Skip to main content

Home/ CurtinNet308/ Group items tagged project

Rss Feed Group items tagged

Filter: All | Bookmarks | Topics Simple Middle
Kaye England

Factiva - 2 views

global.factiva.com.dbgw.lis.curtin.edu.au/...default.aspx

online learning collaboration forum chat project

shared by Kaye England on 10 Apr 11 - No Cached
  • Novel way for using technology. By PETER LELONG, VINCE SUMMERS. 500 words31 July 2002Hobart MercuryMRCURY26English(c) 2002 Davies Brothers Limited STUDENTS in years 5 to 8 are helping to write a great online novel called Billy Bathtub. As confidence grows in the use of online learning technologies, we are seeing the range of activities made available for students continue to develop. The adventures of Billy Bathtub, supported by the Department of Education, is a topical case in point. Author Damian Morgan is currently engaged in writing a novel, online, in collaboration with Tasmanian students during second term. A teacher and writer for many years, Damian has been working with students from around the state in recent weeks. On the completion of the novel in August, Erica Wagner, a publisher with Allen & Unwin, will be editing the novel for publication. The contributions of the students who participated in developing the story will be acknowledged. The partnership of writer and editor in an online collaborative project with schools around Tasmania is certainly a new and innovative way of engaging students from years 5 to 8 in the writing process. With the completion of four drafts of chapter one completed, the author posted a number of questions on the forum to engage students to take an active part in writing the story with him. "I know this is the story of Will Reynes, but do I call him Will or do I call him I?" Morgan asks. One of the many responses which he received: "I think if the story is going to be written in the present tense it should be written in the third person, but if it is in the past tense, the first person. I personally find stories easier to read if they are written like that." The story revolves around the adventures of Will Reynes, who we first meet in chapter one as he tries to rescue his window-cleaning mother from a high-rise building, where she has become entangled in her safety harness. In chapter two, Will, is with his father in a frantic rush to the airport, to meet an important scientist who comes complete with a large ceramic elephant. Students involve themselves in the writing of the novel by submitting ideas through the Discover Education online forum. The author responds to the suggestions from the students. This interaction between author and reader in the development of a novel demonstrates a very good use of the technology. Schools can also engage in online chat sessions with the author by booking time with him over the web. Alternatively they can invite him to visit their classroom. The Discover web site provides a link to download the software, Microsoft Comic Chat, for the online chat segment of the project. Once configured this program provides a secure online environment for students to communicate with the author. The story will continue to unfold with contributions from students until the end of August. To take part visit the Discover web site at http://www.discover.tased.edu.au/ billybathtub/. Document mrcury0020020730dy7v000nc
  • Kaye England on 10 Apr 11
     
    Even though this article from The Mercury (Hobart) is nearly 9 years old, I believe that it is very interesting, and the first time that I have been aware of an online collaboration to write a children's novel. It also shows that online collaboration need not be complicated. Sometimes we overlook the simple in order to engage in the latest popular online trend or something that is seen to be technologically complex. This article shows how sometimes a simple online collaboration tool works best. The collaboration involved students from grades 5 to 8 and was coordinated by author Damian Morgan. Damian received a grant from the Tasmanian government to undertake the collaboration project. Collaboration for the project was undertaken in an online forum and through online chat sessions. Over a period of time students contributed and collaborated with Damian in order to write the novel. Collaboration can take many forms and often we don't realize that we are engaged in it, I suspect that the children in this project were having fun, learning and collaborating all at the same time and had little notion of it! It is interesting that access to the forum is still available and in fact it details the collaborative conversations between students and Damian. The forum is still available at the following URL: http://forum.education.tas.gov.au/webforum/student/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=forum;f=97 Final and draft versions of the novel are available at the following URL: http://odi.statelibrary.tas.gov.au/Resources/Framer.asp?URL=%2F2002%2F2%2F010%2Fdefault.htm&ID=00215534 References: Lelong, P. (2002, July 31). Novel way for using technology. The Mercury (Hobart), p. 26. Retrieved from http://global.factiva.com
  • ...2 more comments...
  • anonymous on 12 Apr 11
     
    This resource directly links to my topic of crowdsourcing as it discusses a crowdsourcing project which involved young students having the ability to write a novel in a collaborative manner. Students were part of the process of writing 'The adventures of Billy Bathtub'. The article highlights some of the key benefits of crowd sourcing: non-professionals can make important contributions. Anyone can contribute, in this case, despite their age, their input was deemed valuable. It is important to consider that this project occurred in 2002; the nature of the online context was vastly different to today, and we can see this with the design/appearance of the project's online forum. In http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/news/2007/07/creative_crowdwriting Gorski (2007) explored two popular examples of collaborative novel writing using crowdsourcing. 'A million Penguins' and 'These Wicked Games' also allowed a group of people to write the novel. However unlike 'The Adventures of BillyBathtub' they did not rely on a forum, but rather wiki technology and were also very open and allowed anyone to make edits. Due to this chaotic structure, i believe 'The Adventures of Billy BathTub' was more successful because it was more controlled and restricted. 'A million Penguins' and 'These Wicked Games' faced many issues including vandalism. Many contributors were also contributing content to chapters without bothering to read what was happening in the narrative. However as stated by Jeremy Ettinghausen (publisher of 'A million Penguins') the project was mainly a experiment to see what would happen if anyone could edit and write a novel (A Million Penguins - The More the Merrier, 2007). This article suggests that collaborative narrative writing can be successful if organizers implement some degree of crowd control and impose certain restrictions to avoid chaos, spam, and vandalism.
  • anonymous on 12 Apr 11
     
    References: A Million Penguins - The More the Merrier.(2007, February 1). Retrieved from http://thepenguinblog.typepad.com/the_penguin_blog/2007/02/a_million_pengu.html Gorski, K. (September 7, 2007). Creative crowdwriting: the open book. Wired Online. Retrieved from http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/news/2007/07/creative_crowdwriting
  • Jiawen Lin on 12 Apr 11
     
    Hi Kaye, thank you for your interesting article and comments. Following is mine: This article is a good example of how people use internet to communicate and collaborate, which is similar to one of my readings: The American Pain Foundation (APF) and The HealthCentral Network Collaborate to Develop Enhanced Internet Resources for People with Pain. Both articles explain how people are connected by Internet to share ideas, gain information, and interact with each other through a website. Both websites mentioned in these two articles are open for general users, such as year 5-8 students and patients with pain, who may not have professional skills on Internet, so these websites are designed to be simple and user-friendly. Such websites let users easily focus on gaining information and collaboration without technical issues. As Kaye (2011) claims, "a simple online collaboration tool works best". In addition, this article shows the trend of using Internet to improve learning efficiency and allows communication and collaboration after school. As students' contribution will be available to view once they enter it to the website, Internet not only makes collaboration across time and geographical boundaries by global networking but also encourages students to contribute to their projects with more flexibility. Furthermore, as students normally access to Internet at home, this makes learning in a more relax and intimate environment. As Pelton (1996) mentions, online learning allows students to move from a passive learning to an active learning mode. In short, online collaboration helps student to achieve learning goals more efficiently with powerful and user-friendly features. Reference: England, K. (2011). Comment on Novel way for using technology. Retrieved from http://groups.diigo.com/group/curtin_net308 Pelton, J. N. (1996). Cyberlearning vs. the university: An irresisti
  • Kaye England on 17 Apr 11
     
    Thanks Jiawin and Cathy for your comments. It was a very interesting project wasn't it and I agree with you Cathy that one of the reasons that it was successful was probably due to the way it was controlled and organised - not like some of the examples in your readings (which were very interesting by the way). Jiawin - I read your articles too with much interest and would agree that the Internet is a powerful tool as it allows the sharing of ideas and information. Sometimes I think that people are afraid of engaging in some of these new online collaboration tools - but there is much to be gained by simply 'having a go'!! Thanks, Kaye
Emily Murphy

Collection of Activity Data for SourceForge Projects - 2 views

www.cse.nd.edu/...activity_data.pdf

Net308 collaboration open source OSS virtual community collaboration tools

shared by Emily Murphy on 11 Apr 11 - No Cached
  • Emily Murphy on 11 Apr 11
     
    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
  • ...3 more comments...
  • anonymous on 12 Apr 11
     
