Dr Wal Taylor, from Informatics and Communication, has just returned from being an invited speaker at Community Informatics events in Salzburg (Austria) and Prato (Italy) during September.

Dr Taylor said he was highly honoured to be invited to be a member of the Faculty for the Salzburg seminar on Digital Inclusion held in Salzburg, Austria.

“Until I was invited, I had not heard of the Salzburg seminars which were established in 1947 with the aim of bringing together emerging community leaders and researchers from around the world to examine, discuss and plan action in order to address issues affecting humanity and to provide a platform to bring previously waring nations together,” he said.

“The seminars are conducted in the Leopoldskron Schloss (Leopold's crown castle) on the outskirts of Salzburg which has an interesting history and which received popular promotion as one of the main scenes for the filming of the Sound of Music.” Dr Taylor said the Digital Inclusion Seminar was attended by 54 fellows from 30 countries.

“I presented a keynote address on 'From Access to Effective use - the way forward for ICT diffusion' and facilitated one of the five discussion groups,” he said.

The seminar developed 21 projects and plans to conduct regional forums in Africa, South America, Eastern Europe and Asia/Pacific over the coming 18 months as well as reconvening this seminar attendance in 12 months time.

Dr Taylor has been offered a position as VP with the Digital Inclusion Institute.

He was also invited to attend the Many Voices Colloquium conducted by the Centre for Community Networking Research (Monash) and the New Jersey Institute of Technology held at the Monash campus in Prato (Florence, Italy).

“As well as being able to contribute to the colloquium objectives of formalising international collaboration in Community Informatics Research, I presented a refereed paper outlining the research undertaken at COIN on factors affecting non-adoption of ICT for local community benefit,” he said.

The Colloquium was attended by researchers from seven countries and formulated a statement which was forwarded to the current PrepCom for the WSIS (World Summit on the Information Society) being held in Geneva.

The meeting also established the Community Informatics Researchers Network (CIRN) which will help develop, distribute, coordinate and represent research in Community Informatics across the globe. Dr Taylor has been appointed to the steering committee of CIRN.