Themes (3O5Y)
Along with the "what" of the next year's workshops, some underlying themes to carry forward: (3O5U)
1. As Susan mentioned this morning, how do projects/groups "start off on the right foot"? Someone else mentioned "roadmapping" as a need. How can we offer, as an outcome of each workshop, do-able approach for visioning, surveying "what is possible?" and encouraging how groups think about the value they bring to their users (in software terms) and communities (in communication/collaboration terms)? (3O5V)
2. Considering the issue of mediated communication as well as collaboration. Each medium brings opportunities and barriers to human communication... how can we expose and understand the effects? Can we encourage usable and useful? (3O5W)
3. How can we help knowledge transfer out of each session? What is "actionable"? Can we ground presentations and discussions in scenarios that help attendees translate what they hear into their worlds? (3O5X)
Topics (3O66)
- Sharing visions. Visioning is a very specific activity related to the goals of specific projects. However, what can be shared more generally? How can visions from one arena be reviewed, and elements re-applied, in another arena? (3O6C)
- Integrating information and outcomes from collaboration with day-to-day transactional systems. Most people use some form of transactional system to do their work. It is often difficult to integrate new or dynamic information quickly to that. To locate relevant information, people have to "leave their work" and seek information. What are the alternatives? (3O6B)
- What is persistent from electronic records of collaboration? Conversations evolve, but the electronic record can be accessed non-linearly, particularly via search. Is it a criteria-setting/archiving issue - differentiating between process and conclusion? Or is it a usability issue - sign-posting for the user where they are in a process and how to easily get to key summary points? (3O67)
- How to do lightweight semantics to help integrate disparate information sources and aid discovery, without re-engineering the way you produce content for the web? How to make connected knowledge practical? (3O68)
- What are the personal, social, and cultural challenges to adopting new communication approaches and technologies? Do we act from information and research, or are there other things that catalyze adoption? Focus on stories and real-world examples to surface patterns. (3O6A)
Upcoming (3O5Z)
World Usability Day is Nov. 8th, 2007. Focus is on usability in healthcare and health informatics. Is there something that can be done that ties to this, either in October (to contribute) or afterward in November or December (drawing from the outputs of the international usability community). (3O60)