Frequently Asked Questions
Practical Questions
Conceptual Questions
| Practical Questions and Answers |
Q: What is Loops?
A: Loops is a web-based successor to Babble.Loops is a chat-like
tool that allows its users to engage in synchronous or asynchronous textual
conversations, and to create multiple rooms in which participants may
converse, post text on pubic bulletin boards, and store text in slide-out
tabs.Loops uses a visual representation called a social proxy is to show
who is present and how recently they have spoken; Loops conversations
also persist (unlike most chat), so that a user who is not on-line when
a comment is made can see it later, and can scroll back through the entire
history of a conversation.Loops runs in a standard web browser, and requires
only a publically available Flash-MX (TM) plug-in to make it work.
It retains the characteristics that make Babble unique -- a visual representation
of who is present and active, and chat that persists over sessions --
and adds a variety of new features such as bulletin boards and tabs in
each 'room'. For more information see the "Projects" part of
our web site.
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Q: What is Babble?
A: Babble is the predecessor to Loops. It is a client-server system
written in SmallTalk, and has been in use for about five years. It is
no longer under active development, although a few active Babble communities
remain. Like Loops, we see Babble as a vehicle both for providing casual
opportunistic interactions for distributed workgroups, and - over time
- for capturing the knowledge generated in day to day working conversations,
thus providing a deeply social approach to knowledge management, in which
knowledge maintains its links with the people who create and use it. For
more information on Babble see the "Projects" part of our web
site.
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Q: How can
I get a Babble or Loops for my group, team or community?
A: If you and your group are all IBM employees (we cannot, at the
moment, distribute our software outside of IBM) you might be able get
a system if (a) you are willing to let us study your usage of the system,
(b) if we determine that your group is likely to benefit from the system,
and (c) if we have the capacity in both technical and human resources
to support you. Other than participating in our research (responding to
occasional surveys or interview requests), there is no cost to using one
of our systems. Contact Wendy Kellogg, wkellogg@us.ibm.com.
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Q:
I'm an IBMer who works with customer groups -- can I use Babble or Loops
to support communication with and among my customers?
A: As of this writing, neither Babble nor Loops works across the
firewall. We are currently exploring a setup in which Loops could work
across the firewall; we should know whether this will be possible in mid-2002.
Contact Wendy Kellogg, wkellogg@us.ibm.com.
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| Conceptual Questions and Answers |
Q: What
is social computing?
A: Social computing refers to systems which support the gathering,
representation, processing and dissemination of social information, that
is, information which is distributed across social collectivities such
as teams, communities, organizations, cohorts and markets. Examples of
systems which fall in this domain include collaborative filtering and
recommender systems (e.g., firefly), online auction sites (e.g., ebay),
and open source virtual communities (e.g., slashdot). The central hallmark
of social computing is that it relies on the notion of social identity:
that is, it is not just the data that matters, but who that data 'belongs
to', and how the identity of the 'owner' of that data is related to other
identities in the system. More generally, social computing systems are
likely to contain components that support and represent social constructs
such as identity, reputation, trust, accountability, presence, social
roles, and ownership.
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Q:
What is social translucence?
A: In short, social translucence is the idea that we should make
some (but not all) cues about the presence and activity of users of digital
systems available to one another. We like to use a story to illustrate
the idea. In the building where we work there is a door that opens from
the stairwell into the hallway. This door has a design flaw: opened quickly,
it will slam into anyone entering fromthe other side. In an attempt at
a remedy, a sign was posted: "Open Door Slowly." As you might
guess, the sign is not very effective -- people soon cease to notice it.
We like to contrast the 'sign' approach with a different sort of solution:
putting a glass window in the door. The 'glass window' approach is effective
for three reasons: First, as humans, we are perceptually attuned to movement
and human faces and notice them more readily than we notice a sign. Second,
once we become aware that a person is present, our social rules come into
play: I don't open the door quickly because I know that you're on the
other side, and I've been raised in a culture that frowns upon slamming
things into others. There is a third, subtler reason for the glass window's
effectiveness. Even if I haven't been properly acculturated and don't
care about harming you, nevertheless, I may still refrain from slamming
into you because I know that you know that I know you're there, and therefore
I will be held accountable for my actions. We call systems of this sort
-- systems in which perceptual cues about the activities of their users
lead to feelings of awareness and accountability -- socially translucence
systems.
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Q: Isn't 'social
translucence' just a fancy name for taking away people's privacy?
A: No. That's why we use the word "translucence" -- it
stands for striking a balance between privacy and visibility. Consider,
as an example, how elections work. In the physical world, it is important
that some aspects of elections be very private (e.g. who the voter is
voting for), but it is equally crucial that some parts of the process
be very visible and public (e.g. the placing of the ballot in the ballet
box; the counting of the votes; and, more subtly, it should be visible
that the voter is *alone* in the voting booth). For elections to be seen
as valid, it is crucial that some parts be private, and other parts public.
We suggest this is true of most collective processes, and a fundamental
aspect of our research is to understand how to negotiate these tradeoffs
in digital systems.
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Other
projects in