Participation in electronic forums: Implications for the design and implementation of collaborative distributed multimedia

Tekmatics and Informatics, Vol. 14, No. I, pp. 83-96, 1997

Copyright 0 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd Printed in Great Britain. All rights reserved

0736-5853/97 S17.00+0.00 Pergamon

PII: 307~5853(%)00020-2

PARTICIPATION IN ELECTRONIC FORUMS:

IMPLICATIONS FOR THE DESIGN AND

IMPLEMENTATION OF COLLABORATIVE

DISTRIBUTED MULTIMEDIA

Alejandra Rojo Ronald G. Ragsdale

Abstract - We describe the participation patterns in scholarly mailing lists and analyze its implications for the design and implementation of collaborative distributed multimedia. A mixed-methods design included both a qualitative study and an E-mail administered survey. The qualitative study objective was to determine the forum’s patterns of use from the user’s point of view. The E- mail survey objective was to determine participants’ patterns of use. Interac- tion in these electronic forums was far from a many-to-many interactive exchange. The central dimension emerging from the qualitative study was the fragility of users’ binding to the forums (transient membership, preference for a broadcasting recipient role, and weak involvement in the message exchange). These findings were corroborated by the E-mail survey results. The results suggest that participation in the construction of a communal information space is not without problems. Some of the difficulties detected in the participation in electronic forums could be amplified when participation involves the composition of multimedia messages. These increased contributing costs can further unbalance the incentive structure for contributing to the shared communal information space. Strategies to change the incentive structure involve decreasing contribution costs by facilitating technology learning and use, and increasing incentives to contribute messages. Given these considerations, it appears that collaborative distributed multimedia should follow a model more like tailored collaborative distributed multimedia systems for specific communities of professionals dealing with very special problem areas, where the use of collaborative distributed multimedia is the best way to advance the knowledge base of the group. 0 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved

“Everything is permissible”-but not everything is beneficial. (1 Corinthians 10:23)

Our use of technology would be more effective if it were based on an assessment of human needs, but in practice, it often appears that the “needs of the technology” are paramount (Ragsdale, 1988). Don Norman (1993) describes an approach that blends

Alejandra Rojo is presently an Associate Fellow at the Centre for Research in Latin America and the Caribbean at York University, Toronto, Canada. Ronald G. Ragsdale is a Professor at Northwestern State University, Natchitoches, LA 71497, with primary responsibility in the Educational Technology Doctoral Program. Address all correspondence to Ronald G. Ragsdale; E-mail [email protected].

83

84 Alejandra Rojo and Ronald G. Ragsdale

the strengths of humans and technology, but notes that this goal is usually not reached and often unsought. Here, we argue in a similar vein, that developers must consider more than technical and task issues when developing computer systems to support group activity. The additional challenge, absent in the design of systems for individual users, is to address issues emerging from the social processes within the groups. The design and implementation issues emerging from social dynamics discussed in the literature are: (a) how to counteract the possible disruption of work, social and political processes (Grudin & Clement, 1994; Kling, 1991; Sachs, 1995); (b) how to provide flexibility in the system to handle exceptions in the organization of work (Grudin & Clement, 1994; Kjoer & Halskov, 1995); (c) how to secure a critical mass of users; and (d) how to diminish the disparity of work and benefits allocation (Grudin & Clement, 1994). Some researchers (Grudin & Clement, 1994; Kling, 199 1; Kjoer & Halskov, 1995; Sachs, 1995) advocate that developers include the problem of how to manage system acceptance in their conception of the development process. Given this perspective, it seems important to consider the social dynamics of message contribution in the design and implementation of collaborative distributed multimedia.