    Although my topic is crowdsourcing and not OSS, SourceForge is actually a strong example of crowdsourcing online. The website is simple, clean and easy to use. One of its main advantages is that it has a clear user friendly structure and offers developers useful features such as a clear summary and reviews of a piece of software. Open source software collaboration is an example of crowdsourcing because the crowd is in charge of shaping the nature of the product or system in question. In this case improvements and changes to software codes are influenced by a range of people with different skills and knowledge. These individuals are not necessarily industry experts, but rather a range of people with varying degrees of expertise. Going by the statistics in this article, SourceForge.net is proof that crowdsourcing works and can provide useful and sustainable results if a stable, reliable and controlled system such as CVS is made available to 'the crowd'. According Christley and Madey (2005, p. 1) SourceForge.net "is the word's largest open source software development website with the largest repository of open source code and applications available on the internet". This article is quite technical in nature, so it doesn't really explore reasons behind why people choose to engage with websites such as SourceForge.net. According to Veale (2005) people are motivated to make contributions online even though there is no payment involved. This differs from collaborative sites such as www.made.com and www.designcrowd.com. Veale (2005) argues that payment is no longer a primary motivation; individuals contribute for free because they get something out of this. One of the benefits of contributing to OSS projects is being able to improve something and use it for yourself or just being able to be a part of a community. This article is a useful resource for exploring open source software platforms and crowdsourcing.
  • anonymous on 12 Apr 11
     
    References: Veale, K. (2005 December 5). Internet gift economies: voluntary payment schemes as tangible reciprocity. First Monday, special issue #3. Available: http://firstmonday.org/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/1516/1431.
  • Emily Murphy on 15 Apr 11
     
    Great points! In reading about OSS collaboration, I have found that as well as the benefit of being able to improve something for one's own use, participants are motivated by the learning opportunities and the opportunity to satisfy their own ego.
  • Ran An on 15 Apr 11
     
    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.
  • Jiawen Lin on 17 Apr 11
     
    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
Matthew Hewett

Reference 3: Continuous Coordination: A New Paradigm to Support Globally Distributed So... - 0 views

citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/...download

shared by Matthew Hewett on 11 Apr 11 - No Cached
  • Matthew Hewett on 11 Apr 11
     
    Subject: How online collaboration has affected the software development industry Reference 3 Continuous Coordination: A New Paradigm to Support Globally Distributed Software Development Projects by David Redmiles , André Van Der Hoek , Ban Al-ani , Tobias Hildenbr , Stephen Quirk , Anita Sarma , Roberto Silveira , Silva Filho , Cleidson De Souza , Erik Trainer ABSTRACT Along with the rapid globalization of companies, the globalization of software development has become a reality. Many software projects are now distributed in diverse sites across the globe. The distance between these sites creates several problems that did not exist for previously collocated teams. Problems with the coordination of the activities, as well as with the communication between team members, emerge. Many collaborative software engineering tools that have been used to date, in global software development projects, exhibit a fundamental paradox: they are meant to support the collaborative activity of software development, but cause individuals and groups to work more or less independently from one another. The underlying issue is that existing software engineering tools, such as configuration management repositories, issue trackers, and workflow engines, separate time and tasks in concrete but isolated process steps. Designing tools based on the premise that human activities can be codified and that periodic resynchronization of tasks is an easy step reflects poor understanding human nature. We therefore propose a new approach to supporting collaborative work called Continuous Coordination. Underlying Continuous Coordination is the premise that humans must not and cannot have their method of collaboration rigidly dictated, but should be supported flexibly with both the tools and the information to coordinate their activities and to collaborate in their activities as they see fit. In this paper, we define the concept of Continuous Coordination, introduce our work
  • Matthew Hewett on 11 Apr 11
     
    Review of article - Continuous Coordination: A New Paradigm to Support Globally Distributed Software Development Projects This is quite a useful paper about current issues relating to the collaboration of software development and though it does not appear to have been published it is still a well-researched review of the topic. It focuses on the developing technology and changing methods of collaboration when developing software. It reviews a number of issues such as coordination issues that may arise between different sites that are working on a collaborative project together and looks at why these issues arise when developers and designers are working with current versions of collaborative software. It further focuses on why these issues arise and then reviews some of the software that is currently under development that may fix these issues. The software that it reviews includes YANCEES notification service that is an automatic publication/subscribe service for keeping software collaboration coordinated; Palantir workspace awareness tool that is an enterprise-level integrated analysis platform that works on a client/server model; Ariadne that is a tool for the collaborative searching/analysis of databases/source code and the graphical visualization and tracking of such searches; the TriVis which is a utility for graphically tracing collaborative software development and interactions and finally WorldView which is similar to TriVis but can extend from visualising design models to high level representations of development team interactions. Overall this is a very interesting article about the future direction of software development collaboration Redmiles, D. V. D. H., André; Al-ani, Ban; Hildenbr,Tobias; Quirk, Stephen; Sarma, Anita; Silveira, Roberto; Filho, Silva; De Souza, Cleidson; Trainer, Erik Continuous Coordination: A New Paradigm to Support Globally Distributed Software Development Projects. Retrieved from http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/dow
Kristy Long

Collaboration tools are anti-knowledge sharing? - 7 views

www.steptwo.com.au/...index.html

intranet; collaboration; information silo; fragmentation

shared by Kristy Long on 13 Apr 11 - Cached
  • Kristy Long on 13 Apr 11
     
    The goal of many intranets is to centrally store corporate information so that all staff can share information across divisions, access it and use it to make work-based decisions. This article argues that while there are many organisational benefits that occur from introducing collaborative tools to an intranet, if they are not managed properly they can create information silos, and therefore become tools that support anti-knowledge sharing. The article says the strengths of collaborative tools can also become their weakness. It starts with staff forgetting to publish outcomes or finalised documents produced in a 'locked down' collaborative space to the published area of the intranet. This then potentially causes hundreds of small collaboration spaces containing important and useful corporate information that hasn't been shared with the wider group. It is this fragmentation which makes it hard to find anything. The article argues, "This is the lesson we didn't learn from Lotus Notes and we are repeating it now." (J. Robertson, 2007) Even though some documents might be published to a broader audience, those who don't have access to the full collaborative space they were produced in may lack the context to understand what they are reading and how to use it. That is, the project plan might be a working document held in a permission only collaborative space, but the change management plan might be published. Both need to be read together to provide the user with richer context. "By 'locking up' the knowledge in these spaces, organisations make knowledge sharing harder, not easier." (J. Robertson, 2007) As an intranet manager and member of a professional intranet peer group, I have witnessed this happen in many organisations. These organisations are now spending lots of money and lots of time untangling their collaborative tools. In an unmanaged environment, not only do teams create information silos, but because of the nature of the collaborative too
  • ...4 more comments...
  • Jiawen Lin on 13 Apr 11
     
    This article emphasises some weaknesses of using collaboration tools in an organisation, such as unmanaged content misplaced in the system, a lack of organizational context for new staff, and irrelevance of search results for staff. This can link to one of my selected article - Sign of the times: manufacturing and e-business blend as a digital enterprise - which mentions another weakness that is the new solution may not integrate with the organisation's existing system and the existing organisational knowledge may fail to exploit. Long (2011) comments that both organizational teams and the nature of the collaboration tools can create information silos in an unmanaged environment. I agree that no collaboration tool is perfect but I also argue that such tools become a competitive necessity of most organizations because they provide powerful service to simplify business process and reduce cost. As Toole (2000) mentions, a trend for most enterprises is e-business which combines Internet and information technology to manage organizational information and process business geographically. I believe that with the continuous development of information technology, those collaboration tools can be improved and offer better services. Furthermore, organizations need to provide professional staff training on using those tools and make sure everyone follows the same procedure to process information in an effective way. Toole (2000) claims the bottom line of using collaboration tools is that they can deliver "better innovation and lower costs with higher quality products and services". Reference Toole, P. (2000). Sign of the times: manufacturing and e-business blend as a digital enterprise. Design Engineering, 46(8), 12. Retrieved from http://proquest.umi.com.dbgw.lis.curtin.edu.au/pqdweb?did=374775371&Fmt=7&clientId=22212&RQT=309&VName=PQD Long, K. (2011). Comments on Collaboration tools are anti-knowledge sharing? Retrieved from http://groups.diigo.com/group/c
  • Kelly Kerr on 15 Apr 11
     
