Final Call for Registration: .Astronomy 2009

[Alasdair Allan]

.Astronomy 2009
 From 30 Nov 2009 through 4 Dec 2009

This is the final call for registration for the .Astronomy 2009  
meeting to be held in the Lorentz Center in Leiden later in the year.  
The .Astronomy conference series explores the connection between  
astronomy and the Internet.

More information about the meeting is available on the conference  
website http://dotastronomy.com/.

Workshop Description

Astronomy is facing a paradigm shift. The huge quantities of data that  
will be generated by a new generation of surveys and instruments  
require new ways of thinking. At the same time, an ever more connected  
world is bringing astronomy to the masses by the vast possibilities of  
the web, via  blogs,podcasts, social networks and more.

Google Sky and Microsoft’s Worldwide Telescope have taken astronomy  
into the home with stunning elegance. Exciting citizen science  
projects enlist the general public into world-class astronomy  
research. Data mining, robotic telescopes and virtual observatories  
will soon takepetabytes of data to a global audience of professionals  
and amateurs. Communication and networking technologies are changing  
science, for both researchers and the public alike.

In 2008 the first .Astronomy conference took place in Cardiff, to  
discuss the ideas and methods emerging in this new era and the way in  
which they present interesting and novel opportunities for both  
conducting and communicating astronomy.

Themes and topics

* Citizen Science
	* Galaxy Zoo
	* Web-based platforms for citizen science projects
	* Future citizen science projects
	* New media for outreach and communication
	* IYA 2009 and the web
* Podcasting and blogging astronomy
* Microblogging
	* Networked technologies for research
* Virtual observatory
* Literature tools
* Data mining
	* Visualisation concepts
* Google Sky, Microsoft Worldwide Telescope
* Visualisation as a research aid

An entire day of the workshop will be devoted to an “Astronomy Hack  
Day”, where developers can
work together on novel astronomy-related applications. We will be  
working with both web based
software, software for mobile platforms such as the Apple’s iPhone and  
Google’s Android phones, as
well open hardware projects based on the Arduino microprocessor board.  
We aim to lay the basis for
several new citizen science projects during the .Astronomy week.

Workshop format

We plan to have talks in the morning of every day, with the afternoon  
reserved for working break-out groups or discussion sessions.  This  
means the number of "formal talks" will be quite limited, but everyone  
will have a chance to speak their mind. Each day will deal with one of  
the above themes, with the 5th day devoted to the Hack Day.

Scientific organizing committee

Dr. Alasdair Allan, University of Exeter (@aallan)
Dr. Sarah Kendrew, University of Leiden (@sarahkendrew)
Dr. Chris Lintott, University of Oxford (@chrislintott)
Dr. Stuart Lowe, University of Manchester (@astronomyblog)
Dr. Carolina Ödman, University of Leiden/Universe Awareness (@carolune)
Mr. Robert Simpson, University of Cardiff (@orbitingfrog)

.Astronomy and the International Year of Astronomy

The United Nations proclaimed 2009 the International Year of Astronomy  
(IYA2009) in celebration of the anniversary of Galileo Galilei’s first  
astronomical observations through a telescope. The vision of the IYA  
is to “help the citizens of the world rediscover their place in the  
Universe through the day- and night-time sky, and thereby engage a  
personal sense of wonder and discovery”. The internet has been  
instrumental in bringing the activities of the IYA to a huge public  
with blogs, podcasts andwebcasts. During the .Astronomy workshop we  
will review the success of these initiatives and discuss how to keep  
the momentum of the IYA into the coming years.

This workshop is an official IYA2009 conference.