I'll be at the Ontario College of Art's Mobile Nation Conference today. As many of you know, I am a long-time advocate of using digital technologies to either better understand the city or heighten the experience of using it. This conference hosted by the OCAD's new President, Sara Diamond, promises to show how that institution wants to differentiate itself in the Canadian educational and research marketplace.

Their objective?:

The Mobile Nation conference provides a unique opportunity for researchers, companies working in mobile content and technology development and users to share their interests and approaches to conducting research in this fast-changing field. Key themes include the challenge of creating content that is usable across platforms (television and mobile for example); how to create content that is appropriate to its physical location yet can find markets elsewhere; how to design with the end-user in mind, especially for technical platforms where we expect to communicate and share content; how mobile systems can be integrated into education; how new designs engage physical environments whether built or worn; and how designer's working methods and social scientist's analysis of behaviours, (such as usage patterns), can be more closely aligned for effective and efficient outcomes.

Here is today's schedule:

9:15am - 10:00am
Framing the Conference: Sara Diamond, Martha Ladly and
Michael Longford
Mobile Nation proposes to create methodologies for research in the mobile context, including design for pervasive environments; locative experience; participatory culture and social computing, in order to engage the larger context of the debates identified in five broad thematic fields of inquiry:
Creating for the multi-platform context, and challenges of media and place
Participatory culture, ethnography, participatory design and the end-user
Mobile communication and education
Pervasive meets social computing
Engineering methodologies and solutions meet humanities and social
science approaches

10:00am - 11:00am
Creating for the Multi-platform Context
Halos: new apprehension of political time and space
Keynote: Dr Nigel Thrift
Moderator: Dr Barbara Crow
Response to Keynote Addresses: Anne Galloway Discussion

11:00am - 11:15am
BREAK

11:15am - 12:15am
Participatory Culture and Ethnography
Everything is all Going on at the same Time
Keynote: Nina Wakeford
Moderator: Paula Gardner
Response to Keynote Addresses: Sara Diamond, Discussion

12:15am - 12:45am
Engineering meets Humanities and Social Science
Simultaneous Interactive Technology and Sensor Workshop
Brief Roundtable Introduction to the Saturday and Sunday Workshops
Ron Wakkary with:
MEE led by Tom Donaldson
Arduino led by Daniel Jolliffe (rapid prototyping of networked physical computing devices)
MIDAS 2.0 led by Tek-Jin Nam (augmented reality to prototype and test mobile interfaces)

12:45pm - 1:45pm
LUNCH - If you get take-out:
Mobile Play 1
Location: Auditorium, Various locations, OCAD, Grange Park
Mobile Nation participant research will be available on display for conference guests to explore and discuss with MDCN researchers Dr David McIntosh, Dr Paula Gardner, Sara Diamond, Martha Ladly, Geoffrey Shea, Bruce Hinds, Patricio Davila, Angus Leech, Jason Lewis, Michael Longford, Dr Barbara Crow and Dr Kim Sawchuk.

1:45pm - 2:30pm
Pervasive and Social Computing
Drew Hemment
Matt Adams and Blast Theory - Teleconference
Moderator: Julie Andreyev

2:30pm - 3:45pm
Creating for the Multi-Platform Context
Roundtable: Broadcast Media, Story-telling and the Mobile Context:
Forays, Formats, Fun
Moderator: Ana Serrano
Raja Khanna, Leena Saarinen, Vincent John Vincent
Judy Gladstone video presentation, with Bravo!Fact in attendance

3:45pm-4:00pm
BREAK

4:00pm - 5:45pm
Participatory Culture and Ethnography
Panel: Mobile Methodologies: Emerging New Categories of Practice
Moderator: Minna Tarkka
Respondent: Nigel Thrift, Barbara Crow, Angus Leech, Michael Longford,
David McIntosh, Kim Sawchuk

5:45pm - 6:15pm
Engineering meets Humanities and Social Science
MEE Announcement
Led by Tom Donaldson, with PIs Sara Diamond and Michael Longford

6:15pm
MEE Toast

6:15pm
DINNER AND FREE TIME

8:00pm - 9:30pm
Participatory Culture and Ethnograph
Panel: Who are we designing for and with - addressing popular culture, public spaces and institutions and mass markets
Moderator: Eric Zimmerman
Respondent: Richard Kanee, Minna Tarrka, Anne Galloway, Suzanne Stein,
Ron Wakkary