COMPUTER PROFESSIONALS for SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
Turning Thoughts to Actions

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• REPORT FROM THE BOARD
• OFFICE SPACE NEEDED
• CPSR BOARD ELECTIONS
• DAN GILLMOR TALK - May 20th
• PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE NEEDS HELP
• 2003-04 STUDENT ESSAY CONTEST
• CPSR SPAIN HOSTED A BARCELONA MEETING - May 15
• VOTING TECHNOLOGY WORKING GROUP
• PDC 2004 REGISTRATION AVAILABLE SOON
• PUBLIC SPHERE PROJECT
• NON CPSR OPPORTUNITIES

REPORT FROM THE BOARD

The 2004 annual conference and meeting will take place in or around Washington, DC, date to be determined. The board would like to combine some of the traditional issue-oriented content with extensive discussion of CPSR's future. Substantial time and attention will be devoted to how to better engage members, support programmatic activity, increase membership and impact, and generally revitalize CPSR. Volunteers are needed to help organize this event. Please contact Paul Hyland, phyland(a)cpsr.org, if you are willing and able to assist.

In the interest of contributing to some of the debates accompanying the U.S. presidential campaign, CPSR aims to develop a "report card" that grades the current U.S. administration on its performance in several policy or issue areas, e.g. privacy, of concern to CPSR. This report card, which would probably involve one or two pages of supporting explanation for each grade, would be formally announced and released in the fall, prior to the election. Ideally, this would take place at the annual meeting. Any member interested in contributing to this effort is invited to contact Stuart Shapiro, sshapiro(a)cpsr.org. Please note that to date we have received few expressions of interest. If there continues to be insufficient interest, this project will likely be dropped.

CPSR OFFICE SPACE NEEDED

CPSR seeks suggestions for finding about 250 square feet of cheaper or free office space in the greater Palo Alto area by June/July. Please contact cpsr(a)cpsr.org if your organization/ company may have space, or if you have ideas.

CPSR BOARD ELECTIONS

Candidate statements are posted at http://www.cpsr.org

Members can have access to the candidates, and current and continuing board members, to discuss and debate issues by joining the Elections list via http://lists.cpsr.org/elections

Recent CPSR elections have been decided by a handful of votes. Your vote really can make a difference. Participating in the annual board election represents one of the most fundamental ways in which you can engage and influence your organization.

YOUR BALLOT MUST BE POSTMARKED BACK TO CPSR BY JUNE 7.

CPSR C0-HOSTING DAN GILLMOR TALK

What happens when anyone can make and distribute news to the whole world?

Thrusday, May 20th, 6-9 pm Computer History Museum, Mountain View, CA

San Jose Mercury News columnist Dan Gillmor previews a central theme from his upcoming book. The collision of journalism and technology is transforming the roles of newsmakers, reporters, editors, and readers, as the audience becomes an active participant in the news making process.

6:00-7:00 pm light snacks and a networking reception.

$10 SDForum/Co-Host members, $20 non-members. At door add $10.

Co-hosted by the Computer History Museum, CPSR, CSPA, and ACM San Francisco Bay Area Chapter.

See http://www.sdforum.org/SDForum/Templates/CalendarEvent.aspx?CID=1380
Email: info(a)sdforum.org
Phone: 408-494-8378

PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE NEEDS HELP

Members interested in writing and/or editing for the impending reincarnation of the CPSR website and/or for the CPSR Journal, should join and contact the Publications Committee via http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/cpsr-publications

2003-04 STUDENT ESSAY CONTEST

CPSR received 21 essays from:

• 13 U.S. States and Territories, and Canada and Europe,
• 18 Undergraduates, 3 Graduate Students
• 6 CPSR members' students, 6 non-CPSR members' students
• California Polytechnic State University, Depaul University,
• Norwich University, Pennsylvania State University, Ryerson
• University, Towson University, University of North Carolina-
• Chapel Hill, University of Notre Dame, University of Wisconsin-
• Parkside, University of Washington - Tacoma, Washington
• State University, and West Virginia University

They are being reviewed now by 22 CPSR members. Thanks!

CPSR SPAIN HOSTED A BARCELONA MEETING - MAY 15

http://people.ac.upc.es/leandro/cpsr-es-bcn-meeting.html

An open meeting for CPSR members and peple interested and ICT policies, just afer the ICG/INET 2004 conference.

Objectives/Objetivos:

• Focus on main developments in ICT policy environment--- Catalonia & Spanish, Europe, Global---and CPSR's possible responses.
• CPSR organization: CPSR-ES, European chapter, challenges and issues.