Collaborative distributed multimedia or collective dynabases (Press, 1992) are databases made up of texts, graphics, drawings, scanned images, videoclips etc. contributed by members of a distributed organization or community. In contrast to broadcasting multimedia-in which there is a single centralized source of media content-in collaborative distributed multimedia any individual member of the group is a potential provider of content and the very existence of the medium depends on the audience’s contributions.’ Two concrete examples of collaborative distributed multimedia systems are Lotus Notes and the JITOL (Just In Time Open Learning) system. Lotus Notes is a response to organizational needs for collecting, managing, and accessing discretionary information2 (Press, 1992). In the JITOL project (Goodyear, 1995) the intent is to support the continuing professional development of practitioners3 that are geographically distributed. The role of the system is to facilitate the sharing and reifica- tion4 of the tacit knowledge embedded in the working practices of a specific professional community. The goal is to build evolving browsable libraries of annotated multimedia representations of working practices through community exchange (Goodyear, 1995); “the knowledge bases feed and are fed by users” (Gardiol, Boder, & Peraya, 1993:270).

There is no research available on the issue of participation in this kind of collaborative distributed multimedia, but insight into some of the key issues of message contribution dynamics in collaborative distributed multimedia can be achieved by analyzing participation in isomorphic collaborative communication systems-electronic forums. Both collaborative distributed multimedia and electronic forums can be seen as instances of a special communication structure conceptualized by Connolly and Thorn (1990) and called discretionary database. This communication structure is

‘This is a similar concept to Rafaeli and LaRose’s (1993) concept of collaborative mass media-electronic media in which the audience is at the same time the creator and receiver of the media content.

‘Information whose owner can choose whether or not to make it available to others (Connolly & Thorn, 1990).

3Three professionals’ groups were the target of the JITOL project: professionals involved in the design of computer-aided learning systems and environments; professionals involved in diabetic self-help therapy; cor- porations managers.

4Boder has characterized the process of knowledge reification as “(a) selecting relevant items from the file containing users’ interaction; (b) analyzing knowledge; (c) organizing knowledge to build up the knowledge base” (Boder, 1992: 180).

Participation in electronic forums 8.5

characterized by: (a) a shared pool of information; (b) information in the pool has the property of what is called “public goods”-that is to say it is available to all members of a community regardless of whether or not individuals contribute to achieve it; (c) contributing messages involves costs in terms of time investment, reputation risks etc.; and (d) an incentive structure that poses a dilemma for potential users: on one hand, the incentive to contribute to the medium content is minimal and “rational” users would tend to “free ride” because they can enjoy the benefit of other members’ contribution without contributing themselves; on the other hand, if they withhold contributions-nobody will contribute and no content will be available.

In this paper we describe the participation patterns in scholarly mailing lists’ and analyze its implications for the design and implementation of collaborative distributed multimedia, particularly those systems intended to be used in academic and professional settings.

METHOD

A mixed-methods design included both a qualitative study and an E-mail administered survey (Rojo, 1995). The qualitative study objective was to determine the forum’s patterns of use from the user’s point of view (see Rojo, 1995). A qualitative design based on the grounded theory approach was selected as adequate to reveal users’ viewpoints on their on-line participation. The method consisted of a maximum diversity sample,6 a semi-structured interview, ’ inductive data, and the constant comparison method.8 Subjects in the qualitative study were twelve participants in ten different forums.’ Seven were female and five were male. Their ages ranged between 27 and 65 years. There were six university professors; four professional staff and two graduate students. They were all affiliated with universities located in Toronto.

The E-mail survey objective was to determine participants’ patterns of use. Par- ticipants were selected through a two-stage sampling procedure: (1) a judgment sampling to select 12 forums (selection criteria: forums with a content on Social Sciences and Humanities, with at least a year and a half of existence, and with archives; see Fig. 1) and then (2) simple random samples of 50 users were drawn from the selected forums. Data were collected through an E-mail administered survey. The response rate was 36% (187 subjects) (see Rojo, 1995). Almost two thirds (64%) of the sample were males.

The age distribution was slightly skewed to the higher range of age, 46 years and up (37%); the other two categories O-35 years and 3645 years had similar percentages of participants (29 and 28%, respectively) see Table 1.

Almost 40% of participants were professors; 17% were students (13% graduate students); 9% were professional staff and 8% were researchers. Of the participants, 7.5% were teachers and 4% were high ranking administrators, see Table 2.

