Digital Commons Network^™

Sport As Speech, Genevieve Lakier

Articles

No abstract provided.

Regulation Through Boilerplate: An Apologia (Reviewing Margaret Jane Radin, Boilerplate: The Fine Print, Vanishing Rights, And The Rule Of Law (2013)), Omri Ben-Shahar

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No abstract provided.

First Report On The Implementation Of The Ict Principles, Brian O'Neill

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It was a core commitment from the outset in 2010, when discussions began on the formation of an ICT Coalition spanning the whole ecosystem of internet-connected devices and online services, that any such self-regulatory initiative would need to demonstrate its commitment to independent assessment of its members’ achievements in online safety, given the concerns of the public and other stakeholders in this area. This report is the first such assessment, carried out by Dr Brian O’Neill, two years after the formal launch of the ICT Coalition - a timely moment to review the achievements of ICT Coalition members, assess the …

Putting The 'Student' In Student Learning Outcomes [Poster], Henry Etlinger, Rajendra K. Raj

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The presentation will describe a practical, light-weight, and effective assessment approach to involving students in assessing their own progress toward meeting course and program level learning outcomes. Research into the level of student engagement represents a valuable addition to assessment activities already being conducted at the program level. Funded by RIT's Student Learning and Outcomes Assessment Office, two faculty researchers surveyed students in three Computer Science classes to involve them in tracking their progress toward BS Computer Science program outcomes during these courses. This project and its preliminary results will be presented at this session.

Measuring Political Brand Equity In Ireland, Ewan Alexander Mcdonald, Roger Sherlock, John Hogan Dr

Articles

Measuring Political Brand Equity in the Republic of Ireland

This paper will apply cognitive mapping techniques to understand the manner in which political brand equity is formed and distributed amongst the four largest Irish political parties from the perspective of citizens. It assesses the fundamental aspects of branding and brand equity in the marketing and political marketing literatures and offers and overview of the market in question – the Irish political environment. Primary data was generated through the participation of 232 citizens in the political brand elicitation stage and a further 75 citizens were involved in the construction of the …

Real-Time Control Of Shunt Active Power Filter Under Distorted Grid Voltage And Unbalanced Load Condition Using Self Tuning Filter, Samet Biricik, Soydan Redif, Ozgur Ozerdem, Shafiuzzaman K. Khadem, Malabika Basu

Articles

In this paper, an alternative control method is proposed to improve the harmonic suppression efficiency of the active power filter in a distorted and an unbalanced power system to compensate for the perturbations caused by the unbalanced non-linear loads. The proposed method uses a self-tuning filter (STF) to process the grid voltage in order to provide a uniform reference voltage to obtain the correct angular position of the phase locked loop. Moreover, the required compensation currents are obtained by implementing another STF in the transformed set of currents in order to separate the fundamental and the harmonic currents. This allows …

Net Children Go Mobile: Policy Recommendations, Monica Barbovschi, Brian O'Neill, Anca Velicu, Giovanna Mascheroni

Articles

The aim of the Net Children Go Mobile project is to provide robust findings of patterns of online use, access, risk and opportunity in relation to children’s mobile access to the internet and to examine the implications for risks, online safety and – for the purposes of this report – the important policy issues which arise. The use of mobile connected devices by children and young people in Europe has undergone remarkable development in recent years with 45% of 9-16 year olds, and 65% of 15-16 year olds now using tablets or smartphones to access the internet on a daily …

Dna → Rna: What Do Students Think The Arrow Means?, Leslie Kate Wright, J. Nick Fisk, Dina L. Newman

Articles

The central dogma of molecular biology, a model that has remained intact for decades, describes the transfer of genetic information from DNA to protein though an RNA intermediate. While recent work has illustrated many exceptions to the central dogma, it is still a common model used to describe and study the relationship between genes and protein products. We investigated understanding of central dogma concepts and found that students are not primed to think about information when presented with the canonical figure of the central dogma. We also uncovered conceptual errors in student interpretation of the meaning of the transcription arrow …

A Cavity-Backed Spiral Slot Antenna With Wide Axial Ratio Beamwidth For Gps System, Xiulong Bao, Max Ammann

Articles

A monofilar spiral slot antenna with a cavity-backed reflector is described. presented, which can achieve the performance of the wide Axial Ratio beamwave for Global Positioning System GPS system. It comprises an arrangement of a single printed spiral slots fed by a 50 Ω microstrip line. By using cavity-backed covering the slot structure, a wide axial ratio beamwidth performance is achieved in the GPS L1 frequency. The angle with less than 3 dB axial ratio at 1.575 GHz in the YoZ plane is about 215 degree. The measured results show that the HPWB beamwidths at 1.575 GHz are 100 degree …

Beginnings: 3 Examples (And Why They Work), Julie Patterson

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Our writer-in-residence helps us look closely at the beginnings of three short stories.

