| The promise of globally networked computers to usher in a new age of universal
learning and sharing of human knowledge remains a distant dream; the software and
social practices needed have yet to be conceived, designed, and adopted. To support
online collaboration, our technology and culture have to be reconfigured to meet a
bewildering set of constraints. Above all, this requires understanding how digital
technology can mediate human collaboration. The essays gathered in this volume
document one path of exploration of these challenges. They include efforts to design
software prototypes featuring specific collaboration-support functionality, to analyze
empirical instances of collaboration, and to theorize about the issues, phenomena,
and concepts involved today in supporting collaborative knowledge building.
The studies in this book grapple with the problem of how to increase opportunities
for effective collaborative working, learning, and acting through innovative uses of
computer technology. From a technological perspective, the possibilities seem
endless and effortless. The ubiquitous linking of computers in local and global networks
makes possible the sharing of thoughts by people who are separated spatially
or temporally. Brainstorming and critiquing of ideas can be conducted in many-tomany
interactions, without being confined by a sequential order imposed by the
inherent limitations of face-to-face meetings and classrooms. Negotiation of consensual
decisions and group knowledge can be conducted in new ways. |
