4. Wicked problems
Society faces many wicked problems (Rittel & Webber,
1973)
These are difficult to solve due to
requirements that are
incomplete
contradictory
changing
hard to recognize
Interlocking problems
solving one often creates many others
6. Collaborative communities
Communities
Strong, lasting interactions
Bonds between members
Common space
Collaborative communities
Common goals
Effective/efficient communication
Perform/coordinate work
Community governance structures/processes
Sense of community
Common space: Internet + face-to-face
7. Tool systems
Tool system
the system of integrated and customized information and
communication tools tailored to the specific information,
communication, and coordination requirements of a collaborative
community
No standard solutions
Socio-technical systems design
Collaborative communities need to evaluate the functionalities in
their unique context of use
Understand the purpose of the technologies in this context
Adopt a process view
• Example: co-authoring a call for papers
8. Co-authoring tool system v1
Version
Author 2
Author 2
Version
Version
Author 1
Author 3
Author 1 Author 3
9. Co-authoring tool system v2
Version
Author 2
Author 2
Conference
Version
Version
Author 1
Author 3
Author 1 Author 3
10. Co-authoring tool system v3
Version Version Version
Author 1 Author 1 Author 1
Agreed
lines
Conference
Author 1 Author 2 Author 3 / Editor
Chat
(Modified)
paragraphs
Version-in
Progress
11. Towards socio-technical solutions
Research problem online collaborative communities
Not lack of motivation
Many self and other-oriented motives to get critical mass, e.g.
in Wikipedia
Lack of activation
Fragmentation of communicative acts across tool system
functionalities
R&D objectives
1. Frame these activation problems
2. Model socio-technical design solutions
12. Socio-technical system view
Domains
Community Context Purposes
Activities
Social Focused
Communication
System Purposes
Sustained
Evolving
Discussing
Communication Debating
Forms Questioning
Consoling
…
Technical
System
Communication
Support ?
13. Modeling pragmatic communication
processes
Theories
Language/Action Perspective
Language as coordination mechanism, focusing on
communicative interactions
Pragmatic Web
Applying appropriate web technologies to help improve the
quality and legitimacy of collaborative, goal-oriented
discourses in communities (Schoop et al, 2006)
Build a socio-technical infrastructure that supports the
negotiation of meaning and the coordination of action
(Aakhus, 2007)
Research question
How to model activation in collaborative communities using
distributed tool systems?
14. Collaborative community activation
Collaborative community activation
supporting the initiation, execution, and evaluation of
goal-oriented (online) communication processes to
increase the effectiveness and efficiency of
collaboration
Outline
Digital class case
Conceptual model of online collaborative
communities
Collaboration patterns
Applications
15. Case: a digital class community
Who
19 Information Management students
What
create group report on design of parliamentary research
information system
When
8 weeks + evaluation session
How
Face-to-face lectures, parallel digital class
Tool system
Blackboard (Learning Management System)
Set of blogs
GRASS (Group Report Authoring Support System)
Scoring tool
17. Group report authoring workflow
Theory interpretation (blogs)
Case information collection (blog)
Report authoring (GRASS)
Wk1 Wk 2 Wk3 Wk4 Wk5 Wk6 Wk7 Wk8
18. Results
63-page report created in 8 weeks by 18 authors
Most students scored much higher than the minimum
required
Survey among students
Digital study class better than face-to-face study class
Overall design of tool system plus workflow adequate
Blog posting/commenting plus GRASS position definition/taking
and argument creation functionalities easy to learn
Problems
Blog creation easy, however, following what was
happening too difficult
Fragmentation of discussion considered a major problem
→ ‘blog monitor’ helped to reduce sense of fragmentation and to increase
participation
19. Activation lessons learnt
Incentives for individual students to participate
Minimum score required to qualify for exam
Overview of current scores per student visible to all
Vouchers
Improving the overview of activities within individual tools
Indented instead of linear comments in blog
Creating “meta-tools” to keep overview of activities
across tools
“Blog monitor”
20. A conceptual model of online
collaborative communities (1)
Tool system
the system of integrated and customized information and
communication tools tailored to the specific information,
communication, and coordination requirements of a
collaborative community
Tool system levels
Systems: “group report writing system”
Tools: “blogs”, “courseware”, “authoring support tool”
Modules: “position definition/taking”, “argument creation”
Functions: “add argument pro”, “add argument con”
21. A conceptual model of online
collaborative communities (2)
Usage context
Goals
Activities: operationalized goals, with deliverable
“writing a group report”
Aspects: abstract goals, across processes and structures
“legitimacy”, “efficiency”
Actors
Detailed role ontologies
“Administrator”, “Facilitator”, “Member”
“WikiChampion”, “WikiZenMaster”
“Position Defender”, “Argument Summarizer”, “Report Conclusion
Editor”
Domains
Professional culture, work practices, …
22. The power of patterns
• WikiPatterns site
– http://www.wikipatterns.com
• Public Sphere project
– http://www.publicsphereproject.org/patterns/pattern.pl/public
23. Collaboration patterns
Patterns
Define relatively stable solutions to recurring problems at
the right level of abstraction
Collaboration patterns
Capture socio-technical lessons learnt in optimizing the
effectiveness and efficiency of collaboration processes
Typology of collaboration patterns (De Moor, 2006)
Goal patterns
Communication patterns
Information patterns
Task patterns
Meta-patterns
24. Goal patterns
Capture community and individual objectives
“finished group report within two weeks”, “produce 3
arguments contra position X”
25. Communication patterns
Communicative workflow and norm definitions
describing acceptable and desired communicative
interactions (focus on (1) initiation, evaluation stages of
communicative workflows, (2) roles played by
members)
“Each student must define positions and pro-arguments for an
assigned report section. All students may comment on these
positions, but assigned students must define arguments pro
or con. At the end of this stage, all students must take the
defined positions.”
26. The case: an enabled communication
pattern (before)
27. The case: an enabled communication
pattern (after)
30. R&D agenda
Activation of online collaborative communities not trivial
The concept of activation needs to be better understood
LAP, PragWeb
Socio-technical design patterns still in their infancy
Pragmatic collaboration support patterns
Norm-driven activation mechanisms
Other fields need to contribute: community informatics,
coordination theory, CSCW, interoperability research,
empirically grounded pattern languages, conceptual
graphs…
Numerous applications
31. Yes we will
Many wicked problems: credit crisis, hunger,
environment, climate, war...
Collaborative communities are key
ICT is a crucial enabler, but not sufficient
Tool systems are needed matched to collaborative
context of use
Collaboration patterns help capture and apply
lessons learnt
Inspiration + activation = collaboration
Towards a “World 2.0”