    This article highlights the fact that whilst an organisation can implement collaboration tools there is more to collaborating that just implementing the technical solution and letting the staff collaborate without governance or guidelines (Till, 2005). The article raises that without leadership and guidance the tools that are designed to assist the business can actually work against it with multiple silos of content occurring, often with duplicate information which is not managed appropriately. For example the same piece of content could appear in more than one silo and be different as different teams are managing each of the sites (silos). Further, staff who are unfamiliar with a particular site are likely to create another instance of a site to avoid a conflict of an existing site. The article raises the issue of knowledge management at the corporate level being neglected and business risk that becomes a side effect of poor knowledge management. For many organisations, the intranet search engine is the quick win to locate information amongst multiple team sites however that is only masking the issue at hand (Brauns, 2004) and the information architecture of the intranet or sites needs to be addressed from an organisational wide approach and identify which information needs to be keep separate and implement a solution to meet the business needs. Reference Brauns, M. (2004). Moving Beyond Search. EContent, 27(7/8), S8-S9. Retrieved April 10, 2011, from ABI/INFORM Global database Till, J.G., (2005). Don't blame the technology. Information World Review, (213), 28. Retrieved April 10, 2011, from ABI/INFORM Global database..
  • Ran An on 15 Apr 11
     
    The article argues that it exists some disadvantages with using those collaboration tools, while collaboration tools were introduced to an intranet of organization. The article argues that it could cause the unmanaged content misplaced, lacking of context, and create information silos as it is not widely used, and therefore, at the end the article gave the conclusion is that collaborate tools can result in anti-knowledge sharing during the daily collaborative work. In fact, when providing team members with some effective e-business collaboration tools and spaces to manage organizational information and communicate each other, team members are also provided with professional knowledge about how to use those tools and spaces in an effective way.(Toole,2000). Team members need actively know how to use the collaboration tools within the group of organization, and learn how to find the important information in the "shared context" and catch up with what's going on with updated context in collaboration spaces before members started using these tools and spaces.(J. Robertson, 2007) I don't agree with that collaboration tools are anti knowledge sharing. Each technological product has its own disadvantages a certain extent, but updated technologies have been improving better services. So, users need find ways to solve the problem with using those collaborative tools in effective ways, in order to achieve the successful collaborative communication among members in the group. Minimize the risk and maximizes the benefits are the key points in the organizations for a better collaborative results. Reference: Robertson, J. (2007). Collaboration tools are anti knowledge sharing? Retrieved from http://www.steptwo.com.au/papers/cmb_antiknowledgesharing/index.html Toole, P. (2000). Sign of the times: manufacturing and e-business blen
  • Michael Nycyk on 15 Apr 11
     
    Kristy I was taken aback by the article but it also reminded me of my time working in a construction company. Many large-scale huge projects require the joining together of organisations (designers, architects, constructors) and professionals who previously competed for construction work. That is why there is much hype around creating a knowledge-sharing culture. This is described as making knowledge sharing a 'norm' (Gurteen, 1999), which means it is an accepted and agreed upon practice in the collaboration of any kind that things are disclosed and not hidden. We know this of course sometimes for politics or self-gain does not work. However, as construction clients do demand many firms to complete a project, knowledge sharing tools must not be anti-knowledge sharing. I will give you an example, which is in the public domain, of an example. I found on one project the issue of context that Robertson (2007) talks about in his article to be important for the sharing of records. The project I did ended up being published, but the situation was the sharing of important construction data. Each manager kept records of materials used on their own laptops and PC's as spreadsheets. No wonder there was confusion when they were told to merge them to share what had been done. They referred to it as 'Spreadsheet Culture' (Nycyk, 2008). They simply did not want to share how much material was being used. Although that suggests a culture issue, Excel can be a collaborative tool but it is obviously anti-knowledge sharing if every manager uses it differently. This is what they did, hence why the simple use of this tool in the wrong way prevented not only a sharing culture to develop but resulted in top management writing into their duty statements they had to use the new central database. References Gurteen, D. (1999). Creating a knowledge sharing culture. Gurteen, Retrieved April 15, 2011 from http://www.gurteen.com/gurteen/gurteen.nsf/id/ksculture Nycyk, Michael (200
  • Shan Shan Cheung on 17 Apr 11
     
    The article described collaboration tools obstruct knowledge sharing if organisations do not manage tools well. I am interesting in this article as theme of the article is an alert for me. There is an association between collaboration tools and knowledge sharing. They work as train and rail. The knowledge needs collaboration tools such as Intranet, Internet or other systems share them to most of user. Trains need rails for running. Thus collaboration tools are rails and Knowledge is trains. They cannot work appropriately once they miss each other. However, railway requires particular planning before it builds up and maintenance after railway is running. The planning ensures railway is working efficiency and safety. Collaboration tools also require particular planning. Robertson (2007) mentioned in his articles, collaboration tools can be anti-sharing once tools are without management, planning and maintenance. Suarez (2006) argue in his blog that e-mail is not a powerful collaboration tools. I think what he argued is about how people using e-mail tools. E-mail is not a powerful collaboration tools because no one performs collaboration function well from e-mail. This is the same logic as collaboration tools. Collaboration tools can be an issue of knowledge sharing once on one control or manage tools. We should make sure collaboration tools are not only store all the knowledge only. Reference Robertson, J. (2007). Collaboration tools are anti knowledge sharing? Retrieved from http://www.steptwo.com.au/papers/cmb_antiknowledgesharing/index.html Suarez, L. (2006). Email: The Good Enough Collaboration Tool - Is It Really? Retrieved from http://it.toolbox.com/blogs/elsua/email-the-good-enough-collaboration-tool-is-it-really-11473
  • Jiawen Lin on 17 Apr 11
     
    This article emphasises some weaknesses of using collaboration tools in an organisation, such as unmanaged content misplaced in the system, a lack of organizational context for new staff, and irrelevance of search results for staff. This can link to one of my selected article - Sign of the times: manufacturing and e-business blend as a digital enterprise - which mentions another weakness that is the new solution may not integrate with the organisation's existing system and the existing organisational knowledge may fail to exploit. Long (2011) comments that both organizational teams and the nature of the collaboration tools can create information silos in an unmanaged environment. I agree that no collaboration tool is perfect but I also argue that such tools become a competitive necessity of most organizations because they provide powerful service to simplify business process and reduce cost. As Toole (2000) mentions, a trend for most enterprises is e-business which combines Internet and information technology to manage organizational information and process business geographically. I believe that with the continuous development of information technology, those collaboration tools can be improved and offer better services. Furthermore, organizations need to provide professional staff training on using those tools and make sure everyone follows the same procedure to process information in an effective way. Toole (2000) claims the bottom line of using collaboration tools is that they can deliver "better innovation and lower costs with higher quality products and services". Reference Toole, P. (2000). Sign of the times: manufacturing and e-business blend as a digital enterprise. Design Engineering, 46(8), 12. Retrieved from http://proquest.umi.com.dbgw.lis.curtin.edu.au/pqdweb?did=374775371&
Emily Murphy

Open Source Everywhere - 1 views

www.wired.com/...opensource.html

Net308 collaboration open source OSS Wikipedia

shared by Emily Murphy on 15 Apr 11 - Cached
  • Emily Murphy on 15 Apr 11
     
    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.
  • Michael Nycyk on 15 Apr 11
     
    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.
Shan Shan Cheung

Email: The Good Enough Collaboration Tool - Is It Really? - 4 views

it.toolbox.com/...ration-tool-is-it-really-11473

collaboration communication e-mail

shared by Shan Shan Cheung on 15 Apr 11 - Cached
  • Shan Shan Cheung on 15 Apr 11
     
    This is an interesting blog that debate e-mail is a powerful collaboration tool or not. I totally agree with Suarez (2006) that e-mail is a very powerful communication tool. We can receive every mail whether are junk mails or useful mails. Others could receive a mail within few minutes from someone who live at the other side of world. In addition, people receive wide range of information from e-mail. However, I am not completely agreed that we miss out the point of collaboration and knowledge management once we define e-mail is good enough collaboration tool. Suarez (2006) mentioned how people have managed e-mails. Although nine people read e-mails, only a person knows the content of e-mails, is able to trace out particular e-mails and uses e-mails. Thus e-mail is not powerful collaborations tool. My opinion is the argument misses the essential elements of knowledge sharing. It is human. No matter the knowledge sharing tools or other collaboration tools, they also require human's management. If no one sends mails in electronic format, e-mail would not be at society anymore. The nature of e-mail still is collaboration tools. Organisations should focus on human is well use e-mail system and the information that inside e-mail system. This is a human base procedure. Reference Suarez, L. (2006). Email: The Good Enough Collaboration Tool - Is It Really? Retrieved from http://it.toolbox.com/blogs/elsua/email-the-good-enough-collaboration-tool-is-it-really-11473
  • ...1 more comment...
  • Samantha Clews on 17 Apr 11
     
