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My topic is the collaboration practices of open source software development. You can access this article by logging into ACM via the Curtin Library website. OVERVIEW: Because the production of Open Source Software (OSS) relies heavily on the work of volunteers, the motivation of those volunteers is imperative to the success of any OSS development. Recognising this, this paper seeks to explain the motivations of those who work on OSS projects, using the learning theory of Legitimate Peripheral Participation (Lave & Wenger, 1991) as a guide. Building on this theory, the authors assert that the transient and open nature of an OSS development community appeals to user/developers as an environment to learn and hone their skills through 'legitimate participation'. Having identified the desire to learn as a key motivation for participants, the authors suggest that to attract more users to become OSS developers, leaders of OSS projects should create a list of progressively difficult tasks to foster the learning process and "enable newcomers to move toward the center of the community through continual contributions" (p. 9). Although this paper focuses on learning as a motivation, the authors acknowledge that because OSS is "a very complicated phenomenon" (p. 10), other motivations no doubt play a part. Informed by this and other articles, I would postulate that these other motivations include dissatisfaction with current software options (because "the best hacks start out as personal solutions to the author's everyday problems" (Raymond, 1999)), the desire for participants to gain reputation within the community, and the egoistic benefits of contributing to a program with a flatteringly large population of users. Raymond (1999) recognises the importance of satisfying the egos of "hacker/users" by providing them with a "piece of the action" (p. 29), while an internet-based survey (Hertel et al., 2003) has found that activities within OSS te

determined by participants' own "perceived indispensability and self-efficacy" (p. 1159). Overall, I believe that the community surrounding any given OSS-development is a key factor in the production of motivation, as it provides participants with the opportunity to gain reputation, satisfy one's own ego, and learn through legitimate participation in a project that the participants are personally interested in. References: Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Raymond, E. (1999). The Cathedral and the Bazaar. Knowledge, Technology & Policy, 12(3), p. 23-49. Hertel, G., Nieder, S., & Herrmann, S. (2003). Motivation of software developers in Open Source projects: an Internet-based survey of contributors to the Linux kernel. Research Policy 32(7), p. 1159-1177.

The "Old Spice Guy" Campaign has proven to be a game-changer, not only for Old Spice but for social media marketing. Ehrlich points out (2010), such campaigns seek to involve the audience in an immersive experience, essentially making viewers part of the campaign. Since the original campaign advertisement was launched, the campaign reached 40 million views in a week for a total 1.4 billion campaign impressions across all media, including thousands of parody mashups. The campaign has since gone on to increase sales of Old Spice by 107% and even won the Cannes Film Lions Grand Prix in 2010 (the advertising industry's equivalent of winning an Oscar for best film). Arguably, the most interesting and memorable feature of the campaign has been the interactive "Old Spice Responses". Responses was a series of 186 custom-made videos made for fans and celebrities selected from comments from Social Media Sites like Twitter, Facebook and Reddit (Ehrlich, 2010; see also Grant, 2010). These videos posted on YouTube became the basis for a viral campaign that achieved 6,000,000 responses in 24 hours. The true genius behind Wieden & Kennedy's simple idea, as Ehrlich points out (2010), is that it is viewers themselves who are maintaining the campaign's momentum as "viewers to go viral". This marks an important shift as "brands don't make viral videos, users make videos viral." That's exactly what Old Spice achieved." (Ehrlich, 2010). References: Grant, R. (2010, 10 August). 'Wieden+Kennedy's Old Spice Case Study' in We are Social [video] Retrieve 12 April 2010 via http://wearesocial.net/blog/2010/08/wieden-kennedys-spice-case-study/ Williams, M. (2010, 26 June). "Old Spice scoops Cannes Film Lions Grand Prix" Retrived 12 April, 2010 via http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/news/1012646/Old-Spice-scoops-Cannes-Film-Lions-Grand-Prix/

