Articoli di riviste sul tema "Usages charitables"

This paper explores how campus-based charitable events can drive future participation through the factors of engagement, social media use, campus community, and self-esteem. Through mixed-methods, researchers drew insights from Twitter posts and survey responses of past and current Jagathon participants. Tweets were analyzed through sentiment analysis and survey data was explored through multiple linear regression, descriptive analysis, and correlation analysis. The results of study one indicates an overall positive attitude towards Jagathon held by participants. The results of study two found that the experience had at Jagathon and social media use are two of the most influential factors on intent to remain involved. The results provide theoretical and practical implications for charitable event hosts and outlines steps for further research in the subject.

Abstract: Our country has an excessive number of organisations, which deter individuals from donating since they are opaque and challenging to monitor. People frequently ponder whether giving to charitable organisations will affect their choice. Many non-profit organisations engage in unscrupulous business techniques to raise money. People's faith in charity has been shattered by these methods, which have also raised concerns about the reliability of charitable endeavours. Today's non-profit sector is highly concerned about transparency. By turning donations into digital assets and boosting trust in non-profit organisations, blockchain [1] and smart contracts [2] open up new opportunities for charitable giving. Now, donors can see the results of their donations, and charities can use crypto tokens [4] to encourage giving. In recent years, blockchain technology has become one of the most trending areas of technology. Specifically, distributed ledger technology has been used in the financial industry to create crypto currency and develop a new digital market sector. Despite this, blockchain with its immutability and transparency has a much wider range of potential applications. Blockchain technology has the ability to significantly alter the charity industry. Increased responsibility and confidence in charitable donations may result from blockchain's decentralised and transparent nature. The usage of blockchain in charity is examined in this research article along with its potential advantages, including greater accountability, increased efficiency, and increased transparency. The absence of regulations, technical complexity, and cost are some of the difficulties that must be overcome. The use of blockchain technology in philanthropy is significant and merits more research to ascertain how it may be most effectively incorporated into current systems to enhance the philanthropic sector.

AbstractThe purpose of this study is to address the ambiguities in the application of anti-trust regulations to the nonprofit sector. We first survey policy tools and their diverse historical usage in nonprofit and mixed markets, specifically in professional associations, hospitals, and education. This analysis informs the development of a typology of anti-competitive nonprofit markets which is used to classify the three historical examples into eight traits. Finally, this typology is applied to three new markets – animal shelters, thrift stores, and soup kitchens – which have less in common with purely for-profit markets and have little or no discussion in antitrust literature. We find that the nonprofit form per se does not indicate an absence of anticompetitive practices or antitrust concerns; however, certain combinations of attributes – such as purely donative revenues and an absence of pricing ability – make the threat of anticompetitive practice less oppressive.

This paper provides a linguistic analysis of abstract nouns belonging to the lexical-semantic field “Gratuitous Assistance to the Needy” and denoting the situation of charitable activities in general — благотворительность, донорство, меценатство, and филантропия. All of them are synonyms; they are defined through each other in dictionary entries and are often used as absolute equivalents. This impedes uncontradictory terminologisation of the language of charity and complicates the justification of the legal framework for this activity. The author aims to distinguish these words by using historical and explanatory dictionaries of the Russian language, dictionaries of synonyms of the Russian language, and The National Corpus of the Russian Language. This helps to determine the semantic scope, context compatibility, and conditions of the textual functioning of these words. The author concludes that the core position in the structure of the lexical-semantic field “Gratuitous Assistance to the Needy” is occupied by the originally Russian word благотворительность, which has a high usage frequency, denotes any gratuitous assistance, and has polar connotations, both positive and negative. Other terms occupy the periphery — either because of a narrower meaning (меценатство), or due to a limited scope of use (филантропия, донорство). The frequency of lexemes that refer to charitable activities increases during periods of social and economic stability, the establishment of better international relations, and decreases when society is forced to deal with serious problems. The intensive growth in the use of these words has been observed in the Russian media space since the mid-1980s and is still growing, which occurs due to the international actualisation of charitable activities and social responsibility trend.

Abstract“Pro bono” is a familiar phrase in North American jurisdictions that generally refers to a lawyer’s provision of free legal services to indigent persons. The phrase “pro bono” has also come to imply a particular approach to a lawyer’s relationship to indigent persons, one that stresses the obligatory as opposed to the charitable nature of the services provided. To what extent has this phrase, and its conceptualisation of a lawyer’s role, been used in Asian jurisdictions? This article examines how one Asian jurisdiction, Singapore, conceptualises a lawyer’s relationship to indigent persons by examining newspaper usage of phrases describing legal services for indigent persons. The article argues that changes in usage over time, from free legal services and legal aid to inclusion of pro bono, coupled with increased discussions of access to justice, represent a shift to a more obligatory concept of indigent legal services. An obligatory conceptualisation potentially exerts greater pressure on lawyers to provide indigent legal services, but can also exert pressure to revise the historical lack of broad-based government funded criminal legal aid in Singapore.

Sport industry leaders have recognized the popularity of social media; however, some have struggled with quantifying the benefits of such usage (Fisher, 2009). This case explores the potential opportunities social media sites can provide to sport organizations. Golf tournament organizer TampaTourneys, LLC created an administrative Facebook page to keep its Facebook users informed about events. The organization also used the page to promote a cause related marketing campaign benefitting a charitable fundraiser. Partnering with Blackhawk Computers, TampaTourneys initiated a week-long campaign, which encouraged the tournament organizer’s Facebook fans to tell their respective Facebook friends about the fundraiser and become fans of the TampaTourneys Facebook page. In turn, the organization made a monetary donation on behalf of its current and new fans. Based on the campaign’s success, TampaTourneys decided to initiate a second and longer fundraising effort. The case asks students to analyze data collected from the first fundraising campaign and develop a new campaign for the tournament organizer.

The question of the nature of “it” and the progression1 from “it” to an “it” in Ifeanyi Menkiti’s normative conception of a person has created divisions amongst philosophers in African philosophy. In this article, I attempt to offer a charitable interpretation of Menkiti’s use of an “it” to denote an individual’s life through the usage of epistemological and ontological tools to assess the individual’s performance. In doing so, I argue that a better account of the progression is from an “it” to an “it+” rather than from an “it” to an “it-it” as formulated by Edwin Etieyibo. This formulation of the nameless dead acknowledges that the latter “it” is significantly distinct from the first “it” as it possesses a number of properties that are distinct from its former “it”, with the moral force as the significant factor in its constitution. In this article, I seek to argue that accepting Etieyibo’s formulations of the latter “it” as an “it-it” risks complicating the normative account of a person conceptually.

Introduction The rising cost of cancer drugs may make treatment unaffordable for some patients. Patients often rely on drug manufacturer-administered Pharmaceutical Assistance Programs (PAPs) to obtain drugs and reduced or no cost. The overall usage of PAPs within cancer care delivery is unknown. Methods We included all cancer patients across an academically affiliated, integrated health system in North Carolina during 2014 ( N = 8591). We identified the subset of patients receiving PAP assistance to afford one or more cancer drugs, in order to calculate the proportion of patients receiving PAP assistance, and the retail value of the assistance. Results Among 8591 cancer patients, 215 unique patients submitted a total of 478 successful PAP requests for cancer drugs. 40% of PAP-utilizing patients were uninsured, 23% had Medicaid coverage, 20% had Medicare coverage, 2% were dual Medicare/Medicaid eligible, and 14% were commercially insured. Among all cancer patients who received medical treatment, 6.0% required PAP assistance, whereas 10.6% receiving an oral agent required PAP assistance. The proportion receiving PAP assistance varied substantially by drug, ranging from <1% of patients (e.g. carboplatin, methotrexate) to 50% of patients (e.g. ponatinib, temsirolimus). The majority of the retail value obtained was for oral agents, including $1,556,575 of imatinib and $1,449,633 of dasatinib, which were the two drugs with the highest aggregate retail value. Conclusions A substantial proportion of cancer patients receive private charitable assistance to obtain standard-of-care treatments. This includes patients with federal and private insurance, suggesting an inability of patients to meet cost-sharing requirements.

In many countries, people face cuts in jobs, wages and social security as economic austerity policies have been implemented to reduce public expenditure following the near collapse of the banking system in 2008. At the same time, rising food and fuel prices have combined to generate increasing and sometimes extreme hardship, not only in poorer countries of the global South where the impact has been severe, but also on economically vulnerable countries and populations in the global North. The re-emergence of ‘hunger’ as a widespread social reality and political concern in richer countries is a notable feature of the last few years, generating community responses and academic research even if, as yet, minimal policy response. For example, a recent special issue of the British Food Journal (Caraher and Cavicchi, 2014) on food banks included nine articles discussing the explosion in usage and acceptability of charitable food aid provision in rich countries. Riches and Silvasti's recent volume (2014), updating First World Hunger: Food Security and Welfare Politics (Riches, 1997) nearly two decades after its account of food and poverty in five rich economies, now provides evidence from twelve such countries, and there could have been more. What is perhaps even more remarkable is how slow public policy has been to react. Partly this is because the issues are cross-sectoral in the location of causal drivers and potential levers, and it is thus difficult to ascribe responsibility; partly it is because ‘hunger’ is not only difficult to define and document, it is also an intrinsically private issue: its experience and effects are personal, embodied and usually silent – except in extremes.

Purpose – The integrated purpose of the libraries’ communication plan in general is to create and accomplish scientific events aiming, first of all, at covering the extensive demand for the scientific conferences. Their primary objective is to raise the prestigious brand name of their organisation, which constitutes the organizing authority. At the same time, this authority, except for its non-profit charitable profile, aims to financial gains by attracting participants for its sustainability. Furthermore, these academic events have contributed to the utmost dissemination of the library’s brand name to an expanding mass of people to the extent of attracting new visitors (Broady-Preston and Lobo, 2011). One of the qualitative academic events, among others, is the creation of academic-nature events, whose following-up is blocked by a multitude of financial barriers according to the new visitors’ viewpoint. Considering the economic crisis, the purpose of this paper is the creation of interesting, in the science of library, online events, just like the online conferences (Broady-Preston and Swain, 2012). Design/methodology/approach – This paper highlights the advantages of the dynamic modelling of systems aimed at developing a successful online conference. In this research, the authors have used the science of design and the research methodology for testing the concept of modeling. Findings – This paper examines the interface among several dimensions for the development of dynamic models. The validity and usefulness of those models in the process of decision-making has been confirmed by the usage of dynamic models in various sectors. Originality/value – This paper applies the system and the concepts of dynamic modelling, which are pioneering elements as to their nature and evolution.

