The story until now…
This is the second of three parts in a series on Collaboration. The first of the three articles presented a quick introduction to the historical aspects of collaboration. Collaboration has made the best use of the fastest communication methods available in any given era. The article now continues with collaborative techniques and a critical analysis of the current scenarios.
Inter-Net-Working
eMails were the first instrument of information exchange on the web. Of course, they were built to serve that way. Information flew back and forth with ‘suitable’ comments, modifications suggestions, revisions and what not. The process of creation received a shot in the arm. But soon, spammers joined the fray and eMails, once the lifeline of the internet, were reduced to annoying snippets of information lodged between pieces of Junk – like an annoying strand of edible fibre stuck between your molars.
Usenet was popular as an information broadcast medium. ‘Newcasts’ were read daily by thousands and millions of users on the world wide web. Links were exchanged and offices discussed the hottest usenet topics overs steaming cups of coffee. eMail was the prime information exchange medium. Many a discussion happened over eMail. But, owing to spam, and fragmentation of context, Usenet discussions had a short life-time. Even today, one can find a lot of posts hanging without a child thread.
Then came blogs and comments. Blogs were simply an extension of the Usenet concept. With an attractive interface and the subsequent ‘children’ appearing as comments to the original post, Blogs served as attractive modifications to the fora-like look of discussion groups. Moreover, the ‘author’ of the blog held exclusive rights over his ‘story’. And the commenst that ensued after were merely discussions, however, intelligent (or not) they may have been.
The next step in evolution had to be something that combined the features of the three tools/utilities – eMail, Usenet, and Blogs. And so, the Wiki was born.
Wiki-wiki-wow-wow!!
The Wiki had the interface of a blogs, the versatility of eMail and the usability of the Usenet fora. Anybody who wanted to make a correction could do so. All he needed was a login. People are hailing Wikis as the next step in the evolution of the collaborative process.
This is not far from the truth. Wikis do offer you the ability to co-create. For the uninitiated few, here’s how wikis work: A member puts up a post (stub) on a Wiki board. Another member with additional information, adds his thoughts to the post, and they are incorporated into the main post. A third member, notices the discrepancies in the underlying concepts and edits the post accordingly.
The co-creative process progresses asynchronously until the final blend of ideas and concepts is found. However, it is worth noting that all Wiki posts are always stubs. Simply because, information is never complete. The deeper one delves into the subject, the more information is uncovered. No Wiki post is ever a final edition.
Wiki-ed!!
Many extensions of the Wiki-concept (but essentially containing the same fundamental element) have sprung up. The Writeboard is just one of them. Writeboard allows you to create and save edited versions of documents and allows you to compare any two versions online. Ñandu is a web-based Office application that allows you to edit and co-create Office documents online.[UPDATE: Seems like Ñandu was one of the casualties of the second dot-com bust...] Instacoll goes a step further (or backwards?) and allows you to edit your Microsoft Office documents in realtime. Instacoll relies on a P2P model wherein participating users are invited to download a P2P client that connects two (or more) users in real time for synchronized Collaboration.
(To be concluded.)
Steve Rubel introduced me to AlwaysOn and I am thankful to him.
Two killjoys:
1. We’ve never met each other yet.
2. He doesn’t know who I am. :)
I am one of the thousands or millions of subscribers to Steve Rubel’s Blogfeed. Yesterday, he happened to mention AlwaysOn in his Blog post. The rest as they say, is history. Or rather, my story.
From Messenger Pigoens to Instant Messengers
There was always an element of aynchronous, non-physical communication that man followed judiciously and conscientiously. Some people went so far as to attach a romantic perspective to it, while other looked upon it as just another extension of communication. Mankind has had messenger pigeons, letters, the telegram, the telephone, eMail and now instant messaging, inform him of the various happeneings in his life. With each new discovery/invention, the world has progressively grown smaller. And the interesting part is: it doesn’t stop here.
As a method of broadcast, we have seen and experienced everything from town-criers to Internet Newscasts, from Radios to Podcasts, from Television to Video Blogs, until today, information was pushed down our throats and we had no option but to either accept it or reject it. We had no say in what kind of information we wanted.
Then suddenly, one fine day, a smart guy stood up and said, “Hey I want all this, and more. I want to have my opinion, my say, on the subject you are yapping away on.”
That was the day when life came to a stand-still and turned around. Collaboration was born.
Exchanging notes.
Collaboration has been prevalent in society for a very, very, long time. We have been collaborating to build bridges of every kind – from the early prehistoric rope-bridges to the current rage – The Internet. Now, there’s another bridge that people are trying to re-build. Oh sorry, re-novate. There’s a sudden buzz in the air about collaboration and Social Software. Yahoo! seems to be going for it with Yahoo! 360, Google has already taken over Orkut and MSN has Spaces in its top priority list for the next five years. How did this sudden social fever come about?
It all started with a smart guy who wanted to know what people felt about him. Until then, the din had been: Don’t care what people think, just do it. (Apologies to the owners of the trademark phrase.) He added a comments page where people could scribble their thoughts about the subject. And boy, did they let it fly or what!
Exchanging comments progressed to exchanging mails and exchanging links. Soon thereafter, people found out that collaboration was indeed an effective tool. They realised that they had been using it for centuries. They had used it when they sat in the town=-square or when they exchanged recipes for a delectable Chocolate mousse (my personal favorite). They used collaboration, when they closed those heavy Oak doors and decided on which smart-ass was to be retained and who was to be given the boot. The light of understanding suddenly dawned upon them and they cried, “Holy Cow!! I need to collaborate!!”
In the meanwhile, another smart-guy (boy, we do have too many of those here, don’t we?) decided that he could sell his products really well if he could make people read it. So he went about sending mails to everyone who would care to flaunt his eMail address. Smart-guys are always followed by copy-cats. And so the ‘trend’ grew and grew until we grew sick of it. So we decided to give it a name and we called it “Spam.” and then came filters and Junk eMail boxes, and they are around till date.
Chaos & the Calm
The Wiki was born around the same time this was happening. And it was an instant success. Thousands and millions of stubs were generated by the minute. Keyboards all around the world experienced a never-before harassment. Documents and Words began to fly back and forth, ideas exchanged, corrections made, plans changed, discussions held, and what not.
But, in the midst of all this ruckus of ideas, one important point continued to be overlooked. How do you track all of this? The bookmarks began to grow and they grew at such an alarming rate that everytime you added a new bookmark, you forgot one. The ideas piled up high and wide. Ideas were flowing in from everywhere. The human brain, however fast it may be, still has its own limitations. We are still trying to find a way to process all this information.
(To be continued…)
