'Preditors': Making citizen journalism work

Although there is great interest in citizen journalism services that harness user-generated content, the continuing contribution of professional staff who coordinate such efforts is often overlooked. This paper offers a typology of the work of the professional "preditors" who continue to operate at the heart of "pro-am" journalism initiatives. It shows that their work takes place along four dimensions – content work, networking, community work and tech work. It suggests that this is a structural change in journalistic practice, which has implications for journalists' professional identity and journalism education

Election Flops on YouTube

In an election campaign as drawn out as this, you'd have to have excellent memory to remember the hype around John Howard's use of YouTube to make policy announcements. Some months ago, the media were all over the story - but unfortunately for the Prime Minister, much like the widely-predicted poll 'narrowing', the YouTube effect has been missing in action

Beyond Gotcha: Blogs as a Space for Debate

The mainstream media and critics of Web 2.0’s "cult of the amateur" often suggest that blogs and citizen journalism will never replace their mainstream counterparts because they "don’t break stories". Notwithstanding the fundamental furphy – who ever said anything about "replacing" the MSM anyway? – there is some truth in this. It goes without saying that most bloggers don’t have the resources, pulling power or proximity to the pollies to do much original political reporting: this is something that most sensible public affairs bloggers concede. (Though how often the mainstream media really break stories – as against exploiting deliberate, calculated ‘leaks’ from party spinsters – is a separate question.

Blogging outside the Echo Chamber

In the current political climate, it's no surprise that a number of sessions at the recent Australian Blogging Conference at Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane focussed on the potential for blogs and other citizen journalism sites to impact on political news and punditry. In a previous article, we've already noted the continuing skirmishes between psephologist bloggers and the political commentators, whose rather unscientific interpretation of opinion poll results that some bloggers have challenged fervently

Impacts of Energy Development on Utah Water Resources

Introduction: Choosing a theme for a conference especially one for a group of diverse disciplines such as the American Water Resources Association encompasses, is always a challenge. you find yourself torn between thigns you\u27d really like to talk and hear about, and topics you think will draw attendance. It was most fortunate when somebody came up with the idea of Water for Energy, becasue to my way of thinking, it met both of these ends. There is no denying that starting in late 1973, energy has been the catchword, and the energy crisis has been the bandwagon to leap upon. But in Utah, energy is more than potent ad copy. Development of the coal, oil, oil shale, bituminous sands, and geothermal resources within the State can, and perhaps will, turn the state unside down. Whether or not anyone at any level of government will be able to exercise control over evnergy-related events remains to be seen. It is no surprise that energy-development in Utah will be governed by the availability of water. What may be more important is the growing evidence that if the laws and policies of the state regarding allocation of water are not changed, energy development will get all the water it needs (through the free market system(, and agriculture will be the loser. So the energy crisis will become in effect a rural life crisis. Nearly everybody wants to have conomic growth; nearly everybody wants to maintain the environmentl and aesthetics that have made Utah a pleasant place to live. But can we have both? Water is but one aspect of this question, but in Utah it is a cruicial one. The papers that follow discuess technical, economic, social, legal, and political factors associated with water development for evergy in Utah. Hopefully, this material will provide new insights and result in more informed and rational decision-making

A Procedure for Determining the Feasibility of Planned Conjunctive Use of Surface and Ground Water

Improved management of water resources is one means for alleviating deficiencies in water supply. One promising management technique is integration of ground water and surface water supplies and storage unites, or planned conjunctive use. In order to assess the value of this technique in relations to a particular area or basin, it is necessary to look at the economic, hydrologic, and legal system as a whole. A planning procedure is developed which will enable feasibility to be determined at a minimum cost. The procedure consists of determining legal constraints, estimating benefits which will accrue to additional water, estimating the quantity of water which is physically available, and determining the costs of supply. Extension of the feasibility study is discussed in terms of systems analysis and linear programming. An example of the use of the procedure in the Little Lost River basin (Idaho) is given

Is There a Customer Relationship Effect from Bank ATM Surcharges?

