The International Symposium on Open Collaboration (2005-2022)

OpenSym News

  • WikiSym is seeking student volunteers

    We are searching for enthusiastic students (undergraduate, graduate or PhD level) who want to help us running WikiSym 2011. We are celebrating our 7th edition on October 3-5, 2011 at the Microsoft Research Campus in Silicon Valley (Mountain View, California).
    Collaboration

    The only mandatory requirement is that you must have had student status for the past academic year (2010-2011). All students, regardless of discipline, are encouraged to apply, and no previous experience is required. This opportunity is particularly well suited for Bay Area students

    WikiSym volunteers commit to the following tasks:

    • Undertake between 5 and 10 hours of work during the conference days (October 3-5).
    • Collaborate with conference organizational team to set up and run on-site activities.
    • Attend a short guidance session in the afternoon before the conference (Sunday, October 2) , at the conference hotel (also in Mountain View).
    • Typical tasks will include: attend the registration desk, support to set up sessions, support for running the Open Space track and other similar duties.

    No other technical or logistics support is forseen, since permanent staff from the conference venue (MSR) will undertake those tasks.

    In exchange, students will get free access to the conference (including meals, reception and dinner) for the 3-days.

    Applicants must send a short motivational letter by September 28 to chair__at__wikisym–dot–org, explaining why they have interest in participating as volunteers in WikiSym. On September 29 we will publish the list of selected volunteers. We have a limited number of volunteer slots, so please contact us early if you are interested.

    Looking forward to meeting you at WikiSym!!

  • WikiSym 2011 Workshops Preview

    Over the next 26 days, we’ll be publishing a series of posts that highlight the awesome content that forms the WikiSym 2011 program. We’ll include titles, authors, and in some cases abstracts.

    Today’s installment: workshops! There will be three workshops, all on Monday, October 3. An important thing to note about WikiSym workshops is that attendance is open; one needn’t submit a position paper or be accepted, as is often the case in other conferences. Just show up! However, it never hurts to introduce yourself to the organizers ahead of time. Contact information for workshop organizers is available under the “further details” links.

    (Aside: there is still time to make plans to attend WikiSym 2011!)

    Lessons from the classroom: Successful techniques for teaching wikis using Wikipedia

    LiAnna Davis and Timothy Senate

    In the fall of 2010, the Wikimedia Foundation partnered with faculty from several top universities to introduce wiki technology and Wikipedia into class assignments of public policy related subjects. Through assignments based in Wikipedia students improved skills in collaboration, critical thinking, expository writing, media literacy, and technology fluency. In video interviews, students describe their experience and the learning objectives emerged through the Wikipedia assignment. Many students also commented on the satisfaction in producing a research document that had value beyond a grade. Professor Max Klein explains the success of his classroom use of a WikiProject page as a springboard for class discussion and homework assignments. Workshop participants experience some of the Wikipedia training modules through activities. This interactive workshop discloses some successes and failures of the Initiative and details specifically what makes a successful Wikipedia- editing assignment.

    Hashtags: #wikisym #wsteach
    Further details on this workshop (PDF)

    WikiLit: Collecting the Wiki and Wikipedia Literature

    Phoebe Ayers and Reid Priedhorsky

    This workshop has three key goals. First, we will examine existing and proposed systems for collecting and analyzing the research literature about wikis. Second, we will discuss the challenges in building such a system and will engage participants to design a sustainable collaborative system to achieve this goal. Finally, we will provide a forum to build upon ongoing wiki community discussions about problems and opportunities in finding and sharing the wiki research literature.

    Hashtags: #wikisym #wslit
    Further details on this workshop

    5th Workshop on Wikis for Software Engineering

    Ademar Aguiar and Paulo Merson

    Using a wiki in software engineering settings dates back to its first usage in 1995. In fact, that was the motivation for Ward Cunningham to create the first wiki. Due to its simplicity, attractiveness and effectiveness for collaborative authoring and knowledge management, wikis are now massively disseminated and used in different domains. This workshop focuses on wikis for the specific domain of software engineering. It aims at bringing together researchers, practitioners, and enthusiasts interested on researching, exploring and learning how wikis can be improved, customized and used to better support software projects. Based on lessons learned and obstacles identified, a research agenda will be defined with key opportunities and challenges.

    Hashtags: #wikisym #wikis4se (Updated)
    Further details on this workshop (PDF)

  • WikiSym 2011 social media analysis by EventBurn

    We are pleased to announce social media analysis for WikiSym 2011 by EventBurn, a Minneapolis-based startup. To see a live summary of what folks have to say about WikiSym on Twitter, Facebook, and Flickr, browse to:

    http://www.eventburn.com/wikisym2011

    This dashboard will be available from immediately until a few weeks after the conference. (And, of course, only public postings are included in the analysis.)

    As a reminder, please tag your photos and posts with “wikisym” in order to share them with the rest of the WikiSym community and ensure they’re included in the summary.

    Please let us know if you have any questions or feedback!

  • WikiSym 2011 registration is now open

    We are pleased to announce that registration for WikiSym 2011 is now open. Follow this link to begin the easy Google Checkout-based process.

    Early-bird registration ends August 29, so don’t delay. Even students will save money by registering early!