NEWS FROM THE COMPUTERS & ENVIRONMENT WORKING GROUP May 14, 2004

It has been three months since I communicated the new plan for a focused approach to breathing life back into the Computers and Environment WorkingGroup. That plan included an issues focus and a few activities that we can pursue in order to raise the CPSR's voice on environmental issues and to promote awareness and action to ensure the impacts from computing are creating a more just, sustainable world.

The short version of an update about relevant activities include:

• a redesigned and improved Web page for the group,
• a meeting with the group's board liaison,
• comments on environment issues from candidates for the upcoming board election, and
• an interesting Bay Area conference coming soon that could be an appropriate venue for our group to meet and act.

* As mentioned in the plan, the web pages for our group were in need of updating. Some of the significant changes that you can now find at http://www.cpsr.org/program/environment are new and working links, division of content to make it easier to navigate, a focus on participation, communication of our focus issues and activities, meta tags, and the use of CSS and XHTML for improved code quality.

* Also, I met with our board liaison, Paul Hyland, this past Monday while I was in DC. Paul is excited about our group and is looking forward to seeing us be an active Working Group. We discussed the possibility of increasing participation with a specific campaign or activity around one of the focus issues (hardware recycling, impacts of computers, green design, and responsible practices in IT).

* Board candidates have been asked to opine on the issues of Computers and the Environment, and those comments are being circulated on our listserv. Thanks to the candidates who have responded. Anyone interested in the comments is welcome to join our listserv- http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/cpsr-environment - or ask me - cjj(a)ifpeople.net - (or the candidates!).

* One last thing: PlaNetwork InterActive conference, San Francisco, June 5-6. Will be very interesting and cover a number of issues close to the group and the broader organization's goals. The conference will cover issues of electronic voting, social networking and Internet activism. It will also feature themes of sustainability, alternative economies, and social responsibility. The InterActive space is promoting participation and you can propose topics once you register. The web site is: http://www.planetwork.net/2004conf/. If you register, please use code: "RefID 4290". Thanks!

Chris Johnson,
Chair, CPSR Computers & Environment WG

P.S. Another event to mention: "The Business Case for Sustainability: Case studies, strategies, and benefits for businesses" - May 26 - Atlanta, GA This interactive workshop will show how business can, and does, benefit from improving social and environmental impacts. See http://www.ifpeople.net for more details and to RSVP.

CPSR'S VOTING TECHNOLOGY WORKING GROUP

Paul Hyland represented CPSR at a press conference by TrueMajority.org, held outside the U.S. Election Assistance Commission hearing in Washington, DC on May 5th. Paul passed out CPSR's Voting Technology Working Group's Statement, written largely by Erik Nilsson, and spoke to several reporters. The hearing received extensive coverage in the media.

Bottom line: "Considering the difficulty of making touchscreen-type voting systems even tolerably trustworthy, it's worth asking if they are actually the best system available for voting. CPSR concludes that these machines are not the best elections systems available, even with the addition of a voter-verifiable paper trail. A voter- verifiable paper trail transforms a dangerous voting system into a mediocre one. America's voting needs can be better met by systems, such as optical scan, which have demonstrated a level of reliability and trustworthiness that touchscreen systems have never come close to, and probably will never achieve. Broken touchscreen systems must be patched-up, but it is better still to vote on systems that are not a patchwork in the first place."

http://www.cpsr.org/issues/EACMay04Statement.htmlhttp://www.cpsr.org/issues/EACMay04.html

CPSR members can join the Working Group by subscribing via http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/vote-wg

CPSR co-sponsored

THE ELECTRONIC VOTE: WHEN DEMOCRACY AND TECHNOLOGY INTERSECT, IS DEMOCRACY AT RISK?

May 4, at the University of Chicago

Featuring: Kenneth Janda, Professor of Political Science at Northwestern University - specializes in the historical ramifications of voting systems for democracy

Adam Stubblefield, Johns Hopkins University Information Security Institute - assisted in the creation of a recent government- sponsored report criticizing Diebold electronic voting systems as vulnerable to tampering

David Orr, Cook County Clerk - presides over all elections in Cook County, and has recently taken interest in the issue of touch-screen voting machines

Sanford J. Morganstein, President and Founder of Populex Voting Systems - worked to design voter-verifiable ectronic voting systems

Carolyn Shapiro, Visiting Associate Professor of Law, Chicago-Kent College of Law - examined election technology disparities by district