My topic is more specifically related to videoconferencing, through the use of software programs such as Skype. But I found this article (and this marketing campaign) interesting as they were combining video technology with a marketing campaign, which was the first marketing campaign of its kind (Taylor, 2010). Video has many advantages including those discussed by Isaacs and Tang (1994), which are connecting people who are geographically dispersed, building motivation, providing visual cues and body language indicators. I think Old Spice incorporated these four benefits of video and utilised them effectively into their campaign. They could have made the responses in text only versions, but this would not have been as impactful or effective. They relied on visual cues and body language indicators to assist in delivering their message. Due this marketing campaign being innovative it helped to motivate consumers who were geographically dispersed into spreading these videos throughout their social networks. However as discussed by Masum, Brooks and Spence (2005), without the use of a high speed Internet connection this campaign would not have been as successful. A high speed Internet connection would need to be in place to upload the video content to its users and also share the content throughout the network. If it was still common for users to have dial up speed Internet connections, they would not have found this campaign as motivating as they would have had to wait for it to download and users may have become uninterested quite quickly. References: Isaacs, E., Tang, J. (1994). What video can and can't do for collaboration: A case study. Multimedia Systems, Vol. 2, Issue 2, pages 63 -73. Masum, H., Brooks, M. and Spence, J. Music Grid: A case study in video collaboration. First Monday. Retrieved on 16 April 2011 from http://firstmonday.org/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/rt/printerFriendly/1238/1158

Thanks Mandy, you make an interesting point about the importance of Broadband Internet in the growth and popularity of video as a means of communication. It is sometimes easy to overlook or even overestimate the role of tools and affordances in analysing collaborative projects and events. Rosanna's article "Egypt did not have an Internet Revolution" suggests the role of social media was greatly exaggerated by the media and, in fact, the most important collaborative tool in the recent Egypt uprising was, in fact, face-to-face communication and word-of-mouth.

This is an analytical article in which the writer, Elisha Peterson, discusses the use of Wiki's in her mathmatical undergraduate course. The wiki-based software, wikidot, allowed her students to post questions as well as work collaboratively on assignments. In the article the author outlines the ways in which the wiki was specifically helpful for her class. She believes that it helped to improve participation by her students. This nturn helped students to feel more at ease when they saw what other students assignments were about. She also talks about their collaborative glossary of terms, in which each student had to post two definitions. She found that because of the collaborative nature, the students posted more than the required. It was also interesting to note that students were able to comment and correct other students work, which in turn ensured they werent studying the wrong material. However it seems that what was the most important for her class was the the compatibility wikidot had with their typesetting tool LaTeX. This made typing out mathematical equations an ease instead of students having to scan written material to the site. it seems that another positive of the site is the fact that it shows the logged time of each student, and therefore shows how much time they spent online either merely reading or perhaps editing (and what they edited was shown as well). I feel the most important part of her analysis is the feedback from her students. When examining the feedback it was obvious to see that many students believed that the online collaboration helped them when it came to studying for exams. I believe this would be a great way to get help from other students; you are able to address your question to a whole group of people instead of just one person (the teacher) this way students will get answers much quicker. It seems that the only issue behind the use of a wiki is the fact that students are unable to edit a page at the same time, however it s

Online collaboration has already proved its worth in software production and in the business models of various websites and organisations (eg. Wikipedia). This article provides a good example of how online collaboration can be worthy of inclusion into course material. In this example, students in the author's maths class benefited from extending their small community into an online space because students could correct each other's glossary entries and gain guidance by looking at other students' projects online. While it would have been possible for these students to collaborate offline as well, I found it interesting that various properties of the Internet seemingly made online collaboration easier than offline collaboration. For example, students could access the Wikidot page even outside of class time. Built-in features of the wiki such as forums, syntax for 'definition lists', hyperlinks, and LaTeX further assisted communication online. Having completed units involving the use of online collaboration tools (including Wikidot), I've observed that the usefulness of online tools is inevitably limited by how many students actually participate. While Ye and Kishida (2003) postulate that a 'community of practice' motivates participants to learn through participation, I would theorise that the allocation of marks to collaborative tasks is the most effective motivation for students to participate. Indeed, the author finds that tasks to which marks are allocated had excellent participation rates, while the forum, for which use was not compulsory, was used by only a few students. References: Ye, Y. & Kishida, K. (2003). Toward an Understanding of the Motivation of Open Source Software Developers. Proceedings of the 25th International Conference on Software Engineering. Accessed April 15, 2011, from http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=776867

