Hello Everyone,
I posted this to Antiquist yesterday and got no response: either folks
are befuddled or could care less about using Web 2.0 tools to facilitate
communication/research between excavation team members both during and
after digging season. So I'm posting here and will probably see what
folks over on Romarch and ARCH-L have to say, too, if anything.
It's no secret that archaeological sites are chock full of data and
metadata, the bits of which are managed by that site's archaeological
team of director, trench supervisors, excavators, cartographers, various
experts/specialists, artists, conservators, photographers -- you know
the usual suspects.
How valuable would it be then for sites like Troy, or Corinth, or the
Agora excavations, or Tel Anafa, or any other myriad excavations
anywhere in the world (both Old and New) to build and maintain a
site-centric website that draws all of the site's personalities together
to discuss current finds, share end-of-season reports, collaborate on
publications, exchange photos, and maintain current (and instant)
contact with team members world-wide? I know of no excavation that
actively posts ongoing research and dialogue on-line for its team
members to use for collaboration after the season ends.
As some of you may know, I manage the eClassics web site for
Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers (http://eclassics.ning.com). I found the
Ning platform incredibly easy to use (no, I'm not shilling for them, but
from my experience anybody can use Ning to create an on-line social
network for just about anything in under 30 minutes).
What I propose is that sites create their own gathering places on the
Interweb to facilitate information exchange. Social networking sites
created via Ning (ning.com) can be secured with a password so that
sensitive research can be carried out prior to releasing it to the rest
of the world. For website users, if an excavation team member has
Intenet access (from work, home, library, cafe, etc.), s/he can log in
anywhere in the world, upload research, notes, photos, drawings, view
posts and discussions from other team members and the like. There's
even site-specific e-mail so that communications can be maintained in a
single space -- nothing gets lost! It's dead simple and can be done
from anywhere. Ning sites are super-easy to manage, too.
Anyway, the short theme to this long message is that the tools are now
available to create social networking sites for archaeological sites to
facilitate better, faster communication, sharing ideas, comments,
publication drafts, and other material on-line. I'll be proposing this
to my site's director in Greece, and we'll see where things go from
there, but it really will cut down on the waiting time for various
publications we're putting together.
Something to ponder and, I hope, execute. Excavations are 4-dimensional
beasts, and social networks utilizing Web 2.0 tools can now effectively
maintain the multi-dimensional aspects surrounding each excavation.
Andrew Reinhard
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Andrew Reinhard
eLearning and IT Coordinator
Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers, Inc.
1000 Brown Street, Unit 101
Wauconda, Illinois 60084
[log in to unmask]
Tollfree: 800.392.6453
Phone: 847.526.4344 x19
Fax: 847.526.2867
www.bolchazy.com
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