Background: Various Socio-political and geographical reasons helped Kerala to provide a favorable atmosphere to flourish Ayurveda in this land. Inestimable contributions made by Ayurvedic practitioners in Kerala led to developments in terms of procedures as well as medicine. Knowledge about the subtler nuances of performing various therapeutic procedures, along with their clinical implications was recorded by eminent practitioners in Kerala. However, it was dispersed amongst various regional texts, and it needed to be lined under one heading. Authors Pavana Jayaram and Manoj Sankaranarayana managed to gather all these pieces of information together and presented them in the form of this book named - Keraliya Cikitsa Paddhati.Methodology: The presented book was studied, analyzed, and compared with other contemporary works on a similar subject.Body and Analysis: The present book is written in Sanskrit and English. It contains 304 pages, and its price is 500 INR. This book was published by Sarada Mahadeva Iyer, Ayurvedic Educational and Charitable Trust, Tamil Nadu. The book was published in 2010. It comprises three sections. The first section encompasses the Sanskrit text Dharakalpa which sheds light on the Procedure named Dhara – one of the specialized Keraliya treatment modalities. Following it, the book presents the first and only english commentary on Dharakalpa written by the authors – Pavana and Manoj. The second section of the book comprises an extensive review of the available literature about external treatment modalities (Bahih-parimarjana cikitsa). The third section of the book encompasses various necessary preparations required before commencing the procedure. It caters both, epistemological knowledge and pragmatic usage of external treatment modalities for the Ayurvedic fraternity. ‘Keraliya Cikitsa Paddhati’ is the first and only attempt made in such a direction where the traditional knowledge is not merely translated but very well explored through available literature.

Community parks provide opportunities for physical activity (PA) and facilitate social interactions. This formative evaluation assesses the implementation of ‘Open Goals’ (OG), a novel multi-sport programme aiming to increase family PA and community cohesion, delivered weekly by Liverpool Football Club’s charitable foundation to local parks in Liverpool, North West England. Three Open Goals parks were chosen for the evaluation settings. Formative evaluation measures included: System for Observing Play and Recreation in Communities (SOPARC) observations (n = 10), direct session observations (n = 8), semi-structured interviews with Open Goals coaching staff (n = 3), and informal feedback from families (n = 5) about their experiences of Open Goals. Descriptive statistics and thematic analysis were applied to quantitative and qualitative data, respectively. Within the three evaluation parks, Open Goals reached 107 participants from May–July 2019, through 423 session attendances. Fidelity of the programme was high (M = 69% of session content delivered as intended). Overall park use when OG was offered compared to when it was not offered was not statistically significant (p = 0.051), however, target area use was significantly increased (p = 0.001). Overall physical activity levels in parks were significantly (p = 0.002) higher when Open Goals was being offered, compared to when it was not. Coaches reported that engagement in OG positively affected family co-participation and children’s behavioural development. Contextual issues included environmental and social barriers to programme engagement, including the co-participation element of the programme and criticism of the marketing of OG. It is evident that community-based multi-sport PA programmes endorsed by professional football clubs are well positioned to connect with local communities in deprived areas and to encourage PA and community engagement. This study suggests that such programmes may have the ability to improve park usage in specific areas, along with improving physical activity levels among families, although further research is required. Effective marketing strategies are needed for promotional purposes. Upskilling of coaches in the encouragement of family co-participation may support regular family engagement in PA in local parks.

Background: Central Nervous System tumours are diverse group of neoplasms affecting brain and spinal cord and are graded from WHO grade I to IV from less to more severity. The incidence of CNS tumours has increased in recent years in both developed and developing countries. Materials and Methods: A total of 100 CNS cases were studied and evaluated from July 2014 to July 2016 in the Department of Pathology, K S Hegde Charitable Hospital. Patient’s data was retrieved from the records. The operated specimen was histopathologically evaluated and diagnosis of CNS tumour was made with WHO grading. The data collected was analysed using statistical tools by SPSS software version 21.0. Results: The study group consisted of 100 cases of CNS tumours. Intracranial tumours accounted for 84% and spinal cord tumours were 16%. The age distribution of the patients with CNS tumours ranged from 21 days to 78 years with mean age of 47.16 years. Males (59%) were commonly affected with male to female ratio of 1.44:1. Adults (93%) were more commonly affected than paediatric age group. In the study period from July 2014 to July 2016, a total of 7800 specimens were received in histopathology, among which 100 CNS tumours were encountered. Majority of them were in WHO grade I (66.67%). Local invasion and recurrence was seen in 22.2% (4 cases each). Metastasis (6 cases) (6%) was equally distributed between brain (50%) and spinal cord (50%).They were WHO Grade IV. The primary of the metastatic tumours to brain encountered were from breast, renal cell carcinoma and colon. Metastasis to spinal cord was from lung carcinoma and plasmacytoma. 20% were WHO Grade II and remaining 7.33% was WHO Grade III. Conclusion: The incidence of metastasis to CNS has been increasing in recent years. A general awareness of clinical manifestations of CNS tumours, along with usage of advanced radiological techniques lead to early precise diagnosis and proper management.

Current studies on the effect of thank-you gifts on charitable giving are primarily based on the conclusion of a milestone paper, “The counterintuitive effects of thank-you gifts on charitable giving” which argued that thank-you gifts are mainly driven by lower feelings of altruism. This article argues that the question design in “The counterintuitive effects of thank-you gifts on charitable giving” may lead to a biased conclusion. This article added an extra treatment group to the original study and found that the authors neglected the critical impact of participants’ inference about the usage of the money.

Abstract“Pro bono” is a familiar phrase in North American jurisdictions that generally refers to a lawyer’s provision of free legal services to indigent persons. The phrase “pro bono” has also come to imply a particular approach to a lawyer’s relationship to indigent persons, one that stresses the obligatory as opposed to the charitable nature of the services provided. To what extent has this phrase, and its conceptualisation of a lawyer’s role, been used in Asian jurisdictions? This article examines how one Asian jurisdiction, Singapore, conceptualises a lawyer’s relationship to indigent persons by examining newspaper usage of phrases describing legal services for indigent persons. The article argues that changes in usage over time, from free legal services and legal aid to inclusion of pro bono, coupled with increased discussions of access to justice, represent a shift to a more obligatory concept of indigent legal services. An obligatory conceptualisation potentially exerts greater pressure on lawyers to provide indigent legal services, but can also exert pressure to revise the historical lack of broad-based government funded criminal legal aid in Singapore.

AbstractCultural identity refers to the identical compound of reminiscences, impressions, ideologies, images, idioms, inventions, and ambitions that maintains a human set’s civilizational identity within the framework of what it knows of developments due to its internal dynamism and its ability to communicate or give and take. Social Media’s deep effect on cultural identity is a matter of constant concern. Therefore, the main aim of this research was to recognize the effect of social media on some components of rural people’s cultural identity. This study was conducted on 360 respondents from rural people in Bamha village, Egypt. Our data were collected using a questionnaire in December 2021 and then analyzed using descriptive statistics, Pearson’s simple correlation coefficient, chi-square, and the ascending multiple regression correlation analysis model (Stepwise). The results showed that for two-fifths of the respondents (40%) the level of change in cultural identity was high in relation to their use of social media; there is a significant relationship between some independent variables of respondents and the degree of change in their cultural identity. These results have important implications for policy, practice, and subsequent research, the most important of which are: working on developing thinking skills and self-learning among students in schools and universities, as well as the need to activate the role of the media in providing meaningful content that preserves societal values, in addition to employing social media to support community participation of young people on the ground by organizing awareness, volunteer and charitable activities, and finally the need to increase cooperation and coordination between all parties, whether they are media, schools, religious or civil institutions, youth centers, or other institutions to maximize the positive use of social media and to reduce its negative effects.

Background: Established diabetes care (“diabetes home”) and regular healthcare visits are important to achieve good outcomes. Nothing is known about psychosocial factors that predict healthcare usage (HCU) in young adults with youth-onset type 2 diabetes. Objective: To identify psychosocial predictors of HCU in the Treatment Options for type 2 Diabetes in Adolescents and Youth (TODAY2) cohort. Design: Longitudinal, measured at T1 (baseline) and T2 (1 year later). Logistic and linear regressions, adjusted for covariates, were used to identify predictors of sub-optimal HCU (defined as no diabetes home, 0 routine care visits, ≥1 urgent care visit in prior 6 months). Participants: N= 366 TODAY2 participants. Mean age=26.0 years, 67.8% female, 37.7% non-Hispanic Black, 35.8% Hispanic, 20.2% non-Hispanic white, mean HbA1c=9.4%. Main measures: HCU survey; reliable, valid measures of diabetes self-efficacy, depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, diabetes distress, beliefs about medicines, diabetes attitudes, material need insecurities and self-management support. Key Results: 25.4% had no diabetes home, 23.7% had 0 routine care visits, 46% had ≥1 urgent care visit in prior 6 months. Beliefs in the necessity of (p&lt;0.001), and concerns about (p=0.004), diabetes medicines, and diabetes having negative psychosocial impacts (p=0.034), predicted higher odds of having a diabetes home at T2. Beliefs that medicines are harmful predicted lower odds of having a diabetes home (p=0.006). Necessity beliefs (p=0.002), concerns (p=0.025), and self-management support (p=0.014) predicted higher odds of having ≥ 1 diabetes care visit in prior 6 months, harm beliefs predicted lower odds (p=0.005). Conclusions: Sub-optimal healthcare usage is common in young adults with youth-onset type 2 diabetes and is predicted by beliefs about medicines and self-management support. We must address these factors to help this vulnerable group establish a stable foundation for diabetes care. Disclosure P.M.Trief: None. D.Uschner: None. B.Anderson: None. H.Wen: None. J.D.Bulger: None. R.S.Weinstock: Consultant; Jaeb Center for Health Research, Other Relationship; Wolters Kluwer Health, Research Support; Insulet Corporation, Medtronic, Eli Lilly and Company, Novo Nordisk, Boehringer Ingelheim Inc., Hemsley Charitable Trust, National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, Tandem Diabetes Care, Inc., Kowa Pharmaceuticals America, Inc. Funding National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (R01DK110456)

Introduction : Mechanical thrombectomy (MT) has been established as a first line therapy for large vessel occlusion stroke; however, MT remains underutilized globally with massive disparity in access based on country income level. Mission Thrombectomy 2020+ (MT2020+) is a global alliance and campaign that aims to reduce this disparity and democratize MT access for patients. A novel smartphone application, Global Thrombectomy Tracking App, was designed to characterize thrombectomy centers on a global‐level and numerically track MT cases in near real‐time. Methods : The MT2020 App was launched in November 2019. To gain insight into local systems of care, neurointerventionalists were prompted to participate in an optional 11‐question survey over a 19‐month period. Questions pertained to population density, organizational structure, academic affiliation, available imaging modalities, tPA usage, and case volumes. Results : Of 338 active users from 9 countries, 49‐neurointerventionalists participated in the survey. The majority (71.5%) practiced in large metropolis with population >1‐million, of which 16.3% were in mega‐cities (>10‐million). The centers were government funded (46.9%), private (40.8%) or charitable (12.2%). Most were academic hospitals (81.6%) with neurointerventional trainees (55.1%). At most centers (87.7%), IV‐tPA was available with annual treatment rate >5% for 55.1%. Most centers (57.1%) utilize additional CT perfusion scans prior to MT. For 69.3% respondents, the annual MT case volume was between 10–100 cases. Conclusions : Our survey analysis shows that the global MT tracking APP can generate important thrombectomy capacity and characteristics at regional levels on a global scale, which can be used for targeted funding and resource allocation to accelerate access to MT.

