The worldwide contest was designed to engage undergraduate and graduate students in the newly emerging, interdisciplinary field of “social computing.” Participants were encouraged to imagine how society and technology will interact 10 to 20 years from now – far enough in the future to stretch our imagination of technology, yet near enough to be plausible.

Contest entries consisted of a description of the envisioned technology as well as an imaginative realization, embodiment, or illustration of the idea. The entries were judged on the basis of creativity, understanding of technology and society, explanatory clarity and organization of the description, and the quality of the imaginative realization, embodiment, or illustration. (See the original contest announcement.)

The Winners:

First Prize ($3,000): “SENSe” by Karen Tanenbaum and Joshua Tanenbaum, graduate students, School of Interactive Arts and Technology, Simon Fraser University

Second Prize ($1,000): “Experiential Skin Diving” by Daniel Luis Kamakura, undergraduate, English major, Duke University

Third Prize ($500): “Anatomical Analytics” by Chris Castiglione, graduate student, New Media Programme, University of Amsterdam

The contest committee would like to also recognize these outstanding Honorable Mentions:
• “Mexican Laser Light Extravaganza“ by Justin Andrew Gutierrez, undergraduate, Interdisciplinary Computing in the Arts/Music, UC San Diego.
• “Continuous Media Mobilities” by Jordan Kraemer, graduate student, Cultural Anthropology, UC Irvine.
• “Virtual Health Centers” by Mariano Mora-McGinity, graduate student, Media Arts and Technology, UC Santa Barbara.

See the full Winners Announcement for more details.
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Established in 2005, the Transliteracies group includes scholars in the humanities, social sciences, and engineering in the University of California system (and in the future other research programs). It will establish working groups to study online reading from different perspectives; bring those groups into conjunction behind a shared technology development initiative; publish research and demonstration software; and train graduate students working at the intersections of the humanistic, social, and technological disciplines. (more…)

Users of today’s digital, networked information spend an increasing amount of time each day “reading” online textual and multimedia materials (for example, email, Web pages). Yet the practices of digital reading in online environments are not well understood according to the protocols of reading that arose in the last two centuries to support the individual, organizational, and social needs of late-literate societies. (more…)

Currently, the Project Group includes University of California scholars. In the future, the group may also include researchers from other universities or affiliated with research programs elsewhere. Project leader: Alan Liu. Members: Kevin C. Almeroth * Bruce Bimber * Sue-Ellen Case * Sharon Daniel * Mark Goble * N. Katherine Hayles * Tobias Höllerer * Yunte Huang * Peter Krapp * George Legrady * Peter Lyman * Mark Meadow * John Mohr * Christopher Newfield * Robert Nideffer * Lisa Parks * Carol Braun Pasternack * Mark Poster * Rita Raley * Ronald E. Rice * Mark Rose * Warren Sack * James Tobias * Matthew Turk * Noah Wardrip-Fruin * William Warner. (Member bios)