Abstract

This is an evaluation of the web 2.0 collection of Digital Non-Fiction user Generated Content for the Aung San Suu Kyi project, ‘Present for Suu’. This has been designed by an experienced foreign correspondent, now MA student, and is done in collaboration with Peter Popham of The Independent newspaper (the writer of the substantial Forward). Also participating is a major UK publisher and the thousands of visitors to the site. The project has been designed to produce a book, or a number of books, to commemorate the 20 years of turmoil in Burma, the anniversary of which is August 2008. There is to be a launch in the ‘real world,’ but also in Second Life and possibly other entities in the Metaverse.

This paper is an analytical assessment and critical evaluation of the Laboratory methodology in this project from October of 2007 until June 2008 when the print book will be published.

Two blogs and a wiki wiki are involved, one from the Managing Editor/Presenter of the project (analyzing the academic research involved). The other, by the same author but with extensive collaboration, is designed to attract contributions from people, from all walks of life and from all nationalities, to the wiki wiki with RSS feeds, to hear podcasts and to read other multi-media content.

The research criteria discussed in this paper will include but are not confined to:
The analysis of the collection, editing and publishing of UGC to produce a) a vibrant wiki and b) the production of print media from UGC in web 2.0; the viability of the use of SMS to text in Second Life for the collection of UGC material; the effectiveness of New Media in activist publishing and also, discretely, of viral activism in New Media.

• Claudia Cragg (UK), De Montfort University, Leicester, UK

Full text (PDF) p.  118-119