This article discusses the author, Elishia Peterson's experience in creating and maintaining a wiki for her mathematics students to use during their semester. Peterson describes the tasks and activities she assigned the students in order to utilise the online collaboration tool that is Wikidot and was satisfied with the level of student involvement. (2009). Peterson is also forthcoming in any negatives and shortfalls she experienced during the course of the semester period, including the issue of more than one person working on the page at a time (which locks the other out and they are thus required to wait their 'turn') and that having to learn how to use the Wiki properly also took up a little extra time. Despite these minor issues, Peterson explains that the wiki created a more "streamlined student - instructor" relationship and that the communication kept the students engaged. The ability to post course material and answer questions on the wiki, along with the activities assigned to the students, created an environment where the students were able to work together. Peterson does mention that the use of the discussion board may have further enhanced the experience for her students but she found the board largely ignored perhaps as there was no grade requirement to utilise that specific tool. This reminds me of Broomhall's (2009) observation that just because a collaboration tool is available, does not mean it will be used. References: Broomhall, A (2009) No collaboration without communications Retrieved from http://www.steptwo.com.au/papers/cmb_nocollaboration/index.html Peterson, E.. (2009). Using a Wiki to Enhance Cooperative Learning in a Real Analysis Course. Primus : Problems, Resources, and Issues in Mathematics Undergraduate Studies, 19(1), 18-28. Retrieved April 17, 2011, from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1642644011). Retrieved from http://proquest.umi.com.dbgw.lis.curtin.edu.au/pqdweb?index=1&did=1642644011&SrchMode=1&sid=10&Fmt=4&VI

My topic is the collaboration practices of open source software development. OVERVIEW: This article compiles data taken from online OSS-management tool SourceForge, and provides an excellent overview of the features, advantages, and limitations of this particular tool. SourceForge (http://sourceforge.net/) is an online tool that facilitates collaboration on Open Source Software (OSS) projects. Among the most significant tools that SourceForge provides are forums discussing each project, a file-release tool, a basic task management system, the ability to post documentation (eg. instruction manuals) online, and the all-important Concurrent Versions System (CVS). This article goes into satisfying detail of how CVS works and why it is advantageous to software developers, explaining the CVS process as follows: 1. CVS holds the current version of a program's source code, and allows developers to 'check out' (i.e. download) this source code so that they have their own version to play around with. 2. Once done, developers can 'commit' (or upload) their changes. If possible, the CVS automatically merges this code with any other changes that have been made since the code was checked out. 3. The CVS system retains a copy of all previous versions of the code, and thus allows reversion to previous versions, as well as the existence of multiple 'branches' of the same source code. The main advantage of the CVS tool is that it "[allows] multiple developers to be working on the source code at the same time without conflict" (p. 6), although teams are may be limited slightly by SourceForge's basic task management system which "lacks capabilities for resource and personnel management" (p. 4). SourceForge is one online tool that greatly aids in the co-ordination of open-source projects. Any software developer considering the use of a pre-made online tool for collaboration would bene

This article elaborates some overviews about data SourceForge which is from online OSS-management tool, with its characters, advantages, and limitations. SourceForge is a very altruistic platform to benefit people for the development of software tools. It is good example of a social networking platform that is geared towards producing collaborative work, which is productive. Its purpose is not entertainment or socializing, but its about bringing together people with specialized skills and providing the framework and tools to allow people to work on a product in a virtual workplace. I don't totally agree by collecting statistics on the software development process,especially one that is non-commercial and can potentially be worked on by any member of the public to be a totally useful study. Software was development which is not a static work flow. There are many standards, development methodologies, languages, platforms, not to mention the human factor that can make interpolation results of the data difficult. However, I strongly believe the success of SourceForge Projects is not the collaborative effort that causes success, but those developers to press ahead and work on their masterpiece. There are some projects that are very successful, but on the whole a majority of the projects are half started and incomplete. There have been many studies in the past to try to quantify the efficiency of Software Engineering and to date. There is no ideal solution to completing a Software Engineering Project. It is still a maturing engineering discipline.