AbstractCorporate social responsibility (CSR) represents a form of international private business self-regulation that contributes to the social aims of a charitable, activist, or philanthropic nature through helping ethically based practices. The benefits from CSR like generating better public image, enhance in community support, enhance in market share, enhance in the satisfaction of the consumer, enhance in the exports, offering better quality services and products, and enhance in the productivity is not considered as the perception level consumers. This paper analyzes the effect of CSR activities on the fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) industries on the basis of the retention of the consumers of FMCG products. Initially, a questionnaire is prepared that consists of five categories. Each category is composed of more than ten questions. The information related to the questionnaire is obtained in the view of the professional students from Odisha. The customers are requested to fill the exact information as much as possible. Next, a higher-order statistical analysis is considered for realizing the behaviour of the categories. Additionally, the usage of deep learning called Optimized RNN (O-RNN) is used for predicting the customer retention in maintaining the CSR on FMCG industries. The improvement in the traditional RNN is done by optimizing the hidden neurons by the improved form of Sea Lion Optimization Algorithm (slno) called Modified slno (M-slno) with the intention of minimizing the error among the actual and the predicted outcome, hence it is called as O-RNN. The retention of the customers regarding the effect of CSR activities on FMCG companies and the benefits from CSR is investigated using the O-RNN prediction analysis against several traditional deep learning models as well as different statistical measures.

Background: The T1D Exchange QI Collaborative (T1DX-QI) is a network of over fifty endocrinology centers improving type 1 diabetes (T1D) care using QI. Participating centers have access to the QI Portal, an EMR-based data platform to chart and benchmark T1D outcomes. It is a valuable tool for population health and supports use of data to inform clinical QI projects. We aim to demonstrate the use of QI science to increase centers’ QI Portal use. Methods: Users are classified into Tiers based on their cumulative monthly QI Portal log-ins (Tier 1 = one month or never; Tier 2 = 2 or 3 months total; Tier 3 = 4 or more months total). This measure describes regularly (monthly) use. For this analysis, new users (user accounts younger than 3 months) are not included to establish true use. Results: The QI Portal has achieved consistent user growth through this project. As users transition from Tier 1 to Tier 3, the latter tiers expand as users consistently use the QI Portal, with a 12% increase in more experienced Tiers (Tiers 2 and 3; Figure 1a). Figure 1b depicts a ~48% increase in the percentage of Tier 3 users since the project started in July 2022 and annotates four Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycles. Conclusion: The T1DX-QI portal usage improved through QI science. These efforts support T1DX-QI centers in more routine use of actionable data and outcomes benchmarking for clinical process improvement. Disclosure A.Mungmode: None. K.Gandhi: None. O.Ebekozien: Advisory Panel; Medtronic, Research Support; Eli Lilly and Company, Dexcom, Inc. T1dx-qi collaborative: n/a. V.Elisha: None. N.R.Fogel: None. B.L.Kiesow: None. G.O'malley: Research Support; Dexcom, Inc., Abbott Diabetes, Tandem Diabetes Care, Inc., Omnipod, Eli Lilly and Company. M.A.Clements: Consultant; Glooko, Inc., Research Support; Dexcom, Inc., Abbott Diabetes. M.L.Scott: None. J.A.Indyk: None. M.Gallagher: None. Funding The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust

Dental arch asymmetry is often associated with malocclusion and is implicated in numerous functional deficiencies including speaking and mastication. While the existence of asymmetric dental arch shape has been well documented in malocclusion, less is known about the potential factors tied to its expression. Developmental instability refers to the suite of epigenetic factors that can disrupt the normal growth pattern of an individual and cause an increase in asymmetry. In this study, we examine the relationship of numerous health and dietary factors with developmental instability in the dental arches of children.A sample of 406 dental casts of children at age 5 from the Iowa Fluoride Study were digitized with 22 landmarks along the gingival papillae and then submitted to a Procrustes ANOVA to quantify dental arch Fluctuating Asymmetry (FA). Using FA as a metric of developmental instability, we separated individuals into low and high FA groups and then ran a series of two sample T‐Tests to see if individuals with high FA had poorer dietary or health related factors when compared to individuals with low FA.Results indicate that antibiotic usage was higher on average in children in the high FA group when compared to children with low dental arch FA (p=0.037), indicating that higher instances of childhood infection and disease may result in more asymmetric dental arches. Likewise, children with lower Vitamin D consumption had increased FA compared to children with higher levels of Vitamin D in their diet (p=0.039).These results confirm that infectious disease and diet can play a role in the normal development of the dental arches. Deficits in important nutrients, like Vitamin D, as well as elevated exposure to infectious disease, can be tied to increased dental arch asymmetry. These factors should be considered not only for the general health of a growing child, but also with regard to their proper masticatory development.Support or Funding InformationSupported by a Carver Charitable Trust Grant #12‐4058 and the NIH through Grants 2 UL1 TR000442, 1T90DE023520, R01‐DE09551 and U01‐DE018903.

Abstract Background Despite the widespread proliferation of food banks in high-income countries over the past several decades, there is a paucity of data regarding the long-term experiences of the people who rely on food banks. We were unable to find any other studies with follow-up interviews later than 6 months after baseline. Objective This study examined the changes in the lived experiences of people who accessed food banks over a period of 18 months. Methods Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 11 people who accessed food banks in Ottawa, Canada and who had participated in a 6-month study that ended one full year before this follow-up study was done. Transcripts of the interviews were analyzed through a general inductive approach involving repeated readings and coding of relevant segments of text with NVivo software according to themes that emerged iteratively. Code reports were then used to discuss and reach consensus on a final set of themes. Results Three main themes emerged: (1) chronic physical and mental health issues intersecting with food bank access; (2) psychosocial impact of relying on food banks; and (3) living on a low income and dealing with poverty. Chronic physical and mental health conditions were prevalent among the participants. As well, 10 of the 11 participants in this 18-month follow-up continued to rely on food banks as a regular resource – not as an emergency relief measure – to supplement their nutritional needs. While most of the participants reported that food banks helped them in some way, many shortcomings were also noted regarding food amounts, quality and choice. Overall, there was little change reported since the 6-month follow-up. Conclusions The shortcomings reported by participants can mostly be attributed to the dependence of food banks on charitable donations; thus, despite the commendable work of food bank staff and volunteers, participants described the food assistance as inadequate. Additionally, long-term food bank usage was a common denominator in the lived experiences of all our participants; therefore, our findings reinforce the need for assistance programs that target long-term food insecurity and its underlying causes, to replace or supplement charity-based food bank programs.

In type 1 diabetes (T1D) , T cells target and destroy pancreatic beta cells. T cells express T cell receptors (TCRs) which recognize peptide antigens, and each TCR is unique to a given T cell. To understand the TCR repertoire during T1D development, we used next generation sequencing to detect TCRβ chains from longitudinal peripheral blood DNA samples at four time points from genetically at-risk cases (n=29) who progressed to T1D and age/sex/HLA matched controls (n=25) beginning early in life (median age 1.4 years) in the Diabetes Autoimmunity Study in the Young (DAISY) . Over 50 million TCRβ chains were sequenced, and the repertoires became less diverse (i.e., more clonal) over time with age in both groups (p&lt;0.001) . Principal component analyses of TCRβ V gene usage identified a subset of cases (n=11) that had higher frequencies of specific V genes beginning early in life before islet autoantibody seroconversion compared to the remaining cases and controls. The subset of cases were more likely to be double positive for GADA and IA-2A compared to the remaining cases (p=0.008) . Previously, we sequenced ∼3,500 αβTCRs from the residual islets of T1D organ donors (n=9) and identified 44 TCRs that recognize preproinsulin (PPI) . We searched for the PPI-reactive TCRβs (identical V gene, J gene, and CDR3) , and 15 TCRβs (6 CD4 and 9 CD8) were found to be shared in DAISY participants. The PPI CD4 TCRβ sequences (templates) were more frequent in cases compared to controls, 180 vs. 14 (p&lt;0.001) , but CD8 PPI templates were similar between cases and controls, 29 vs. 25. Using an algorithm to identify additional TCRs predicted to recognize similar PPI peptides, we found that these TCR clusters were more frequent in cases compared to controls and accumulated after islet autoantibody seroconversion. Lastly, PPI TCRs and clusters were identified in a separate cohort of new onset T1D patients (n=143, mean age 12.5 years) . Our results demonstrate that islet-derived TCR clusters have the potential to be a biomarker prior to clinical T1D onset. Disclosure A.M.Mitchell: None. M.Nakayama: None. A.W.Michels: Employee; ImmunoMolecular Therapeutics, Stock/Shareholder; ImmunoMolecular Therapeutics. E.E.Baschal: None. K.Mcdaniel: None. L.Pyle: None. K.Waugh: None. A.Steck: None. L.Yu: None. P.Gottlieb: Advisory Panel; Janssen Research & Development, LLC, ViaCyte, Inc., Other Relationship; IM Therapeutics, Research Support; Caladrius Biosciences, Inc., Immune Tolerance Network, National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, Novo Nordisk, Precigen, Inc., Tolerion, Inc. M.Rewers: Consultant; Janssen Research & Development, LLC, Medscape, Provention Bio, Inc., Research Support; Dexcom, Inc., JDRF, Roche Diagnostics USA. Funding National Institutes of Health (DK108868, DK110845, DK032083, DK032493, DK116073) Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (3-PDF-2020-943-A-N) Leona M. & Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust (2103-05093) Colorado Clinical and Translational Science Institute (TR002535)