  • CfP Doctoral Symposium WikiSym 2011

    The CfP in the Doctoral Symposium of WikiSym 2011 has been published. You can check the details on the WikiSym 2011 website.

    The call is open to doctoral students doing work related to open collaboration, regardless of their academic discipline. Relevant disciplines include (but are not limited to) computer science, sociology, psychology, anthropology, information science, cognitive science, rhetoric, communications, and economics. Applicants should have a clear research direction in their ongoing work to get utmost benefit from this session.

    In addition, students with accepted submissions to this session will be eligible to receive some support for travel, accommondation and conference registration, thanks to a generous grant from NSF.

    Georg Friedrich Kersting - Der elegante Leser

  • Creative Commons sponsors WikiSym 2011

    We are pleased to announce a new sponsor for WikiSym 2011, the 7th International Symposium on Wikis and Open Collaboration.

    Creative Commons will join us this year as a WikiSym “Associate” sponsor, focusing on Open Educational Resources and open content, both important topics of interest to our conference.

    Creative Commons logo español
    CC logo by claudioruiz, in Flickr

    Creative Commons is a non-profit organization based in San Francisco (California) that develops, supports, and stewards legal and technical infrastructure that maximizes digital creativity, sharing, and innovation worldwide. Our partnership will help us disseminate our shared interests to a broader, global audience.

    We are also preparing joint initiatives that we hope you will enjoy in our exciting march towards WikiSym 2011, October 3-5. We will announce these initiatives as we move along. Creative commons lends us their network to publish important news about WikiSym.

    Make sure to keep an eye on this blog and our Twitter account (@wikisym) to hear about them first!

  • CosmoCode sponsors WikiSym 2011 website

    We are very happy to announce that CosmoCode is sponsoring the upcoming WikiSym 2011 website.

    Thanks to this sponsorship, this year our website will run on the champion wiki platform DokuWiki. The CosmoCode wiki team is also working on a brand new design, exclusive for WikiSym.

    We would like to thank Andreas Gohr and the CosmoCode wiki team for their great support and effort to make the WikiSym 2011 website an attractive experience for our community.

  • Wikisym 2011: Call for participation

    Hello. This is a formal version of the first call for contributions to WikiSym 2011. It will be also available on the 2011 website, as soon as our new wiki is ready (in short time).

    WikiSym 2011 Call for Participation

    ———
    7th International Conference on Wikis and Open Collaboration
    October 3-5, 2011 | Mountain View, California

    The International Symposium on Wikis and Open Collaboration (WikiSym) is the premier conference on open collaboration and related technologies. In 2011, WikiSym celebrates its 7th year of scholarly, technical and community innovation in Mountain View, California at the Microsoft Research Campus in Silicon Valley.

    Submissions are invited for the following categories:

    • Research Papers, Panels, Workshop: April 1
    • Posters, Demos: May 13
    • Notification of Acceptance: June 17

    (more…)

  • WikiSym 2011 at MSR Silicon Valley

    Hello all!

    We are very pleased to share with you some exciting details about the next WikiSym.

    Image from Wikimedia Commons

    WikiSym 2011 will take place at Microsoft Research Silicon Valley, (Mountain View, CA), on October 3-5, 2011. Microsoft itself has become our first premium sponsor for the next year.

    WikiSym annually brings together  researchers, companies, entrepeneurs and practitioners working on open collaboration. We believe this balance between academia and industry is a powerful way to foster innovation and confront the exciting challenges in this field.

    (c) Microsoft 2010

    Open collaboration and its associated technologies have had a significant impact on our society at large: OER, social media, mass-media, business strategies, entertainment, personal and professional relationships, etc. For this reason, we are committed to gathering support from different sponsors, reflecting the growing interest on these topics from distinct angles. We intend to host interesting sessions for our industry audience that will also involve scholars and students.

    Likewise, we plan to once again host a high quality academic program. We call for contributions covering  many different perspectives of open collaboration. The first Call for Papers will be circulated soon. All submissions will undergo a rigorous reviewing process led by our PC Chair Andrea Forte (Drexel University, Philadelphia). Accepted works will be presented at the conference and published in the ACM Digital Library, thanks to our agreement with ACM SIGWEB.

    The deadline for full papers, panels and workshops is April 1, 2011. Submission due for posters and demos is May 13, 2011. The deadline for Doctoral Symposium submissions will be announced later on. Plan your submissions in advance!

    We will publish further news and details very soon.

    Stay tuned!

    Felipe Ortega.
    WikiSym 2011 General Chair.

  • WikiSym 2010 Proceedings Available

    As you may know, at the same time WikiSym 2010 was taking place in the beautiful city of Gdańsk (Poland), last July, the WikiSym 2010 Proceedings were made available in the ACM Digital Library.

    We want to encourage open access to research information, so like in prior years we have uploaded all papers and submissions presented at WikiSym 2010 to the WikiSym 2010 wiki. They are accessible on the Proceedings page, as a ZIP file with the whole collection. Alternatively, you can find and download any individual submission from the list.

    We hope this effort will help to disseminate the valuable research contributions presented at WikiSym. At the same time,  we aim to leverage global awareness about the need to support the widespread circulation of research works and findings in Computer Science.