1. Mike Eisenberg Dean and Professor
The Information School
University of Washington

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

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

4. Purpose

5. Purpose

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

8. Uses Connections Information sharing Information gathering
Information use
Cooperative work
Education

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

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

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

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

13. /Mail Lists

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

15. Video Conferencing

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

17. Chat

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

19. Graphic Chat

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

21. Video Broadcast

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

23. 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

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

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

26. 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

27. 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.

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

29. Thanks for listening!

30. Thanks for listening!