‘Mailing lists predominantly academic or professional in focus. ‘Maximum diversity sampling strategy involves selecting subjects at both ends of the dimensions being

investigated, so that possible relationships between dimensions are magnified (Patton, 1980). ‘The interview addressed the same issues with the same questions but questioning did not follow a

predetermined order. The schedule consisted mainly of broad open-ended questions. ‘An inductive data processing method that allows the researcher to develop a theoretical description of the

phenomenon and at the same time grounds the description in the data (Lincoln & Guba, 1985; Strauss & Corbin, 1990).

9ALTLEARN, CNEDUC-L, CMC, EDNET, EDUTEL, EDPOLYAN, IPCT-L, NEWEDU, QUALRS-L, and STUTT-L (see the forums’ full names in Fig. I).


Forum Tonic

ALTLEARN*

BIOPI-L#

CMc*

CNBDUC-L*

COMDEW

EDNBT*

EDPOLYAN*

EDUTEL*#

IPCT-L *#

MUSIC-ED#!

QUALRS-L*#

SCREEN-L#

SEMIOS-L#

STLHE-L#

STUTT-L*#

TESL-L#

Altemative learning

Secondary Biology teachers enhancement plan

Computer-mediated communication

Computer networks and education

Communication and development

Bducatioual potential of the Internet

Educational Policy analysis

Computer technology and education

Interpersonal computing and technology

New paradigms in education

Qualitative methods

Film and Television

Visual and verbal semiotics

Forum for teaching and leaming in Higher Ed.

stuttering

Teachers of English as a second language

*forums in qualitative study #forums in the e-mail survey

Figure 1. Forums study involved in the qualitative study and in the E-mail survey

Table 1. Frequency distribution of respondents’age

Frequency Percent

O-35 years 55 29.4 36-45 years 53 28.3 46-59 years 66 35.3 60+ 4 2.1 No response 9 4.8

Total 187 100.0

Eighty-one percent of participants were located in North America (64% in the USA and 17% in Canada), with most of the rest in Europe, see Table 3. Almost half of the participants (48%) had unlimited access to a computer connected to BITNET/Internet. A high percentage of participants (87%) had membership in other on-line forums.

Participation in electronic forums

Table 2. Frequency distribution of respondents’ institutional status

87

Status Frequency Percent

Professor 74 39.6 Graduate student 24 12.8 Professional staff 17 9.1 Researcher 15 8.0 Teachers 14 7.5 Administrator 8 4.3 Undergraduate student 8 4.3 Professorial roles (lecturer) 7 3.7 Independent 6 3.2 Computer professional 4 2.1 Librarian 3 1.6 Therapist 2 1.1 Other 2 1.1 No response 3 1.6

Total 187 100.0

Table 3. Frequency distribution of location of user’s address

us Canada United Kingdom Australia Finland Sweden Denmark Netherlands Germany Norway Hungary Belgium Portugal Austria New Zealand Brazil No response

Frequency Percent

120 64.2 31 16.6 7 3.7 7 3.7 4 2.1 4 2.1 2 11 2 11 2 1.1 1 .5 1 .5 1 5 1 .5 1 .5 1 .5 1 .5 1 .5

Total 187 1 CO.0

Statistics about the total number of forum members, total number of messages and number of messages contributed by those participants who did contribute to the forums were also retrieved from the forum’s archives. They were used to determine the forum’s profile in terms of contribution rate, adoption rate, and number of regular contributors. The operational definition of adoption rate was the percentage of increase of the forum total number of participants in 6 months;” the operational definition of forum contribution rate was the number of messages contributed monthly to the forum by the group;” the operational definition of regular contributors was the percentage of participants who have contributed 11 or more messages to the forum. l2

‘@Two categories were developed based on these values: low rate of adoption-less than 30%; high rate of adpptiqn-over 30% (see Table 7).

This value is calculated by subtracting from the total number of messages in February 1994 the total number of messages in August 1993 and then dividing this by 6. Then two categories were elaborated: low-when the number of monthly messages was less than 60 overall (average of less than two messages per day); high--when the number of monthly messages were over 60 (average of more than two messages per day). See Table 7.

12See distribution of users contributing different numbers of messages in Table 9.