What Next For Social Enterprise In Ireland, Gerard Doyle

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No abstract provided.

We The Peoples: The Global Origins Of Constitutional Preambles, Tom Ginsburg, Daniel Rockmore, Nick Foti

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No abstract provided.

Incentives For Reporting Disease Outbreaks, Ramanan Laxminarayan, Julian Reif, Anup Malani

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Background: Countries face conflicting incentives to report infectious disease outbreaks. Reports of outbreaks can prompt other countries to impose trade and travel restrictions, which has the potential to discourage reporting. However, reports can also b

Enacted Legislative Findings And The Deference Problem, Daniel A. Crane

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The constitutionality of federal legislation sometimes turns on the presence and sufficiency of congressional findings of predicate facts, such as the effects of conduct on interstate commerce, state discrimination justifying the abrogation of sovereign immunity, or market failures justifying intrusions on free speech. Sometimes a congressional committee makes these findings in legislative history. Other times, Congress recites its findings in a statutory preamble, thus enacting its findings as law. Surprisingly, the Supreme Court has not distinguished between enacted and unenacted findings in deciding how much deference to accord congressional findings. This is striking because the difference between enactedness and unenactedness …

Street Diversion And Decarceration, Mary Fan

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States seeking more cost-effective approaches than imprisoning drug offenders have explored innovations such as drug courts and deferred prosecution. These treatment-based programs generally involve giving diversion discretion to prosecutors and judges, actors further down the criminal processing chain than police. The important vantage of police at the gateway of entry into the criminal system has been underutilized. [para] The article explores developing the capacity of police to take a public health approach to drug offending by engaging in street diversion to treatment rather than criminal processing. This approach entails giving police therapeutic discretion—the power to sort who gets treatment rather …

Investigating Automatic Measurements Of Prosodic Accommodation And Its Dynamics In Social Interaction, Celine De Looze, Stefan Scherer, Brian Vaughan, Nick Campbell

Articles

Spoken dialogue systems are increasingly being used to facilitate and enhance human communication. While these interactive systems can process the linguistic aspects of human communication, they are not yet capable of processing the complex dynamics involved in social interaction, such as the adaptation on the part of interlocutors. Providing interactive systems with the capacity to process and exhibit this accommodation could however improve their efficiency and make machines more socially-competent interactants.

At present, no automatic system is available to process prosodic accommodation, nor do any clear measures exist that quantify its dynamic manifestation. While it can be observed to be …

Net Children Go Mobile:Initial Findings From Ireland, Brian O'Neill, Thuy Dinh

Articles

Net Children Go Mobile is a two-year research project funded under the European Commission’s Safer Internet Programme. Seven countries participate: Demark, Italy, Romania, United Kingdom, Ireland, Portugal and Belgium.

The project uses quantitative and qualitative methodologies to investigate access and use, risks and opportunities of mobile internet use. This report presents the initial findings of the survey of children and young people’s use of mobile internet technologies in Ireland. 500 9-16 year olds were interviewed face-to-face in their homes. The fieldwork was carried out in Ireland by Ipsos MRBI in November and December 2013.

The Governance Of Visibility: Bodies, Information, And The Politics Of Anonymity Across The Us-Mexico Borderlands, Robert Latham

Articles

This article explores the relationship between information and mobility as it is manifest at the Mexico-US border and understands that border to be one, although very important, site of information processing and production. Within the electronic as well as the physical spaces of the Mexico-US borderlands, it is argued that practices of evasion and exposure produce specific forms of politics. These forms bear on the militarization of the border, particular bourgeois anxieties, various instances of violence, the pursuit of survival strategies and recognition, and the emergence of resistance and countertactics. Also considered are possibilities for alternatives to the ways mobility …

The Limits Of Journalism : How Fictional Narrative Compensates For Journalism’S Shortcomings In John Banville’S The Book Of Evidence, Ian Kilroy

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How fictional narrative compensates for journalism’s limitations in John Banville’s novel The Book of Evidence.

