Unlimited Collaboration - Anything. Anywhere. Anytime.

It all began when the Internet came, when can access large amount of information at our fingertips. Then we learned more, transformed more, and expected more. Today, our lives are changed forever and many of us find it painful to live without the Internet even for just one day!

Online collaboration has become popular not only in business organizations, but also government and education institutions. There is a whole spectrum of services to choose from, including browser-based team dashboards, online conferences with video capabilities, resource and document sharing, calendars, and scheduling of events, etc. Companies including Microsoft, IBM, and Google are competing intensely on their offerings of collaboration products to gain market dominance.

The Obama administration has place heavy emphasis on transparency and open government, and appointed the first CIO and CTO for its country. Propelled by the open source software movement, the administration promotes the concept of open government and uses collaborative technologies to solve collective problems at various levels of government.

Today, education institutions throughout the country are focusing more in technology education. More and more students are learning to use web 2.0 technologies to communicate, collaborate, and work together in and out of classrooms. Tools such as the wiki, blogs, videoconferencing, and online chat are adopted to induce creativity, and encourage communication and collaboration among students worldwide. This transformation is also aimed at better preparing the students when they join the workforce.

Like many organizational changes, online collaboration can be successful only if it is embraced by a supportive corporate culture. Such a culture must possess elements that foster trust, such as

• Offering flexible work schedules to employees (and allows telecommuting and off-site workers)
• Willing to share corporate information and project artifacts with others
• Willing to be available for discussing work matters beyond office hours
• Building a team of technically savvy employees
• Providing management support to this new mode of co-working

In the school environment, educators have reported problems associated with the use of online collaboration as follows:

• Not every student has a computer at home to collaborate after school
• Students tend to waste time and become distracted easily when online
• Students use non-authoritative sources and inappropriate materials
• Loss of efficiency caused by technical glitches with computer tools and limited bandwidth
• Restriction placed on web access

As pointed out in the assigned articles, the real benefit of online collaboration does not come from the nifty technologies themselves, but rather from the creative ways in which organizations make the best use of these technologies to meet their business objectives.

Sources:
Alloway, Kristen. "Students Discovering Online Collaboration." New Jersey Local News, Breaking News, Sports & Weather - NJ.com. 07 Nov. 2009. Web. 18 Mar. 2010.

Clancy, Heather. "Collaborate Using Online Tools - PCWorld Business Center." Reviews and News on Tech Products, Software and Downloads - PCWorld. 20 Apr. 2008. Web. 18 Mar. 2010.

Kelly, Will. "Corporate Culture, Not Technology, Drives Online Collaboration." WebWorkerDaily. 23 Oct. 2009. Web. 18 Mar. 2010.

Lathrop, Daniel, and Laurel Ruma. "Open Government: Collaboration, Transparency, and Participation in Practice." News for Greater Kansas City - Kansas City InfoZine News. 15 Mar. 2010. Web. 18 Mar. 2010.

Orenstein, Gary. "The Cloud Collaboration Wars Ramp Up." GigaOM. 12 Feb. 2010. Web. 19 Mar. 2010.

Touring the Virtual World in Our Pajamas and Slippers

As virtual world interfaces are gaining popularity, many believe this breakthrough technology would become the future means by which we access information.

Second Life, a popular virtual world, allows users ("residents") to interact and collaborate through customized avatars. Its objective is to offer cost-effective, innovative solutions by integrating virtual world into our traditional real world setting. Second Life has particularly wide application in the education environment. Popular use includes serving as classroom replacements, classroom enhancements, recruiting tools, and self-directed learning tools. Specific benefits include:

• Allows teachers or professors to reuse class materials easily
• Enables the university to offer classes to students around the globe
• Imposes low hardware requirements on students
• Provides an experience that is uniform and compatible to various platforms
• Uses generic tools that are recyclable between classrooms and universities
• Integrates with in-world tools, such as furniture and text-entry equipment, to tailor a classroom setting according to one's needs
• Allows educators to create, monitor, and investigate 'interactive experiments' in science
• Allows users to observe different aspects of the weather and meteorology monitoring lab
• Allows higher education's graduate programs to advertise its capabilities and recruit new students
• Offers interactive teaching tools for self-directed learning, progresses at an individual's own pace and availability

Yale University has created two Second Life islands with two projecrs. The first was a simulation project of the recreation of the Seeley J. Mudd Library on Second Life. The second project was the design of a virtual paper mill on Second Life in which students can explore the mill's operations including the machinery and processes. Both projects offer effective, inexpensive, and seemingly real experiences that would otherwise be unattainable.

Other interesting applications of virtual worlds can be found in purchasing, trading, and social gaming. People purchase virtual gifts at relatively inexpensive price for others and for themselves. For example, people can purchase Facebook gift items, Farm Coins and Cash for Farmville, or Xbox accessories for avatars. These micropurchases can amount to big venue for the creators of such products. Virtual goods are high in intangible value because gift-giving allow people to spread love and "exchange sentiments" with one another. People bought accessories, either to upgrade their avatars or enhance their gaming experience, allow them to express their uniqueness and assert their identities. In the virtual gaming environment, researches are being conducted to study gamers' behavior, which will offer insights to enhancing future gaming experience.

With virtual world interface gaining ground like lightning one obvious question is, when virtual world sales are becoming so quickly, how is that going to impact the real world economy? In other words, if we are satisfied with doing everything in a virtual world, then would we be needing clothing other than pajamas and slippers?

Sources:

Hand, Randall. "Learning in Second Life: Virtual Education VizWorld.com." VizWorld.com - Visualization, Computer Graphics, and Animation. Web. 21 Feb. 2010.

O'Donnell, Jayne. "Unlike reality, virtual retail sales are hot, especially for avatars." News, Travel, Weather, Entertainment, Sports, Technology, U.S. & World - USATODAY.com. Web. 21 Feb. 2010.

Patuwo, Grace. "Yale Daily News - Virtual world, real money in 'Second Life'" Yale Daily News - The Nation's Oldest College Daily. Web. 21 Feb. 2010.

Schonfeld, Erick. "Augmented Reality Vs. Virtual Reality: Which One Is More Real?" TechCrunch. Web. 21 Feb. 2010.

"Understanding interaction in virtual worlds." Science Daily: News & Articles in Science, Health, Environment & Technology. Web. 21 Feb. 2010