Use of technologies in domestic spaces in a market economy suggests a certain notion of consumption. But is this the same as consumption or use of technologies in public spaces such as urban streets, internet cafes and libraries? As Baudrillard has argued, consumption can be seen as a form of desire for social meaning and interaction [1988]. How then do we describe the types of social interaction made possible by virtualising technologies, and the tensions between these interactions and the physical spaces in which they take place? Studies of the social and behavioural impacts of new technologies often focus on the home as a site where these technologies (for example, radio and television) are consumed, appropriated, fetishised or made into artefacts by their owners. For example Silverstone and Haddon [1996] speak of the domestication of new technologies as a process involving four stages, making a claim for the role of users/consumers and consumption in the production, design and innovation of technologies - a role which has until recently very rarely been acknowledged. Such a process is dependent on the processes of a capitalist market system in general, which sets roles for people not just in the workplace but in the home as well. Historically this system informed the distinction between public and private spaces. Embedded in this dichotomy are notions of gender, class and race. While Silverstone and Haddon are showing the artificiality of the distinction, their assumption that consumption is a largely domestic activity reinforces the public/private divide. This however begs the question of how technologies are consumed and indeed, whether this is even the right word to use when describing such uses in public spaces. It is ironic that our consumption of technologies has become so public and yet so disconnected from traditional notions of social interaction. The mobile phone, numbers of which surpassed fixed lines for the first time last year in Australia [ACA 2002] is a much-hyped case in point. In our new mobile condition we minimise social encounters with strangers on the street and avoid face-to-face contact. Instead we invest in mediated faceless conversations with known counterparts through text messaging and mobile telephony. After all, as Baudrillard says, most of these machines are used for delusion, for eluding communication (leave a message) for absolving us of the face-to-face relation and the social responsibility. [1995] This may in part explain the sense of anxiety often expressed by commentators (and users) in respect of these new technologies. Perhaps the falling back on a form of technological determinism is in actual fact the expression of a profound pessimism, similar to that voiced by a journalist in a London newspaper in 1897: We shall soon be nothing but transparent heaps of jelly to each other. [Marvin 1988, 68] The use of technologies in public spaces in our own time use has not until recently been noted, even in official statistics, due perhaps to an overwhelming preoccupation with domestic access. It must also be acknowledged that Australian government policy with respect to the Internet during the last decade has assumed that the functions of the free market will deliver access to the home, the assumption being that, like the fixed line telephone, the domestic Internet will eventually become ubiquitous. And, indeed, home computer ownership has risen over time; household connections to the Internet have also risen sharply, and a large number of Australians also access the Internet from work [ABS 2001]. Public libraries, tertiary institutions and friend or neighbour's house as sites of access make up a mere remainder in these statistics. And yet, the inclusion of these three categories makes for a far more complete picture when discussing effective use. What do people use technologies in public spaces for? Are these uses different to domestic uses? If not, what does this suggest about public use, in terms of present policy and provision? We can notionally divide the complex set of places known as public space into four categories: civic spaces (including libraries), commercial spaces (including malls, shops and arcades), public spaces (such as the street and the park) and semi-privat(is)e(d) spaces. The shopping mall, for example, is a semi-privatised space, which mediates both the type of users and their activities through surveillance and obtrusive design (images of the street). The library, as a civic space, represents a place in which the use of new technologies (for example the Internet, if not the mobile phone) can be both appropriate (i.e. relevant) and equitable. But what of Internet access in other public spaces? The existence of a growing body of literature relating to mobile phone use in public spaces, for example, suggests that the relationship between new technologies and space is fluid [see Lee 1999; also DoCoMo Reports 2000] At a more basic, societal level, interactions between people on the street have historically been mediated by considerations of gender, occupation and disability [see for example, Rendell's male rambler]. In the same way as the provision of public access is often miscast as being solely for those without access at home, so too the street has been characterised as a site whose occupiers are transient, homeless or otherwise unengaged (for example, unemployed). So, what happens when the street meets the commercial imperative, as in the case of an Internet cafe? Most Internet cafes in Australia operate on a commercial basis. A further distinction can be made between pay-per-session and free public access Internet cafes. Within the pay-per-session category we may locate not only Internet cafes but also kiosks (the vending machine approach to access) and wireless Internet users; while within the free category we could include libraries, community centres and tertiary institutions. Each of these spaces induce certain kinds of activities, encourage and discourage certain forms of behaviour. When we add use of the Internet, which in itself functions as a semi-private space, this cocktail of design, use, consumption and communication becomes very potent indeed. Crang describes the intersection of two different kinds of spaces: the architectural (where forms are entered and moved through) and the cinematic (where pictures move in front of an unmoving person) (2000, 5). We would argue that Internet cafes, especially those where customers are visible to passers-by on the street, embody this essentially urban, interactive, consumption-driven shopping mall kind of a space, whose 'liberties of action' (to borrow Sawhney's phrase) are contained not within the present but a (perhaps misnamed) hyperreality. This approach has been taken by several multimedia Internet cafes in Australia, notably the Ngapartji centre in Adelaide, where "Equity of access is underlined by the vision of the walk-in, hands-on, street-front showcase of high-end multimedia Timezone for grown-ups. [Green 1996] This is an overwhelmingly urban notion of space. Public space in non-urban areas, by comparison, is located within a predominantly civic framework (the ANZAC memorial, the Town Hall). It's therefore apparent that an examination of public space in terms of strict public/private demarcations must also take into account the inter-relationship between urbanisation and consumption. Crang's image-event (2000, 12) may have many manifestations, not all of which will fit into simple dichotomies such as public/private, commercial/charitable, streetside/inside. What then can we say about users of technologies in public spaces, engaged in a notionally private act in a public space, mediated by a cash transaction? In what ways is this complex interaction made possible by (or embedded within) the design of the Internet cafe itself? Does the kind of public space induce particular forms of behaviour or usage? How do people interact with each other in these public spaces, whilst also engaging with another community, whose sole physical presence is a screen? One could argue, as Connery [1997] does, that the cafe metaphor is appropriate not so much to the space itself, but to the interactions between people on mailing and discussion lists, whose interplay occurs, perhaps ironically, in a virtual space. Internet cafes occupy a vague, barely-researched space somewhere in between the home and the office. They are an example of the intersection between new communications technologies and sites where leisure activities take place. They are at once intensely public but also intensely private. Lee's (1999) study of an Internet cafe and its users is timely, as it refutes the notion that public access encourages totally different users and use, a point of view summed up in a (no longer accessible) 1999 BT OpenWorld market analysis of Internet cafes: The clientele will largely consist of people who appreciate the usefulness of the Internet, but have no other access to it. These circumstances will not continue indefinitely, as PC ownership is increasing daily. In other words, you'd better get in quick, before universal domestic access kills your business! Lee's study runs counter to this view, suggesting that the progression from public access to domestic access is not linear, and that people frequent Internet cafes for a variety of reasons, and may indeed have access elsewhere. Lee's conclusion that peoples' use of Internet cafes is directly connected to their home and work life suggests the need for a re-examination of the kinds of public access being made available, and the public policy assumptions behind this access. Public use does not necessarily equate with a lack of access elsewhere. In fact, mobile Internet users may use public access as an adjunct to their daily activities; travelling users may log on to workstations en route to another destination; public library users may be accessing training, Internet facilities and bibliographic databases at the same time. It is a matter of concern that recent government policies have shown little recognition of these subtleties in both users and their activities. References Australian Bureau of Statistics, 8147.0 Use of the Internet by Householders, Australia (Final Issue: November 2000) and 8146.0 Household Use of Information Technology. Australian Communications Authority (2002) Media Release: Mobile Numbers Up by 25%, 13 February [http://www.aca.gov.au/media/2002/02-06.htm (viewed 6 March 2002)]Baudrillard, J.(1995) The virtual illusion for the Automatic writing of the World in Theory, Culture and Society, 12: 97-107. Baudrillard, J.(1998) The Consumer Society, Myths and Structures, Sage, London Connery, B. (1997) IMHO: Authority and Egalitarian Rhetoric in the Virtual Coffeehouse, in Porter, D. (ed.) Internet Culture, Routledge. Crang, M. (2000) Public Space, Urban Space and Electronic Space: Would the Real City Please Stand Up? in Urban Studies February, 37.2: 301. DoCoMo Reports (2000) No. 9 (The use of cell phones/PHS phones in everyday life) and No. 10 (Current trends in mobile phone usage among adolescents) NTT DoCoMo (Japan), Public Relations Department [http://www.nttdocomo.com] Green, L. (1996) Interactive Multimedia, the Cooperative Multimedia Centre Story in Media International Australia, 81: 11-20. Lee, S. (1999) Private Uses in Public Space: a study of an Internet cafe, in New Media and Society, 1.3: 331-350. Marvin, C. (1988) When Old Technologies Were New: Thinking about Electronic Communications in the late 19th century, Oxford University Press. Rendell, J. (1998) Displaying Sexuality: Gendered Identities and the early nineteenth century street, in Fyfe, N. (ed.), Images of the Street: Planning, Identity and Control in Public Space, Routledge. Silverstone & Haddon (1996) Design and the Domestication of Information and Communication Technologies: Technical Change and Everyday Life in Mansell and Silverstone (eds.) Communication By Design: the Politics of Information and Communication Technologies. Oxford University Press. 44-74. Links http://www.nttdocomo.com http://www.ngapartji.com.au http://www.aca.gov.au/media/2002/02-06.htm Citation reference for this article MLA Style Prater, David and Miller, Sarah. "We shall soon be nothing but transparent heaps of jelly to each other" M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 5.2 (2002). [your date of access] < http://www.media-culture.org.au/0205/transparent.php>. Chicago Style Prater, David and Miller, Sarah, "We shall soon be nothing but transparent heaps of jelly to each other" M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 5, no. 2 (2002), < http://www.media-culture.org.au/0205/transparent.php> ([your date of access]). APA Style Prater, David and Miller, Sarah. (2002) We shall soon be nothing but transparent heaps of jelly to each other. M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 5(2). < http://www.media-culture.org.au/0205/transparent.php> ([your date of access]).

