Speak First, Then What? - Collaborative Technologies and Applications for Interactive Information Design - page 151

Figure 1.

does not forget easily, and lowers the barriers of
talking.
In this article, we will explore some of the
basic tenants of system-supported collaboration,
especially the encouragement of listening to oth-
ers. We envision the necessary expansions to the
available toolsets to increase relevance, to reduce
re-work and throw away, and to make working
together remotely more fun than fad.

collaboration has become increasingly important,
bridging the divides of space (geography) and
time (availability of data or talent). Not surpris-
ingly, systems managing basic ingredients of
collaboration like documents, calendars, and task
lists receive a lot of attention, though the initial
forays have been disappointing from a usability
standpoint. Enhanced tools for online collabora-
tion will receive a warm welcome if they drive
simplicity and reduce the load.
In short: better system design is not optional,
it is essential for corporate success.
The Economist Intelligence Unit conducted
a study in 2007 on the Risks and Opportunities
of the Knowledge Worker (Economist 2007). It
states the main issues around inadequate access
to information are:

bACkground

Online collaboration has come a long way. Start-
ing with simple email and chat, we soon matured
into document sharing (remember when Netscape
added the [input type=”file”] capability in 1995 in
Navigator 2.0). From there, we moved on to the
world of Content Management Systems, includ-
ing Wikis and other publishing approaches. The
journey has taken us now to Web2.0- style “col-
laborative” systems like YouTube, where users
add content and then respond to it.
In his book “ Success Factor Innovation ”,
Wahren published the list of “Internal Barri-
ers to Innovation” (Figure 1) (Wahren 2003).
Communication-related issues are at the core of
many of the issues. In the corporate world, online

• 54% experience lost productivity

• 47% mention bad decision making

• 45% observe a loss of agility or competi-

tive responsiveness

Current systems are great soapboxes to speak
from, but they lack mechanisms to draw a crowd
of listeners. SharePoint, Media Wiki, Joomla and
the likes are miles ahead of the crude beginnings
in 1995. However, they still lack a compelling