Mike Eisenberg Dean and Professor The Information School University of Washington

Perspectives on Virtual Collaboration Mike Eisenberg Perspectives on Virtual Collaboration January 24, 2002

Outline Uses for Virtual Collaboration Barriers – Challenges - Issues R&D Agenda 2002

Purpose

Purpose

Purpose To facilitate human interaction To boost individual and group performance Effectiveness Efficiency To add value by connecting people to people

Uses Connections Information sharing Information gathering Information use Cooperative work Education

Challenge Transition from: traditional teaching of individuals in a highly social setting to: adding the social setting to an already individualized process.

Challenge “… The litmus test for developing technologies will be how well they meet that challenge.” -- Bill Gibbons, Syracuse University email message 8/11/97

Related Issues Affective responses as they relate to time and space It’s more than just communication; it’s also about information

Space & Time The social and psychological dimensions: Nature of the connection in time Feeling regarding space Locus of control Richness of the media experience

Email/Mail Lists

Email/Mail Lists Asynchronous Feeling of being “connected;” beginning of sense of community Locus of control: email – individual; mail lists – can be external (moderator) Media richness - limited

Video Conferencing

Video Conferencing Synchronous Feeling regarding space = sense of distance Locus of control: shared Rich medium

Chat

Chat Synchronous Feeling regarding space – sense of immediacy and connected Locus of control: shared, but cumbersome Medium not very rich

Graphic Chat

Graphic Chat Synchronous Feeling regarding space – immediacy, togetherness Locus of control: shared, but still cumbersome Rich medium

Video Broadcast

Video Broadcast Synchronous Feeling regarding space – broadcast, mass-media Locus of control: one-way Medium can be very rich

Challenge To put it all together: synchronous and interactivity of video conferencing feeling of space immediacy and togetherness of graphic chat sense of community of mail lists shared locus of control of video and chat the medium richness of video

It’s more than just communications Other Challenge It’s more than just communications

It’s more than just communications It’s also about information Other Challenge It’s more than just communications It’s also about information

Information Issues Human Information Behavior in Collaborative Situations purpose and need, problems (overload) uses and sharing search and retrieval Information Management coping with information overload representation and organization storage and retrieval

Agenda 2002 Study the affective - the emotional, psychological and social dimensions. Develop systems that create sense of togetherness, not distance, in space and time. Recognize and study the information side: uses, problems, behavior, management.

And Beyond… Change: Be prepared to break out of thinking in terms of existing systems (media, structure, format).

Thanks for listening!

Thanks for listening!