One of the problems working with and about technology is trying to define what exactly technology actually is. This seemingly straightforward, even banal question -- because, let's face it, we all know what technology is, don't we...? -- has caused philosophers since Aristotle no end of grief, and causes humble graduate students like myself unspeakable dilemmas. Attempting to define what technology is involves diving headlong into such murky problems as the subject/object dichotomy, the ontology of artefacts and the limits of the body -- that is, the very definition of humanity, if I may be so melodramatic. I won't pretend this piece will be even able to address all these problems, let alone solve them, but it may at least point to some of the ways the implications of this very simple question -- 'what is technology?' -- might be thought through. in which things seem so simple Of course, it is always possible that I am making a doctorate out of a molehill here, as there are a number of ostensibly straightforward and simple answers to this question. The first one is basic common sense, and which we might call naïve realism. It says that technology is artefacts made for and used by humans. End of story, right? Well maybe, but what is an artefact? It's an object-in-the-world, a thing-in-itself, which can be directly experienced through sense-impressions by conscious beings. It isn't a subject, obviously, because it's inert, nonhuman, constructed and totally nonconscious. (Remember -- guns don't kill, people do!) There are a few philosophical problems with such a naïve realism though, no matter what use as a rule of thumb it might be. For one, basic semiology demonstrates that whatever objects may or may not exist out there in the world, they are only sensible, comprehendible through and via discourse: to so much as understand an object means one is making sense not of the referent but of a signifier, which is, as we know, very definitely not an 'object-in-the-world'. Furthermore, to make the sort of ontological assumptions necessary to take for granted that objects are in fact objects-in-the-world, experienced or not by a subject, leads one more or less inexorably to the sort of crypto-fascism popularised by Ayn Rand and known, appropriately enough, as 'Objectivism'. in which things get a bit messier Another approach derives from our sense-impressions, and might be called inductive, or less charitably, naïve empiricism. We can, after all, decide fairly easily that some things -- cruise missiles, computers, automotive vehicles and microwave ovens, for example -- are quite obviously 'technological'. They don't appear in nature or spontaneously, they need a good deal of both human effort and other, pre-existing pieces of technology, to come into existence, and they consist largely of inorganic componentry. Other things -- human beings, most obviously, but other organic matter as well -- can reasonably be categorised as non-technological. Of course, once we move on past these simple examples, things get a bit messier: what exactly is a fulcrum, or a hammer, or a screw? Or a bandage? Technology, tool, non-technology or something else? Nevertheless, it is reasonable to expect that these problems might, in theory, be solvable with enough time and consensus. And yet, where does this leave someone like the Melbourne performance artist Stelarc? When he's not suspending himself from ceilings with fishhooks, he has a project known as the Third Arm. This consists of a metal arm-like mechanism, containing computer componentry, which is attached to his body. Simple enough -- sounds like technology: inorganic, non-natural and requiring sophisticated manufacturing capacity. Except that it is controlled and operated by the nerve-endings in his body, just like a real arm -- or a prosthetic arm, for that matter. It isn't attached like a dildo or a belt, it is attached and controlled like any organic limb. Okay, so maybe what Stelarc needs is not a new definition of technology but a strong bout of therapy and a good lie down, but what about pacemakers? Replacement hips? Dildos, for that matter? Or belts, for that matter? Or what about running shoes or football boots? There is a television advertisement for adidas football boots and featuring Alessandro del Piero, in which the ideal football player is built from the ground up according to written and reproducible specifications (that is, as a piece of technology) -- wearing adidas boots and looking exactly like the Juventus striker. True enough, this is just an advert on telly, they're allowed to use metaphor to shift their technologically produced product, but what about other sports people? James Hird, the AFL footballer, is about to have another (metal, technological) pin put in his foot; Michael Voss, another AFL footballer, has a plate in his leg and pins in his knee following a complete knee reconstruction. Where do their bodies end and the technology begin? Or mine, for that matter: I have a mouthful of mercury amalgam fillings, the result of a misspent childhood eating too much sugar. The fillings are obviously technological: they're inorganic, they require sophisticated manufacturing technology to install (unless your dentist is a butcher ouch!) and they're not naturally occurring. But they've been in my mouth for nearly two decades now, they're older and more part of me than any of my hair, nails or skin. Our inductive logic is just another rule of thumb, which breaks down just where it gets interesting, at the boundary of the body and the technology. It is neither by accident nor to be obfuscatory that Foucault talks of 'technologies of the self'. in which things cease making any sense whatsoever So if there is no technological ontology or taxonomy we can discern, what other possibilities are there for definitions of technology? One useful way forward comes from the Italian psychoanalyst Felix Guattari. In Chaosmosis, his last work before his untimely death, Guattari suggests that common usage would speak "of the machine as a subset of technology". However, he argues, we should "consider the problematic of technology as dependent upon machines, and not the inverse. The machine would become the prerequisite for technology rather than its expression. Machinism is an object of fascination ... about which there's a whole historical 'bestiary'. (33) A machine, or more precisely, a 'machinic assemblage' is thus a functional ensemble of different components that are swept up and reshaped by a power of ontological auto-affirmation (35). These components are by no means limited to material existence, however -- Guattari gives the example of the hammer, which can be destroyed through various ingenious means until it reaches "a threshold of formal consistency where it loses its form" -- where it ceases to be a hammer. This threshold beyond which a hammer ceases to be a hammer is not simply physical, however -- it might be semiotic or representational, for instance: "this machinic gestalt", says Guattari, "works moreover as much on a technological plane as an imaginary one, to evoke the dated memory of the hammer and sickle" (35). That is, "the technical object [is] nothing outside of the technical ensemble to which it belong[s]" (36): technology is never simply inert alterity, the silent other -- it always contains humans inside it and before it, and contains within it "a 'nonhuman' enunciation", a protosubjectivity (37). Another way to consider this queasy combination of subject and object that makes up technology -- and by corollary, makes up the body of the subject -- is through Bruno Latour's conception of the 'quasi-object' (closely allied, as it is, to the 'cyborg' deployed by Donna Haraway in some of her earlier work). Latour shares much of Guattari's unease at common-sense definitions of technology and his desire for 'ontological relativity' (51). Working from a sociological (albeit a French sociological tradition that is far less obsessed with particular forms of reductive rationality than the mainstream Anglo-American sociological tradition) rather than a philosophical or psychoanalytic perspective, Latour's quasi-object is perhaps more user-friendly and widely applicable than Guattari's machinic assemblages. In his work We Have Never Been Modern, his most sustained attempt at a coherent philosophy rather than a contingent pragmatics, Latour argues that the distinction between the Object and the Subject is not ontologically given nor a pre-existing truth, but rather the result of struggles over the naming of things as 'objects' or 'subjects'. "We do not need", says Latour, to attach our explanations to these two pure forms known as the Object or Subject/Society, because these are, on the contrary, partial and purified results of the central practice which is our concern. The explanations we seek will indeed obtain Nature and Society, but only as a final outcome, not as a beginning. (79) The quasi-object -- which Latour sometimes refers to as 'quasi-subject' to remind us that he is not simply describing especially complex objects -- is thus an entity of variable ontology and dimensions, structured by the particular and contingent needs of its own and of other quasi-objects who/that seek to enrol, mobilise or define it. Quasi-objects are, says Latour, "[r]eal as Nature, narrated as Discourse, collective as Society, existential as Being" (90). Questions like 'where does the body end?' or 'what is technology' therefore, are not so much abstract philosophical questions as very real struggles between different agglomerations -- different networks or arrangements, if you would -- of quasi-objects, the answer to which will not result from a logical exercise so much as a 'reality on the ground', to use current NATO parlance. As Latour says in a companion piece to We Have Never Been Modern, the quasi-object is a continuous passage, a commerce, an interchange, between what humans inscribe in it and what it prescribes in humans. It transplants the one into the other. This thing is the nonhuman version of people, it is the human version of things. (ARAMIS or The Love of Technology 213) So there we have an answer -- questions concerning technology and the body do not need to be answered before one proceeds to study any given socio-technical imbroglio, because they are not ontological realities. Rather, such questions become answerable -- albeit in highly contingent and specific ways -- as one proceeds through the research and the variable geometries and ontologies of the assemblage of actors becomes apparent and definable. Sure, its not as universal as Heidegger, I admit, but it's a damn sight more useful. postscript: in which the plot has been lost If we take seriously Latour and Guattari's imputation of agency and removal of certainty from what used to be harmless objects, we are led, eventually, to question just what we, as speaking, thinking, centres of agency -- i.e., as subjects -- actually are. If we too are quasi-objects, where does subjectivity reside and come from? Although I can confidently state that there are several doctoral theses in that question, I'd like to hazard a solution in the space available. Guattari and his frequent collaborator, the French philosopher Gilles Deleuze, in their immense work A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, define a mode of individuation that is not a subjectivity as a haecceity (261). The haecceity precedes, exists underneath and exceeds the subject -- they are "the subjectless individuations that constitute collective assemblages" (266), "the entire assemblage in its individuated aggregate" (262). That is what people are, that is what we are: collective assemblages of haecceities -- of looks and stomachs and fillings, of becomings and desires and histories and career paths, of tired feet and sore heads, of emotions, mood swings and family backgrounds, and many more individuations and affects. As Deleuze and Guattari state, you will yield nothing to haecceities unless you realise that is what you are, and you are nothing but that. ... You are longitude and latitude, a set of speeds and slownesses between unformed particles, a set of nonsubjectified affects. You have the individuality of a day, a season, a life (regardless of its duration) -- a climate, a wind, a fog, a swarm, a pack (regardless of its regularity). Or at least you can have it, you can reach it. (262) Where does my body end? Well, that depends upon the question. References Deleuze, Gilles, and Felix Guattari. A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. Trans. Brian Massumi. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1987. Foucault, Michel. The Care of the Self. Vol.3 of The History of Sexuality. Trans. Robert Hurley. New York: Pantheon Books, 1986. Guattari, Felix. Chaosmosis: An Ethico-Aesthetic Paradigm. Trans. Paul Bains and Julian Pefanis. Sydney: Power Publications, 1995. Haraway, Donna. Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: The Reinvention of Nature. New York: Routledge, 1991. Latour, Bruno. ARAMIS or the Love of Technology. Trans. Catherine Porter. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard UP, 1996. ---.We Have Never Been Modern. Trans. Catherine Porter. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1993. Citation reference for this article MLA style: Sean Aylward Smith. "Where Does the Body End?" M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 2.3 (1999). [your date of access] <http://www.uq.edu.au/mc/9905/end.php>. Chicago style: Sean Aylward Smith, "Where Does the Body End?" M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 2, no. 3 (1999), <http://www.uq.edu.au/mc/9905/end.php> ([your date of access]). APA style: Sean Aylward Smith. (1999) Where does the body end? M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 2(3). <http://www.uq.edu.au/mc/9905/end.php> ([your date of access]).