ARTFUL INTEGRATION: INTERWEAVING MEDIA, MATERIALS AND PRACTICES PDC 2004

July 27-31
Toronto, Ontario, CANADA

The secure online registration page will be available soon. Watch http://cpsr.org

PUBLIC SPHERE PROJECT REPORT

by Doug Schuler

I've been pushing forward with the Public Sphere Project, mostly talking to people about "civic intelligence." I'll be presenting "Smart Enough Soon Enough? Understanding and Enhancing Society's Civic Intelligence" for a symposium of The Center for Communication and Civic Engagement, " May 25 at the University of Washington. I'll be the guest editor of a special issue of AI & Society: THE JOURNAL OF HUMAN CENTRED SYSTEMS AND MACHINE INTELLIGENCE on "Exploring Civic Intelligence: Descriptions & Prescriptions." We are now finishing up the call which should be out within the week. Civic intelligence is slated to be the topic for the next DIAC that we plan to convene in 2005. It may be in Seattle and it may be in ??? Ideas related to organizing and funding, also, would be much appreciated!

The pattern language project (http://www.cpsr.org/program/sphere/patterns) just completed a major milestone. Working with the people on the pattern-language mailing list, we selected 132 pattern submissions that we believe will provide the backbone for the final pattern language. We also adopted a provisional categorization scheme. Both the patterns themselves —http://cpsr.org/program/sphere/patterns/phase-II.html— and the categories — http://cpsr.org/program/sphere/patterns/phase-II-categories.html are now on the web.

I was interviewed for an article on e-government in Metro, a weekly newspaper based in San Jose. The title is "Cybersloths: When it comes to technology, Silicon Valley governments are still in the primitive stages" by William Dean Hinton. http://www.metroactive.com/papers/metro/05.05.04/cybersloths-0419.html

I'm working with Dmitry Latuhkin and others in Chelyabinsk, Russia on a project entitled, "Universal Community Networking." If all goes well I'll be visiting in Chelyabinsk later this summer to help develop a collaborative project.

Finally, we'd like to see you enter your book or other citations into our collaborative bibliography. It's still a little sparse -- http://cpsr.org/program/sphere/refs/display-citations.php - but we're hoping to see it expand considerably in the next couple of months.

NON CPSR OPPORTUNITIES

Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society Invites Applications for Emerging Leaders International Fellows Program
Deadline: September 30, 2004

The Emerging Leaders International Fellows Program provides leadership training through applied research and professional mentorships for young scholar-practitioners in the nonprofit sector. The program is open to scholars and practitioners interested in building third-sector capacity in the United States and overseas. This year's fellows will be selected from abroad and also from communities of color under-represented in the U.S. grantmaking sector.

The topics for the Emerging Leaders Program in 2005 will be community foundations and diaspora philanthropy. See http://philanthropy.org/programs/ifp/application.html http://philanthropy.org

The Journal of Information, Communication and Ethics in Society (ICES) is looking for high quality unpublished work - conceptual, visionary, empirical or policy focused, or any combination of these - from academics and practitioners. All topics in the area of social and ethical issues are acceptable. Those organising appropriate conferences might wish to consider discussing an arrangement for the best papers from the conference to appear as a special section - contact the editors at nbf(a)dmu.ac.uk. See http://www.troubador.co.uk/ices/submissions.asp.

The CPSR Compiler is a monthly notice with short updates on recent activities of our members and opportunities to engage in the development of the public voice through CPSR projects.

To report news for future issues, send a sentence or two (and URL if available) to cpsr(a)cpsr.org

CPSR provides a discussion and project space where individuals can contribute to the public debate and design of our global digital future. Through CPSR's chapters and working groups, members focus on regional and civic issues developing the public voice. To insure a democratic future in a time of intense globalization, the voice of the public must command a prominent position on the world stage. CPSR frames and channels the public voice.

When in doubt about how to get more out of your CPSR membership, contact cpsr(a)cpsr.org or refer to the Activists Handbook http://www.cpsr.org/publications/Activists_Handbook.htmlto get help in getting the most out of your membership.

To get involved in policy work through CPSR, consider joining one of CPSR's Working Groups http://www.cpsr.org/cpsr/workgrps.html or contact cpsr(a)cpsr.org about starting a new one.

CPSR-Activists is the main members forum of CPSR, where the board and members discuss current policy and organizational issues. Only subscribed members can post to this list: http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/cpsr-activists

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Susan Evoy * Managing Director
Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility
P.O. Box 717 * Palo Alto * CA * 94302
Phone: (650) 322-3778 * (650) 322-4748 (fax)
Email: evoy(a)cpsr.org
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