in dis-praise of the Chronicle
I was appalled by the Chronicle's article -- especially the headline -- on the putative death of e-lists such as this one. First, they gave no systematic evidence, just some anecdotes. Although the article was more nuanced than the headline: "on the one hand, on the other hand." Yet, still anecdotes. Second, they ignored the organizational ecology research that has shown that some organizations die and some get born all the time. Third, the posts by my fellow Canucks Catherine Middleton and Peter Timusk clearly showed the difference between 140 character Tweets (which I do a fair amount) and posts to this list (ibid). Both of their posts were too nuanced to be short tweets. Fourth, as Marc Smith can show you, even the older Bulletin Boards are still thriving. Indeed, my hunch is that each communication form adds on to the other, rather than displacing it, which is why I never get much writing done (today's excusive, anyway). Happy Canada Day to All (except Janet Napolitano), Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________ S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________
On Tue, 30 Jun 2009, Barry Wellman wrote:
Indeed, my hunch is that each communication form adds on to the other, rather than displacing it, which is why I never get much writing done (today's excusive, anyway).
A lot of journalists looking for a 'story' appear to miss the fact that 'netizens' are fairly good at media-switching and using media that suit a particular purpose (which in a way is also the un*x philosophy). As you just mentioned there is a difference between what we try to communicate on tweets and on mailing lists (just to name these two). Those who know don't need a one-fits-all (in fact we value diversity). I think it was Steve Whittaker who pointed out this kind of purpose-driven media switching when analyzing the emerging use of instant messengers in corporate settings some 10 years ago (happy to search for the paper if of interest) best regards christopher -- Dr. Christopher Lueg Professor of Computing University of Tasmania Private Bag 100 Hobart TAS 7001, Australia christopher.lueg@utas.edu.au http://www.cis.utas.edu.au/users/clueg/ CRICOS Provider Code: 00586B
On Wed, 1 Jul 2009, Christopher Lueg wrote:
I think it was Steve Whittaker who pointed out this kind of purpose-driven media switching when analyzing the emerging use of instant messengers in corporate settings some 10 years ago (happy to search for the paper if of interest)
The paper that I had in mind references works that say the above but presents different findings: "Contrary to prior research, we found that the primary use of workplace IM was for complex work discussions. Only 28% of conversations were simple, single-purpose interactions and only 31% were about scheduling or coordination. Moreover, people rarely switched from IM to another medium when the conversation got complex." from: The character, functions, and styles of instant messaging in the workplace E Isaacs, A Walendowski, S Whittaker, DJ Schiano, C Kamm Proc 2002 ACM conference on Computer supported cooperative work http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/587078.587081 best regards christopher -- Dr. Christopher Lueg Professor of Computing University of Tasmania Private Bag 100 Hobart TAS 7001, Australia christopher.lueg@utas.edu.au http://www.cis.utas.edu.au/users/clueg/ CRICOS Provider Code: 00586B
On Wed, 1 Jul 2009, Christopher Lueg wrote:
The paper that I had in mind references works that say the above but presents different findings:
"Contrary to prior research, we found that the primary use of workplace IM was for complex work discussions. Only 28% of conversations were simple, single-purpose interactions and only 31% were about scheduling or coordination. Moreover, people rarely switched from IM to another medium when the conversation got complex."
from:
The character, functions, and styles of instant messaging in the workplace E Isaacs, A Walendowski, S Whittaker, DJ Schiano, C Kamm Proc 2002 ACM conference on Computer supported cooperative work http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/587078.587081
BW: Yes, this fits with the work that Anabel Quan-Haase and I did some years ago. Longest version is in Anabel's diss. Published version is: Anabel Quan-Haase and Barry Wellman. "Hyperconnected Net Work: Computer-Mediated Community in a High-Tech Organization." Pp. 281-333 in The Firm as a Collaborative Community: Reconstructing Trust in the Knowledge Economy, edited by Charles Heckscher and Paul Adler. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006 which is also available on my website. We also were aware of the staying with the same medium norm. I semi-humourously called it "Wellman's Law of the Conservation of Media". However, when people in the organization thought that things had gotten too complex for IM, they moved to in-person meetings.