RESULTS

Patterns of use

The central dimension emerging from the qualitative study data analysis was the fragility of users’ binding to the forums. This concept is articulated in three aspects: transient membership, users preference for a broadcasting recipient role, and weak involvement in the exchange of messages. These findings were corroborated by the E-mail survey results.

Transient membership

The interviewees’ memberships in forums seem fragile and temporary. Users dis- carded forums both in the process of exploring and finding suitable forums and after having established membership in some forums for a time. There were many situations that led to leaving the forum.

For example, some users felt they were not getting the benefits they expected from the forum and others felt that they disliked the tone or way a topic was being discussed but felt unable to change that kind of discourse (e.g., instances of flaming). Also, if new users found out that they did not share the purposes of the forum (e.g., a qualitative method-oriented researcher in a forum discussing quantitative methods) or the style of interaction in the forum (e.g., lack of meaningful discussion), they did not stay. If older users felt their priorities had changed and the forum did not contribute to these new priorities, they left (e.g., a person who started working on his thesis left unrelated forums). In some cases, if some external event interrupted the normal receiving of or access to messages, some participants didn’t bother to restore their membership (e.g., technical mishaps, absences due to holidays, conferences, job changes). Also, there were users who changed groups of forums according to present job tasks or were on and off one forum; this was their style of using forums, especially for those using technical forums. In summary, participants in the qualitative study would anticipate dropping out or had actually dropped out of forums for the following reasons: (a) content disappointment; (b) interaction disappointment; (c) external events inter- ference; and (d) changes in work focus.

The E-mail survey confirmed forums’ turnover. Though 72% of participants were planning to stay in the forums (see Table 4), 41% of E-mail survey subjects were new users, with a membership up to 6 months in the current forums (see Table 5); 18% had a membership from 7 to 11 months. Old users, those who have stayed in the forums for one year or more accounted for 40% of the E-mail survey subjects. However, transience was forum differential, some forums had a large number of new users and some other forums had a large number of old users. Also there were differences among forums with respect to the number of participants intending to stay and planning to leave.

Table 4. Frequency distribution of users’ plans to stay or leave

Frequency Percent

Planning to leave 52 27.8 Planning to stay 134 71.7 N/R 1 0.5

Total 187 100.0

Participation in electronic forums 89

Table 5. Frequency distribution of users’ membership length

Frequency Percent

New user (less than 6 months) 77 41.2 Intermediate user (7 to 11 months) 33 17.6 Old user (more than one year) 74 39.6 N/R 3 1.6

Total 167 100.0

Users’ preference for a broadcasting recipient role

Participants showed three modes of use of the forums, the preferred mode being the non-interactive use mode. These modes are general purposes for being in the forum and can coexist, or alternate in the same person. They are the following:

l Fishing for information mode. People use forums as a way of getting information and keeping updated in their field or interests. Some of them see forums as “newsletters” and themselves as “extracting information”, “tucking away information”, or “getting the pulse of the land”. They function as broadcasting recipients and rarely contribute; if they contribute it is factual or experience- related information. This is the least involved use of the medium but is the mode most frequently found in these users.

l Enjoying debate mode. People use the forums as a way to participate in or listen to the exchange of ideas in their field of interests. Most of the interviewees only “listen” to the discussion. A few approach the forums as an interactive medium that allows them to express their views, “listen” to other people’s views, and argue ideas with others, so they do contribute their opinions or initiate a discussion of issues. A very recent user described his behavior as “challenging”. He aims to provoke debate and bring different viewpoints to the fore.

l Social networking mode. People use the forums to “network” with others of similar interests. They approach the forums as an interactive medium allowing them to meet other people, to keep contact with others, to build contacts. Con- sequently they keep names and E-mail addresses, contribute documents to the forum, ask for feedback, follow the exchange of ideas in the forum by personal E- mail, and continue developing relationships with people met at conferences through the forum discussion. Only a few participants use the forums in this interactive way.

The E-mail survey results confirmed the pattern; the fishing for information mode is the most frequent mode (39%). Only 3% use the forums in the enjoying debate mode and social networking mode. Fifty-six percent report using the forums in a mix of the fishing for information mode, enjoying debate mode, and social networking mode. However, as will be shown later, most of participants (over 80%) have never or seldom actually contributed messages to the forums.

