Information Course Schedule Spring 2012

How can we critically think about emergent phenomena of the Internet? Is the Internet a democratic medium for political action (a "networked public sphere") or a surveillance apparatus of centralized control? Who has access to digital information and what techniques are used to make information artificially scarce? How do trade group lawsuits against digital "piracy" affect a generation's perception of the law? Should we look at the growing sphere of copyright as a public interest problem, or celebrate the expansion of creators' rights? Can free software thrive independently from ideological backing? Why are peer production communities like Wikipedia and Linux affected by extreme gender disparity?

In this course, we will examine the societal implications of computer networks from critical and technical perspectives. We will collectively engage with issues of intellectual property, access to information, privacy, freedom of speech, representation, and peer production. We will be discussing provocative texts and media, doing hands-on exploration of emerging technologies, and practicing ethnographic fieldwork in online communities. We will also offer opportunities for field trips and guest speakers to provide us with different perspectives. Additionally, students will engage in a semester-long collaborative project in a flexible format.

This is a student-initiated group study course (DE-Cal). Please contact the student coordinator(s) for specific questions.

Must be taken on a passed/not passed basis.

Surveying history through the lens of information and information through the lens of history, this course looks across time to consider what might distinguish ours as “the information age” and what that description implies about the role of “information technology” across time. We will select moments in societies’ development of information production, circulation, consumption, and storage from the earliest writing and numbering systems to the world of Social Media. In every instance, we’ll be concerned with what and when, but also with how and why. Throughout we will keep returning to questions about how information-technological developments affect society and vice versa?

Three hours of lecture per week. Prerequisites: No prior New Media production experience required.  Introduction to interdisciplinary study and design of New Media. Survey of theoretical and practical foundations of New Media including theory and history; analysis and reception; computational foundations; social implications; interaction, visual, physical, and narrative design. Instruction combines lectures and project-based learning using case studies from everyday technology (e.g., telephone, camera, web).

How can we critically think about emergent phenomena of the Internet? Is the Internet a democratic medium for political action (a "networked public sphere") or a surveillance apparatus of centralized control? Who has access to digital information and what techniques are used to make information artificially scarce? How do trade group lawsuits against digital "piracy" affect a generation's perception of the law? Should we look at the growing sphere of copyright as a public interest problem, or celebrate the expansion of creators' rights? Can free software thrive independently from ideological backing? Why are peer production communities like Wikipedia and Linux affected by extreme gender disparity?

In this course, we will examine the societal implications of computer networks from critical and technical perspectives. We will collectively engage with issues of intellectual property, access to information, privacy, freedom of speech, representation, and peer production. We will be discussing provocative texts and media, doing hands-on exploration of emerging technologies, and practicing ethnographic fieldwork in online communities. We will also offer opportunities for field trips and guest speakers to provide us with different perspectives. Additionally, students will engage in a semester-long collaborative project in a flexible format.

This is a student-initiated group study course (DE-Cal). Please contact the student coordinator(s) for specific questions.

Must be taken on a passed/not passed basis.

This course is designed to be an introduction to the topics and issues associated with information and information technology and its role in society. Throughout the semester we will consider both the consequence and impact of technologies on social groups and on social interaction and how society defines and shapes the technologies that are produced. Students will be exposed to a broad range of applied and practical problems, theoretical issues, as well as methods used in social scientific analysis. The four sections of the course are: 1) theories of technology in society, 2) information technology in workplaces 3) automation vs. humans, and 4) networked sociability.

7 weeks - 4 hours of laboratory per week. This course introduces software skills used in building prototype scripts for applications in data science and information management. The course gives an overview of procedural programming, object-oriented programming, and functional programming techniques in the Python scripting language, together with an overview of fundamental data structures, associated algorithms, and asymptotic performance analysis. Students will watch a set of instructional videos covering material and will have four hours of laboratory-style course contact each week.

As information becomes increasingly strategic for all organizations, technology professionals must also develop the core business skills required to build personal brand, expand influence, build high-quality relationships, and deliver on critical enterprise projects. Using a combination of business and academic readings, case discussions and guest speakers, this course will explore a series of critical business topics that apply to both start-up and Fortune 500 enterprises. Subjects include: communication and presentation skills, software and product development methodologies, negotiation skills, employee engagement, organizational structures and career paths, successful interviewing, and CV preparation.

This course will provide an introduction to the field of human-computer interaction (HCI). Students will learn to apply design thinking to user experience (UX) design, prototyping, & evaluation. The course will also cover special topic areas within HCI.

