Community and Design

With the advent of Web 2.0 technologies out in the market, the Internet is certainly seeing a new ray of hope in the development of online communities on the Internet. It has become the norm for people to undergo collaboration in applications and to share files with others under the same roof - namely the Internet. Online communites are also sprouting up, such examples range from chat rooms to instant messaging (IM). 

So why is it so important to have a proper design in communities on the Internet? We can attribute that to several reasons, all of them practical in use in today’s “web-centric” way of thinking. Communities create investments wherever it is situated on, due to peoples’ need of belonging in one. Such communities and the time it needs to be developed would mean income on the part of sites and businesses that use them. They also seek to improve the people who engage in such communities. By undergoing studies on communities, it is found out that people who engage in communities tend to have more participation than those who don’t belong. So is it safe to say that communities foster participation? Maybe. It would be better to say that participation fosters communities.

Communities, in social networking, are drivers of people. When online communities are used in the realm of business they would be labeled as self-organizing competitors. Sounds pretty deep? It is, however I feel that this is true. In today’s Web 2.0 environment communities drive people. They inspire them to work with others and share ideas. It also gives them a sense of belongingness which is sometimes hard to come by in real life. However, online communities gave them a chance to be with others who would more or less share the same sentiments as them and would look at the same angle as them. However, in the company setting they can be tools for competition and they would continually grow in power due to the influences of its members. Hence the term “self-organizing”. There is a need of getting it right the first time though or risk losing money on the part of the business.

In order to have a good overall design when forming such communities you would need to form a community plan of action or CPOA for short. It is then that we should set our goals for the project and be able to set roles in its formation. After planning the CPOA we should set the main goal of the group in forming the community. The goal should be oriented towards the users in mind. We should ask ourselves on what they would want out of the community and how we can give it to them. It is easier said than done but it would set the basis on the design development of the community. In this, we would also need to think original and not take ideas already used by others.

So before we go any further (do I sound like a prof?), what is a community? We can look at its definition in many ways, however we will use the definition that relates it with social computing. A community, according to Dorine Andrews, is a “…set of relationships where people interact socially for mutual benefit.” We should no longer look at it from a physical point of view because that idea was omitted upon the arising of online communities which substantiate this claim. In forming communities we should also look at the formation of social networks in the community. This refers to the levels of relationships that we make with others belonging in the same community. It can be attributed to a list of friends and of friend’s friends and so on so forth. This is noticeable in applications such as Friendster and Orkut. Strong and weak ties are defined here.

Communities are all driven by “commons” which you can refer to as the central reason why people joined that community and the similar qualities they share with others belonging in the community. In every community they establish a set of communicating standards which sets the ways they communicate with members of the community i.e. if they will talk in Chinese, Filipino, English or even if they will talk in slang. Boundary definitions are also set up, to determine the “membership standards” of the community. It bans certain people to enter a community and equally gives privileges to others.

So, who should be the one to establish such a community? First off, people should understand that building a community requires time and effort. You cannot just make one poof out of nowhere and you most certainly must not depend on one individual to build it for you. Building a community is “socio-technical”. What I mean by this is that all of the prior design principles should be followed and one should not depend on someone who has technical skills, instead he should make the effort to help him in the formation process. You must also have the necessary tools to make an application whether it be Internet access or what. Feasibility should also be looked upon: do we have enough resources? Do we have the right resources? Does it require a large amount of money and / or time to create? So on, so forth. Determining the type of community you want to build comes later, but it is the most important step which will determine if all of your previous brainstorming was aimed at the right idea and if your community will “click”.

Now to look at the design principles revolving around communities. Aside from the aforementioned aesthetic principles of communities, let’s look at the design factors. Places which we will be creating should be flexible and should be able to evolve at a moment’s notice. It should also promote cyclic events or events which may repeat over certain instances. A set of roles and leadership should also be established. All of these ensure that the community would be stable and be able to stand for itself in times of trouble (and there will be, many times - life is not a rose garden after all…).  Leaders should administer principles found in relating around people, he or she should have good PR skills. Members should also support each other in information gathering or in other events requiring optimum effort from all members of the community. Most importantly though is that there should be trust among leader - members and members - members.

If you’re asking yourself why I delved into such a subject matter, I feel that online communities are the next big thing in social computing. The possibilities of acquiring new information and growth from the development of such applications are near infinite. In knowing that it is also equally important to know on how to design it well enough for it to be usable for others. For more reference check out:

http://www.slideshare.net/arnicas/design-for-online-community-past-the-hype/

Why Wikipedia is so Successful

Upon reading the title of this blog, you would more or less say to yourself that the reason that Wikipedia.org, the user-based encyclopedia application, is so successful is because you could just do the “copy-paste” syndrome to your research papers. However, that’s not the reason Wikipedia became successful. It wasn’t because people kept on visiting it for information. It was because people gave their time and resources into making the application whole. The article that was written by Mr Fernanda B. Viegas - namely ”The Visual Side of Wikipedia” details some of the reasons why Wikipedia has become one of the most successful user-oriented and managed sites on the Internet today.

