SocInfo 2009

Call For Papers International Conference on Social Informatics (SocInfo’09) 22-24 June, 2009, Warsaw, Poland

Social Informatics is an area of informatics that studies how information systems can realize social goals, apply social concepts, and become sources of information relevant for social sciences and for analysis of social phenomena.

Social Informatics can be decomposed into two interacting areas. A branch of Social Informatics research is devoted to the sensing of society through information systems. A good example of such research is Webmining or the design of social network services. A second branch of Social Informatics concerns how information systems influence social systems. This branch is devoted to the realization of social goals through the application of social concepts. Examples of such research are Trust Management and Computational Social Choice. Social Informatics also requires the collaboration of social scientists for the evaluation of the effects of the influence of the information system on society. An example of such research is the study of the impact of information technology on organizations.

The goals of Social Informatics are the improvement of both the sensing and influencing of the social system by the information system. To achieve these goals, Social Informatics must have a deeper understanding of social goals, concepts and mechanisms. For this, Social Informatics must be an interdisciplinary science that draws upon the results of sociology, economics, psychology, anthropology, behavioral game theory, sociobiology and others. Informatics has already sought inspiration from these areas. For example, the problems of conflict of interests in open, distributed systems (like Peer-to-Peer networks and the grid) have been modeled using concepts from game theory and equity theory. A practical goal is the anticipation of the social adoption and social effects of Web2.0 or other social ICT applications.

Detailed research topics of interest for this conference include, but are not limited to:
• Design and analysis of Web2.0 applications
• Computer supported collaborative work
• Trust Management algorithms and protocols
• Mechanisms for providing fairness in information systems
• Social networks: discovery, evolution, analysis and applications
• Web mining and its social interpretations
• Algorithms and protocols inspired by human societies
• Computational models of social phenomena and social simulation
• Social choice mechanisms in the e-society
• Social sciences research based on the sensing of the social system by the information system
• Social sciences research studying the effects of the information system’s influence on society