About this Issue

About this Issue: December 2003

This issue of Interface, the e-journal of the Berglund Center for Internet Studies has been an exciting one, for a number of reasons. First, we put this issue together while I was traveling and working in China. With the student editor, Marci Lim, and the rest of the support staff working at Pacific University and me checking in from a variety of computers at universities and Internet cafes in Guilin, Beijing, Shanghai, and finally, Wenzhou, where I have taught for the last three weeks, this has sometimes been a daunting task.

We think, however, and hope that you will agree, that it has been worth it. We lead off the issue with one of our 2003 Berglund Fellow's, Samuel Ebersole. Dr. Ebersole, of Colorado State University, offers "Online Learning Communities: Connecting with Success" <http://bcis.pacificu.edu/journal/2003/09/ebersole.php>. This essay is not only precisely centered in the mission of the Berglund Center, but also offers the most recent scholarship as well as Dr. Ebersole's wealth of personal experience in exploring this critical issue. It is pieces like this, we feel, that legitimate Jim Berglund's vision in funding the center and supporting Fellows such as Dr. Ebersole. In subsequent issues we will present the work of additional Berglund Fellows.

Continuing the theme of learning communities, our friend and contributor, Jeff Cooper, Education Technology Specialist for the College of Education, Pacific University at the time of writing, presents Educational MUVES: Virtual Learning Communities, found at: <http://bcis.pacificu.edu/journal/2003/09/cooper/cooper.php> Jeff has since moved on. We will miss him, he has been a constant supporter of the Berglund Center and provided important technical support at critical times. We hope that he may have time to continue contributing in his new work.

Appropriate to this issue posted from China is Sun Chia-Sui piece, "Globalization, Internet and Cultural Flows—The Case of the Taiwanese Publishing Industry" found at: <http://bcis.pacificu.edu/journal/2003/09/chia-sui.php> Ms. Sun, a doctoral candidate in the Department of Cultural Studies and Sociology, at the University of Beirmingham, UK, is herself Taiwanese. Here she outlines the manner in which the Internet has affect both a business, Taiwanese publishing, and the international transmission of culture. Businesses seeking to do business with "Greater China", including Taiwan, the P.R.C., Hong Kong and Singapore, will find this piece useful reading.

The most popular of our regular columnists, Kevin Kawamoto, contributes a piece which provides both a tribute to one of the pioneers of Internet distributed health information, Dr. Patricia Radin, who died recently, and a great deal of perspective on this particular impact of the Internet. This piece, "Compassion Knows No Border: The Research of Patricia Radin", is found at: <http://bcis.pacificu.edu/journal/2003/09/kawamoto.php> Thank you Kevin, for this totally appropriate tribute.

Our education and grants editor, Dr. Mark Szymansky, offers another contribution with marked international overtones, "Toyota Gives Strength to the United States Thread," found at:<http://bcis.pacificu.edu/journal/2003/09/szymanski.php> Mark details the support provided for American education by this great Japanese company, and provides yet another source for supportive grants for our readers in the K-12 educational community.

My contributions as editor are, of course, marked by my residence in China during the writing. I review two books, Salam Pax: The Clandestine Diary of an Ordinary Iraqi, found at <http://bcis.pacificu.edu/journal/2003/09/pax.php> and Ellen Rose's User Error. Resisting Computer Culture, found at: <http://bcis.pacificu.edu/journal/2003/09/rose.php>. The first of these books is both gripping and informative. The second provides a useful guide to the current thinking of a group of Canandian theorists.

In my editorial, "My Life As a Pirate," found at: <http://bcis.pacificu.edu/journal/2003/09/edit.php>, I attempt to discuss the problem of piracy of American films in today's China. Perhaps because of my own checkered past as a now completely reformed pirate, I try to discuss issues that are often ignored in discussing this problem.

We hope that you will find this issue of Interface both interesting and informative, and that you have had a great holiday season, wherever you may live.

Jeffrey Barlow
Editor, Interface.