Introduction 2021 was the year that NFTs got big—not just in value but also in terms of the cultural consciousness. When digital artist Beeple sold the portfolio of his 5,000 daily images at Christie’s for US$69 million, the art world was left intrigued, confused, and outraged in equal measure. Depending on who you asked, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) seemed to be either a quick cash-grab or the future of the art market (Bowden and Jones; Smee). Following the Beeple sale, articles started to appear indicating that the film industry was abuzz for NFTs. Independent filmmaker Kevin Smith was quick to announce that he planned to release his horror film Killroy Was Here as an NFT (Alexander); in September 2021 the James Bond film No Time to Die also unveiled a series of collectibles to coincide with the film’s much-delayed theatrical release (Natalee); the distribution and collectible platforms Vuele, NFT Studios, and Mogul Productions all emerged, and the industry rumour mill suggests more start-ups are en route (CurrencyWorks; NFT Studios; NewsBTC). Blockchain disciples say that the technology will solve all the problems of the Internet (Tewari; Norton; European Business Review); critics say it will only perpetuate existing accessibility and equality issues (Davis and Flatow; Klein). Those more circumspect will doubtless sit back until the dust settles, waiting to see what parts of so-called web3 will be genuinely integrated into the architecture of the Internet. Pamela Hutchinson puts it neatly in terms of the arts sector: “the NFT may revolutionise the art market, film funding and distribution. Or it might be an ecological disaster and a financial bubble, in which few actual movies change hands, and fraudsters get rich from other people’s intellectual property” (Hutchinson). There is an uptick in the literature around NFTs and blockchain (see Quiniou; Gayvoronskaya & Meinel); however, the technology remains unregulated and unstandardised (Yeung 212-14; Dimitropoulos 112-13). Similarly, the sheer amount of funding being put into fundamental technical, data, and security-related issues speaks volumes to the nascency of the space (Ossinger; Livni; Gayvoronskaya & Meinel 52-6). Put very briefly, NFTs are part of a given blockchain system; think of them, like cryptocurrency coins, as “units of value” within that system (Roose). NFTs were initially rolled out on Ethereum, though several other blockchains have now implemented their own NFT frameworks. NFTs are usually not the artwork itself, but rather a unique, un-copyable (hence, non-fungible) piece of code that is attached, linked, or connected to another digital file, be that an image, video, text, or something else entirely. NFTs are often referred to as a digital artwork’s “certificate of authenticity” (Roose). At the time of writing, it remains to be seen how widely blockchain and NFT technology will be implemented across the entertainment industries. However, this article aims to outline the current state of implementation in the film trade specifically, and to attempt to sort true potential from the hype. Beginning with an overview of the core issues around blockchain and NFTs as they apply to film properties and adjacent products, current implementations of the technology are outlined, before finishing with a hesitant glimpse into the potential future applications. The Issues and Conversation At the core of current conversations around blockchain are three topics: intellectual property and ownership, concentrations of power and control, and environmental impact. To this I would like to add a consideration of social capital, which I begin with briefly here. Both the film industry and “crypto” — if we take the latter to encompass the various facets of so-called ‘web3’ — are engines of social capital. In the case of cinema, its products are commodified and passed through a model that begins with exclusivity (theatrical release) before progressing to mass availability (home media, streaming). The cinematic object, i.e., an individual copy of a film, is, by virtue of its origins as a mass product of the twentieth century, fungible. The film is captured, copied, stored, distributed, and shared. The film-industrial model has always relied on social phenomena, word of mouth, critical discourse, and latterly on buzz across digital social media platforms. This is perhaps as distinct from fine art, where — at least for dealers — the content of the piece does not necessarily matter so much as verification of ownership and provenance. Similarly, web3, with its decentralised and often-anonymised processes, relies on a kind of social activity, or at least a recorded interaction wherein the chain is stamped and each iteration is updated across the system. Even without the current hype, web3 still relies a great deal on discourse, sharing, and community, particularly as it flattens the existing hierarchies of the Internet that linger from Web 2.0. In terms of NFTs, blockchain systems attach scarcity and uniqueness to digital objects. For now, that scarcity and uniqueness is resulting in financial value, though as Jonathan Beller argues the notion of value could — or perhaps should — be reconsidered as blockchain technology, and especially cryptocurrencies, evolve (Beller 217). Regardless, NFT advocates maintain that this is the future of all online activity. To questions of copyright, the structures of blockchain do permit some level of certainty around where a given piece of intellectual property emerged. This is particularly useful where there are transnational differences in recognition of copyright law, such as in France, for instance (Quiniou 112-13). The Berne Convention stipulates that “the subsistence of copyright does not rest on the compliance with formal requirements: rights will exist if the work meets the requirements for protection set out by national law and treaties” (Guadamuz 1373). However, there are still no legal structures underpinning even the most transparent of transactions, when an originator goes out of their way to transfer rights to the buyer of the accompanying NFT. The minimum requirement — even courtesy — for the assignment of rights is the identification of the work itself; as Guadamuz notes, this is tricky for NFTs as they are written in code (1374). The blockchain’s openness and transparency are its key benefits, but until the code can explicitly include (or concretely and permanently reference) the ‘content’ of an NFT, its utility as a system of ownership is questionable. Decentralisation, too, is raised consistently as a key positive characteristic of blockchain technology. Despite the energy required for this decentralisation (addressed shortly), it is true that, at least in its base code, blockchain is a technology with no centralised source of truth or verification. Instead, such verification is performed by every node on the chain. On the surface, for the film industry, this might mean modes of financing, rights management, and distribution chains that are not beholden to multinational media conglomerates, streamers like Netflix, niche intermediaries, or legacy studios. The result here would be a flattening of the terrain: breaking down studio and corporate gatekeeping in favour of a more democratised creative landscape. Creators and creative teams would work peer-to-peer, paying, contracting, servicing, and distribution via the blockchain, with iron-clad, publicly accessible tracking of transactions and ownership. The alternative, though, is that the same imbalances persist, just in a different form: this is outlined in the next section. As Hunter Vaughan writes, the film industry’s environmental impact has long been under-examined. Its practices are diverse, distributed, and hard to quantify. Cinematic images, Vaughan writes, “do not come from nothing, and they do not vanish into the air: they have always been generated by the earth and sun, by fossil fuels and chemical reactions, and our enjoyment of them has material consequences” (3). We believe that by watching a “green” film like Avatar we are doing good, but it implicates us in the dirty secret, an issue of “ignorance and of voluntary psychosis” where “we do not see who we are harming or how these practices are affecting the environment, and we routinely agree to accept the virtual as real” (5). Beyond questions of implication and eco-material conceptualisation, however, there are stark facts. In the 1920s, the Kodak Park Plant in New York drew 12 million gallons of water from Lake Ontario each day to produce film stock. As the twentieth century came to a close, this amount — for a single film plant — had grown to 35-53 million gallons per day. The waste water was perfunctorily “cleaned” and then dumped into surrounding rivers (72-3). This was just one plant, and one part of the filmmaking process. With the shift to digital, this cost might now be calculated in the extraction of precious metals used to make contemporary cameras, computers, or storage devices. Regardless, extrapolate outwards to a global film industry and one quickly realises the impact is almost beyond comprehension. Considering — let alone calculating — the carbon footprint of blockchain requires outlining some fundamentals of the technology. The two primary architectures of blockchain are Proof of Work (PoW) and Proof of Stake (PoS), both of which denote methods of adding and verifying new blocks to a chain. PoW was the first model, employed by Bitcoin and the first iteration of Ethereum. In a PoW model, each new block has a specific cryptographic hash. To confirm the new block, crypto miners use their systems to generate a target hash that is less than or equal to that of the block. The systems process these calculations quickly, as the goal is to be “the first miner with the target hash because that miner is the one who can update the blockchain and receive crypto rewards” (Daly). The race for block confirmation necessitates huge amounts of processing power to make these quick calculations. The PoS model differs in that miners are replaced by validators (or staking services where participants pool validation power). Rather than investing in computer power, validators invest in the blockchain’s coins, staking those coins (tokens) in a smart contract (think of this contract like a bank account or vault). When a new block is proposed, an algorithm chooses a validator based on the size of their stake; if the block is verified, the validator receives further cryptocurrency as a reward (Castor). Given the ubiquity and exponential growth of blockchain technology and its users, an accurate quantification of its carbon footprint is difficult. For some precedent, though, one might consider the impact of the Bitcoin blockchain, which runs on a PoW model. As the New York Times so succinctly puts it: “the process of creating Bitcoin to spend or trade consumes around 91 terawatt-hours of electricity annually, more than is used by Finland, a nation of about 5.5 million” (Huang, O’Neill and Tabuchi). The current Ethereum system (at time of writing), where the majority of NFT transactions take place, also runs on PoW, and it is estimated that a single Ethereum transaction is equivalent to nearly nine days of power consumption by an average US household (Digiconomist). Ethereum always intended to operate on a PoS system, and the transition to this new model is currently underway (Castor). Proof of Stake transactions use significantly less energy — the new Ethereum will supposedly be approximately 2,000 times more energy efficient (Beekhuizen). However, newer systems such as Solana have been explicit about their efficiency goals, stating that a single Solana transaction uses less energy (1,837 Joules, to be precise) than keeping an LED light on for one hour (36,000 J); one Ethereum transaction, for comparison, uses over 692 million J (Solana). In addition to energy usage, however, there is also the question of e-waste as a result of mining and general blockchain operations which, at the time of writing, for Bitcoin sits at around 32 kilotons per year, around the same as the consumer IT wastage of the Netherlands (de Vries and Stoll). How the growth in NFT awareness and adoption amplifies this impact remains to be seen, but depending on which blockchain they use, they may be wasting energy and resources by design. If using a PoW model, the more valuable the cryptocurrency used to make the purchase, the more energy (“gas”) required to authenticate the purchase across the chain. Images abound online of jerry-rigged crypto data centres of varying quality (see also efficiency and safety). With each NFT minted, sold, or traded, these centres draw — and thus waste, for gas — more and more energy. With increased public attention and scrutiny, cryptocurrencies are slowly realising that things could be better. As sustainable alternatives become more desirable and mainstream, it is safe to predict that many NFT marketplaces may migrate to Cardano, Solana, or other more efficient blockchain bases. For now, though, this article considers the existing implementations of NFTs and blockchain technology within the film industry. Current Implementations The current applications of NFTs in film centre around financing and distribution. In terms of the former, NFTs are saleable items that can raise capital for production, distribution, or marketing. As previously mentioned, director Kevin Smith launched Jay & Silent Bob’s Crypto Studio in order to finish and release Killroy Was Here. Smith released over 600 limited edition tokens, including one of the film itself (Moore). In October 2021, renowned Hong Kong director Wong Kar-wai sold an NFT with unreleased footage from his film In the Mood for Love at Sotheby’s for US$550,000 (Raybaud). Quentin Tarantino entered the arena in