Weak involvement in the message exchange

Though it was difficult for some of the respondents to estimate the volume of messages coming from the forums because it was mixed with personal messages, some


reported that they received approximately 5-30 messages daily, others between 30-65, and those who subscribed to technical forums reported 200-400 messages. If they were very busy and didn’t have time to go through their messages they would discard most of the messages, except for the personal ones. Primarily, the subject headings are used to discard messages, though if they have time some respondents go into the message and read the first lines or first screen. Again, a varied range of external events could provoke ceasing to read the whole flow of messages for a period. If many messages accumulated they tended to discard most of them to save time, though most respondents review their mail on a daily basis, In summary, these users are very aware of the time they take in reading messages and have an active stance on counteracting the feeling of information overload. They had developed strategies to reduce the amount of messages to be read: they selected messages in the mailbox directory; they had set limits on the time they were willing to spend on the forums; some people started and stayed with just a few forums; others reduced their number of forums to those that were strictly relevant to their pursuits of the moment.

Echoing the selective message reading behavior of users in the qualitative study, two- thirds of the participants have a minimum or a medium messageI reading involvement; a third of participants have a strong message reading involvementi However, reading involvement is forum differential, there are forums with a high percentage of participants with strong reading involvement and forums with a high percentage of participants with weak reading involvement.

With respect to the contribution of messages, people again tend to the non-involved side. Many of them describe themselves as observers. Some utilize the word “lurker”. There are some who have contributed sporadically, mainly to ask questions or to respond to factual or experience-related questions. However, there were also a few who contributed on a more regular basis. These users say they enjoy debate in the forums, and/or using the forums for social networking. These more active participants give opinions during ongoing discussion, ask or respond to more complex questions or make more elaborate comments. It appears as if these persons have transferred face-to- face sociability to the computer-mediated communication environment and are using the forums to enhance their active professional networking and their activities for analyzing ideas and information. The positive incentives to contribution were: (a) being interested in the topic; (b) identifying and/or knowing people in the forum; (c) feeling comfortable about one’s own knowledge of an issue; (d) feeling the need to reciprocate; and (e) conception of scholarly electronic forums and expectations about own role in them. Deterrents to contribution were: (a) time investment required, people are aware that contributing takes time and express that they are not willing to spend that time; (b) bad timing, respondents were too busy to participate at the time that an interesting exchange-in which they would have liked to participate-was going on; and (c) aware- ness of reputation risk, some users point out they need to be sure their contribution will be worthwhile before deciding to send a message.

Similar to interviewees in the qualitative study, over 82% of the E-mail survey participants have never or seldom contributed. The type of contribution with the maximum frequency (15.5%) is to “make short comments”, followed by “ask for information” (10.7%) and “provide information” (10.7%)-the less involved types of

‘3Minimum involvement: (a) reading messages irregularly or regularly and discarding most messages and (b) reading messages irregularly and reading a variable number of messages. Medium involvement: (a) reading messages regularly and reading a variable number of messages and (b) reading messages irregularly but reading most of messages.

14Strong involvement: reading messages daily and reading most messages.


contributions. The less frequent types of contribution are the more involved types of contribution: “answer complex questions”, “make elaborate comments” and “ask complex questions” with 8, 6.4, and 4.8%, respectively (see Table 6).

In summary, the qualitative study findings were sustained by the E-mail survey results. First, transience in the forums was corroborated but qualified-forums differ in their capability to recruit and retain users. Second, the coexistence of the three “modes of use” (fishing for information mode, enjoying debate mode, and social networking mode) and the predominance of the fishing for information mode found in many of the interviewees in the qualitative study were corroborated by the E-mail survey results. Third, similar to the qualitative study interviewees, most participants have a weak involvement in the exchange either in message reading or in contribution, most users have never or seldom contributed.

Forums profile

Seven of the selected forums showed high rates of adoption and contribution but four did not: EDUTEL, MUSIC-ED, COMDEV, and BIOPI-L (this forum had a high rate of adoption but a low rate of message contribution (see Table 7). Interestingly, a high percentage of users who contributed had contributed only a single message to the forums (40-60%) and over 80% of participants had only contributed up to five messages (see Table 8).