    I was interested in this article as much of my research for the assignment has made the same argument that this article makes. And that is, Email may be great for communication but is most deffinately not at all useful for collaboration. As Luis Suarez states, most will file the email away and will be unlikely to find it later. He also states that new people to the project wont have those emails. The article by Stackpole (2008) talks about the use of wiki's as great online collaboration tools that help users to organise projects and separate them from eachother. Many of the points addressed in this article are almost exact responses to the issues with email. As stated above, those users who join a project late wont have the email. Stackpole (2008) explores this notion by talking about new members being able to catch up on the development of a project easily without having to sift through hundreds of emails. The wiki page will give the most current information as well as show the progress in a neat logical way. Saurez also states that the ability to find information/changes in emails is challenging as one has to search / sift through their emails. As stated above wiki's allows users to easily see these changes without having to try find the five or ten emails it was discussed in. Stackpole (2008) also notes that changes/updates/information and separate projects can all be kept in the one place. However, if one was to send an email to 10 different people, perhaps only some would actually click reply all (in which the response is sent to all recipients) therefore if one was to click just reply, only the initial sender would see the response, thus information is too scattered as some have less access. With a wiki it is all in one spot for everyone to reference. While reading Saurez's article I strongly agreed with his arguments, and Stackpole (2008) article backs up the notion that email is not a strong collaborative tool, that doesn't mean it is not a strong
  • Belinda Milne on 17 Apr 11
     
    I know someone who works in information management and, to prevent duplication, they have dedicated procedures, spelling out who is supposed to archive emails and documents. As I understand it, only the original sender submits a copy to the file, cc copies can be deleted.
  • Sheila Bonsu on 17 Apr 11
     
    Thanks Shan as I enjoyed reading this article. The question of whether the good old email is a good enough collaboration tool is an interesting debate. I beg to differ that email is not a powerful collaboration tool. I am part of an organisation where are main communication and collaboration happens through emails. We plan, organise, discuss and share documents through emails. I will list some functions vital to our organisation that email provides: 1. Organisation - You can track and organise responses through email by clicking on the latest responses. The latest email often contains the conversation from previous users as mentioned my Samantha in her response. Who said what and at what time can also be noted. 2. Document sharing - Just like any collaboration tool, you can attach and send any document in any format to the group in your network. The only area traditional email clients falls short is real-time editing. Google Gmail provides this function by incorporating Google Docs with the Gmail Service. This makes it a powerful online collaboration tool where content editing is incorporated into the email system. 3. Records - Like modern collaboration tools, emails can be archived and searched. Though we meet up on monthly basis, my organisation can be classified as a virtual team. As a virtual team, email is a powerful collaboration tool for us. Thanks once again, a great article related to my topic of collaboration within organisations.
Bianca F

The Virtual Newsroom: An International Online Collaboration between Broadcast Journalism - 0 views

www.youtube.com/watch

collaboration Online education

shared by Bianca F on 17 Apr 11 - No Cached
  • Bianca F on 17 Apr 11
     
    Although I am not sure if a YouTube video link is alright for this assignment I felt it was a great source for the topic of online collaboration in student education and learning. Coomey envisioned an online global collaboration of journalism and broadcast students from different universities and in the year 2000 set out to accomplish this project in collaboration with other universities around the world. Many obstacles were in the way of success however, mostly technical, and highlight the evolution of online collaboration technologies. Computer access in 2000 was not as readily available as it is today in 2011, bandwidth was slow and internet connections were unreliable. Time differences between the students in their respective countries was also an issue as for this project, chat rooms were used as the main collaboration tool. Coomey ultimately says the collaboration effort was not really a collaboration as the students weren't able to work together due to these technical issues but rather they were only able to discuss their projects after the fact. Now in 2011 as most of the technological issues have been solved and also with the development of Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. A new project called the Global City is now in it's maiden form and the website can be found here http://www.theglobalcity.org/. With the continuing evolution of online collaboration tools an the innovation of users we can see that many of the obstacles and boundaries once faced are slowly able to be dissolved, which opens up new opportunities and experiences to students around the globe. References: Coomey, M. (2010). The Virtual Newsroom: An International Online Collaboration between Broadcast Journalism Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPAtVVKwzPw
  • Rosanna Candler on 24 Apr 11
     
    As a journalism major having spent the last two weeks working 9am to 6pm newsroom shifts to produce our newspaper's first edition for 2011, I find myself particularly drawn to this topic. Putting aside its unreliable air-conditioning and sticky keyboards, the short tempers of sleep-deprived students and the threat of vitamin D deficiency...working in the newsroom proved to be one of the most socially creative and genuinely rewarding environments I have experienced. And I can say with certainty- it wouldn't have been the same online. I am an enthusiastic advocate for the news media to embrace the online sphere and enable its consumer to "archive, annotate, appropriate and recirculate media content in powerful new ways" (Jenkins, 2004). The convergence of news online presents an exciting opportunity for audiences to interact with the news in "increasingly participatory" (Dueze, 2007) ways such as Facebook, Twitter and Youtube (Coomey, 2011). There are noticeable positives to an online newsroom: reporters can publish their work immediately and from anywhere, the capacity for international voices, and not having to rent office space or purchase on-site equipment. According to a 2005 survey into the roles of journalists in online newsrooms (Magee, 2005), organisations expect their journalists to multi-task- writing, producing multimedia, and publishing their work- an overload which may dilute the quality of the product. A traditional newsroom has its journalists physically and mentally there, and the atmosphere is intoxicating. It's noisy, you bump into people, and there's always someone microwaving Chinese food. You don't need to wait for someone to come online to reply, or get tripped up by faulty programs and Internet connection. It's a hive of imagination and collaboration. Someone will walk past and offer their suggestions on a better layout, people call out for a headline or editing suggestion, others showing photographers and
Michael Nycyk

How organisations collect, manage and share resources through Internet and other Techno... - 41 views

Yes you do post comments on here but it has been made very difficult because there are two groups but just ignore that and post here.

collaborate; collaboration; collect; manage; information; internet; resources;organisation;

started by Jiawen Lin on 05 Apr 11 3 follow-ups, last by Michael Nycyk on 07 Apr 11
Emily Murphy

Toward an Understanding of the Motivation of Open Source Software Developers - 2 views

portal.acm.org/citation.cfm

Net308 collaboration open source motivation OSS community virtual community learning

shared by Emily Murphy on 15 Apr 11 - No Cached
  • Emily Murphy on 15 Apr 11
     
    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
  • Emily Murphy on 15 Apr 11
     
    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.
Steffi Jones

99designs - 1 views

www.toasteggme.com/...ing-opportunities-at-99designs

Business collaboration crowdsourcing design

shared by Steffi Jones on 15 Apr 11 - No Cached
  • Steffi Jones on 15 Apr 11
     
    '99Designs' is a website that connects designers with small businesses who need design projects. The website allows for those who need designs to post what they want and then for designers to take on the project and compete to complete the best design. The design chosen by the project poster is awarded prize money. Looking for graphic designers online enables businesses to quickly and conveniently source the designs they want. The main advantage also being that they have the pick of many designs put forward to them, rather than say paying someone for their time to create something for you, only for it to be not entirely what you want. You obviously have to have the skills in design, but it gives those who have not been given the opportunities in the real world, to put their skills to use and make money on the internet. Websites such as this also allows for people to build their portfolios and in the long run are advantaged by the opportunity to design for people that they choose. This use of crowd sourcing shows how the internet is changing the way in which we do business, as it offers an easier and cheaper option for the buyers and more opportunities for the producers. References About Us. (2011). Retrieved from 99designs: http://99designs.com/help/aboutus Kumo. (2011, January). Design and Money Making Opportunities at 99designs. Retrieved from ToastEggMe: http://www.toasteggme.com/index.php/money-making-opportunities-site/design-and-money-making-opportunities-at-99designs/
  • Belinda Milne on 17 Apr 11
     
    As a designer, this article raises some very important important issues within the design industry. Design99 is just one of many similar crowdsourcing sites, which have cropped up online, which encourage designers to compete and bid for work online. In the industry, this is known as "spec work" and has often been a source of strong debate. Spec work presents a great opportunity for clients as they get to pick and choose from potentially dozens of designs, all the the price of one. On the other hand, designers run the risk of putting in many hours of work, for which they may or may not be paid. For a design student, this presents no real risk, and it can even provide a degree of professional development but a professional designer cannot hope run a business if they are essentially expected to work for free. For this reason, many professionals refuse to engage in spec work. Except for pro-bono and some charity work AIGA, the American Institute of Graphic Arts and AGDA, the Australian Graphic Design Association actively discourage the practice. Grefé points out (2009) AIGA "believes that professional designers should be compensated fairly for the value of their work and should negotiate the ownership or use rights of their intellectual and creative property through an engagement with clients". AGDAs position is rather more blunt, as Bartow recommends avoiding spec work "like the plague" (Bartow, n.d). While many freelance sites behave this way (see O'Dell, 2010) there are also crowdsourcing sites which don't. Brandstack.com allows designers to upload and sell unused designs from other jobs and, as only professional designers are accepted on the site, clients can be assured of receiving only high quality designs and professional service. References: Bartow, D. (n.d). "29 Things Young Designers Should Know" in Howdesign.com. Retrieved via Agda.com.au nofollo
  • Belinda Milne on 17 Apr 11
     
