Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS)
Conference Website:http://www.hicss.hawaii.edu/hicss_44/apahome44.htm

Call for Papers: Research 2.0: Web 2.0 and Virtual Worlds as Research
Environments, HICSS 2010
Please visit the minitrack website for more details:
http://www.ualberta.ca/~drathi/hicss/research2.0.html

Part of the Track: Internet and Digital Economy


Minitrack: Research 2.0: Web 2.0 and Virtual Worlds as Research Environments
The Web 2.0 environment offers many new opportunities for researchers
undertaking both qualitative and quantitative research (e.g., increased
potential for collecting data from online communities and social networks
around the globe). However, these technologies can also be used by
researchers to enhance the research process (e.g., facilitating research
collaboration between project team members to develop tools and technologies
to analyze data and write papers). Understanding the privacy and legal
implications in both contexts – i.e., the implementation of the study, as
well as the research process – is an area that warrants further exploration
in a minitrack environment.

This minitrack invites papers on topics including (but not limited to):

* Changing landscape for qualitative and quantitative research due to
emergence of Web 2.0 and virtual worlds;
* Development of online research communities;
* Online collaborative techniques in Web 2.0 environments for advancing
research methodologies;
* Use of Web 2.0 tools and technologies in data collection and analyses;
* Use of Web 2.0 platforms and virtual worlds (e.g., Second Life) such as
avatars, online communities, for conducting qualitative and quantitative
research;
* Effectiveness of Web 2.0 for increasing participating rates in research
(e.g., questionnaire response rates; online focus groups);
* Using user-generated content as a data source in research;
* Ethical and legal issues (e.g., privacy; copyright) in conducting
qualitative and quantitative research in virtual environments;
* Use of social computing in building research communities;
* Role of social computing in the advancement of data collection techniques;
* New data collection approaches in Web 2.0 environments.


Minitrack Co-Chairs:
Lisa M. Given
(Primary Contact)
School of Library and Information Studies
University of Alberta
Email: lisa.given[at]ualberta.ca
Website: http://www.ualberta.ca/~lgiven/

Dinesh Rathi
School of Library and Information Studies
University of Alberta
Email: drathi[at]ualberta.ca
Website: www.drathi.com