In article <l03130300b3dea9de949f@[195.102.201.174]>,
[log in to unmask] (Alan Dix) wrote:

> There are many different kinds of interactions:
> 1. participant-participant - direct communication [snip]

I'm not sure whether our two taxonomies are analogous but I view the world
of computer-aided working as mediating between three entities: people,
data and processes. (I suppose, Alan, you might merge the latter two as
artifacts?)

One can readily fill in the methods and technologies that apply to each
paired set within the resulting nine-cell matrix. The results form
different domains, e.g.
- person-person = CMC or CSCW (a debate for academics, I feel),
- person-process = process automation (e.g. workflow) or
- data-person (data publishing).

The first, which is usually effectuated by some form of groupware, can be
further divided into a four-cell matrix, depending on whether the
communication is with one/few or with many. This is useful in my present
work, which is looking at electronic commerce. Communications to 'many',
from either type of source, can be regarded as mass marketing (i.e. where
the recipient is not known). Those to 'one/few', again from either source,
can be regarded as targeted marketing. (This, of course, includes the
currently fashionable holy grail -- one-to-one marketing.)

One implication of this is that the rise of ecommerce may spur a renewed
interest in groupware, presently a largely moribund area of activity among
users and software makers alike. (Knee-jerk reactions seem to have
progressed, if that's the right word, from the "Groupware? That's Lotus
Notes, isn't it?" type of response to "Groupware? You mean do we
prefer Notes to Exchange?".) If that happens, CSCW studies might then seem
meaningful again to practitioners and users.

> it is easy to accidentally damage or destroy the
> implicit channels

I like this train of thought (one new to me). I suppose that the result of
such damage could be defined as computer-sustained clueless workplaces, or
"CSCW". Will it ever catch on as an initialism, I wonder? 8-)

Regards,
 
Roger
 
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Roger Whitehead,
Director, Office Futures


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