My research and teaching focuses on social, policy, and ethical aspects of ICTs, political economy of the media, feminism/gender issues and media in Canada.

I have been active in conducting research on the social and policy aspects of the Internet since the mid-1990s. My research contributions straddle the line between academic and non-academic audiences, including policymakers and non-profit groups.

I've been involved in the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) funded Canadian Research Alliance for Community Innovation and Networking (CRACIN), a research partnership between academics, government officials and community ICT organizations, whose aims are to investigate community networking practices and ICT policy in Canada (see www.cracin.ca). An outgrowth of this was the Alternative Telecommunications Policy Forum bringing together public groups to discuss the impacts of telecom deregulation in Canada on the public interest, which resulted in a book published by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, For Sale to the Highest Bidder: Telecom Policy in Canada (co-edited with Marita Moll, 2008). Other projects have looked at domestic use of the internet in the home (Children, Young People and New Media in the Home) also funded by SSHRC, and involvement in a SSHRC-Law Commission of Canada project on Communication Rights in Canada with PI Marc Raboy of McGill Univ.  I am the author of Gender and Community in the Social Construction of the Internet (Peter Lang, 2002), and co-editor of Feminist Interventions in International Communication (with Katharine Sarikakis, Rowman & Littlefield, 2008), two volumes in Communications in the Public Interest (edited with Marita Moll, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives) and Mediascapes: New Patterns in Canadian Communication, 2nd ed (with Paul Attallah, Nelson Canada). Articles have also appeared in Continuum, The Gazette, Canadian Journal of Communication, Government Information Quarterly. I'm  the former President of the Canadian Communication Association (2004-06) and the former editor of Computers and Society.

I'm also a Committee Member for the NK Grants.