This article reviews SourceForge (http://sourceforge.net/) which is an Open Source software (OSS) development tool and provides free services to Open Source developers. By explaining how SourceForge collect, manage and apply activity data, this article points out the strengths and weaknesses of SourceForge as an online collaboration tool. An (2011) comments that the purpose of SourceForge is to bring "together people with specialized skills and [to provide] the framework and tools to allow people to work on a product in a virtual workplace". This feature is similar to Optimize Solutions which is mentioned in one of my selected articles: Optimize Solutions launches to help professional services organizations better manage - projects, resources, expenses. Both SourceForge and Optimize Solutions are collaboration tools with powerful functions for data management and user communication. With their network-based interface, distance is no longer an issue for collaboration and interaction among users. SourceForge deals with data and statistic; and Optimize Solutions manage various business resources, such as documents, images, and spreadsheet. While SourceForge is open for users to develop softwares, Optimize Solutions is used within an organization and external clients for business purposes. Although these two applications offer services in different fields, they both aim at enabling global collaboration and improving processing efficiency. I believe that with the development of information technology, especially online collaboration, such applications will be widely used in most organizations and for personal use. Reference: An, R (2011). Comment on Collection of Activity Data for SourceForge Projects. Retrieve from http://groups.diigo.com/group/curtin_net308?view=recent&page_num=1

This article published in the First Monday Journal provides a case study of how video conferencing was used by teachers for education purposes. Lessons learnt from this case study can be implemented by a business looking to establish a collaborative team communicating through the use of video conferencing. The case study segmented the benefits into four areas, other places, other times, other senses and other brains. The teachers found that videoconferencing was effective in motivating its students as they were communicating with people around the world. Organisations can take this learning and use it in the workplace by connecting like-minded individuals who are located in different offices/countries. This has the ability to motivate and inspire other team members and will potentially lead to more successful outcomes being achieved. Members of the project found that sometimes it was more convenient to videoconference as each member could suggest a suitable time to meet. However this would not always benefit teams communicating with people in other countries as they could be affected negatively by time differences. However team members were able to use the recording function to ensure information was always accessible in the future. The case study found that video conferencing gave team members the ability to use other senses other than just hearing to experience the communication. By being able to see people reactions, facial gestures and body language the communication process was improved and collaboration was easier. As the saying goes "many hands make light work" with the more brains included in the collaborative process different ideas and approaches can be discussed. With increased focus on cost saving, video conferencing provides a cost effective way to ensure that the best employees are included in the collaborative process.

My topic is the collaboration practices of open source software development. OVERVIEW: Open source software has popularised the concept of free, open collaboration through the huge success of projects such as Linux, Apache, and Mozilla. This article from Wired Magazine explores how the concept of open source, propelled by the success of OSS projects, is being applied to all aspects of information compilation, from free scientific journals, to liberally-licensed gene-transfer technology, to freely-editable encyclopaedia Wikipedia. Although this article takes a somewhat liberal interpretation of 'open source', it does a good job of explaining the origins and future of the open source ethos. It also pinpoints two factors behind open source's success: the rise of the Internet, and general exasperation with stifling intellectual property laws. By concentrating on open source as "a broad body of collaborators ... whose every contribution builds on those before" (p. 1), this article successfully links the concept of open source with the broader theme of online collaboration. Open source software developments, along with other incarnations of open source such as Wikipedia, are prime examples of the power of online collaboration. Relying on the work of semi-anonymous participants and loose organisational mechanisms, open source projects create something of value without many of the restrictions of intellectual property. As exemplified in this article, all kinds of organisations can learn from the success of open source's collaborative online approach.