The article dabbles on the visual side of Wikipedia, hence the title of the article. Aside from the multitudes of articles that users constantly update every second of the day, there also exist images that pertain to particular portions of the article. They are the main heroes of this story. Wikipedia gives people the chance to contribute images to any article on the site. That’s not all however. People are dedicated to this cause, it gives them a chance to spread their knowledge through the pictures that they contribute to the application. This is much like the articles of the application. The site grew since people, us ordinary users, contributed in our own little way to make the application more complete. I mean, people even design and edit pictures to make them more presentable on the application. Talk about dedication.

Wikipedia attracts all sorts of people because of the broad range of things that are posted on the application. Whether they are articles about scientific discoveries, unsolved mysteries, popular media or even simple housekeeping - people still continue to manage the application as a whole and contribute whatever knowledge they have to the world through the application. Academicians and other scholarly constantly make use of Wikipedia and contribute to it to impart their own knowledge and acquire new knowledge of their own. In the same way, they study articles on the application in order to determine its credibility. In most cases, pertinent information on the site coincides with tradtional scholarly writing. Though, this isn’t the case most of the time - it’s no wonder people still continue making use of the application for their researches and casual reading, thus attracting more “Wikipedians” who would also in some way contribute to the application’s growth. Now, let’s talk about pictures in Wikipedia.

As indicated in the article, “Wiki technology was designed for manipulating text, not images.” True enough the highlights of the application are the text. Images are separate files which would have to be imported by external means, language dependent, and may be subject to copyright. Aside from that, images also suffer from the technical deficiencies such as having necessary equipment to edit images, etc. So by looking at all of these possible negatives, can images instill a sense of collaboration or cooperation amongst contributors?

Due to a survey conducted by the author of the article, they were able to find out various reasons why people would still opt to post images, orginal or not, to Wikipedia’s articles. The survey consisted of different people throughout the world. A majority of these people contributed a hefty number of pictures to the application. The pictures all varied from original pictures to scanned pictures. Many of them were taken using digital cameras and edited with various photo editing tools like Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator.

What motivated them to post pictures? The respondents all had varying motives on uploading the images, however they had several similar ideas which should be noted. One, they felt that articles would’ve been better off with an accompanying images. Here we can already see a form of user collaboration. One or more makes the article, and one or more helps make the article better by adding images. This can also be seen through another motive which is to improve images already uploaded. With the varying thoughts of people, their sense of “good” and “bad” are very different and this is no exception. Nevertheless, Wikipedia’s articles are the ones who benefit from this opposition the most. The next motivation oversees Wikipedia’s success story, because people want to make contribution that would last for a long time. Lastly, for love of photography.

Now to answer the question I posted in paragraph 4 (no counting now..) do all the respondents feel a sense of collaboration among their Wiki-peers through the images posted? In order to answer that the author threw a monkey wrench at them in several questions the first, and the only one that I will discuss, is if the already available images in the application inspired them to upload their own images. 86% of the respondents answered yes, so what exactly drove them to do so? First off, many pictures were a source of inspiration to them. Second, it gave them a chance to improve upon ugly photos or on the article itself by adding better pictures. Third, to set the bar on improvement. Fourth, to cover grounds in the articles which were still not touched on by others through their images. Fifth, for learning purposes and lastly to compete with others’ images. It is interesting to note that people’s identities play a big role in uploading images. They are constantly driven by something which doesn’t necessarily work towards the improvement of the application but rather themselves. The fact that the application benefits from these is no wonder though. I could tackle the reasons of the respondents on asking others to upload photos and why most would rather seek external help in technical matters, but I know that you are already bored so I’ll try to wrap up my blog entry soon. However, if you are wondering 96% opted to tell others to contribute and 92% sought outside help.

The community of image contributors has certainly grown because of many underlying reasons. All of these reasons have become individual puzzle pieces to the question on why Wikipedia has become one of the best user-collaboration applications on the Net today. As I said earlier, image gathering is tedious and hard. You would need to meet with people in real life in order to acquire a number of them - that is already forming a certain degree of collaboration that can be extended in Wikipedia. And as I finally end this article, I would like to say that user collaboration in sites help in the development of the application. “Man is not an island” to quote the classic saying, and this proves it.

To see the full article go to: http://www.research.ibm.com/visual/papers/viegas_hicss_visual_wikipedia.pdf

The Logic Behind “Tagging”

By now, everyone should have an overall idea behind tagging and how it works. True enough, by implementing tags into available searches it becomes easier for us to classify different articles, images and the like. It also makes searches easier and handier. But, what makes tagging really something unique is the fact that tagging focuses on the individual. What does this mean? By means of tagging, people can express on what types of things they favor by means of the things that they post for tagging. Sites like Del.icio.us maximize the use of tags in order to promote social computing within each of their applications. As opposed to sorting of items which people have become accustomed to, tagging is able to bring about more substantial benefits for people searching. Tagging has a lower cognitive cost, less rich data and most importantly it is easier to aggregate socially. Tagging also allows us to perform consensus building among peers. Tagging is so important in today’s society because of the Web becoming more “social”. It is where people come into contact with others in a split second, no matter where they are. They also maintain contact with social networks and these are continuously sought out in times of need. And a new idea, called “networked individualism” is made as a result. In a sense, tagging makes the web a shared experience. There is still more to be said about the subject matter. For full details please visit:

http://tagsonomy.com/index.php/social-information-architecture-sorting-and-tagging/

For xian’s reference to Rashmi Sinha’s talk at the IA Summit.