    Diigo keeps deleting my references so I'll try again Bartow, D. (n.d). "29 Things Young Designers Should Know" in Howdesign.com Retrieved via Agda.com.au http://agda.com.au/news/national/819/29-things-young-designers-should-know Grefé, R. (2009, May). "What is AIGA's position on spec work? And how are ethical standards determined?" in Aiga.org. Retrieved from http://www.aiga.org/content.cfm/what-is-aigas-position-on-spec-work-and-ethical-standards#addcomment O'Dell, J. (2010, April 2)."Want Crowdsourced Design Without the Spec Work? Try Brandstack" on Mashable.com. Retrieved via http://www.mashable.com/2010/04/02/brandstack/
Michael Nycyk

What type of collaboration helps? Psychological ownership, perceived learning and outco... - 0 views

74.125.155.132/scholar

collaboration ouaNet308-2011 308 508 Curtin Net education Google Docs

shared by Michael Nycyk on 15 Apr 11 - No Cached
  • Michael Nycyk on 15 Apr 11
     
    This study by Blau and Caspi is valuable for seeing how using Google Docs in a sharing and collaborating environment has on perceived student learning. The credibility of this study is enhanced by a wide survey of 118 students at an Open University in Israel. Ownership meant the degree to which the student using Google Docs felt responsible to work on and update project documents. This quantitative study also sought to measure the perceived learning and quality of project outcomes students felt were a result of using Google Docs. The implications from the study suggested the importance of owning the document, but also to make sure others knew of changes to the document. A document creator felt they lost ownership of the document when editing was done on it. They became the reader of the document. Such a change in hierarchy shows the importance of communicating changes done on Google Docs to every team member. A second implication was that the value of the document seemed to increase when more revisions was done. This suggested that more work on the document resulted in a more credible and trustworthy document as the project document was improved towards its final presentation. In fact most survey respondents seemed to not think the document got worse as more things were added to it. Overall, there was a correlation between document quality and revision, with Google Docs being perceived as quite effective in producing trustworthy documents which add to the learning process. The researchers' main advice from the study is that revising documents and suggesting improvements is far more effective than editing another's documents. Whilst this is not always possible it does suggest the importance of communication in the collaboration process. Google Docs is not a passive collaboration media; therefore, care in making sure all team members communicate changes is vital to a much better collaboration process.
  • Michael Nycyk on 15 Apr 11
     
    References Blau, I., & Caspi, A. (2009). What type of collaboration helps? Psychological ownership, perceived learning and outcome quality of collaboration using Google Docs. Proceedings of the Chais conference on instructional technologies research 2009: Learning in the technological era. Y. Eshet-Alkalai, A. Caspi, S. Eden, N. Geri, Y. Yair (Eds.), Raanana: The Open University of Israel. Retrieved April 2, 2011, from http://74.125.155.132/scholar?q=cache:bBVQbNfm4-MJ:scholar.google.com/+google+docs&hl=en&as_sdt=0,5
Michael Nycyk

Undergraduate perceptions of the usefulness of Web 2.0 in higher education: Survey Deve... - 5 views

web2integration.pbworks.com/...eb+2.0+in+Higher+Education.pdf

collaboration ouaNet308-2011 308 508 Curtin Net education Google Docs

shared by Michael Nycyk on 15 Apr 11 - No Cached
  • Michael Nycyk on 15 Apr 11
     
    Kumar's work has a reasonable amount to offer in terms of a resource; his research gives more clues to the perceived effectiveness of Google Docs users have towards it as a collaborative tool. He has chosen to use the effective research method focus groups with semi-structured questions. Perhaps the useful part of investigating Google Docs as a collaborative tool is how he selected students at the university site who were in many disciplines. Thus he was able to elicit some good insights into why Google Docs is so praised as a collaborative educational tool. One finding was that students preferred Google Docs as a time saving tool where no formal meetings took place. Although the students were on campus, it was surprising that they felt they would rather use Google Docs then all meet to work on a project. The other finding was that the acceptance of this Web 2.0 collaborative technology was greater amongst students that had previous experience with Google Docs or other similar software. Another major advantage found by Kumar (2009) was that overall using such collaborative tools increased interest in the subject matter of their particular discipline. The concept that new technologies add value to existing practice was also interesting. Although Kumar was not clear on this concept, what students indicated this was the case, such a statement suggests that using Google Docs is linked to increased interest in a subject and in turn a desire to succeed. The weakness of this resource is Kumar is not clear of this link; however, as an article to show that Google Docs is of value equating collaboration tools with increased productivity shows how potentially valuable using them can be.
  • ...4 more comments...
  • Michael Nycyk on 15 Apr 11
     
    References Kumar, S. (2009). Undergraduate perceptions of the usefulness of Web 2.0 in higher education: Survey development. In D. Remenyi (Ed.) Proceedings of 8th European Conference on E-learning, Italy, 308-314. Retrieved April 13, 2011, from http://web2integration.pbworks.com/f/Undergraduate+Perceptions+of+the+Usefulness+of+Web+2.0+in+Higher+Education.pdf
  • Kaye England on 15 Apr 11
     
    I was interested in this article as I work in an academic institution (75% of our students are external) and it is a very topical subject for us at the moment. It was of interest to note that many students "expect to learn with new technologies and because higher education should prepare students for the workplace of the future" (Kumar , 2009, p.308). In terms of the use of Google Docs as a collaborative tool in academic institutions I think that we are only just beginning to see the benefits of this type of online collaboration. Google Docs, as stated by Edwards & Baker (2010, p.836) "can be used to save valuable time that would be otherwise spent e-mailing, revising, saving, e-mailing back etc.". Google Docs is a relatively new collaborative tool but the benefits to both lecturers and students are very evident, as anything that saves time and engages students is worth using. It was interesting that Kumar (2009) said that the use of Wikis was not a popular online collaborative tool - although it was easy to see the possibilities of its use. In one of my resources I looked at the positive use of wikis in educational settings as they "assist students in learning new content and support them in connecting new knowledge with personal experiences" (Deters, Cutherell & Stapleton, 2010, Discussion section, para.2). Successful online collaborative work is not necessarily a time saver or a short cut but approached positively and with good planning and leadership I believe that it will become an efficient and well used educational tool. References: Deters, F., Cuthrell, K. & Stapleton, J. (2010). Why Wikis? Student Perceptions of Using Wikis in Online Coursework . Journal of Online Teaching and Learning 6(1). Retrieved from http://jolt.merlot.org/vol6no1/deters_0310.htm Edwards, J. T., & Baker, C. (2010) A Case Study: Google Collaboration
  • Michael Nycyk on 15 Apr 11
     
    My reading of it Kaye is that Kumar found that was the case at the time the study was done, but I am sure if he redid the study that would be less of an issue. I see Wikis are being quite popular now. Also I agree with your point, it is not always about time saving but if one spends the time learning it, it can be a useful tool for education. Our experiences in this course with Ning last year and the online conference proved that.
  • anonymous on 16 Apr 11
     
    This article is interesting as it highlights the benefits of using collaborative tools in higher education for teaching and learning. Although, it is also interesting how the article mentions wikis as one of the collaborative tools and then Kumar (2009, p. 6) then omits wikis as part of the group focus discussion as the students involved in the focus group had not used wikis in their personal life nor on campus. What is more interesting about this reasoning by Kumar (2009) is that it was not explained to students about the use of Wikipedia. Wikipedia is a very popular wiki used as a reference tool both in studies and personal life, so it is hard to comprehend that the students in this focus group did not draw any correlation to Wikipedia and the use of wikis. This article also supports the benefits in using a wiki for both, organisations and for teaching and learning as Kumar (2009) highlights how a wiki "improves students writing" (Kumar, 2009, p. 3) and also engages students to collaborate across disciplines (Kumar, 2009, p. 3). The majority of articles supporting wiki use as a collaborative tool have highlighted how the ease of use allows for communication and collaboration, whilst also focusing on the culture of sharing within these two groups. Therefore, wikis are a great collaborative tool, although it is important to also create a sharing culture and provide guidelines when implementing the use of a wiki so, that the participates will use it to support the organisational culture or teaching and learning outcomes in collaborating and communicating with fellow peers or colleagues. References: Kumar, S. (2009). Undergraduate perceptions of the usefulness of Web 2.0 in higher education: Survey Development. In Proceedings of 8th European Conference on E-learning (ECEL), Italy, retrieved from http://web2integration.pbworks.com/f/Undergraduate+Perceptions+of+the+Usefulness+of+Web+2.0+in+Higher+Education.pdf
  • Kaye England on 17 Apr 11
     