I wanted to comment Emily on what a fascinating example of collaboration this is and a good resource to share. The open source software movement, particularly Linux, was one of the first online examples of the gift economy at work as identified by many anthropologists. Indeed, what makes some scratch their heads when trying to get others to collaborate on projects is the eagerness of those to contribute without reward to the programming process. Much has been made of the fact that niceties are attended to in the community, such as making sure the other programmers know what you did on the code. Anthropologist Coleman (2004) commenting on Project Muse shows not only the power of collaboration practices, but also how political they can get. For example to clarify this point, Zeitlyn (2003) studied the motivations of programmers who get involved in such collaborations. Much open source work is built on an ideal and goal, it is just that the sheer size of these collaborations make them very interesting in the way they are organised and executed. I do think mass scale collaborations such as Red Hat are different to Wikipedia. To me Wikipedia is somewhat anarchistic. There are rules but there is no actual valued goal; not everyone is out improve Wikipedia, whereas Linux has a greater degree of concern for the end goal, which is often being the alternative to Windows. I enjoyed reading all your postings on this issue and it seems that both Zeitlyn and Hertel et al did a lot of work to try to understand open source software and collaboration practices. References Coleman, G. (2004). The Political Agnosticism of Free and Open Source Software and the Inadvertent Politics of Contrast. Anthropological Quarterly, 77(3), 507-519. Zeitlyn, D. (2003). Gift economies in the development of open source software: Anthropological reflections. Research Policy, 32(7), 1287-1291.

OVERVIEW Because of the ability to share and interact online, collaboration tools are being considered as tools that can help children with learning. Keith McPherson believes that students should be kept up-to-date on recent technologies as they help educators expand their notion of literacy to embrace evolving communication that moves beyond (but still includes) just reading and writing. He also suggests that "educators assist their students to develop critical literacy capabilities across a wide set of real-life communication contexts and technologies." The article then goes on to describe 5 different online literacy tools that can be used to aid student participation and collaboration and therefore help in their learning. The 5 tools he talks about are, Gliffy, Google Docs, Newsmap, OpenOffice and Delicious. Each analysis gives the reader a brief outline of each tool and the advantages and disadvantages of each. While exploring the strengths and weaknesses, there were many contributing factors that were evident in Gliffy, Google Docs and OpenOffice, all three of them incorporate document type editing tools which make them easy to use. Also, all three of them allow various formats to be exported and imported onto the websites database. Of course all 5 incorporate the main theme of sharing (so this is where delicious and NewsMap fit into the mix) However NewsMap is the more interesting analysis that Keith McPherson includes in his article. This site is very different to the other four, yet he has found a way to include it as one of the key tools for students. This site uses Google Maps, and, as McPherson states "allows users to quickly locate international, national, regional, or local news." He believes it helps literacy skills because it aids middle/high school students with learning about mapping, directions, news and critical thinking. This is perhaps a site that may not have instantly been associated with learning in schools but interstingly has been

This is an interesting article highlighting the tools that can help assist students with their literacy. I find this subject extremely interesting as I have studied via distance education and I know from experience how tools such as Google Docs can be greatly beneficial in facilitating a group project. Another way students can be assisted in learning is through the use of videoconferencing. Videoconferences can assist students that are restricted due to physical disabilities or geographical limitations. By using videoconferencing software such as Skype in the classroom, students can be exposed to a number of different teaching methods or styles and other students. One of the great benefits with videoconferencing is providing students with motivation (Masum, Brooks and Spence, 2005). Instead of students feeling isolated with their learning they can use videoconferencing to discuss and share ideas with other teachers and students on a worldwide basis. By incorporating tools such as Google Docs, Delicious and video conferencing software, teachers can provide a more interesting way of teaching students. Google Docs could be used to facilitate the collection of ideas, Delicious can be used to share links and articles, while follow up and discussion of those ideas could take place through videoconferencing. This would present a student, that has restricted access to a school, with a full rounded experience of being in a classroom without physically having to leave their home. References: Masum, H., Brooks, M. and Spence, J. Music Grid: A case study in video collaboration. First Monday. Retrieved on 16 April 2011 from http://firstmonday.org/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/rt/printerFriendly/1238/1158

