User-Created Content and Online Social Networks

Traditional media are under assault from digital technologies. Online advertising is eroding the financial basis of newspapers and television, demarcations between different forms of media are fading, and audiences are fragmenting. We can podcast our favourite radio show, data accompanies television programs, and we catch up with newspaper stories on our laptops. Yet mainstream media remain enormously powerful. The Media and Communications in Australia offers a systematic introduction to this dynamic field. Fully updated and revised to take account of recent developments, this third edition outlines the key media industries and explains how communications technologies are impacting on them. It provides a thorough overview of the main approaches taken in studying the media, and includes new chapters on social media, gaming, telecommunications, sport and cultural diversity. With contributions from some of Australia's best researchers and teachers in the field, The Media and Communications in Australia is the most comprehensive and reliable introduction to media and communications available. It is an ideal student text, and a reference for teachers of media and anyone interested in this influential industry.

Research participation of individuals with dementia : decisional capacity, informed consent, and considerations for nurse investigators

Decisional capacity is a precious component of personhood and is progressively diminished in dementia. Conducting research with individuals with dementia demands a commitment to ensure the quest for knowledge does not overwhelm the rights of those it is intended to protect. The purposes of this article are to describe current understandings of the concept of decisional capacity, describe recent regulatory developments related to the consideration of additional protections for decisionally impaired adults, and provide recommendations for nurse investigators working with this vulnerable group.

Community engagement for sustainable urban futures : editorial preface

This special issue of Futures is concerned with community engagement strategies that help to inform medium and long-term futures studies in order to foster sustainable urban environments. Recent special issues of Futures, such as Human Extinction (41:10) and Utopian Thought (41:4), reflect the increasing significance of sustainability issues, which is why we present another crucial component of sustainability, community engagement. Responding to futurists’ long term concerns about climate change outlined in Futures 41(9) [1], Stevenson concluded that we can no longer support infinite growth, and that our goal should be to reshape the economy to let us live within our means. In the face of the continued and accelerated crisis in environmental, economic and social sustainability, a number of trends informed our call for papers on the possible role of community engagement in contributing to enhanced urban sustainability: • Changes in the public sphere in terms of participation, online deliberation systems, polity of urban futures; • The possible use of user-generated content for urban planning (paralleling the rise of user generated content elsewhere); • The related role of social networking, collective and civic intelligence, and crowd- sourcing in urban futures; • The rise of technologies such as wireless Internet and mobile applications, and the impact of neogeography, simulations and 3D virtual environments that reproduce and analyse complex social phenomena and city systems in urban futures, design and planning.

Incorporating uncertainty in environmental models informed by imagery

In this thesis, the issue of incorporating uncertainty for environmental modelling informed by imagery is explored by considering uncertainty in deterministic modelling, measurement uncertainty and uncertainty in image composition. Incorporating uncertainty in deterministic modelling is extended for use with imagery using the Bayesian melding approach. In the application presented, slope steepness is shown to be the main contributor to total uncertainty in the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation. A spatial sampling procedure is also proposed to assist in implementing Bayesian melding given the increased data size with models informed by imagery. Measurement error models are another approach to incorporating uncertainty when data is informed by imagery. These models for measurement uncertainty, considered in a Bayesian conditional independence framework, are applied to ecological data generated from imagery. The models are shown to be appropriate and useful in certain situations. Measurement uncertainty is also considered in the context of change detection when two images are not co-registered. An approach for detecting change in two successive images is proposed that is not affected by registration. The procedure uses the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test on homogeneous segments of an image to detect change, with the homogeneous segments determined using a Bayesian mixture model of pixel values. Using the mixture model to segment an image also allows for uncertainty in the composition of an image. This thesis concludes by comparing several different Bayesian image segmentation approaches that allow for uncertainty regarding the allocation of pixels to different ground components. Each segmentation approach is applied to a data set of chlorophyll values and shown to have different benefits and drawbacks depending on the aims of the analysis.