    Yes Michael - I agree - things are constantly changing and evolving on the Internet and as you say if Kumar did the study again it would be a different outcome. Cheers, Kaye
  • Ran An on 17 Apr 11
     
    This paper articulates through research and data analysis from although relatively small focus group the effectiveness of using new technologies 2.0 to enhance learning of students from different background in their respective disciplines. This is as same topic as one of my discussions with article Art Education, Collaboration and the Internet. It talks about internet technology integrates into contemporary education. New generation communicates and shares information differently in current technological society. Computer literate generation are different from earlier generations who rely mainly on books and printed materials. Collaborative online activity as an educational endeavor is involving people from different areas to work together.(Harris, 1999). Internet is also being used in region of high education that adopts Web2.0 to help students learning for their self-study and group projects and leverage strategies. (Kumar, n.d). Not only for undergraduate students, but also those students from high schools and colleges, all gained the benefits of new technologies across disciplines in order to achieving their teaching and learning purposes of education. For high education, I completely agree with that Google Documents is very popular among the students for collaborative projects or assignments, because I often use Google document for my topic research and reference as well. I also believe that the internet generation's familiarity with new media undoubtedly will make this way easier for teachers to craft effective learning experiences and to use such tools to engage students. Reference: Harris, J. (1999). First steps in telecollaboration. Learning and leading with technology. 27(3),54-57. Roland, A. (2003). Art Education, Collaboration and the Internet. Retrieved from http://www.artjunction.org/articles/arted_collab_internet.pdf Kumar, S. (n.d). Undergraduate Perceptions of the Usefulness of Web 2.0 in Higher Education: Survey Development. Re
Bianca F

Teaching and learning online with wikis - 0 views

www.ascilite.org.au/...augar.html

collaboration teaching online wikis education

shared by Bianca F on 17 Apr 11 - Cached
  • Bianca F on 17 Apr 11
     
    Augar, Raitman and Zhou discuss the benefits of using wikis and online collaboration in teaching and learning. In this article, the authors describe what a wiki is, and how it is used. Originating from the Hawaiian word for quick, (Augar, Raitman & Zhou, 2004, p. 95.) wikis are fully editable websites where content can be edited and added by users. This can also be referred to as "open editing" (Leuf and Cunningham, 2001.) and is a great tool for online collaboration. Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia of information is a popular example of a wiki. It is possible for users to edit and add to the content of Wikipedia allowing knowledge and content to come from many sources. Augar, Raitman and Zhou provide a comparison of a few different wikis and their functionality, including the ability to upload images (not all wikis support this) and their method of tracking users and their contributions to the wiki. This particular function is useful to guage participation of students in an educational sense. As Augar, Raitman and Zhou have concluded through a survey of university students at Deakin, for one particular class, 50% of students were not satisfied with the completely online learning experience (2004, p.98) and in order to foster a more positive learning environment with a higher level of satisfaction for students, an ice breaker acitivity has been employed using an onine wiki to improve participation and collaboration. The ice breaker activity took place over two weeks and required students to answer a series of questions designed to help them get to know their fellow students on a more personal level and to introduce them to how to use the wiki properly. Augar, Raitman and Zhou claim the ice breaker activity was successful is accomplishing this. References: Augar, N., Raitman, R. & Zhou, W. (2004). Teaching and learning online with wikis. In R. Atkinson, C. McBeath, D. Jonas-Dwyer & R. Phillips (Eds), Beyond the comf
  • ...1 more comment...
  • Ran An on 17 Apr 11
     
    This paper articulates that Wikis are an excellent tool for collaboration in an online environment that any internet user can share and add content on the website. Wikis, as a useful tool, facilitate online education, which are reviewed to emphasize the features that make them became a valuable technology for teaching and learning online. This project uses a wiki to host an icebreaker exercise which aims to facilitate ongoing interaction between members of online learning groups. Some wiki projects illustrate how e-learning practitioners move beyond their comfort zone by using wikis to enhance the process of teaching and learning online. I think Wikis is a valuable online tool to improve students for participation and collaboration in an educational teaching and learning region. Its particular function is that users could add relevant information and knowledge to enrich the topic on Wikis website. However, this function also cause that the information Wikis websites are being provided with is not exactly correct enough with lacking of formal format and academic reference; therefore, I believe that Wikis is not an ideal online studying tool for those high education users. References: Augar, N., Raitman, R. & Zhou, W. (2004). Teaching and learning online with wikis. In R. Atkinson, C. McBeath, D. Jonas-Dwyer & R. Phillips (Eds), Beyond the comfort zone: Proceedings of the 21st ASCILIT
  • Fransisca Mayang Sari on 17 Apr 11
     
    Wikis is a truly tools for online collaboration, whereas we as users would be able to visit the page we looking for, able to read it, re-organize and even update the structure or content inside, which is in other words, we would be able to collaborate each other in terms of creating one documents with contributing our thought and list out information inside. This article is one from a good example, it's really focus on how wikis can be use in terms of facilitating online education, the article itself I found it as a credible resource which is based on report from School of Information Technology, It is useful and really explaining on how wikis can be use as online education tools. By looking at the value for the project, we can use wikis as one of the online collaboration tools whenever we need to sharing contents as well as adjusting the content, hence we would be able to contribute our part equally and accessible at all times in any occasion. By relating this article with my article - which is talk about the use and features of social bookmarking site (delicious), wikis as well provides special features in terms of facilitating online collaboration which is same as delicious sites, it is useful, support communication and collaboration among users, accessible and convenient. References: Augar, N., Raitman, R. & Zhou, W. (2004). Teaching and learning online with wikis. In R. Atkinson, C. McBeath, D. Jonas-Dwyer & R. Phillips (Eds), Beyond the comfort zone: Proceedings of the 21st ASCILIT
  • Bianca F on 17 Apr 11
     
    Augar, N., Raitman, R. & Zhou, W. (2004). Teaching and learning online with wikis. In R. Atkinson, C. McBeath, D. Jonas-Dwyer & R. Phillips (Eds), Beyond the comfort zone: Proceedings of the 21st ASCILITE Conference (pp. 95-104). Perth, 5-8 December. http://www.ascilite.org.au/conferences/perth04/procs/augar.html
Jiawen Lin

Article 3: Optimize Solutions Launches to Help Professional Services Organizations Bett... - 11 views

My comment: With the continuous growing demand for high level organisational service, an efficient software solution is needed to manage all business processes of an organisation. Coffin (2006) me...

collaboration; business; technology; organisation; efficient; Net308_508; Optimize Solutions

started by Jiawen Lin on 10 Apr 11 1 follow-up, last by Jiawen Lin on 12 Apr 11
Matthew Hewett

Reference 2: Opening minds: Cultural change with the introduction of open-source collab... - 2 views

ieeexplore.ieee.org.dbgw.lis.curtin.edu.au/...stamp.jsp

collaboration software development open-source

shared by Matthew Hewett on 11 Apr 11 - No Cached
  • Matthew Hewett on 11 Apr 11
     
    Subject: How online collaboration has affected the software development industry Reference 2 Opening minds: Cultural change with the introduction of open-source collaboration methods ABSTRACT As open-source software becomes accepted worldwide, open-source collaboration and development methods are also gaining greater momentum. Collaboration based on the open-source paradigm is increasingly being used to improve multisite development and teamwork inside companies. Drawing on experience in projects for improving multisite collaboration, this paper explains how we evaluate communication and collaboration problems, assess obstacles to change, and facilitate the change by introducing employees to the benefits of the collaborative model over traditional development projects in a workshop setting. This method has proven to be a valuable ''mind-opener'' and helps identify specific obstacles that need to be addressed as part of the introduction of open-source development and collaboration methods. The paper concludes with lessons learned for facilitating the introduction of these methods in an organization. (Neus, 2005) Full document available from http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.dbgw.lis.curtin.edu.au/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=5386734 Bibliography Neus, A. (2005). Opening minds: cultural change with the introduction of open-source collaboration methods. IBM systems journal, 44(2), 215. Retrieved from http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.dbgw.lis.curtin.edu.au/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=5386734
  • Matthew Hewett on 11 Apr 11
     