Making An Impact: New Directions For Arts And Humanities Research, Ellen Hazelkorn

Articles

The severity of the global economic crisis has put the spotlight firmly on measuring academic and research performance and productivity, and assessing its contribution, value, impact and benefit. While traditionally, research output and impact was measured by peer-publications and citations, there is increased emphasis on a “market-driven approach”, which favours the bio-, medical and technological sciences, and helped reinforce a disciplinary hierarchy in which arts and humanities research (A&HR) has struggled for attention. This article charts the changing policy environment across Ireland, the Netherlands and Norway. It draws on evidence from the HERAVALUE project which studied how different stakeholders value …

Toward An "Unqualified" Otherwise Qualified Standard: Job Prerequisites And Reasonable Accommodation Under The Americans With Disabilities Acts, John E. Rumel

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No abstract provided.

The Collision Between The First Amendment And Securities Fraud, Wendy Gerwick Couture

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This Article seeks to correct the imbalance that occurs when the First Amendment and securities fraud collide. Under current precedent, securities analysts, credit rating agencies, and financial journalists are subject to differing liability standards depending on whether they are sued for defamation or for securities fraud. Under New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, First Amendment protections apply in the defamation context in order to prevent the chilling of valuable speech, yet courts have declined to extend these protections to the securities fraud context. This imbalance threatens to chill valuable speech about public companies. To prevent the dangerous chilling effect of …

Adaptive Water Governance Project: Assessing Law, Resilience And Governance In Regional Socio-Ecological Water Systems Facing A Changing Climate, Barbara Cosens

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No abstract provided.

Policy Influences And Country Clusters: A Comparative Analysis Of Internet Safety Policy Implementation, Brian O'Neill

Articles

EU Kids Online has developed a four cluster classification of 25 European countries based on the activities undertaken, the exposure to risk and harm, and type of internet safety mediation experienced by young people across Europe.

The purpose of this report is to add a further dimension by examining the policy context and to look at how countries within each cluster approach implementation of internet safety. Implementation in this context refers to a) policy frameworks and b) policy actions undertaken at the individual country/regional level.

Bastards! . . .. And The Welfare Plantation, Zanita E. Fenton

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No abstract provided.

The Changing Discourse Of The Supreme Court, Stephen M. Johnson

Articles

In addition to exploring whether the Court’s opinions have become less readable, this Article also examines whether factors identified in other studies, such as the opinion type or the subject matter in dispute, correlate to the readability of the Court’s opinions, either in the 1930's or today, and whether that has changed over time.

Part I outlines the criticisms that have been leveled at the Supreme Court’s opinions and some of the possible reasons for the obfuscation of the opinions. Part II explores the purposes of, and intended audiences for, Supreme Court opinions and considers whether it really matters whether …

Preparing Port Container Terminals For The Future: Making The Most Of Intelligent Transport Systems (Its), K. Mcginley

Articles

Governments and legislators all over the world view ports and terminals as vital infrastructure assets as they play a critical role in economic growth by attracting and generating trade. A port that does not have the ability to cope with rapidly advancing technologies will not be in a position to foster the development of the trade sector. Their ability to ‘go green’ by reducing their carbon footprint and by being more sensitive to environmental considerations is vital to their success. The future is bringing increased demands for greater efficiency and for more sustainable designs in cargo handling technologies. Moreover, the …

The Religious Landscape Of Walter Macken's Fictional Universe, Eamon Maher

Articles

Eamon Maher lectures in the Department of Humanities, Technological University Dublin. He is director of the National Centre for Franco-Irish Studies.

Microfiber Coupler Based Biosensor Incorporating A Layer Of Gold Nanoparticles With Improved Sensitivity, Yuliya Semenova, Lin Bo, Pengfei Wang, Furong Tian, Hugh Byrne, Gerald Farrell

Articles

We studied the effect of a star-shaped gold nanoparticles layer coated on the surface of the microfiber coupler (MFC) on the sensitivity of the embedded MFC biosensor. It is shown that deposition of the layer of star-shaped gold nanoparticles on the MFC sensor surface results in a significantly increased spectral shift (on average 3.05 nm shift compared to a 1.08 nm shift per layer of electrolyte for the sample without the nanoparticles layer). In addition, introducing the nanoparticle layer results in the decrease of the transmission power; measurement of the changes in transmission also could be used as a means …

Cold Comfort Food: A Systematic Examination Of The Rituals And Rights Of The Last Meal, Sarah Gerwig-Moore

Articles

Last meals are a resilient ritual accompanying executions in the United States. Yet states vary considerably in the ways they administer last meals. This paper explores the recent decision in Texas to abolish the tradition altogether. It seeks to understand, through consultation of historical and contemporary sources, what the ritual signifies. We then go on to analyze execution procedures in all 35 of the states that allowed executions in 2010, and show that last meal allowances are paradoxically at their most expansive in states traditionally associated with high rates of capital punishment (Texas now being the exception to that rule.) …