The first day ends with the regular/famous panel on “ECSCW: Where are we? Reflections and Prognostications” – Here some comments from the presentations and the discussion.
Geraldine Fitzpatrick
- we have to remember how the (computer) world looked like when we started (20 years ago) …
- questions/issues: 1) what sorts of influences have we had in the world? (what problems have we solved) – at the beginning engineers without any ethnographic studies, new things/tools developed; 2) a lot of different conferences dealing with CSCW topics (in particular topics like mobile systems etc) – do we still have something to say/contribute? Yes!
Ina Wagner
- social science side of CSCW research
- several fields/social science theories are not well represented in CSCW, e.g.: industrial sociology (technology as mediating skills, control, employment, …); organizational theory (role of technology in organizational change/knowledge creation); social studies of technology (the “making” of technology) – where we can find lots of lots of interesting things about technology and technology in organizations
- Where is CSCW research?
- CSCW has unique focus: work practices – technology use (interaction, coordination, artefacts); design and implementation
- What is special about CSCW? CSCW course outline: case studies (health care, manufacturing, design, domestic environments), concepts (awareness, common information spaces, articulation work, coordination mechanisms, coordinative artefacts, standards and cs – problem: they are not really connected, CSCW systems – design principles, theories in the background (ethnomethodology, phenomenology, some organizational theory)
- Open issues: the need for a theory of cooperative work; the need to pay attention to organizational issues; is there a socio-political perspective, the need for one; how to connect to STS – studies of technology construction/use, the community; how and if to integrate a concern for skill, control, employment issues
Wolfgang Prinz
- ECSCW started with large initiatives/projects (sponsored by the European Commission and others)
- Influences: Speech Acts, Multi-user VR, Awareness, Ubiquitous Collaboration, Communities, Social Web – We looked at particular/isolated issues – that was the easy time – Now these areas have separate conferences … We have influenced these areas, but they left us, they do not bring anything back
- problems to face: collaboration as a commodity? All we have thought about 1) left us to start its own life, 2) is now part of MS Sharepoint, 3) and what we haven’t thought about is Web 2.0 ;-)
- Problems with funding (CWE and Living Lab initiative of the EC): We are viewed as doing nothing constructive …
- “We have contributed the broomsticks, now we need to support their management” – solve the complexity – The Sorcerer’s Apprentice: “Spirits that I’ve cited, my commands ignore …”
Kjeld Schmidt
- What CSCW set out to do? Starting point were disappointing experiences with office automation movement. Understand how machines can be used in complex work settings.
- Where are we now? A lot of fascinating technologies appeared. We have not managed to stay focussed. We have not managed to stay involved in the development of the technologies (e.g. workflow management systems)
- Has the ECSCW community become risk aversive? (no large scale systems in complex settings …)
Discussion
- The technologies now used to organize work are not addressed in CSCW – Is CSCW left behind? – Industry took over (Sharepoint, IBM Lotus) – so we are escaping in niches – we have to look into how the large systems are used – but this is quite complex/complicated (too complicated for the usual PhD project?)
- CSCW has influence in new areas like Web 2.0 etc (former CSCW research is relevant today) – look at notes on CSCW and Web 2.0 workshop
- Core achievement of CSCW is that it has brought practice to computing
- Organizations are different now … earlier we started out to bring organizations computer support tools … now they have computer support tools … and they have problems with them … the second phase of CSCW should be to help organizations to solve the problems they have with the computer support tools