Those forums having higher percentages of regular contributors had higher rates of adoption and contribution (see Table 9). The rank order correlation between the percentage of regular contributors and the message contribution rate is 0.68 (p=O.Ol).

Table 6. Frequency distributions of different types of contribution

Never/Seldom f %

Once a month f %

No Response f %

Asks for information 163 87.2 20 10.7 4 2.1 Provides informatron 163 872 20 10.7 4 2.1 Asks complex question 174 93.0 9 4.8 4 2.1 Answers complex question 168 89.8 15 8.0 4 2.1 Makes short comments 154 82.4 29 15.5 4 21 Makes elaborate comments 169 90.4 12 6.4 6 3.2

Table 7. Forums’adoptron and contribution rates

Forum Size in Aug. 1993 Adoption rate: % size increase Contribution rate:

No. messages per month

TESL-L 1854 IPCT-L 700 QUALRS-L 512 EDUTEL 450 SCREEN 400 STLHE-L 321 MUSIC-ED 204 SEMIOS-L 171 COMDEV 166 BIOPI-L 103 STUTT-L a7

_

55.6 (High) 65.4 (High) 45.5 (Htgh) -12.2 (Low) 61.0 (High) 47.7 (High) 25.0 (Low) 43.3 High)

7.2 (Low) 52.4 (High) 65.5 (High)

311.1 (High) 163.5 (High) 146.2 (High)

18.0 (Low) 223.3 (High) 152.1 (High) 11.3 (Low)

151.8(High) 14.5 (Low) 34.7 (LOW)

114.2 (High)


Table 8. Frequency distributions of users contributing different numbers of messages for individual forums

No. messages 1% 26% 6-l 0% 1 i-20% 2160% 51-80% 81-110% 111+%

MUSIC-ED 62.6 35.5 1.9 COMDEV 62.0 31.3 3.3 2.7 0.7 EDUTEL 60.5 28.1 6.5 1.3 3.1 0.2 BIOPI-L 54.4 35.3 6.4 3.4 0.5 IPCT-L 49.1 35.0 7.7 4.0 2.8 0.7 0.4 0.3 SCREEN-L 48.8 32.3 8.9 5.7 3.6 0.4 0.1 0.1 SEMIOS-L 44.9 27.7 10.1 5.7 2.7 3.7 5.1 QUALRS-L 43.1 37.6 11.1 5.5 1.9 1.1 TESL-L 41.8 34.7 9.3 6.5 5.1 1.4 0.5 0.7 STLHE-L 41.4 43.8 8.0 3.6 2.4 0.5 0.3 STUTT-L 40.8 32.5 10.1 8.3 4.1 2.3 1.2 0.6

Table 9. Forums’contribution rate and percentage of regular contributors

Forum % Regular contributors

SEMIOS-L 17.2 STUTT-L 16.6 TESL-L 14.2 SCREEN 10.0 QUALRS-L 8.5 IPCT-L 8.2 STLHE-L 6.8 EDUTEL 4.7 BIOPI-L 4.0 COMDEV 3.3 MUSIC-ED 0

Contribution rate- Monthly No. messages

151.8 114.2 311.1 223.3 146.2 163.5 152.1 18.0 34.7 14.5 11.3

DISCUSSION

Interaction in the electronic forums studied is far from a many-to-many interactive exchange; it is rather a few-to-many exchange, among users with a fragile binding to the forums (transient membership, preference for a broadcasting recipient role, and weak involvement in the message exchange). Out of those users who do contribute, most contribute only a single message or up to a few messages; it is only a small group of users who contribute more significantly. The interaction generated by these regular contributors is the catalyst to further interaction-the higher the percentage of regular contributors in a forum the higher its rates of adoption and message contribution. Though this depiction of participation dynamics should be treated as tentative given the sample limitations, there is also external evidence for these findings.15-17

“Cornserve data (Cornserve, 1993) on forum subscriptions and memberships point to a high turnover as well (Comserve is a set of on-line services of the Communication Institute for On-line Scholarship, Inc. (CIOS), a non-profit corporation. Ha (1995) also found a high turnover among scholarly electronic forum users, 51% of the subjects subscribed to the mailing lists she studied had discontinued their membership in other mailing lists.