Analysis of primary user duty cycle impact on spectrum sensing performance

Spectrum sensing is considered to be one of the most important tasks in cognitive radio. Many sensing detectors have been proposed in the literature, with the common assumption that the primary user is either fully present or completely absent within the window of observation. In reality, there are scenarios where the primary user signal only occupies a fraction of the observed window. This paper aims to analyse the effect of the primary user duty cycle on spectrum sensing performance through the analysis of a few common detectors. Simulations show that the probability of detection degrades severely with reduced duty cycle regardless of the detection method. Furthermore we show that reducing the duty cycle has a greater degradation on performance than lowering the signal strength.

New Media and Public Communication: Mapping Australian User-Created Content in Online Social Networks

Presentation describling a project in data intensive research in the humanities. Measuring activity of publically available data in social networks such as Blogosphere, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube

An architecture for user configurable mobile collaborative geographic applications

Geographic information is increasingly being touted for use in research and industrial projects. While the technology is now available and affordable, there is a lack of easy to use software that takes advantage of geographic information. This is an important problem because users are often researchers or scientists who have insufficient software skills, and by providing applications that are easier to use, time and financial resources can be taken from training and be better applied to the actual research and development work. A solution for this problem must cater for the user and research needs. In particular it must allow for mobile operation for fieldwork, flexibility or customisability of data input, sharing of data with other tools and collaborative capabilities for the usual teamwork environment. This thesis has developed a new architecture and data model to achieve the solution. The result is the Mobile Collaborative Annotation framework providing an implementation of the new architecture and data model. Mobile Collaborative Mapping implements the framework as a Web 2.0 mashup rich internet application and has proven to be an effective solution through its positive application to a case study with fieldwork scientists. This thesis has contributed to research into mobile computing, collaborative computing and geospatial systems by creating a simpler entry point to mobile geospatial applications, enabling simplified collaboration and providing tangible time savings.

Informed consent : the review of the law of negligence and the utility of reference to NHMRC guidelines

Although rarely referred to in litigation in the years that have followed the Ipp Review Report, there may well be some merit in more frequent judicial reference to the NHMRC guidelines for medical practitioners on providing information to patients 2004.

Proof of causation in informed consent cases : establishing what the plaintiff would have done

A degree of judicial caution in accepting the assertion of a plaintiff as to what he or she would have done, if fully informed of risks, is clearly evident upon a review of decisions applying the common law. Civil liability legislation in some jurisdictions now precludes assertion evidence by a plaintiff. Although this legislative change was seen as creating a significant challenge for plaintiffs seeking to discharge the onus of proof of establishing causation in such cases, recent decisions suggest a more limited practical effect. While a plaintiff’s ex post facto assertions as to what he or she would have done if fully informed of risks may now be inadmissible, objective and subjective evidence as to the surrounding facts and circumstances, in particular the plaintiff’s prior attitudes and conduct, and the assertion evidence of others remains admissible. Given the court’s reliance on both objective and subjective evidence, statistical evidence may be of increasing importance.

Informed learning: a pedagogical construct attending simultaneously to information use and learning.

The idea of informed learning, applicable in academic, workplace and community settings, has been derived largely from a program of phenomenographic research in the field of information literacy, which has illuminated the experience of using information to learn. Informed learning is about simultaneous attention to information use and learning, where both information and learning are considered to be relational; and is built upon a series of key concepts such as second–order perspective, simultaneity, awareness, and relationality. Informed learning also relies heavily on reflection as a strategy for bringing about learning. As a pedagogical construct, informed learning supports inclusive curriculum design and implementation. This paper reports aspects of the informed learning research agenda which are currently being pursued at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT). The first part elaborates the idea of informed learning, examines the key concepts underpinning this pedagogical construct, and explains its emergence from the research base of the QUT Information Studies research team. The second presents a case, which demonstrates the ongoing development of informed learning theory and practice, through the development of inclusive informed learning for a culturally diverse higher education context.