This paper investigates the use of ATM surcharges as a strategic device to increase bank profitability. We show that ATM surcharge changes can have both a direct effect on bank profitability and an indirect effect via customer switching and a related customer relationship effect. That is, customer switching results in an increase in the demand for other services provided by the surcharge-increasing bank. Using unique databases, we provide evidence to show that overall bank profitability is favorably affected by surcharge increases. We also show evidence supporting the existence of an indirect effect, especially for larger banks

Is There a Customer Relationship Effect from Bank ATM Surcharges?

This paper investigates the use of ATM surcharges as a sategic device to increase bank profitability. We show that ATM surcharge changes can have both a direct effect on bank profitability and an indirect effect via customer switching and a related customer relationship effect. That is, customer switching results in an increase in the demand for other services provided by the surcharge increasing bank. Using unique data bases, we provide evidence to show that overall bank profitability is favorably affected by surcharge increases. We also show evidence supporting the existence of an indirect effect, especially for larger banks

The role of lithosphere thickness in the formation of ocean islands and seamounts: contrasts between the Louisville and Emperor-Hawaiian hotspot trails

The Hawaii-Emperor and Louisville seamounts form the two most prominent time-progressive hotspot trails on Earth. Both formed over a similar time interval on lithosphere with a similar range of ages and thickness. The Hawaii-Emperor seamounts are large and magma productivity appears to be increasing at present. The Louisville seamounts, by contrast, are smaller and the trail appears to be waning. We present new major-and trace element data from five of the older (74-50 Ma) Louisville seamounts drilled during International Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) Expedition 330 and compare these to published data from the Emperor seamounts of the same age. Despite drilling deep into the shield-forming volcanic rocks at three of the Louisville seamounts, our data confirm the results of earlier studies based on dredge samples that the Louisville seamounts are composed of remarkably uniform alkali basalt. The basalt composition can be modelled by ~1.5–3% partial melting of a dominantly garnet lherzolite mantle with a composition similar to that of the Ontong Java Plateau mantle source. Rock samples recovered by dredging and drilling on the Emperor Seamounts range in composition from tholeiitic to alkali basalt and require larger degrees of melting (2–10%) and spinel-to garnet lherzolite mantle sources. We use a simple decompression melting model to show that melting of mantle with a potential temperature of 1500ºC under lithosphere of varying thickness can account for the composition of the shield-forming tholeiitic basalts from the Emperor seamounts, while post-shield alkali basalt requires a lower temperature (1300–1400ºC). This is consistent with the derivation of Hawaii-Emperor shield-forming magmas from the hotter axis of a mantle plume and the post-shield magmas from the cooler plume sheath as the seamount drifts away from the plume axis. The composition of basalt from the Louisville seamounts shows no significant variation with lithosphere thickness at the time of seamount formation, contrary to the predictions of our decompression melting model. This lack of influence of lithospheric thickness ischaracteristic of basalt from most ocean islands. Theproblem can be resolved if the Louisville seamounts were formed by dehydration melting of mantle containinga small amount of water in a cooler plume. Hydrous melting in a relatively cool mantle plume (Tp=1350–1400°C) could produce a small amount of melt and then be inhibited by increasing viscosity from reaching the dry mantle solidus and melting further. The failure of the plume to reach the dry mantle solidus or the base of the lithosphere means that the resulting magmas would have the same composition irrespective of lithosphere thickness. A hotter mantle plume (Tp≈1500°C) beneath the Emperor seamounts and the Hawaiian Islands would have lower viscosity before the onset of melting, melt to a larger extent, and decompress to the base of the lithosphere. Thus our decompression melting model could potentially explain the composition of both the Emperor and Louisville seamounts. The absence of a significant lithospheric control on the composition of basalt from nearly all ocean islands suggests that dehydration melting is the rule and the Hawaiian islands the exception. Alternatively, many ocean islands may not be the product of mantle plumes but instead be formed by decompression melting of heterogeneous mantle sources composed of peridotite containing discrete bodies of carbonated and silica-oversaturated eclogite within the general upper mantle convective flow