    Review of article - Opening minds: cultural change with the introduction of open-source collaboration methods This article reviews a different part of collaboration in the software development environment than the other articles. It looks at how software development collaboration works in the open source environment or at least that part of open source environment where developers do not all use the same development tools to develop a project. It is a detailed and well researched article that has been peer reviewed and that looks at the theories behind open source development and why it is different from traditional collaborative software development. One of the main differences between this article and my others it than it focuses more on the cultural and social aspects of collaboration in developing software and tends to see collaboration as much looser and less controlled than in traditional software development. The article does not focus on particular tools for collaboration when writing application code but sees the collaboration as more of many individuals working independently and mainly collaborating on documenting what is going on using software such as a a wiki as a content management system. This is much less controlled than traditional collaborative software development and quality control in this case is done by maintaining a detailed version history using the wiki. Neus, A. (2005). Opening minds: cultural change with the introduction of open-source collaboration methods. IBM systems journal, 44(2), 215. Retrieved from http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.dbgw.lis.curtin.edu.au/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=5386734
  • anonymous on 15 Apr 11
     
    This article is important in the discussion of collaboration tools like wikis as it explores, the importance of having a collaborative culture within the organisation to ensure that communication and collaboration occur. This article relates to the other articles about wikis as the main purpose of the wiki is for communication and content sharing, easily and efficiently. If the organisation does not support open source collaboration then the wiki will not succeed in its purpose. This article by Neus & Scherf (2005, p. 216) explores the idea that the main limitations in the implementation of open source software is the people of the organisation and not the software. It is therefore imperative, that if open source software is implemented, then the organisation ensures that the people of the organisation are encouraged to communication and collaborate with the new software. This article is interesting as it highlights that simply implementing new collaborative software into an organisation does not simply mean that will be used at all. Organisations tend to forget that people have been performing tasks in a traditional manner so an organisation that originally used top down management cannot assume that the people of the organisation will not be suspicious of the new flat hierarchy in collaborative tools like wikis. This article illustrates this type of suspicion with the change in management styles by stating "it is not sufficient for management to stand up and proclaim that open collaboration is a good thing" (Neus & Scherf, 2005, p. 220) and people always want to know "what's in it for me" (Neus & Scherf, 2005, p. 220), illustrating that when implementing open source collaboration software like a wiki, organisations need to ensure that the culture is one that supports and encourages collaboration and communication. References Neus, A. (2005). Opening minds: cultural change with the introduction of open-source collaboration methods. IBM s
Kristy Long

Communities of Practice: Knowledge Management for the Global Organization - 20 views

I read this article with great interest as I am about to establish a Community of Practice among intranet authors in my workplace. Our intranet authors are spread over many geographical sites and ...

communities of practice CoP intranet collaboration innovation community

started by Kelly Kerr on 14 Apr 11 4 follow-ups, last by Kristy Long on 18 Apr 11
Belinda Milne

Measuring The Value Of Social Media Advertising - 1 views

techcrunch.com/...social-media-advertising

advertising social media facebook social media marketing Nielsen techcrunch

shared by Belinda Milne on 12 Apr 11 - Cached
  • Belinda Milne on 12 Apr 11
     
    This article, posted on TechCrunch, discusses the release of a report from Nielsen, a worldwide market research firm, based in the US, perhaps best known for the ACNielsen Poll and Television ratings survey (Nielsen, 2011). Wauters here discusses the outcome and conclusions of research conducted by Nielsen into the effectiveness of social media advertising on Facebook. Wauters states, 'the report leverages six months of research consisting of surveys of more than 800,000 Facebook users and more than 125 individual Facebook ad campaigns from some 70 brand advertisers." Mangold & Faulds argue that by "enabling customers to talk to one another" social media is effectively "an extension of traditional word-of-mouth communication"(Mangold & Fauld, 2009). With traditional advertising rates and audiences falling, advertisers are keen to seek ways to reach new markets. Being able to leverage users social media networks can provide an important tool to reach a wider audience. Wauters suggests, according to surveys conducted by Nielsen, advertising recall on Facebook jumped between 16% and 30% when adverts mentioned friends or were featured in friends newsfeeds. Statistics here strongly suggest advertising is more likely to be noticed, and acted upon, if it seen to be 'recommended' by someone consumers know. --- It is interesting also to note Nielsen and Facebook are themselves engaged in a collaborative project to study social media advertising. Wauters points out: "Nielsen and Facebook recently joined forces to develop ad effectiveness solutions to determine consumer attitudes, brand perception and purchase intent from social media advertising." With this in mind, perhaps Wauters is correct to sound a note of caution: "we're not saying the report is bogus, but it's something to keep in mind if you decide to download it for yourself." References: Mangold, W. & Faulds, D. (2009, July-August). Social Media: The New Hybrid Ele
  • Sheila Bonsu on 17 Apr 11
     
    Belinda, This article was particularly of interest to me as I have used Facebook advertising platform both for work and my online business. Social Media advertising to me is different to other online and offline advertising. Having used Facebook as a medium to advertise my business, I can conclude that it's not the best medium to advertise. The conversion rates on the campaigns were low, that is the conversion of clicking and purchase. I accept that there might have been other factors that influenced the data. Comparing my Facebook campaign to my Google Campaign, it showed that campaigns through search i.e. user searches for your service or product is more effective. There is also the probability that campaigns may not reach the right demographic. In 2007, Vodafone suspended advertising on Facebook after its ads appeared on the profile page of a British right-wing Party. This prompted a flurry of other advertisers, including the AA, COI and Virgin Media, to follow suit (Clark, 2007). Facebook cannot effectively measure that the campaign is reaching the right audience. If I am allowed to, can I boldly state that Social Media campaigns are only effective when free or user generated. I applaud the article for questioning the release of such data by Nielsen. The question is, are social media networks the correct channel to advertise when users may be more interested in connecting than buying your product or service? Social Brands perform better on Facebook because most people on Social Networking sites are there for fun so it makes logical sense that industries such as tabloids and blogs (Bullas, 2011). Reference: Bullas, J. (2011). How Effective Are Facebook Ads? Retrieved from JeffBullas.com website: http://www.jeffbullas.com/2011/02/25/how-effective-are-facebook-ads/ Clark, N. (2007). Storm over ads on social sites. Marketing, 1. Retrieved from http://proquest.umi.com.dbgw.lis.curtin.edu.au/pqdweb?index=0&did=1326449831&SrchMode=1&sid=1&Fmt=3&VInst=PROD&
  • Karina Mitya Pradipta on 18 Apr 11
     
    I certainly agree with the article. With mass consumed site like Facebook there should be advantages that give opportunity to certain business. The detail profile users made, can a kind of mass database that marketer can access. Collaborate the business with Facebook may allow company to get broader publication. But in Yu (2010) article, "The Most Powerful Secret in Facebook Ads", he mentioned that only certain business type that can get the best result. Local business will be the one who get most advantages because in Facebook you can have detail specification of where your ad will appear (the reason why it's effective) (Agarwal, 2010). This local business is easier to share among friend because they have likelihood in geographical aspect. Consumer product and entertainment also will get a good publication through Facebook ad. Users interest that provide in Facebook profile will give you opportunity to reach the main target audience of your product. But still the interesting fact that found by Nielsen will affect how business sees social media website. They will think about it straight away to use this kind of advertising methods that will lead them to higher profit (although the marketing teams need to have a complete plan before rather than just follow the trend). Agarwal, A. (2010). How Effective is Advertising on Facebook?. Retrieved from http://www.labnol.org/internet/are-facebook-ads-effective/13957/ Yu, D. (2010). The Most Powerful Secret in Facebook Ads. Retrieved from http://www.allfacebook.com/facebook-ads-secret-2010-06
Karina Mitya Pradipta

Tumblr as Social Media Collaboration Tools for Publisher - 4 views

emediavitals.com/...5-tumblr-microblogs-work

collaboration Tumblr socialmedia publisher

shared by Karina Mitya Pradipta on 14 Apr 11 - No Cached
  • Karina Mitya Pradipta on 16 Apr 11
     