Barry, your next-to-last paragraph is on target, IMO: think of all the predictions of "death of...because of the introduction of..." [AM radio...FM radio; radio...TV; movies...TV;...the list goes on] It's not true of all technologies, of course, but it's true for communications technologies/media. Bob -----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Barry Wellman Sent: Tuesday, June 30, 2009 4:08 PM To: aoir list; Denise N. Rall; Catherine Middleton; Peter Timusk Subject: [Air-L] in dis-praise of the Chronicle I was appalled by the Chronicle's article -- especially the headline -- on the putative death of e-lists such as this one. First, they gave no systematic evidence, just some anecdotes. Although the article was more nuanced than the headline: "on the one hand, on the other hand." Yet, still anecdotes. Second, they ignored the organizational ecology research that has shown that some organizations die and some get born all the time. Third, the posts by my fellow Canucks Catherine Middleton and Peter Timusk clearly showed the difference between 140 character Tweets (which I do a fair amount) and posts to this list (ibid). Both of their posts were too nuanced to be short tweets. Fourth, as Marc Smith can show you, even the older Bulletin Boards are still thriving. Indeed, my hunch is that each communication form adds on to the other, rather than displacing it, which is why I never get much writing done (today's excusive, anyway). Happy Canada Day to All (except Janet Napolitano), Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________ S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
Altho I wonder if IM has mostly given way to texting. Haven't checked the data, though. Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________ S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________ On Tue, 30 Jun 2009, Robert Mason wrote:
Date: Tue, 30 Jun 2009 18:08:36 -0700 From: Robert Mason <rmmason@u.washington.edu> To: Barry Wellman <wellman@chass.utoronto.ca>, aoir list <air-l@aoir.org> Subject: RE: [Air-L] in dis-praise of the Chronicle
Barry, your next-to-last paragraph is on target, IMO: think of all the predictions of "death of...because of the introduction of..." [AM radio...FM radio; radio...TV; movies...TV;...the list goes on]
It's not true of all technologies, of course, but it's true for communications technologies/media.
Bob
-----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Barry Wellman Sent: Tuesday, June 30, 2009 4:08 PM To: aoir list; Denise N. Rall; Catherine Middleton; Peter Timusk Subject: [Air-L] in dis-praise of the Chronicle
I was appalled by the Chronicle's article -- especially the headline -- on the putative death of e-lists such as this one.
First, they gave no systematic evidence, just some anecdotes. Although the article was more nuanced than the headline: "on the one hand, on the other hand." Yet, still anecdotes.
Second, they ignored the organizational ecology research that has shown that some organizations die and some get born all the time.
Third, the posts by my fellow Canucks Catherine Middleton and Peter Timusk clearly showed the difference between 140 character Tweets (which I do a fair amount) and posts to this list (ibid). Both of their posts were too nuanced to be short tweets.
Fourth, as Marc Smith can show you, even the older Bulletin Boards are still thriving.
Indeed, my hunch is that each communication form adds on to the other, rather than displacing it, which is why I never get much writing done (today's excusive, anyway).
Happy Canada Day to All (except Janet Napolitano),
Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________
S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
Mmm...interesting; possible exception? However, I'd guess that IM is mostly from the computer (web-based) and texting (telco based) is mostly from mobile phones. As netbooks get smaller and mobiles become better with the web services, the lines may become blurred. Bob -----Original Message----- From: Barry Wellman [mailto:wellman@chass.utoronto.ca] Sent: Tuesday, June 30, 2009 6:11 PM To: Robert Mason Cc: aoir list Subject: RE: [Air-L] in dis-praise of the Chronicle Altho I wonder if IM has mostly given way to texting. Haven't checked the data, though. Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________ S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________ On Tue, 30 Jun 2009, Robert Mason wrote:
Date: Tue, 30 Jun 2009 18:08:36 -0700 From: Robert Mason <rmmason@u.washington.edu> To: Barry Wellman <wellman@chass.utoronto.ca>, aoir list <air-l@aoir.org> Subject: RE: [Air-L] in dis-praise of the Chronicle
Barry, your next-to-last paragraph is on target, IMO: think of all the predictions of "death of...because of the introduction of..." [AM radio...FM radio; radio...TV; movies...TV;...the list goes on]
It's not true of all technologies, of course, but it's true for communications technologies/media.
Bob
-----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Barry Wellman Sent: Tuesday, June 30, 2009 4:08 PM To: aoir list; Denise N. Rall; Catherine Middleton; Peter Timusk Subject: [Air-L] in dis-praise of the Chronicle
I was appalled by the Chronicle's article -- especially the headline -- on the putative death of e-lists such as this one.
First, they gave no systematic evidence, just some anecdotes. Although the article was more nuanced than the headline: "on the one hand, on the other hand." Yet, still anecdotes.
Second, they ignored the organizational ecology research that has shown that some organizations die and some get born all the time.
Third, the posts by my fellow Canucks Catherine Middleton and Peter Timusk clearly showed the difference between 140 character Tweets (which I do a fair amount) and posts to this list (ibid). Both of their posts were too nuanced to be short tweets.
Fourth, as Marc Smith can show you, even the older Bulletin Boards are still thriving.
Indeed, my hunch is that each communication form adds on to the other, rather than displacing it, which is why I never get much writing done (today's excusive, anyway).
Happy Canada Day to All (except Janet Napolitano),
Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________
S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
This is especially true now that IM services, among others, tend to consolidate texting, IM-ing, tweeting and other forms of status updates into one spot (theirs, naturally), and provide both web based and mobile apps. ~ Dana Dana Rotman PhD Candidate University of Maryland's iSchool On Tue, Jun 30, 2009 at 9:15 PM, Robert Mason <rmmason@u.washington.edu>wrote:
Mmm...interesting; possible exception?
However, I'd guess that IM is mostly from the computer (web-based) and texting (telco based) is mostly from mobile phones. As netbooks get smaller and mobiles become better with the web services, the lines may become blurred.
