W4A and W4A Camp Trip Report

Well as you can expect, after the W4A 2013 and W4A Camp 2013 there comes the trip report. I can tell you that the research was excellent and the quality of discussion was awesome. But don’t take my word for it have a look at the videos for each session (below).

Social Events every night at the W4A. Thanks to Hiro Takagi for the photo.

So is it just me who thinks the work is good and influential? Lets have a look:
CHI has been running from 1981-2013 publishing 10,424 papers with 486.66 average downloads per paper and a citation average per article of 8.28. Now ASSETS on the other-hand has been running from 1994-2012 (13 years less) publishing 726 papers (less than a tenth of CHI papers) with 340.94 average downloads per paper and a citation average per article of 4.27. Finally, lets look at W4A. The new kid on the block and aged just 10 years old, running from 2004-2012 (23 years less) publishing just 217 good quality papers (less than 2% of CHI papers, and less that a third of ASSETS papers) but punching way, way, above it’s weight with 438.52 average downloads per paper and a citation average per article of 3.76. This means that citations per paper are rising at a much higher rate than either ASSETS or CHI, and average downloads per paper beating ASSETS and gaining on CHI (just 50 downloads per paper different). This means that the W4A is gaining on both in impact and is beating ASSETS in reach, while getting very close to CHI.

As I say above, have a look at the videos (below) and at the panel if you don’t believe me on quality and interactivity, but the part that is missing is the W4A Camp held in the morning of ‘Crazy Wednesday’ the free 3rd day of the W4A.

This years camp was again excellent, and the camp report will be out next year, but we had around 30 participants (I think the rest were on the beach?) and this year Markel Vigo (the Crazy Wednesday co-chair) decided on a series of round table open discussions picked from the post-it notes used to gather topics (un-conference style) over the first 2 conference days. The discussion went on for between 3 and 4 hours, and I found this discussion really thought provoking with most attendees contributing; and with the Google Student Award winners also getting a 20 minute grilling a-piece! Well worth attending for everyone – you really had to be there – so if you want the details you’ll need to attend next year – and if you don’t want to attend the Monday or Tuesday, the camp is free.

Now on to the videos!