Very Interesting article. Here I am reminded of Jean Baudrilliard and "Simulacra & Simulation". In it, he talks about how the media shapes the way viewers understand. Effectively he suggests war as it shown on television, was a manufactured by media represention. "The media and the official news service are only there to maintain the illusion of an actuality… of the objectivity of the facts. All events are to be read backward." (Baudrillard, 1994, p.38) Like most things, with recent events in Egypt, it is the media represented accounts, which have become the "real". The idea the Twitter and Facebook can mobilise a revolution is a powerful symbol. "What is perhaps the most telling here is that, as Bikyamasr points out, "millions of the Egyptians that went to the streets probably don't own a computer, and definitely were not checking Twitter or Facebook for where the next gathering was taking place." The article suggests that, by the time the internet was cut off, the protests were already in full swing. Perhaps the Egyptian Government fell for the media reports of the power of Social Media. "It was through word of mouth, not online calls for activism that brought the Egyptian government to its knees". It is important to point out that word-of-mouth is a powerful tool for communication, whether it is through hand-written messages, text or social media, word-of-mouth messages are more likely to be trusted and acted upon by recipients (see Kozinets et.al, 2010) as well as fostering a connection and sense of community between the sender and receiver. References Baudrilliard, J. (1994) Simulation and Simulacra. University of Michigan Press. Translated from the French by Sheila Faria Glaser. Kozinets. R., de Valck, K., Wojnicki, A. & Wilner, S. (2010, March). "Networked Narratives: Understanding Word-of-Mouth Marketing in Online Communities" in Journal of Marketing. 74(2). pp.71-89. Retrieved via American Marketing Association/Atypon.com, 13 April 2011. http://ww

Mayton seeks to address what he views as the Western Media attributing the Egyptian political revolution to the presence of activists online. He underlines that with only a quarter of the population having access to social networks and media online, the idea that a "Revolution 2.0" occurred is seriously flawed. While acknowledging the useful presence of collaboration online, Mayton attributes the success of this political change to a word-of mouth and paper handout campaign, combined with a motivated and committed Egyptian people, preferring to credit the Internet with bringing the issue to the forefront of international politics. However Wael Ghonim a leader of the ground movement that would ultimately topple Mubarak, contradicts the ideas presented in this article. Instead he accredits social networks and in particular facebook (ref) as being the catalyst behind the revolution. While Ghonim acknowledges that any political protest requires bodies on the ground, he attributes the internet and collaboration that occurred on facebook with empowering Egyptian individuals. Furthermore the ability of these networks to spread information at a vast rate, combined with the ability to go undetected were attributed to the success of the initial protest which began in April 2008. This protest organized solely online was the trigger cause for the unrest and the political change that would unfold. Mayton highlights that the common misconception that every Egyptian has direct access to the internet is perhaps symbolism for an Egyptian society that still remains stratified. While this paper underlines the idea that attributing the success of this political collaboration to the internet overlooks the ground work and alternative methods employed to help further this revolution, there can be little doubt that in this course of history social networks did provide empowerment for some of the Egyptian people and played a significant role in this advancing this political colla

To most Australians, the conflict in Egypt was not an Internet revolution until their newspapers, bulletin websites and television told them as such. Spurred on by Google Middle East and North Africa Marketing Director Wael Ghomin's announcement that the Egyptian protesters had "the internet to thank for their victory" (Luna, 2011), headlines across the globe were swept up by the 'Revolution 2.0' media darling. It may be a journalist's job to disseminate current affairs- constructing language and presenting palatable news to their public- however the truth and integrity of the Egyptian Uprising reports suffered at the hands of the outspoken. Jordanian expert on branding Ahmad Humeid recognises these synoptic "slogans" (Pickerill, 2011) such as 'Revolution 2.0' as "extremely important for Western media audiences... [to] take an event and package it in a certain light" (Humeid, 2011). Joseph Mayton's commentary works to detangle the internet's 'exaggerated' role in Egypt. He presents the facts: 25 per cent of Egyptians have no access to a computer, let alone a wifi connected iPhone in their back pocket. The 'Online Revolution' label directly discounts the internet "have-nots" who "struggled for the same cause under the same umbrella". Finally, activists continued to mobilise, even during the four days the Government shut down the Internet service (Mayton, 2011). Yes, there was a significant initial online role in the January protests, but this article encourages that we cannot lump strong-willed street activism in its hundreds of thousands as an Internet uprising. Mayton reminds us the well-worn lesson: we should not accept anything at face value. Ignorance is bred through the blind digestion of 'fact'; we can only come closest to the truth by negotiating as many disparate viewpoints as possible. References: Mayton, J. (2011) Egypt did not have an Internet Revolution. Published on BIKYAMASR, Feb

