From Inspiration to Activation:Making OnlineCollaborative CommunitiesWork

Aldo de MoorCommunitySense

the Netherlands

WWW.COMMUNITYSENSE.NL

Yes we can…

but how?

The Internet is key

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

Seeing the system for the tools?

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

Tool systems

Tool systemthe system of integrated and customized information andcommunication tools tailored to the specific information,communication, and coordination requirements of a collaborativecommunity

No standard solutions Socio-technical systems design

Collaborative communities need to evaluate the functionalities intheir unique context of use

Understand the purpose of the technologies in this context Adopt a process view

• Example: co-authoring a call for papers

Co-authoring tool system v1

Author 1

Author 2

VersionAuthor 2

VersionAuthor 1 Version

Author 3

Author 3

Co-authoring tool system v2

Author 1

Author 2

VersionAuthor 2

VersionAuthor 1 Version

Author 3

Author 3

Conference

Co-authoring tool system v3

Author 3 / EditorAuthor 1 Author 2

Conference

Agreedlines

(Modified)paragraphs

Chat

VersionAuthor 1

VersionAuthor 1

VersionAuthor 1

Version-inProgress

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 systemfunctionalities

R&D objectives1. Frame these activation problems2. Model socio-technical design solutions

Socio-technical system view

CommunicationPurposes

Focused Sustained Evolving

CommunicationForms

Discussing Debating Questioning Consoling …

Community Context Domains Purposes Activities

CommunicationSupport ?

Social System

Technical System

Modeling pragmatic communicationprocesses

Theories Language/Action Perspective

Language as coordination mechanism, focusing oncommunicative interactions

Pragmatic Web Applying appropriate web technologies to help improve the

quality and legitimacy of collaborative, goal-orienteddiscourses in communities (Schoop et al, 2006)

Build a socio-technical infrastructure that supports thenegotiation of meaning and the coordination of action(Aakhus, 2007)

Research question How to model activation in collaborative communities using

distributed tool systems?

Collaborative community activation

Collaborative community activation supporting the initiation, execution, and evaluation of

goal-oriented (online) communication processes toincrease the effectiveness and efficiency ofcollaboration

Outline Digital class case Conceptual model of online collaborative

communities Collaboration patterns Applications

Case: a digital class community Who

19 Information Management students What

create group report on design of parliamentary researchinformation 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

The GRASS authoring tool

Group report authoring workflow

Wk1 Wk 2 Wk3 Wk4 Wk5 Wk6

Theory interpretation (blogs)

Case information collection (blog)

Report authoring (GRASS)

Wk7 Wk8

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 washappening too difficult

Fragmentation of discussion considered a major problem→ ‘blog monitor’ helped to reduce sense of fragmentation and to increase

participation

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 activitiesacross tools “Blog monitor”

A conceptual model of onlinecollaborative communities (1)

Tool system the system of integrated and customized information and

communication tools tailored to the specific information,communication, and coordination requirements of acollaborative 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”

A conceptual model of onlinecollaborative 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, …

The power of patterns

• WikiPatterns site– http://www.wikipatterns.com

• Public Sphere project– http://www.publicsphereproject.org/patterns/pattern.pl/public

Collaboration patterns Patterns

Define relatively stable solutions to recurring problems atthe 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

Goal patterns Capture community and individual objectives

“finished group report within two weeks”, “produce 3arguments contra position X”

Communication patterns Communicative workflow and norm definitions

describing acceptable and desired communicativeinteractions (focus on (1) initiation, evaluation stages ofcommunicative workflows, (2) roles played bymembers)

“Each student must define positions and pro-arguments for anassigned report section. All students may comment on thesepositions, but assigned students must define arguments proor con. At the end of this stage, all students must take thedefined positions.”

The case: an enabled communicationpattern (before)

The case: an enabled communicationpattern (after)

Application: communicating acrossvirtual worlds

Application: collaboratories

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, conceptualgraphs…

Numerous applications

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”