A Look at Designing Web 2.0

If you have ever tried making a website, you would more or less remember the times when you first looked at your new site (which you have toiled on for at least an hour) and then realized that it didn’t exactly look appealing. In today’s Web 2.0 age, the look and design of an application in the net is very important in social computing and attracting people to your application. In Ellyssa Kroski’s article “Information Design for a New Web”, she details different different strategies on how to design a good Web 2.0 application and still be able to eat you cake at the same time. The article is indeed very good and relevant to studies regarding social computing, since social computing deals in our relationships with others through the World Wide Web. The article gives specific tips on improving on your application and an explanation regarding each. Overall, this article is worth reading. It’s found at:

http://www.masternewmedia.org/information_design/information-design-principles/

web-20-design-simple-social-design-components-20071017.htm

The Future of Learning

With the emergence of Web 2.0, people are changing the way they learn new information and how they gather it. Learning 2.0 has become such an efficient tool for learning that it may be a substitute to going to school. It also provides the opportunity to interact well with people of similar ideas and mindset. According to a blog that I found in the 21st Century Collaborative website, Learning is about unlearning and adapting. What does this mean? In my understanding, in order for learning 2.0 to be effective people would have to put aside what they about something and be flexible enough to learn new ways of acquiring new knowledge about them. Complicated as the explanation is, you can’t deny the fact that the world is becoming so attached to technology. As the technology is advancing, so should our way of learning things. It may even come to a point that we won’t need to go to school to acquire the information we need to move on in life, though I hope that that isn’t the case. However, with the recent advancements in technology, it may happen. Visit the blog at:

http://21stcenturylearning.typepad.com/blog/2007/08/learning-20.html

The ideas presented are rather deep, so put on your thinking caps before attempting to read it in one sitting! But it is very in-depth and should be checked out at least once.

Scrapbooks: A Strike on Web 2.0

You might be wondering on what I mean by my title, it’s really simple. According to Selena of New Zealand in her blog entry entitled “Limitations of Web 2.0 Applications in Setting Up Eportfolios”, Web 2.0 technologies have yet to move past the stage of being just “scrapbooks”. Many applications in the web today such as Flickr, Friendster and Picasa may be considered examples of such ”scrapbooks” and suffer from such limitations indicated in the blog, that they are better off as “photo archivals” more than anything else. This is also something that I noticed as a similar quality among many applications. However, I must note that this blog entry was made last year (2006) and these applications may have updated their overall look and feasibility. So for me, it can’t really be a limitation to just be a “scrapbook”. They offer more things that increase the way people interact with the Web than ever before and are still improving over time. Selena’s blog can be found at this site:

http://mportfolios.blogspot.com/2006/05/limitations-of-web-20-applications-in.html

What do you think? Do you feel that such applications still suffer from “Scrapbook syndrome”?

The Past / Present / Future 10 Problems of Web 2.0

Web 2.0 isn’t perfect like anything else. So it would seem fitting to have an article addressing potential problems of Web 2.0. The author, Dion Hinchcliffe, details the 10 potential problems of Web 2.0 as of the year 2006. He indicates that many of these problems arise due to the infancy stage of the technology and to that end I agree with him. However, many of these “problems” can easily be resolved. For instance, in regards to the 4th problem changing the computer’s speed will prove to be an ample solution, as well as faster Internet connection. Of course, that’s just my opinion and people are indeed entitled to their own opinions.

How about you? Check out his blog at:

http://web2.socialcomputingmagazine.com/10_issues_facing_web_20_going_into_2006.htm

Piracy - A Problem for Web 2.0?

With the increase in demand of Web 2.0 technologies over the Internet, the amount of people involvement increases. What I mean about it is that people are more free to download AND upload things in the Internet that can be used by others. I came across this PDF file when I was browsing for Web 2.0, and it shows that indeed piracy is a major issue with Web 2.0. I’ve never realized it until now. We constantly download mp3 files and emulated games and such from the Internet, disregarding the fact that it is indeed causing much copyright infringement, thus harming our industries. Miles Metcalfe shows this in his simple powerpoint style article on this site:

http://info.rsc-eastern.ac.uk/files/events/_972_JISC-RSC_Legal-Issues.pdf

Check it out, and see where piracy stands in Web 2.0.

A Look At E-Learning 2.0

I came across this website a couple of days back concerning e-learning 2.0. Over the past few years, e-learning has indeed evolved to accomodate more of the new users of the Internet, and it shows in the new Web 2.0 system being formed. Part of that is e-learning 2.0, an upgrade to the Internet’s e-learning. I found this article important because it shows different applications that are already gearing towards being more user-friendly and more open to different people. In fact, many old applications that were originally part of the e-learning regime are changing to e-learning 2.0, like Google and Apple. If you want to view this article visit:

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/e-learning_20_all_you_need_to_know.php

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