IOSA.it Open Archaeology

I just landed in Rome, and I've learned from the news that Alberto Ronchey passed away some days ago. He was ministry of Cultural Heritage during the 1990s with 2 different Italian Governments, but that's only the most known thing he did in a long career as a journalist and writer. His name is strongly tied to a bill that still brings his name (Legge Ronchey), about the introduction of private commercial activities in State-owned museums and archaeological areas. While disputed for some years, this bill is nevertheless of paramount importance for the whole Italian heritage ecosystem, and played a key role in the development of cultural heritage into a commercially exploitable field (albeit an oligopoly, one might dare to say), even though the role of the State is still vital.

Today the Open Knowledge Foundation blog features an article written by myself introducing “Open data in archaeology”, the working group started a the OKF last month and some arguments that highlight why open data is good for building archaeological knowledge in the twenty-first century.
Please find 15 minutes to read it and “retweet” to your colleagues, students, teachers. You don't need to be an hacker or a programmer to understand and contribute, it's all about your daily work.

Forward from the Scientific Committee:

[V]i comunico che la scadenza per la presentazione degli abstract è stata
posticipata dal 30 gennaio al 19 febbraio.

AGGIORNAMENTO PRINCIPALI SCADENZE:

• 19 febbraio 2010: Termine per la presentazione abstracts
• 8 marzo 2010: Notifica dell'accettazione e pubblicazione web degli abstract
• 15 aprile 2010:Termine per la consegna dei paper camera ready

E' possibile proporre contributi su ogni aspetto inerente il progetto, lo sviluppo e l'uso di formati liberi e/o di software libero o open source in archeologia.

Sono previste sessioni per la presentazione di papers soggetti a recensione.

E' prevista anche una sessione poster per la presentazione di progetti in corso o recentemente conclusi.

Anche in questa edizione sarà organizzata una specifica sessione di laboratorio (OpenLAB). Quest'anno i laboratori dedicati all'incontro diretto con gli strumenti Open Source saranno dedicati a modellazione 3D
applicata all'archeologia, gestione di mesh 3D con particolare riferimento ai Beni Culturali e creazione e gestione di Database e applicazione in campo archeologico.

Per tutte le informazioni sull'evento vi invito a visitare il sito www.archeologiadigitale.it/archeofoss/2010.html

I can't remember exactly when I started following Open Access News, the most important source of news for everything open access, from literature to public sector information. I can say for sure that it was long before OAN became a blog (that is, one with feeds and more-than-weekly updates). I remember IOSA.it being covered on OAN as a
Good things evolve over time and this one makes no exception: Open Access News, starting from last week, has been “superseded” by the already running Open Access Tracking Project. This means basically that most “retweets” like links to relevant breaking news from academia or governments will take their way in Connotea. OAN will continue to exist, but with a low volume — I'm sure this will mean in-depth discussion of major issues or advancements. In Suber's words:

OATP is more comprehensive than a large blog because it is crowdsourced and distributes the labor to all who want to take part. It's leaner than a large blog because most of its news alerts are just citations, links, and brief descriptions.

The mere fact that one single person can't follow alone the entire flow of news about Open Access is great, by the way.
So, to make a long story short:

1. thanks, thanks a lot to Peter Suber and Gavin Baker for their restless work during these past years
2. go to http://www.connotea.org/tag/oa.new and subscribe to the newsfeed (incidentally, please note that most of the content there is submitted daily by Peter Suber himself)
3. (optional, but recommended) get yourself an account on Connotea and start tagging relevant open access news
4. don't forget to check out also http://www.connotea.org/tag/oa.archaeology and maybe share news about open access at your lab, department, university, company or office
5. finally, when you see that the oa.* prefix can be used for anything, look for your country, field of study/work, etc

I can't remember exactly when I started following Open Access News, the most important source of news for everything open access, from literature to public sector information. I can say for sure that it was long before OAN became a blog (that is, one with feeds and more-than-weekly updates). I remember IOSA.it being covered on OAN as a
Good things evolve over time and this one makes no exception: Open Access News, starting from last week, has been “superseded” by the already running Open Access Tracking Project. This means basically that most “retweets” like links to relevant breaking news from academia or governments will take their way in Connotea. OAN will continue to exist, but with a low volume — I'm sure this will mean in-depth discussion of major issues or advancements. In Suber's words:

OATP is more comprehensive than a large blog because it is crowdsourced and distributes the labor to all who want to take part. It's leaner than a large blog because most of its news alerts are just citations, links, and brief descriptions.

The mere fact that one single person can't follow alone the entire flow of news about Open Access is great, by the way.
So, to make a long story short:

1. thanks, thanks a lot to Peter Suber and Gavin Baker for their restless work during these past years
2. go to http://www.connotea.org/tag/oa.new and subscribe to the newsfeed (incidentally, please note that most of the content there is submitted daily by Peter Suber himself)
3. (optional, but recommended) get yourself an account on Connotea and start tagging relevant open access news
4. don't forget to check out also http://www.connotea.org/tag/oa.archaeology and maybe share news about open access at your lab, department, university, company or office
5. finally, when you see that the oa.* prefix can be used for anything, look for your country, field of study/work, etc

The last special issue of the Radiocarbon journal marked a big step forward in radiocarbon dating. The IntCal04 calibration curve was available for a period that goes back to 26000 years BP, while the new IntCal09 data extends calibration back in time until 50000 years BP, pretty much covering the entire time span that can be obtained by means of ¹⁴C. Radiocarbon scientists believe the availability of this new calibration curve, together with some adjustments and updates for already covered periods, will allow a lot of archaeological sites to get better absolute dates, including those from the age of transition between Neanderthals and modern humans in Europe and the Mediterranean. The IntCal working group will continue to enhance the available data and a new issue is already planned for 2011.

Marco Valenti from the University of Siena and his LIAAM (Laboratorio per l'Informatica Applicata all'Archeologia Medievale) recently published a new manual about archaeology and computing, or as they like to say “an archaeological way to computing”.
In his introduction, he also writes:

In questo contesto il recente interesse dell’archeologia per il mondo open source può costituire un buon punto di incontro fra le discipline umanistiche e le scienze informatiche. Il tipo di approccio “mentale” proposto dalle comunità open source, le esperienze di utilizzo degli open format, la circolazione degli open content possono portare contributi importanti alle nostre ricerche; soprattutto se intesi come strumenti per attuare un fecondo interscambio delle informazioni e garantire qualità e trasparenza alla ricerca, incentivando un utilizzo della tecnologia come mezzo per facilitare la costruzione e la diffusione di un sapere storico collettivo, i due obiettivi principali (l’uno scientifico, l’altro sociale) dell’archeologia. In altre parole, traslare i principali concetti del mondo open source, applicandoli alla ricerca archeologica, significa essenzialmente progettare architetture del dato aperte e prevedere la condivisione delle informazioni, due principi alla base di tuttele attività e le soluzioni sviluppate presso il LIAAM.

I cannot but agree with his words, and I hope not only that our university will eventually play again a leading role in bringing technology and archaeology together, but also that new manuals expressing such “radical” views really help students in learning a new, different way for doing public archaeology.