Incommunity at National City: off to a great start...

...were we today at the Board of Directors meeting for NUCRI (National University Community Research Institute). I was honored to be there. Dr. Tom McCalla took the opportunity to tell the audience what was going to take place at National University in the next couple of days - the InComunity event, which my next blog entries will document: a summit that will gather thinkers and practitioners who strategize/work/reflect on the braod topic of smart communities. I will blog extensively during that period but for now just a quick note on the Board of Directors meeting. Professor David Goldberg (UCHRI - UCI) via videoconference talked about HASTAC and its overarching objectives as this was a diverse audience - and in fact some clarification of terminology is often required in this (and other) areas - terabytes, grid, cyberinfrastructure. I was pleased to hear Professor Goldberg talk about a project involving the collection of Portuguese maps as an example of the historical value that large collections stored in the Grid may have (ahem ...truly yours is Portuguese). There were some really strong questions from the audience, namely from Professor John Eger on the future of HASTAC and the direction it is taking. Dr. Radah Nankamur had the opportunity to mention some of the social science projects currently undertaken at NCSA, to underline some of the points Dr. Goldberg was making about the enormous potential for interdisciplinary work that this immense repository of data that is the GRid, may offer. One of the most inspiring presentations in a sort of dreary way... - and certainly the one with the highest notes of humor - was delivered by Professor Juan Carlos Moreno-Brid, United Nations Senior Economic Affairs Officer for Mexico and the Caribbean. It was a very serious, rather black, perspective on Latin American Economy. Professor Moreno-Brid included some reflexions on the recent shift to the left lived in Latin American and confronted with numbers the accusations (or better yet: predictions...) of "irresponsibility" that some are imputing to this left-wing governments (Chavez, Ortega,...). His last sentence - that I cannot reproduce exactly here - summarized in the witty style that characterized all his presentation (and pesonality, one shoudl say!) his macro-analysis of where things are going in Latin America: From Dickens to Austin: From Great Expectations to less Pride and Prejudice That is all for now from National University at San Diego. The Incommunity event kicks-off tomorrow. Stay tuned for more information from Ana Boa-Ventura, English-impaired but enthusiastic "blogger on the scene"!