January 2022, auctioning uncut scenes from his 1994 film Pulp Fiction, despite the threat of legal action from the film’s original distributor Miramax (Dailey). In Australia, an early adopter of the technology is director Michael Beets, who works in virtual production and immersive experiences. His immersive 14-minute VR film Nezunoban (2020) was split into seven different chapters, and each chapter was sold as an NFT. Beets also works with artists to develop entry tickets that are their own piece of generative art; with these tickets and the chapters selling for hundreds of dollars at a time, Beets seems to have achieved the impossible: turning a profit on a short film (Fletcher). Another Australian writer-producer, Samuel Wilson, now based in Canada, suggests that the technology does encourage filmmakers to think differently about what they create: At the moment, I’m making NFTs from extra footage of my feature film Miles Away, which will be released early next year. In one way, it’s like a new age of behind-the-scenes/bonus features. I have 14 hours of DV tapes that I’m cutting into a short film which I will then sell in chapters over the coming months. One chapter will feature the dashing KJ Apa (Songbird, Riverdale) without his shirt on. So, hopefully that can turn some heads. (Wilson, in Fletcher) In addition to individual directors, a number of startup companies are also seeking to get in on the action. One of these is Vuele, which is best understood as a blockchain-based streaming service: an NFT Netflix, if you like. In addition to films themselves, the service will offer extra content as NFTs, including “behind the scenes content, bonus features, exclusive Q&As, and memorabilia” (CurrencyWorks). Vuele’s launch title is Zero Contact, directed by Rick Dugdale and starring Anthony Hopkins. The film is marketed as “the World’s First NFT Feature Film” (as at the time of writing, though, both Vuele and its flagship film have yet to launch). Also launching is NFT Studios, a blockchain-based production company that distributes the executive producer role to those buying into the project. NFT Studios is a decentralised administrative organisation (DAO), guided by tech experts, producers, and film industry intermediaries. NFT Studios is launching with A Wing and a Prayer, a biopic of aeronaut Brian Milton (NFT Studios), and will announce their full slate across festivals in 2022. In Australia, Culture Vault states that its aim is to demystify crypto and champion Australian artists’ rights and access to the space. Co-founder and CEO Michelle Grey is well aware of the aforementioned current social capital of NFTs, but is also acutely aware of the space’s opacity and the ubiquity of often machine-generated tat. “The early NFT space was in its infancy, there was a lot of crap around, but don’t forget there’s a lot of garbage in the traditional art world too,” she says (cited in Miller). Grey and her company effectively act like art dealers; intermediaries between the tech and art worlds. These new companies claim to be adhering to the principles of web3, often selling themselves as collectives, DAOs, or distributed administrative systems. But the entrenched tendencies of the film industry — particularly the persistent Hollywood system — are not so easily broken down. Vuele is a joint venture between CurrencyWorks and Enderby Entertainment. The former is a financial technology company setting up blockchain systems for businesses, including the establishment of branded digital currencies such as the controversial FreedomCoin (Memoria); the latter, Enderby, is a production company founded by Canadian film producer (and former investor relations expert in the oil and uranium sectors) Rick Dugdale (Wiesner). Similarly, NFT Studios is partnered with consulting and marketing agencies and blockchain venture capitalists (NFT Investments PLC). Depending on how charitable or cynical one is feeling, these start-ups are either helpful intermediaries to facilitate legacy media moving into NFT technology, or the first bricks in the capitalist wall to bar access for entry to other players. The Future Is… Buffering Marketplaces like Mintable, OpenSea, and Rarible do indeed make the minting and selling of NFTs fairly straightforward — if you’ve ever listed an item for sale on eBay or Facebook, you can probably mint an NFT. Despite this, the current major barrier for average punters to the NFT space remains technical knowledge. The principles of blockchain remain fairly opaque — even this author, who has been on a deep dive for this article, remains sceptical that widespread adoption across multiple applications and industries is feasible. Even so, as Rennie notes, “the unknown is not what blockchain technology is, or even what it is for (there are countless ‘use cases’), but how it structures the actions of those who use it” (235). At the time of writing, a great many commentators and a small handful of scholars are speculating about the role of the metaverse in the creative space. If the endgame of the metaverse is realised, i.e., a virtual, interactive space where users can interact, trade, and consume entertainment, the role of creators, dealers, distributors, and other brokers and players will be up-ended, and have to re-settle once again. Film industry practitioners might look to the games space to see what the road might look like, but then again, in an industry that is — at its best — somewhat resistant to change, this may simply be a fad that blows over. Blockchain’s current employment as a get-rich-quick mechanism for the algorithmic literati and as a computational extension of existing power structures suggests nothing more than another techno-bubble primed to burst (Patrickson 591-2; Klein). Despite the aspirational commentary surrounding distributed administrative systems and organisations, the current implementations are restricted, for now, to startups like NFT Studios. In terms of cinema, it does remain to be seen whether the deployment of NFTs will move beyond a kind of “Netflix with tchotchkes” model, or a variant of crowdfunding with perks. Once Vuele and NFT Studios launch properly, we may have a sense of how this all will play out, particularly alongside less corporate-driven, more artistically-minded initiatives like that of Michael Beets and Culture Vault. It is possible, too, that blockchain technology may streamline the mechanics of the industry in terms of automating or simplifying parts of the production process, particularly around contracts, financing, licensing. This would obviously remove some of the associated labour and fees, but would also de-couple long-established parts and personnel of the industry — would Hollywood and similar industrial-entertainment complexes let this happen? As with any of the many revolutions that have threatened to kill or resurrect the (allegedly) long-suffering cinematic object, we just have to wait, and watch. References Alexander, Bryan. “Kevin Smith Reveals Why He’s Auctioning Off New His Film ‘Killroy Was Here’ as an NFT.” USA TODAY, 15 Apr. 2021. <https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/movies/2021/04/15/kevin-smith-auctioning-new-film-nft-killroy-here/7244602002/>. Beekhuizen, Carl. “Ethereum’s Energy Usage Will Soon Decrease by ~99.95%.” Ethereum Foundation Blog, 18 May 2021. <https://blog.ethereum.org/2021/05/18/country-power-no-more/>. Beller, Jonathan. “Economic Media: Crypto and the Myth of Total Liquidity.” Australian Humanities Review 66 (2020): 215-225. Beller, Jonathan. The Cinematic Mode of Production: Attention Economy and the Society of the Spectacle. Hanover, NH: Dartmouth College P, 2006. Bowden, James, and Edward Thomas Jones. “NFTs Are Much Bigger than an Art Fad – Here’s How They Could Change the World.” The Conversation, 26 Apr. 2021. <http://theconversation.com/nfts-are-much-bigger-than-an-art-fad-heres-how-they-could-change-the-world-159563>. Cardano. “Cardano, Ouroboros.” 14 Feb. 2022 <https://cardano.org/ouroboros/>. Castor, Amy. “Why Ethereum Is Switching to Proof of Stake and How It Will Work.” MIT Technology Review, 4 Mar. 2022. <https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/03/04/1046636/ethereum-blockchain-proof-of-stake/>. CurrencyWorks. “Vuele - CurrencyWorks™.” 3 Feb. 2022 <https://currencyworks.io/project/vuele/>. Dailey, Natasha. “Quentin Tarantino Will Sell His ‘Pulp Fiction’ NFTs This Month despite a Lawsuit from the Film’s Producer Miramax.” Business Insider, 5 Jan. 2022. <https://www.businessinsider.com.au/quentin-tarantino-to-sell-pulp-fiction-nft-despite-miramax-lawsuit-2022-1>. 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What NFTs Mean for Film.” BFI, 22 July 2021. <https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/nfts-non-fungible-tokens-blockchain-film-funding-revolution-hype>. Klein, Ezra. “A Viral Case against Crypto, Explored.” The Ezra Klein Show, n.d. 7 Apr. 2022 <https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/05/opinion/ezra-klein-podcast-dan-olson.html>. Livni, Ephrat. “Venture Capital Funding for Crypto Companies Is Surging.” The New York Times, 1 Dec. 2021. <https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/01/business/dealbook/crypto-venture-capital.html>. Memoria, Francisco. “Popular Firearms Marketplace GunBroker to Launch ‘FreedomCoin’ Stablecoin.” CryptoGlobe, 30 Jan. 2019. <https://www.cryptoglobe.com/latest/2019/01/popular-firearm-marketplace-gunbroker-to-launch-freedomcoin-stablecoin/>. 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Affect theory is generally associated with the lifetime’s work of Silvan S. Tomkins, whose four volume work, Affect, Imagery, Consciousness, was published between 1962-92. The volumes argue that humans are subject to a range of innate affects: two positive (interest/excitement; enjoyment/joy), one neutral (surprise/startle) and six negative (distress/anguish; fear/terror; anger/rage; shame/humiliation; dissmell [reaction to a bad smell]; disgust). In a crude “advanced search” using Google, affect is related to emotion in 3,620,000 Web references; to intellect in 1,530,000 instances; and to both intellect and emotion in 1,670,000 cases (Google). Affect may consequently be constructed as a common but complicated response which cannot be simply elided with either emotion or intellect but which involves the integration of both. In particular, affect is generally constructed as a human response to a precipitating stimulus (be it an idea, a physical event, etc). If this is accepted, then Tomkins’s Affect theory might imply that the innate affects only reach conscious awareness as a result of a change in circumstance (e.g., idea or event) which requires a response. The importance of affect as a motivator for action has long been put to good use by advertising and marketing professionals who recognised early in their professions’ development that it is the ESP (emotional selling proposition) that delivers more punch, more quickly, than rational argument. An organisation’s (or individual’s) unique selling point can be rational or emotional, but it is easier for many people marketing a product or service to craft a perceived (unique) difference using emotion rather than logical rationality. For example, Coke and Pepsi are generally constructed as fighting their turf wars based on their emotional appeals, rather than any logical difference between the brands. This paper deals with the use of affect to craft an online therapeutic Website (HeartNET) as a joint ARC-Linkage research project between the National Heart Foundation of Australia (WA Division) and Edith Cowan University’s School of Communications and Multimedia. The research originally started with the idea that heart patients would appreciate the opportunity to communicate online with people going through similar experiences, and that this might create a virtual community of mutually supportive recovering participants. The reality held a few surprises along the way, as we discuss below. HeartNET has been designed to: 1) reduce the disadvantage experienced by people in regional and remote areas; 2) aid the secondary prevention of heart disease in Australia; and, 3) investigate whether increased interaction with an organisation-sponsored affective environment (e.g., the Website) impacts upon perceptions of the organisation. (This might have long-term implications for the financial viability of charitable organisations). In brief, the purpose of the research is to understand the meanings that Web-participants might generate in terms of affective responses to the notion of a shared HeartNET community, and investigate whether these meanings are linked to lifestyle change and responses to the host charity. Ultimately the study aims to determine whether the Website can add value to the participants’ communication and support strategies. The study is still ongoing and has another 18 months to run. Some early results, however, indicate that we need more than a Website and a common life experience to build an affective relationship with others online. The added extra might be what makes the difference between interaction and affective interaction: this needs conscious strategies to generate involvement, aided by the construction of a dynamic (and evolving) Web environment. In short, one stimulus is not enough to generate persistent affective response; the environment has to sustain multiple, evolving and complex stimuli. Online support groups are proliferating because they are satisfying unmet needs and offering an alternative to face-to-face support programs (Madara). Social support also combines some elements of affective community, namely belongingness, intimacy and reciprocity. These community elements can be observed through three levels or layers of social support: 1) belongingness or a sense of integration, 2) bonding