    As a not fully identified type of platform-a blog or microblog-Tumblr has become the preferred platform to share information and ideas. Unlike Twitter with limited 140 characters post and Facebook that ask you to create virtual identity, Tumblr give a space that is more fun and entertaining. As collaboration tools, Tumblr will be a perfect match with traditional publishing. This article talks about how publisher use Tumblr as an online tools to emerge two-way communication between publishers and readers. Author stated that by posting stories, Tumblr offer opportunity to make it going viral (Mwangaguhunga, 2010). The easiness of Tumblr to be shared around, give a chance that Tumblr will become a great collaboration tools. The five publishers mentioned in the article, each publisher using Tumblr in their own way to fit their printed version. They see Tumblr as a new way of communicating with younger audience and it is how they understand their readers. * Life (http://life.tumblr.com/) * The Village Voice (http://villagevoice.tumblr.com/) * The Atlantic (http://villagevoice.tumblr.com/) * The Economist who always incorporated their magazine with nontraditional elements that exist (http://theeconomist.tumblr.com/) * The New Yorker (http://newyorker.tumblr.com/). The way publisher post a story in Tumblr does not have to be the same type that they published on the printed version. It can be a funny story, a glimpse of what the audience sees on the next edition, a short video of related topics on magazine (which they can show in their magazine) and other type of content that give more experience to readers. Tumblr also can be a good publicity for the publisher, showing that they understand their readers. Mwangaguhunga, R. (2010). 5 Tumblr Microblogs that Works. Retrieved from http://emediavitals.com/content/5-tumblr-microblogs-work
  • Elin Frustol on 17 Apr 11
     
    Tumblr is quickly becoming one of the Web's most popular and unique platforms on which to share and discover interesting content of all media. Many popular publishers have flocked to Tumblr to share content in a new way. The article is interesting as it gives an overview of five publishers that use the microblogging platform effectively. Many companies are struggling with their social media strategy and getting it right can be a challenge. In order to succeed with tools like Tumblr, businesses need to understand the audience they are trying to reach and communicate in a language of their customers (Nathan, 2010). The five publishers that Mwangaguhunga (2010) examines know how to communicate in ways that attract their readers. The author suggests that frequency in posting is what attract and engage the community. Microblogging can be an effective tool for businesses if used well. One of the benefits of microblogging that has not received as much attention in the literature is its use for crowdsourcing. Crowds can be more performing and efficient than current organisations. Using a microblogging site like Tumblr for crowdsourcing can be faster, cheaper and more accurate than putting a project in hands of individuals (Kessler, 2010). Tumblr provides a new way of communicating with consumers, thus I find this article valuable as a resource for the project. References Kessler, S. (2010). 5 Creative Uses for Crowdsourcing. Retrieved from http://mashable.com/2010/05/26/creative-crowdsourcing/ Mwangaguhunga, R. (2010). 5 Tumblr Microblogs that Work. Retrieved from http://emediavitals.com/content/5-tumblr-microblogs-work Nathan, L. (2010). How Businesses Can Overcome Social Media Obstacles. Retrieved from http://www.logannathan.com.au/social-media/how-businesses-can-overcome-social-media-obstacles/
  • Fransisca Mayang Sari on 17 Apr 11
     
    From this article I found out that Tumblr as one of the blogging platform is a way for publishers to be more irreverent, funny and make them unique by putting on Tumblr both in their official website or even their blogs. This article mentioned about five publishers that use Tumblr as micro blogging social platform such as Life, The Village Voice, The Atlantic, The Economist and The New Yorker. In here, users can share both information and ideas whereas Tumblr give more space compare to Twitter which limited into 140 characters only. By relating to my own topic, which is talk about the use as well as features of social bookmarking site (delicious), tumblr both features and usefulness support as an online tools to works, create and emerges two-way communication within readers and publishers, it is a great collaboration tools since each of the users would be able to customized their own way, and as for this case as the outcomes, tumblr is a new way of communicating with younger audience, last but not least as for the sources itself, its taken from some media sites named emedia as in credible sources where it based on media organization. By looking at this article I found out several benefits of using tumblr and how the features support on how users - in here are publishers and readers are able to share both information and ideas. References: Mwangaguhunga, R. (2010). 5 Tumblr Microblogs that Works. Retrieved from http://emediavitals.com/content/5-tumblr-microblogs-work
Mandy Burke

Skype - 0 views

www.skype.com

collaboration communication Business videoconference instantmessaging filesharing

shared by Mandy Burke on 16 Apr 11 - Cached
  • Mandy Burke on 16 Apr 11
     
    Skype is a free download which can be accessed from their website (www.skype.com.au). It is user-friendly, quick and easy to download. Once installed, minimal instruction is required to use Skype. Skype users can be located through searching the email address book, connecting through Facebook or inputting the username into the search box. Once connected with others, Skype has the ability to make audio calls, videoconference, share files and instant message. Video conferencing can be utilised throughout Skype with no charge. Skype allows users to see and hear others, which increases the effectiveness of the communication exchange. In Skype's recent update, screen-sharing functionality was added. This functionality enhances a videoconference by providing users with access to share one another's screens to view presentations or to assist with IT issues. Audio calls can be made between Skype accounts or through VOIP software to landlines or mobiles. The benefit of making calls through Skype is that they can be significantly cheaper than calling through a mobile or landline. Skype call charges start as low as $0.23c per minute. Credit for calls can be loaded onto Skype through the use of a credit card. Instant messaging allows users to talk to one another without the use of audio or video. It can be utilised when working on projects or for an alternative to video/audio in particular when Internet speed may not be high enough for a good connection. Instant messaging can be conducted with just one person or multiple people can use instant messaging simultaneously allowing for people to collaborate on projects. An extra benefit of Skype is file sharing, files can be shared instantaneously with no limit on the file size. This is a great benefit to businesses that may have size restrictions on their work email.
  • Elin Frustol on 17 Apr 11
     
    Skype is an excellent software that both individuals and businesses can make use of. Skype's unified communications capabilities make it a useful strategic tool for businesses. While Skype has been successful in the consumer market, it may have had harder time cracking into business market as there are already several competitors. Skype likes to point out that more than 30 percent of its global user base uses the service for business. However, there have been speculations that a greater proportion of business use is overseas and that a much smaller percentage of "business users" have integrated Skype with their office systems (Blackwell, 2009). Blackwell (2009) suggests that the reason why not more businesses use Skype is that call and connection quality are not always as good as they are on public switched telephone network. As Skype works over the open, Internet and peer-to-peer technology help route calls, thus the service may not provide the quality sufficient for business use. Another concern is the security of the Skype service as it uses the public Internet for voice calls (Reardon, 2009). I think that the different collaborative opportunities Skype offers are valuable for small or medium-sized companies looking to keep costs down. Reardon (2009) believes that businesses in general won't get rid of their existing telephone service to use Skype, but some may use it to communicate with employees internally. References Blackwell, G. (2009). The Pros and Cons of Skype for Businesses. Retrieved from http://www.smallbusinesscomputing.com/buyersguide/article.php/10729_3816716_2/The-Pros-and-Cons-of-Skype-for-Business.htm Reardon, M. (2009). Skype Targets Businesses with New Service. Retrieved from http://news.cnet.com/8301-1001_3-10201830-92.html
  • Jacqueline Liu on 17 Apr 11
     
    I agreed that skype is an excellent tool, since it is user friendly and widely accessible. Apart from computer usage, it could also be accessed on smart phones, which it is a trend now and still growing on mobile phone usages. I felt that Skype had especially collaborated distant communication; as a student studying away from home country, a budget international communication tool like Skype is demanded. Yet the quality of calls is doubtable as Elin Frustol said, and I found this is a problem with most of online calling tools, such as msn messengers, tango and vibers. I believe that is not only the problem of the tool but also internet accessibility, and computer technology. These issues would need a longer time to fixed, and it may lead to broader usage such as business and government, however the question is would it still be a budget tool by then?
Steffi Jones

The Rise of Crowdsourcing - 3 views

www.wired.com/...crowds.html

collaboration Business crowdsourcing stockphotos

shared by Steffi Jones on 15 Apr 11 - Cached
  • Steffi Jones on 15 Apr 11
     
    This article shows an example of how crowd sourcing is thinning the line between amateurs and professions. With Web 2.0 making the internet about networking and sharing, crowd sourcing is something that is changing the way in which people can consume products. The example in this article is that of a project director who needed specifically themed photographs for a project. Instead of hiring a professional photographer she went to the internet to find stock photos, initially a photographer offered her photographs for a competitive price, until she found a website called 'iStockPhoto' in which she could purchase stock photographs for $1. Websites like 'iStockPhoto' are databases of photographs taken by amateurs in the field. The issue raised in this article is how crowd-sourcing is obviously eliminating peoples need to find professional photographers, and whether crowd-sourcing will eventually eliminate the need for professionals in industries such as photography and design. People no longer have to look locally for professionals to do things for them; the internet is a whole other realm for finding exactly what they want, but for less money. Howe states that "The open source software movement proved that a network of passionate, geeky volunteers could write code just as well as the highly paid developers at Microsoft or Sun Microsystems." This reinforces the belief that people who may not be able to make it in the real world with their talent, have much more opportunities online.
1 - 20 of 43 Next › Last »
Showing 20▼ items per page