6.805/STS085 Procedures for the end of the term

End-of-term conference

We will end the term with a conference on Sunday, December 6. The conference will be held at Harvard Law School in the Ames Moot Court Room, Austin Hall, from 10 till 5. We hoping to have a party following the conference -- stay tuned for details.

For the conference, we will combine the teams into three groups, and there will be a session devoted to each group.

Each session will start with one person from each team making a 10-minute presentation of the team's findings and proposals. Then a panel of expert guests will discuss their reactions to the presentations.

Executive summaries

Each team should prepare a brief executive summary of their white paper. These summaries will be collated into a conference proceedings to be used by the expert panelists and other attendees. One of the MIT students on each team should be responsible for the summary. This will count as that student's second writing assignment. The other MIT students on the team will have a different writing assignment, also due on December 1. Look here for more information on the MIT writing assignments.

Preparing and turning in the white papers

White papers are due on December 10. Each team has by now met with Hal and Larry, so you should have a good idea of what we're looking for. Don't hesitate to get back to us if you still have questions.

Each team should assign one person as editor for the white paper, to be responsible for overall uniformity of style and presentation. Remember that you are supposed to produce a coherent paper, not merely separate pieces glued together. Papers should have a summary introduction and table of contents, and they should have adequate footnote references in accordance with standards for law review articles.

You should format, print, and bind your paper (in some simple way -- don't go overboard). Turn in five copies of the paper (for Larry, Jonathan, Hal, Joanne, and Mike). You can turn in papers either at Larry's office or at Hal's office.

With the team's permission, we would like to post the white papers on the web. If you agree to let us post your paper, please also send a copy of the paper in HTML or MS Word format to Hal, together with a note on behalf of the group giving us permission to post the paper. Whether or not you grant us permission will have no effect on your grade.

Division of effort and allocation of credit

As we said at the beginning of the semester, grades in the course will depend primarily on the quality of work produced by the team. Along with the white paper, each team should turn in a brief statement that details the contributions of each team member to the overall effort during the semester: the in-class presentation, presentation at the end-of-term conference, and the white paper.

Each team should turn in an "allocation of credit" statement. Counting the entire team effort this semester as 100%, please advise us how credit for that 100% effort should be parceled out among the individual team members. Teams may do this allocation on any basis they wish, so long as all team members agree.

Second writing assignment for MIT students

For MIT students, there are two possible ways to complete the second writing assignment. Either way, this is due on December 1. As with the first assignment, please send copies of your paper by email to Hal, Joanne, and Mike.
  1. Executive summary for your team's conference presentation
    This summary of your team's white paper will be distributed to the expert guests and other conference attendees. It should be three to five pages long, and should highlight the most important results of the white paper. Remember that this is written for experts in the field, so it should not be necessary to provide a lot of background or to review material that is obvious or well-known. This summary will be the main way that conference attendees will get an impression of your team's work this semester. It goes without saying that the summary should be impeccably written, so as to present your team's work in the best possible light. The team will probably want to include the summary (or an edited version of it) at the beginning of the white paper.

    Each team should agree on one team member (an MIT student) to be responsible for preparing the summary, although the entire team will probably want to review it, since its quality will reflect on the entire team.

  2. Another analysis, as in the first writing assignment
    The other MIT students on each team should do another analysis like the one for the     first paper. Pick a different example than you did for the first paper. Before writing this, review your first paper and the feedback you received on it. One common problem on the first paper was that many papers did not adequately address the legal and societal issues. Feel free to pick a topic related to your team's white paper, where you can take advantage of the work you've done here. Some were graded down because of writing quality. Please pay careful attention to this.

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    Hal Abelson (hal@mit.edu)
    Joanne Costello (joanne@mit.edu)
    Mike Fischer (mfischer@mit.edu)
    Larry Lessig (lessig@law.harvard.edu)
    Jonathan Zittrain (zittrain@law.harvard.edu)

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    Last modified: November 15 1998, 11:16 PM