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CONTACT: Anne P. Wilson
IMMEDIATE
The new site combines the features of a well-edited magazine of opinion and a town hall forum, offering essays by IT leaders and interactive feedback from site visitors New York, February 29, 2000...The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) today announced Ubiquity, a new web service to support the IT professional. Ubiquity is located at http://www.acm.org/ubiquity. The website combines the features of a well-edited magazine of opinion and a town hall forum, and will feature essays by IT leaders as well as eventually interactive feedback from site visitors in the form of moderated, threaded lists. Readers will be encouraged to propose and submit pieces. Ubiquity is a free service of the ACM, open to all. Ubiquity is dedicated to fostering critical analysis and in-depth commentary on issues relating to the nature, constitution, structure, science, engineering, technology, practices and paradigms of the IT profession. John Gehl and Suzanne Douglas are Ubiquity’s editors; Peter J. Denning is chair of its editorial advisory group. Commenting on the new site, Denning said today "Our goal with Ubiquity is to give the IT community a central place where they can discuss vital issues of the day as an interactive community. We will engage leading writers to help us think through issues with essays and commentaries. Unlike newsgroups, Ubiquity is focused and moderated. Our editors provide useful structure and help keep discussions on topic". "The ACM brings its vast resources to the table with Ubiquity. We hope to tap into the expertise of the professional community in all areas of information technology. We will provide top-notch editors and stand behind the quality of the service." "Ubiquity will typically open a discussion with an essay, a commentary, an interview, or a set of position statements by our featured speakers and writers. The floor would then be opened for comments and discussion by site visitors. The discussion would eventually be closed and the entire package archived on the site, possibly with closing comments by speakers." ITP Initiative Ubiquity will focus on matters of wide interest as the IT field grows up. By so doing, it will advance the aims of the ACM’s Information Technology Profession initiative (ITPI), whose long-term goal is to help establish IT as a profession. Editorial background Ubiquity’s editors are John Gehl and Suzanne Douglas. John Gehl is president of NewsScan Inc., an electronic publishing company. He has worked as a researcher and consultant, and directed a university office of computer services. Suzanne Douglas is vice president of NewsScan, and has worked in the telecommunications and information technology fields for the past 18 years. They offer a variety of Internet-based editorial services including NewsScan daily (formerly Edupage) and Innovations Weekly. Peter J. Denning is past president of ACM (1980-82) and chaired the Publications Board during the development of the ACM digital library. He is currently chair of the ITP Initiative Steering Committee and of the Education Board. He is professor of computer science at George Mason University. About the ACM Founded in 1947, ACM (www.acm.org) is the world's first educational and scientific computing society. With more than 80,000 members worldwide, a dynamic series of authoritative publications, a wide range of special interest groups (SIGs), and an outstanding array of conferences, workshops and forums, ACM is a world-class resource for the entire technology field. |
