Institutional Web Management Workshop 2007: Plenary Talks
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2007/talks/
Details of the Institutional Web Management Workshop 2007 Plenary Talksen-GB2007-05-25UKOLNhttp://www.ukoln.ac.uk/resources/images/ukoln-logo/logo.gif
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/
Plenary Talk 1: Sustainable Communities: What does 'Community of Practice' mean for Institutional Web Managers?
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2007/talks/warburton/
Steven Warburton will discuss how the notion of community continues to be recognised as a fundamental aspect within descriptions of shared human activity and group bonding. In his socio-cultural analysis of the work place Wenger defined a particular type of communion, which he termed a community of practice (CoP). The concept of a CoP has been somewhat abused in current literature yet it does provide valuable insights into how communities evolve, behave and sustain themselves. By elaborating dimensions of community such as shared practice, dialogue, legitimate peripheral participation and negotiation of boundaries, Wenger has provided a model that can be applied to a number of differing groups of activity. This talk will explore what we can draw from the work on CoPs, in terms of the role and identity of institutional web manager, one that is inseparable from a field of practice that remains dynamic, fluid and under constant negotiation. 2007-07-16Plenary Talk 2: Let the Students do the Talking...
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2007/talks/wildish/
Alison Wildish, Head of Web Services, Edge Hill University will talk about how Students are asking each other for help and advice rather than coming direct to our staff. These same students are advising our applicant community about University life and they're all doing it in an "informal" environment.
These are all positive developments but it does mean we start to ask the question... if we're moving towards developing and nurturing students in these online communities and empowering them to help themselves, will we still need a "corporate" Web site in the future? Furthermore with the increase in "free" tools available such as email, file storage, blogs etc. - will Institutional systems be a thing of the past?2007-07-16Plenary Talk 3: Building Highly Scalable Web Applications
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2007/talks/barr/
Jeff Barr, Amazon Web Services (Senior Manager, Web Services Evangelism) will discuss Amazon's approach to Web-scale computing. Using this new approach, developers can use Amazon's broad line of web services to rapidly and cost-effectively build scalable and flexible Web applications. Jeff will focus on Amazon's newest services, including the Simple Queue Service, the Simple Storage Service, and the Elastic Compute Cloud. The talk will include technical details and an overview of how the services are being used by customers all over the world. 2007-07-17Plenary Talk 4: Can Your Web site Be Your API?
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2007/talks/mclellan/
Drew McLellan will talk about how every time non-semantic markup is used, a piece of data dies. Data was born to be shared. Discover how the use of semantic markup and microformats can obsolete common read-heavy APIs and can be paired with identity protocols and OpenID to provide casual APIs for the loosely coupled generation.2007-07-17Plenary Talk 5: The Promise of Information Architecture
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2007/talks/doyle/
During Keith Doyle, Salford University talk, delegates will discover
how, by taking the information architecture approach as their next step, they can
improve the user experience and business benefits. Information architecture gives
delegates a framework and benchmarks for managing web provision at an institutional level.
This should be an engaging and entertaining talk which would help delegates decide
whether a formal IA role is appropriate to their organisation. Helping delegates
consider their institutional strategic approach: What is IA? How is the role
covered at the moment? Should it be a specific post rather than something that's
squeezed in with everything else we do?2007-07-172007-07-17Plenary Talk 6: Trends in Web Attacks
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2007/talks/clune/
Arthur Clune, Honeynet Project, discusses how attacks on Web servers, and internet connected devices in general have become both more common and more sophisticated in recent years. This talk will look at how people attack Web servers, and what they are hoping to gain from it, based on data from the Honeynet Project's deployment of Honeypot servers worldwide.2007-07-17Plenary Talk 7: Marketing Man takes off his Tie: Customers, Communities and Communication
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2007/talks/reader/
Peter Reader, University of Bath explains that E-communications, e-marketing and social media are hot topics for university marketers and communicators, with old ideas of 'control' looking more and more unrealistic. Now the talk is of 'influence', viral marketing, students as customers, and of client management, with the web and web technologies seen increasingly as the university's most important marketing tools. So what are the challenges, and what are the issues with which marketers will face us? Expect more of "why" and "want" than of "how"!2007-07-17Plenary Talk 8: Social Participation in Student Recruitment
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2007/talks/boag/
Paul Boag, from Headscape, considers how social participation is the cornerstone of the web 2.0 movement and has been spearheaded by sites such as digg.com. One of the underlying principles of these sites is that peer to peer recommendations carry more weight than those from either a search engine or from corporate advertising. The commercial sector has been quick to adopt this peer review mechanism with customer reviews and ratings.
This talk proposes to explore how social participation can be applied to the process of recruiting new students and what lessons can be learnt from the approach adopted by the commercial sector. We will also look at what institutional barriers exist that prevent this approach and how these can be overcome.2007-07-17Panel 1: Dealing with the Commercial World: Saviour or Satan?
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2007/talks/panel-1/
With the introduction of variable fees Universities have entered what education secretary Ruth Kelly called "a new era". Financial departments have had to find more creative ways to meet the sector's growing competitive demands and those working within universities have had to take a more business-like, customer-focused approach to many aspects of their work as they compete for students.2007-07-18