Participation Literacy

1. This might shock you if you have a traditional view of a librarian, but I find paper based information hopelessly dysfunctional. Traditional ways to publish research texts are by paper and now also PDF. The PDF format acts mainly as a source for printing. Both these forms are very static. I would like to se the main form of research texts published in polylogue environments similar to wikis, where research texts are viewed more like evolving collaboration entities with the original research text as a start of collaborative knowledge. I do not mean that everyone should have rights to edit the text itself. A Web 2.0 document is much more than a traditional document with its hyperlinks, comments, rankings, trackbacks and pingbacks.

This text is a Web 2.0 document. If you are reading it in its primary environment on the Web, it will be hyperlinked and open for participation (discussion). If you are reading a closed version such as the paper book or a print out of the PDF, I urge you to read it actively in close contact with a Web environment. Links are provided in one way or another in all versions. Words you do not understand should be easy to look up in a search engine or encyclopaedia. If you are suspicious of my interpretation of a word, please look it up and participate with your own understanding. By participating in this way, you actively promote the spirit of this text.

2. This thesis works with different styles, all from the very banal to the very complex. There are two reasons for this. 1) This is how I am. 2) The Web 2.0 practices and theories move along this wide continuum. It starts with seemingly trivial functions in software practices. The usage of these practices induces a network of increasingly complex theories. I am only in the beginning of this process.

3. My argumentation might be too enthusiastic sometimes. This is also who I am and the context of this text would be diminished if I tried to hide this. I want my person to be visible in the text, since I am a significant part of the context.

4. These issues are based on my view of Situated Knowledge (Haraway, 1991). Knowledge is always contextual and situated. This means that I cannot erase myself from the text. I am always in the centre of my text.

5. Some wise transdisciplinary researchers have a Glossary, for example John Law (2004). I guess this is almost necessary since some transdiciplinary texts address a wide community of researchers, not necessarily with the same terminology as the author. Instead of having a glossary in the paper and PDF forms, I am going to spend my energy on the primary wiki form, which will be hyperlinked both within my own text and the outside world. The hyperlinked research text is a form, which is starting to mirror the nature of research texts. Research texts have always been hyperlinked in an abstract sense with its explicit quotations and references, and the implicit intertextual qualities. There will be more about Intertextuality in part III.

6. Since I am using a lot of material from the Web, I have saved every cited page in PDF format. This is because the Web continuously changes. If you want to see the original page I quoted, just mail me the cache number, i.e. cache 0001. The cache number is stated in relation to the reference in the footnote or in the reference list.