Highlighted throughout this wire piece is the principal idea that the collaboration of online political supporters of the Obama campaign did not happen randomly, rather as Benko (2008) notes there was a "clear vision" behind the strategies used to empower, encourage and promote this activism. While this article takes a more statistical approach the vast success that the campaign had in translating online collaboration into an offline political movement is demonstrated as over 150,000 campaign related events were organized through online communities, and in the last week of the campaign online volunteers were asked to make over a million phone calls encouraging others to vote. A key strength of this source is the lack of political ideology or motive present. As a news piece it offers factual and well supported observations and comparisons as to how this online collaboration evolved. This is documented when noting the crucial role that this organized campaign played in generating financial muscle for the candidate, Obama himself noting "that it was the working men and women" who helped to obtain over $600 million most of which was donated online. The Obama campaign employed the right people in Rospars, Hughes an Goldstein (2009) to exploit the potential Youth, grassroots and hard - to-reach voters with an online political strategy they helped to not only involve them in this revolutionary online collaboration but to also give them a feeling of political empowerment. This reliable source is therefore key in documenting how the Obama campaign skillfully executed an online strategy to maximize group collaboration. Offering not only a balanced and factual observation as to how the internet empowered and mobilized the ordinary citizen thus revolutionizing the political scene of the western world, but also crucially that with this campaign there was a clear bridge that activism online can result in political involvement and ultimately change offline. Refer

It is important to remember that, although Obama cleverly attached the Internet to his campaign, a combination of factors contributed to his 52 per cent (Stirland, 2008) majority: A compelling and humanising personal narrative, stellar oratory skills, and that "the moment was perfect for his message of 'change'" (Norquay, 2007). Obama's candidacy was a consciously planned and executed national movement that "lent itself to mass mobilisation among that very portion of the population that is the most new media friendly and tech-savvy, the younger demographic" (Norquay, 2007). The youth not only engaged in the web pages and online action groups produced by the Obama campaign, they took it upon themselves to create their own media content; such as the 'Yes We Can' (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjXyqcx-mYY, 2008) celebrity-driven music video which reached Youtube notoriety, or the portrait graphic a supporter produced later going on to be assimilated into the official promotion. This content-creation parallels my topic on Middle East revolutions, through activist's construction of uniform slogans, signs and imagery (McHugh, 2011). This article concludes with the prediction that Obama's "rise to the presidency will be studied for years to come as the textbook example of a new kind of electioneering driven by people and technology" (Stirland, 2008), and- to a less successful extent- this was realised in the Kevin07 campaign, in which "Kevin Rudd launched his campaign to online publicity buzz- turning to blogging, Youtube and Facebook" (Best, 2007). The Obama Campaign speaks volumes on trends towards the democratic possibilities of technology; but dystopian thought suggests that "people go online to find out more about a subject, not to be politically transformed" (Lievrouw & Livingstone, 2002). Even though a 2000 ULCA study (Kahn & Keller, 2004) showed only 29.7% of users felt the internet led to people having greater pow

Although often overlooking the role of politicians in organizing online political collaboration, Sanson documents the crucial role that facebook played in galvanizing and motivating the millennial generation of voters to participate and engage in political debate throughout the 2008 election. There is an underlying theme throughout this paper that it was a case of peer -to-peer relationships that caused this revolutionary collaboration of young voters. Further highlighted is the ease with regards to facebook being an organizing tool, with social actions within the site being reflective of a ground based campaign and helping to form a new kind of politics(Sanson, 2008). Sanson ponders why it is that the youth vote has suddenly became more engaged in the political spectrum, considering factors outside of the political world; noting that both circumstance(BBC News,2008 ) and the timing of incidents over the last decade may well have instigated this youth movement. Yet it is crucially noted that the internet and particularly Facebook became a catalyst for this millennial collaboration, based not solely on political presence online but also the wealth of information and the free-flowing style of messages combined with the vast number of users(Facebook, 2011) and the ultimate chain reaction of a peer-to-peer connection. Noted throughout is the fact that this social network was used for more than just organization and a spear head of this political collaboration - highlighted is how it was used for financial muscle, as well as a tool for micro-targeting and the education of a younger generation on both the candidates and the political process. Throughout this academic paper a thorough explanation is offered as to the triggers of this millennial political collaboration which has led to a new dialogue being opened between the politicians and the voters, there can be no question that Facebook has revolutionized the way that political collaborations are conducte

