From: Anita Colyer

Date: Wed, Apr 17, 1996 8:04 AM

Subject: I'm back/ethnography of Cinema-L

To: cinema-l@american.edu

Greetings, Cinema-lovers! It's good to be back on Cinema-L after a long hiatus. I've been lurking for the past few weeks, listening in occasionally. Haven't had much time for posting lately--my cinema viewing has been mightily constricted these past few years, unfortunately (sadly enough, sometimes life intrudes on art)--but I am enjoying just listening in, for now.

Some of you old-timers will remember the ethnography of this listserv that I began working on during April of 1993 as part of my media studies coursework at Penn State (I'm wrapping up a master's degree in the next year or so, she said hopefully). The general theme of my project at that time was "use of electronic media as social practice," and as part of my project I analyzed some of the listserv dynamics. Well, guess what! I'd like to revisit some of my earlier assumptions, now that a few years have passed, and I would like to request some volunteers to help me out!

In addition to listening in on the listserv through the end of April (I hope you don't mind--I'll try to be as unobtrusive as possible!), I'd also like to request some volunteers who wouldn't mind being briefly "interviewed" via e-mail as part of my project. PARTICIPATION IN THIS PROJECT IS PURELY VOLUNTARY!

If you'd like to volunteer, please send me an e-mail note off-list (I'm at afc1@cde.psu.edu), and within a few days I'll e-mail you a brief questionnaire and a consent form. My timeline is pretty tight: I will need to wrap up my interviews before April 30. (To protect your anonymity, in the final paper that I write, I will use pseudonyms in place of the names of all participants, but I do need your consent in order to quote you.)

I welcome all comments and suggestions.

Thanks!

Anita Colyer

afc1@cde.psu.edu