which is somewhat more personal and involves linkages between people, and, 3) binding whereby a sense of responsibility for others is experienced and expressed (Lin). Here, social support may prompt an affective response and provide a useful measure of community because it incorporates other elements. Initial Design The project was initially designed to build “an affective interactive space” in the belief that an effective online community might develop thereafter. However, the first stumbling block came in terms of recruiting participants: this took almost nine-months longer than anticipated (even once Ethics approval had been granted). Partly this was due to a specific focus on recruiting people born between 1946–64 (“baby boomers”), partly it was due to the requirement that participants had access to the Web, and partly it was because we sought to specifically recruit non-metropolitan Western Australians who had suffered a health-challenging heart-related episode. We were hoping to identify at least 80 such people, to allow for a control group in addition to the people invited to join the online community. Stage 1 was to be the analysis of the functioning of the online community; Stage 2 would take the form of interviews of both community members and the control group. One aspect of the research was to determine whether online participants perceived themselves as belonging to an online community (as opposed to “interacting on a Website”) and whether this community was constructed as therapeutic, or in other ways beneficial. Once the requisite number of people had been recruited, the Website went “live”. Usage was extremely hesitant, and this was the case even though more people were added to the Website than originally planned. (In the end we had to rely upon the help of cardiologists publicising the research among their heart patients. This had a continuing trickle effect that meant that the Website ultimately had 68 people who agreed to participate, of whom 15 never logged in. Of the remaining 53 participants, 31 logged in but never posted anything. Of the 22 people who posted, 17 made between one and four contributions. The remaining five people posted five or more times, and included the researcher and an experienced facilitator, Sven (name changed), who was serving in a “professionally-supportive” role (as well as a recovering heart patient himself). This was hardly the vibrant, affectively-supportive environment for which we had been planning. Even with the key researcher-moderator calling people individually and talking them through the mechanics of how to post, the interactions fell away and eventually ceased, more or less, altogether after 11 weeks. One of the particularly distressing implications of the lack of interaction was the degree of self-revelation that some participants had offered when first logging onto the site. New members, for example, were encouraged to “share their heart story”. Susan’s (name changed) is an example of how open these could be: I had a heart attack in February 2004. This came as a huge shock. I didn’t have any of the usual risk factors. Although my father has Coronary Vascular Disease, he didn’t have any symptoms until his mid 60s and never had a heart attack. I had angioplasty and a stent. I accept I will be taking medication for the rest of my life. I’m fine physically but am having treatment for depression, which was diagnosed 6 months after my heart attack. In normal social situations an affective revelation such as “I’m fine physically but am having treatment for depression” would elicit a sympathetic response. In fact, such “stories” did often get responses from active members (and always got a response from the researcher-moderator), but the original poster would often not log in again and would thus not receive the group’s feedback. In this case, it was particularly relevant that the poster should have learned that other site users were aware that some heart medication has depression as a common side effect and were urging Susan to ask her doctor whether this could be a factor in her case. A further problem was that there was no visible traffic on much of the Website. During the first 12 weeks, only seven of 155 posts were made to the discussion forums. Instead, participants tended to leave individual messages for each other in “private spaces” that had been designed as blogs, to allow people to keep online diaries (and where blog-visitors had the opportunity to post comments, feedback and encouragement). It was speculated that this pattern of invisible interaction was symptomatic of a generation that felt most comfortable with using the internet for e-mail, and were unfamiliar with discussion boards. (Privacy, ethics, research design and good practice meant that the only way that participants could contact each other was via the Website; they couldn’t use a private e-mail address.) The absence of visible interactive feedback was a disincentive to participation for even the most active posters and it was clear that, while some people felt able to reveal aspects of themselves and their heart condition online, they needed more that this opportunity to encourage them to return and participate further. Effectively, the research was in crisis. Crisis Measures After 10 weeks of the HeartNET interaction stalling, and then crashing, it was decided to do four things: write up what had been learned about what didn’t work (before the site was “polluted” by what we hoped would be the solution); redesign the Website to allow more ways to interact privately as well as publicly; throw it open to anyone who wished to join so that there was a more dynamic, developing momentum; use a “newbie” icon to indicate new network members joining in the previous seven days so that these people could be welcomed by existing members (who would also have an incentive to log in at least weekly). Five weeks into the revamped Website a number of things have become apparent. There is some “incidental traffic” apart from research-recruited participants and word-of-mouth, for example (Jane): “I discovered this site while surfing the net. I haven’t really sought much support since my heart attack which was nearly a year ago, but wish I had since it would have made those darker days a lot easier to get through.” An American heart patient has joined the community (Sam): “I have a lot to be positive about and feel grateful to have found this site full of caring people.” Further, some returnees, who had experienced the first iteration of the site, were warm with acknowledgement (Betty): “the site is taking off in leeps [sic] and bounds. You should all be so proud.” People are making consecutive postings, updating and developing their stories, revealing their need for support and recognising the help when they receive it. It is not hard to empathise with “Wonky” (name changed) who may not have family in whom s/he can confide: (Wonky, post 12, Wed) [I need] preventative surgery of this aorta [addressing a bi-cuspid aortic valve] before it has an aneurysm or dissects … and YES I AM SCARED … but trying to be brave cos at least now I know what is wrong with me and its kinda fixable … After being asked by interested members to update the community on his/her progress, Wonky makes the following posts: (Wonky, post 13, Wed) […] I am currently petrified … And anxiously waiting to see the cardio at 3 pm Thursday regarding the results of my aorta echo … and when they are going to decide I need lifesaving surgery … (Wonky, post 15, Fri) ok…so I am up to Friday morning and fasting for the CT scan of the dodgy aorta etc … this morning … why do I get hungry when I have to fast yet any other day I really have to force myself to remember to even eat … (Sven, online support person, Fri) great news [Wonky] and I sense a more ‘coming to terms’ understanding of your situation on your part. You’re in good hands believe you me and you are surrounded by a great number of friends who are here to cheer you on. Keep smiling. […] (Wonky, post 16, Sun) Yes [Sven], you are exactly right […] [declining health] I guess is what scared me and plus I had pretty-much not bothered to research into the condition early on when I was first diagnosed … but yeah … my cardio guy is wonderful and has assured me I am not going to drop dead any-time soon from this … For people who had experienced heart disease without support, the value of the HeartNET site was self-evident (Jace): “My heart attack was 18 months ago and I knew no one with a similar experience. My family and friends were very supportive but they were as shocked as me. Heartnet has given me the opportunity to hear other people’s stories.” Almost two weeks later, Jace was able to offer the benefit of her experience to someone suffering from panic attacks: I had several panic attacks post my heart attack. They are very frightening aren’t they? They seemed to come out of nowhere and I felt very out of control. I found making myself breath[e] more slowly and deeply, while telling myself to calm down, helped a lot. I also started listening to relaxation CDs as well. Take care, [Jace]. Others have asked for advice: (Anne): “Everyone, and I mean everyone, has been saying ‘are you sure you want to go [back to work]?’ Does anyone have coping strategies for those well meaning colleagues and bosses who think you need to be wrapped up in cotton wool?” Several people have taken the opportunity to confide their deepest fear: (Marc): “Why me? Why now? Can I get back to work normally? Every twinge you feel, you think is the big one or another attack that will get you this time.” (Anne): “I decided to spend last night in A&E [accident and emergency] after a nice little ambulance ride. It turned out to be nothing more than stress and indigestion but it scared the crap out of me. I have taken it so easy today and intend to rest up from now on in.” Some of the posts are both celebratory and inspirational (although the one cited below required a rider to the effect that any change in activity should be checked with a GP or specialist): (Joggy) I mentioned on an earlier post that I was going to run the 4km in the City to Surf and I actually did it. This is from someone who has probably run no more than 100 metres in one go in her life and guess what, I quite like it now […] I know that I am way fitter now than I have ever been and in a nutshell it’s great. Others see support as a two-way street: (Drew) “If you no longer fell [sic] YOU need the support, keep in mind others may benefit from YOUR support.” Discussion Tomkins’s Affect theory suggests that humans are subject to two positive affects: interest/excitement; enjoyment/joy, and one neutral affect: surprise/startle, along with six negative affects. All these affects are decoded/interpreted from facial expressions and require face-to-face interactions to be fully perceived. When we look at what affective prompts may be inciting people to log into HeartNET and communicate online, however, it becomes hard to second guess the affective motivation. Interest/excitement may be overstating the emotional impulse while enjoyment/joy may be an extreme way to describe the pleasure of recognition and identification with others in a similar situation. Arguably, HeartNET offers an opportunity to minimise negative affect, in particular “distress/anguish; fear/terror; anger/rage; shame/humiliation” – all of which may be present in some people’s experiences of heart disease. A strategy for reducing negative affect may be as valuable as the promise of increasing the experience of positive affect. As for the rational or emotional impact, it seems clear from the first stages of the research that rationally people were willing to take part in the trial and agreed to participate, but a large majority then failed to either log in or post any contribution. The site came to emotional life only when it was less obviously a “research project” (in the sense that all participants still had to log in via an ethics disclosure and informed consent screen) in that people could join when and if they were motivated to do so, and were invited to participate by those who were already online. Since the Website was revamped and relaunched on 2 August 2005 a further 124 people have joined. It appears that HeartNET is now both an affective and effective success. References “Affective Therapy.” Affective Therapy Website: Tomkins and Affect. 9 Oct. 2005 http://www.affectivetherapy.co.uk/Tomkins_Affect.htm>. “Google Advanced Search.” Google. 1 Nov. 2005 http://www.google.com.au/advanced_search>. Lin, Nan. Conceptualizing Social Support: Social Support, Life Events, and Depression. Ed. Nan Lin, Alfred Dean, & Walter Ensel. Orlando: Florida, Academic Press, 1986. Madara, Edward. “The Mutual-Aid Self-Help Online Revolution”. Social Policy 27 (1997): 20. Tomkins, Silvan S. Affect, Imagery, Consciousness (Volume 1): The Positive Affects. New York: Springer, 1962. ———. Affect, Imagery, Consciousness (Volume 2): The Negative Affects. New York: Springer, 1963. ———. Affect, Imagery, Consciousness (Volume 3): The Negative Affects: Anger and Fear. New York: Springer, 1991. ———. Affect, Imagery, Consciousness (Volume 4): Cognition: Duplication and Transformation of Information. New York: Springer, 1992. Citation reference for this article MLA Style Bonniface, Leesa, Lelia Green, and Maurice Swanson. "Affect and an Effective Online Therapeutic Community." M/C Journal 8.6 (2005). echo date('d M. Y'); ?> <http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0512/05-bonnifacegreenswanson.php>. APA Style Bonniface, L., L. Green, and M. Swanson. (Dec. 2005) "Affect and an Effective Online Therapeutic Community," M/C Journal, 8(6). Retrieved echo date('d M. Y'); ?> from <http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0512/05-bonnifacegreenswanson.php>.