The Internet has presented a medium for people to carry out 'liberal individualist' transactions with government agencies. In 2001, Microsoft announced that the internet will empower citizens "to set their own political agendas, establish government priorities and help implement policies" (Katz & Rice, 2002) and, as Angela Sanson's chapter explains, the 2007/8 United States elections rang this prediction true. Campaign finance was "just one of the many ways Obama's IT and social networking approaches revolutionised citizen participation" (Norquay, 2007): Evidence of internet incensed political dialogue, such as discussion forums, sites indicating support/non-support for parties and leadership (for example, President Obama's 1.7 million friends at the time), videos, art and news combine to create an increasingly potent role for the internet user. Obama endeavoured to "define his campaign by 'conversations' with the American people" (Westling, 2007), and in doing so, formed genuine connections which later translated into votes. As Westling recognises, Facebook is an ultimate campaign tool as it combines the "best features of local bulletin-boards, newspaper, and town hall meetings and places them in one location that is available at any time in practically any location" (2007). Many scholars have likened the transformative role of the Internet in political propaganda to that of television in the 1966 U.S. Election. The impact of the internet, however, far surpasses television because of the vast potential for individual empowerment. Instead of simply voting for themselves, citizens had the opportunity to actively contribute to political change in their peers. From the public's perspective, Facebook "gives amateur activists an easy way to connect with other citizens around the globe and helps them push their collective concerns to the top of political agendas" (Sanson, 2008). This same online influence was successfully em

Subject: How online collaboration has affected the software development industry Reference 4 Shared Waypoints and Social Tagging to Support Collaboration in Software Development By Margaret-Anne Storey, Li-Te Cheng, Ian Bull, Peter Rigby (2006) ABSTRACT This paper presents the conceptual design of TagSEA, a collaborative tool to support asynchronous software development. Our goal is to develop a lightweight source code annotation tool that enhances navigation, coordination, and capture of knowledge relevant to a software development team. Our design is inspired by combining "waypoints" from geographical navigation with "social tagging" from social bookmarking software to support coordination and communication among software developers. We describe the motivation behind this work, walk through the design and implementation, and report early feedback on how this lightweight tool supports collaborative software engineering activities. Finally, we suggest a number of new research directions that this topic exposes. (Rigby, 2006) Full document available from http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.136.3988&rep=rep1&type=pdf TagSEA software/code available from http://tagsea.sourceforge.net/download.html Bibliography Rigby, P. S., Margaret-Anne; Cheng, Li-Te; Bull,Ian. (2006). Shared waypoints and social tagging to support collaboration in software development. Paper presented at the CSCW'06, ACM http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.136.3988&rep=rep1&type=pdf

Review of article - Shared Waypoints and Social Tagging to Support Collaboration in Software Development This article reviews the development and purpose of TagSEA and gives us an understanding of the technology and why it is useful for software development collaboration. This is software that is designed to allow developers to place collaborative annotations attached to specific locations in source code. This is a professionally written article that looks at both why the software was developed and how it works, including a trial evaluation of the software. It also includes information on what it is written in (java) and what it works as part of (eclipse IDE). The article reviews what it can be used for and includes images displaying the look and feel of the software but does not explain how to use the software itself or provide a link to further information. However research on the internet has provided a link http://tagsea.sourceforge.net to where the software is available. The site where the software is located provides further information on how to use the software and links for downloading it as well as information about further developments. Both the article "Shared Waypoints and Social Tagging to Support Collaboration in Software Development" and the website appear to be written/designed to be read/used by people with technical skills i.e. developers and tends to use a significant amount of specialised terminology. Rigby, P. S., Margaret-Anne; Cheng, Li-Te; Bull,Ian. (2006). Shared waypoints and social tagging to support collaboration in software development. Paper presented at the CSCW'06, ACM Retrieved from http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.136.3988&rep=rep1&type=pdf