Bob
-----Original Message----- From: Barry Wellman [mailto:wellman@chass.utoronto.ca] Sent: Tuesday, June 30, 2009 6:11 PM To: Robert Mason Cc: aoir list Subject: RE: [Air-L] in dis-praise of the Chronicle
Altho I wonder if IM has mostly given way to texting. Haven't checked the data, though.
Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________
S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________
On Tue, 30 Jun 2009, Robert Mason wrote:
Date: Tue, 30 Jun 2009 18:08:36 -0700 From: Robert Mason <rmmason@u.washington.edu> To: Barry Wellman <wellman@chass.utoronto.ca>, aoir list <air-l@aoir.org
Subject: RE: [Air-L] in dis-praise of the Chronicle
Barry, your next-to-last paragraph is on target, IMO: think of all the predictions of "death of...because of the introduction of..." [AM radio...FM radio; radio...TV; movies...TV;...the list goes on]
It's not true of all technologies, of course, but it's true for communications technologies/media.
Bob
-----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Barry Wellman Sent: Tuesday, June 30, 2009 4:08 PM To: aoir list; Denise N. Rall; Catherine Middleton; Peter Timusk Subject: [Air-L] in dis-praise of the Chronicle
I was appalled by the Chronicle's article -- especially the headline -- on the putative death of e-lists such as this one.
First, they gave no systematic evidence, just some anecdotes. Although the article was more nuanced than the headline: "on the one hand, on the other hand." Yet, still anecdotes.
Second, they ignored the organizational ecology research that has shown that some organizations die and some get born all the time.
Third, the posts by my fellow Canucks Catherine Middleton and Peter Timusk clearly showed the difference between 140 character Tweets (which I do a fair amount) and posts to this list (ibid). Both of their posts were too nuanced to be short tweets.
Fourth, as Marc Smith can show you, even the older Bulletin Boards are still thriving.
Indeed, my hunch is that each communication form adds on to the other, rather than displacing it, which is why I never get much writing done (today's excusive, anyway).
Happy Canada Day to All (except Janet Napolitano),
Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________
S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
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It also sounds like this misses the nuance of *who is talking to whom*, with stronger ties using more media to communicate than weaker ties, and stronger ties more able to influence joint (pairwise to groupwise) use. -- this is all with the caveat that I haven´t read the Chronicle article (I´m not on my own machine with my usually totally wired connection right now). But, I also wonder if we may be seeing a shift in what the ´base´ connector for groups is going to be. Sure, AoIR is long-established on email, but would you do that today? or would you set up a Facebook or equivalent groupinstead? I rather think the latter if you didn´t think about crossing borders and internet transmission rates. Anyway, I better go read the article! /Caroline ---- Original message ----
Date: Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:07:46 -0400 From: Barry Wellman <wellman@chass.utoronto.ca> Subject: [Air-L] in dis-praise of the Chronicle To: aoir list <air-l@aoir.org>, "Denise N. Rall" <denrall@yahoo.com>, Catherine Middleton <cmiddlet@ryerson.ca>, Peter Timusk <ptimusk@sympatico.ca>
I was appalled by the Chronicle's article -- especially the headline -- on the putative death of e-lists such as this one.
First, they gave no systematic evidence, just some anecdotes. Although the article was more nuanced than the headline: "on the one hand, on the other hand." Yet, still anecdotes.
Second, they ignored the organizational ecology research that has shown that some organizations die and some get born all the time.
Third, the posts by my fellow Canucks Catherine Middleton and Peter Timusk clearly showed the difference between 140 character Tweets (which I do a fair amount) and posts to this list (ibid). Both of their posts were too nuanced to be short tweets.
Fourth, as Marc Smith can show you, even the older Bulletin Boards are still thriving.
Indeed, my hunch is that each communication form adds on to the other, rather than displacing it, which is why I never get much writing done (today's excusive, anyway).
Happy Canada Day to All (except Janet Napolitano),
Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________
S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
Caroline Haythornthwaite Professor, Graduate School of Library and Information Science, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 501 East Daniel St., Champaign IL 61820 haythorn@illinois.edu OR haythorn@uiuc.edu
I can't wait to get my hands on Google Wave, http://wave.google.com/. What I've seen of it tells me it could be a game changer. -- Terry Calhoun, MA, JD Society for College and University Planning (SCUP) terry.calhoun@scup.org | www.scup.org 734 .355.0431 fax 734.998.6532 360º Feedback On Terry - Anonymous, Just Click and Go http://tinyurl.com/anonymousfeedback Connect with SCUP on various social media: LinkedIn - http://www.linkedin.com/groups?about=&gid=1714477&memberID=5799782&pvs=ps Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=18532339568&ref=ts Twitter - http://twitter.com/SCUP44 www.campusheritage.org www.sustainability.info
participants (6)
-
Barry Wellman -
Caroline Haythornthwaite -
Christopher Lueg -
Dana Rotman -
Robert Mason -
Terry Calhoun