This course addresses concepts and methods of user experience research, from understanding and identifying needs, to evaluating concepts and designs, to assessing the usability of products and solutions. We emphasize methods of collecting and interpreting qualitative data about user activities, working both individually and in teams, and translating them into design decisions. Students gain hands-on practice with observation, interview, survey, focus groups, and expert review. Team activities and group work are required during class and for most assignments. Additional topics include research in enterprise, consulting, and startup organizations, lean/agile techniques, mobile research approaches, and strategies for communicating findings.

Three hours of lecture per week. This course covers the practical and theoretical issues associated with computer-mediated communication (CMC) systems (e.g., email, newsgroups, wikis, online games, etc.). We will focus on the analysis of CMC practices, the relationship between technology and behavior, and the design and implementation issues associated with constructing CMC systems. This course primarily takes a social scientific approach (including research from social psychology, economics, sociology, and communication).

Three hours of lecture per week. Prerequisites: Graduate standing. As it's generally used, "information" is a collection of notions, rather than a single coherent concept. In this course, we'll examine conceptions of information based in information theory, philosophy, social science, economics, and history. Issues include: How compatible are these conceptions; can we talk about "information" in the abstract? What work do these various notions play in discussions of literacy, intellectual property, advertising, and the political process? And where does this leave "information studies" and "the information society"?

Three hours of lecture per week. Introduction to legal issues in information management, antitrust, contract management, international law including intellectual property, trans-border data flow, privacy, libel, and constitutional rights.

The design and presentation of digital information. Use of graphics, animation, sound, visualization software, and hypermedia in presenting information to the user. Methods of presenting complex information to enhance comprehension and analysis. Incorporation of visualization techniques into human-computer interfaces. Three hours of lecture and one hour of laboratory per week.

Specific topics, hours and credit may vary from section to section, year to year. May be repeated for credit with change in content.

Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies.  Two to six hours of lecture per week for seven and one-half weeks or one to four hours of lecture per week for 15 weeks.  Prerequisites:  Consent of instructor.  Specific topics hours, and credit may vary from section to section, year to year.

Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies.  Two to six hours of lecture per week for seven and one-half weeks or one to four hours of lecture per week for 15 weeks.  Prerequisites:  Consent of instructor.  Specific topics hours, and credit may vary from section to section, year to year.

Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies.  Two to six hours of lecture per week for seven and one-half weeks or one to four hours of lecture per week for 15 weeks.  Prerequisites:  Consent of instructor.  Specific topics hours, and credit may vary from section to section, year to year.

Specific topics, hours and credit may vary from section to section, year to year. May be repeated for credit with change in content.

How does the design of new educational technologies change the way children learn and think? Which aspects of creative thinking and learning can technology support? How do we design systems that reflect our understanding of how we learn? This course explores issues in designing and evaluating technologies that support creativity and learning. The class will cover theories of creativity and learning, implications for design, as well as a survey of new educational technologies such as works in computer supported collaborative learning, digital manipulatives, and immersive learning environments.

Specific topics, hours and credit may vary from section to section, year to year. May be repeated for credit with change in content.

Specific topics, hours and credit may vary from section to section, year to year. May be repeated for credit with change in content.

Course may be repeated for credit. One and one-half to two hours of lecture per week for eight weeks. Two hours of lecture per week for six weeks. Three hours of lecture per week for five weeks.

In your present and future work, you will increasingly face what have been called “wicked problems.” They are volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous. Dealing with them requires new ways of thinking about issues and new ways of innovative leadership. This class focuses on having you learn about and practice some of the processes and tools — drawn from the fields of critical thinking, design thinking, systems thinking and creative problem solving — that will help you grapple with the “wicked problems” presented to you in school and beyond. Specifically, we’ll work with ways of collecting information to characterize a problem, framing and re-framing that problem, coming up with a range of solutions and then gathering feedback to assess those solutions. We’ll work in a “learn-by-doing” mode in five zones: observations, insights, ideas, solutions and stories and apply those processes and tools to designing and redesigning in real settings.

One hour colloquium per week. Must be taken on a satisfactory/unsatisfactory basis. Prerequisites: Ph.D. standing in the School of Information. Colloquia, discussion, and readings designed to introduce students to the range of interests of the school.

Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies.  Two to four hours of seminar per week. Prerequisites: Consent of instructor. Topics in information management and systems and related fields. Specific topics vary from year to year. May be repeated for credit, with change of content.

Topics in information management and systems and related fields. Specific topics vary from year to year. May be repeated for credit, with change of content. May be offered as a two semester sequence.

Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies.  Two to four hours of seminar per week. Prerequisites: Consent of instructor. Topics in information management and systems and related fields. Specific topics vary from year to year. May be repeated for credit, with change of content.