‘-here is also evidence for user preference for a broadcasting recipient role in electronic forums in an orBanizationa1 setting (Steinfield & Fulk, 1988).

‘The importance of a small number of regular contributors in electronic forums has been corroborated in two studies: one in electronic forums for teachers and one study in bulletin boards. Robin (1993) found that a relatively small number of users accounted for a large percentage of the message contribution to an academic forum on Maths and Science in a school network. Rafaeli and LaRose’s (1993) study found that symmetry in bulletin boards exchangethe percentage of users characterized by the board operator as being “givers” or “exchangers” (sharing resources or participating in a fair exchangebwas positively related to contribution level and adoption rate.


The results of this study suggest that participation in the construction of a communal information space is not without problems. It is plausible that some of the difficulties detected in the participation in electronic forums (e.g., the reluctance to invest too much time in reading or contributing messages and most people preferring a recipient role) could be amplified when participation involves the composition of multimedia messages. On one hand, people would have to deal with multimedia editors, multimedia databases and multimedia libraries, thus increasing the slope of the technology learning curve and the time invested in composing a message:

l Increased complexity of technology learning. People would have to learn how to use multimedia editors for video, graphics, pictures, audio, specialized languages (e.g. to represent choreographic movement, to represent molecules); they also would have to learn to access, search, register and modify information in records in multimedia databases; and finally they would have to learn how to access and search multimedia libraries. All this is on top of their learning how to access their Internet service provider or institution mainframe computer, how to move in their Internet service provider or mainframe environment, the social protocols of electronic communication etc. Thus, training for using collaborative distributed multimedia technology could become quite laborious.

l Increased time to compose a message. Even if people become quite proficient in using these new tools that facilitate representing and exchanging ideasus (new generations could develop these skills in schools) the time to compose a multimedia message can be taxing: the user has to either (a) search for a graphic or videoclip or picture in his/her personal multimedia database or in public multimedia libraries and send it just like that or, edit it; or (b) create one from scratch: the graphic object would be the simpler case, the user would just need to use his/ her graphics editor; however, video data or pictures require the added steps of planning and actually videotaping or taking the picture (hopefully with a digital camera) and editing. Only then would the user be able to send the message.

On the other hand, the informal nature of electronic communication exchange could change to one more deliberate in character:

l Evolving cultural standards for information display. The layout quality in Web pages has been increasing steadily and the evaluation criteria and standards that have appeared do consider design (e.g., University of Michigan Clearing House Rating System; Sun Guide to Web Style). It is possible to imagine situations in which members of a collaborative distributed multimedia system would abstain from contributing messages to the system because they feel compelled to contribute multimedia messages, as this has become the group norm, even if they do not feel they need to do so.

l More elaborate routines to deal with multimedia messages. Composing or processing multimedia messages would require that the user’s routines for dealing with electronic communication incorporate the time necessary to deal with multimedia editors and the management of multimedia databases with all the indexing work involved in storing the information. All of this would change the ease and rhythm of exchange now allowed by text E-mail.

18We are considering the case of professionals literate in the use of languages other that text for expressing their ideas (choreographers and movement notation, chemists and molecules representations, engineers and diagrams and graphics, etc.).

94

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Alejandra Rojo and Ronald G. Ragsdale

D@culties derived from the ethos of knowledge production system. McClure et al. (1991) posit that the use of computer networks should be congruent with or at least give rhetorical support to the ethos of the knowledge production system, for scholars and professionals to feel comfortable as forums participants as is the case in electronic forums and in the JITOL project. This ethos is a complex structure consisting of: (a) the social” and technical*’ norms that guide scholars and professionals in their professional endeavors; (b) the communication process-the formal communication and the informal exchange of knowledge; and (c) the reward system (McClure, Bishop, Doty, and Rosenbaum, 1991). However, some of the characteristics of the electronic exchange-ease and speed of information dissemination, inability to assure secure confidential communication, problems with intellectual property etc.-can collide or result in contradictions and dilemmas with traditional scholars and professional communication patterns and therefore inhibit participation in collaborative media. A suitable example is the reluctance to share information that has not yet been published (Carley & Wendt, 1991). So it is possible that until the medium gains some scholarly legitimacy, people will not use it to its full potential (McClure et al., 1991; Harrison & Stephen, 1992).

