From Buddyspace to CitiTag: Large-scale Symbolic Presence for Community Building and Spontaneous Play

In this paper we discuss the conceptual framework and principles that guide our work in the design of large-scale informal environments for collaborative work, learning and play, aiming to foster social bonds and to provide an exciting testbed for emergent social behaviours. We present three different applications we have developed: Buddyspace, an Instant Messaging environment for community building, BumperCars, an online presence-based multiplayer game and CitiTag, an experimental wireless mixed reality game

Collaboration in the Semantic Grid: a Basis for e-Learning

The CoAKTinG project aims to advance the state of the art in collaborative mediated spaces for the Semantic Grid. This paper presents an overview of the hypertext and knowledge based tools which have been deployed to augment existing collaborative environments, and the ontology which is used to exchange structure, promote enhanced process tracking, and aid navigation of resources before, after, and while a collaboration occurs. While the primary focus of the project has been supporting e-Science, this paper also explores the similarities and application of CoAKTinG technologies as part of a human-centred design approach to e-Learning

BuddySpace: Large-Scale Presence for Communities at Work at Play. Inhabiting Virtual Places Workshop at E-CSCW

Our research addresses the question of how presence in networked environments can enhance the sense of social participation and well-being among isolated individuals in very large virtual communities. Large-scale presence poses a special challenge, and for this reason we aim to leverage the ‘buzz ’ and ‘feel-good factor ’ evident in certain kinds of large crowds. As Donath (1996) asks: “Is there a design that would make palpable the sensation that one was indeed on-line in the company of millions of other people? ” Such a sensation could of course be thrilling, but it may equally be daunting, confusing, annoying, or simply irrelevant, depending on the context. We therefore pose a slightly different question. In particular, we want to know “how can we create and sustain verylarge-group ‘buzz ’ at work, study, and play?” We know that the presence of very large numbers (millions) of people can be represented visually using density plots on maps (Dodge and Kitchen, 2000), and in very compelling ways such as the NASA Earthlight map (NASA, 2000) which shows the most densely populated areas on our planet via a stitched-together global panorama of night-time satellite photos revealing the illumination patterns of city lights. This is more than

SOCIAL PRESENCE

In this paper we discuss the conceptual framework and principles that guide our work in the design of large-scale informal environments for collaborative work, learning and play, aiming to foster social bonds and to provide an exciting testbed for emergent social behaviours. We present three different applications we have developed: Buddyspace, an Instant Messaging environment for community building, BumperCars, an online presence-based multiplayer game and CitiTag, an experimental wireless mixed reality game. Categories and Subject Descriptors H.5.3 [Information Interfaces and Presentation]: Group and Organisation Interfaces---synchronous interaction, collaborativ

Collaborative Tools in the Semantic Grid

The CoAKTinG project aims to advance the state of the art in collaborative mediated spaces for distributed e-Science. The project is integrating several knowledge based and hypertext tools into existing collaborative environments, and through use of a shared ontology to exchange structure, promotes enhanced process tracking and navigation of resources before, after, and while a meeting occurs. This paper provides an overview of the CoAKTinG tools, the ontology that connects them, and current research activities