their childrens' activities, how children respond to that form of surveillance and even create a term "helicopter parents."

As a social informaticist I find the article interesting as an example of how the use of technology is socially shaped, and how all technologies come with unintended consequences.

As a parent I'm a little creeped out.

Exploring the web, I came across this website. The site is dedicated to hawking the wares of a Marcus P. Zillman and he's co-opted the term 'social informatics' for precisely that purpose.  An obvious reason to exclude Mr. Zillman from your consideration as a commentor on social informatics is that there is not a single bona fide social informatics resource listed on his social informatics resource page.

If you're curious about social informatics research, two better places to start are The Rob Kling Center fo Social Informatics and Wikipedia

Sara Kiesler who is very active in the Social Informatics / Cyberinfrastructure research community is seeking candidates for a post doc position that sounds pretty fantastic:

I am seeking someone to conduct an NSF-funded interview study of scientific collaborations. This task will involve quite a bit of traveling to universities and talking with a variety of people including top scientists (half of whom will be CS, the other half a variety of disciplines), grad students, and staff including bureaucratic personnel such as people in budget offices. The task will also involve coding and analysis of the interviews.

If you are interested in virtual organization, the science of science, e-science, CSCW, and other related topics, you would have a chance to carve out your own paper from this work.

The postdoc would be for one year. It would not be necessary to live in Pittsburgh since the study is nationwide, however, would require you to visit periodically.