These increased contributing costs can further unbalance the incentive structure*’ to contribute to the shared communal information space. Thus, there exists the risk that the posited benefits of adding multimedia data to the exchange of messages--enhancing the communication process by including representational objects other than text (Pea & Gomez, 1992)--would be unfulfilled by a decreased participation.

Strategies to change the incentive structure underlying collaborative distributed multimedia have to do with:

(1) Decreasing contribution costs by facilitating the learning and use of the technology: l Providing eflective user training and support through peer help networks.

Eveland et al. (1995) contend that central support systems cannot cope with computer systems users’ demands and also that people prefer to ask for help from people who perform similar work rather than to computer experts. So they suggest that an answer to the problem of providing ongoing support for users of CSCW system is the development and cultivation of local experts-“those individuals within work groups who, for whatever reasons, become more competent at manipulating computer-based tools than most of their fellow workers” (Eveland et al., 1995:114). However, collaborative distributed multimedia users are geographically distributed. How can this problem be approached? It is possible to imagine that people could have access to the many local experts cross-site as needed if tele- presence and shared view technologies are used a la media space concept.**

“Impersonal criteria to judge claims to truth; common ownership of research results, disinterestedness, organized skepticism (McClure et al., 1991).

‘Ability to recognize and define important problems, use instruments correctly, and secure accurate mea- surements, develop reasonable solutions and conclusions, accurately and appropriately report research results (McClure et al., 1991:123).

2’Recall that the incentive structure of discretionary databases does not stimulate contribution to the system (see the introduction).

22“An electronic setting in which groups of people can work together, even when they are not resident in the same place or present at the same time. In a media space, people can create real-time visual and acoustic environments that span physically separate areas. They can also control the recording, accessing and replay- ing of images and sounds from those environments.” (Bly, Harrison, & Irwing, 1993:30).


(2) Increasing the incentives to contribute messages to the system: l Ensuring a discourse and on-line practices that makes salient the link between

individual and collective benefits. People would be more willing to deal with multimedia editors, multimedia databases and multimedia libraries if the effort in composing multimedia messages makes sense in terms of important individual pursuits (e.g., personal professional development) and these efforts can be dovetailed with a collective benefit (advancing the group professional practices). One can imagine a group of specialists sharing diagnosis and treatment strategies in very rare illnesses where each new case and all the multimedia data contributed is the only way to accrue individual and collective knowledge in a reasonable time.

l Securing congruence between the emerging and planned on-line activities and broader scholarly and professional contexts influencing users ’ participation in the systems. Lougee (1994) predicts that scholarly and professional evaluation procedures will expand to grant recognition to scholarly and professional dissemination and exchange carried through electronic communication and the limbo status of contributions to the scholarly world in cyberspace is starting to change.23 However, since the academic and professional on-line world is in flux, there should be special care for the emerging social protocols and rewards for on-line professional collaborative practices.

CONCLUSION

The results of the study on participation in scholarly electronic forums-users transience, users preference for a broadcasting recipient role, and weak involvement in the message exchange-show that optimal participation in collaborative media is difficult to achieve by the patterns of use and social protocols emerging spontaneously in the everyday use of collaborative media. It is possible that multimedia systems will exacerbate some of the problems found in electronic forums, such as the reluctance to invest too much time in reading and responding to contributions. That is, the possible increased overhead of multimedia content, in terms of receiving, reading, responding, and transmitting, may reduce rather than increase communication. Given these considerations it appears that collaborative distributed multimedia should follow another model than that of public, self-organizing, electronic forums such as mailing lists. Perhaps the model would look more like tailored collaborative distributed multimedia systems for specific communities of professionals dealing with very special problem areas where the use of collaborative distributed multimedia is the best way to advance the knowledge base of the group.

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Participation in electronic forums: Implications for the design and implementation of collaborative distributed multimedia