Chat May 19, 2008

Task: Using ICQ, yahoo chat, Messeger, virtual or webct chat, arrange a discussion with your peers. Talk about which chat service you prefer, and what forms of communication chat is most useful for. How does the method you are familiar with appear to differ from other chat or messaging? Which system do you prefer?

Log entry:  I’d never used an Internet chat program before this exercise, so it was all new to me.  I signed up to Messenger and ICQ, but found the ICQ interface a bit harder to use.

I had a chat with classmates using Messenger. From the group chat exercise and discussions on the Bulletin Board, I’d say that most classmates tend to prefer using Messenger. Others use more than one chat program, such as ICQ or Pidgin.

I find that chat is useful if you’d like to get an immediate (synchronous) response from a contact. It’s also a useful way of checking to see if a contact is online (or wants to let people know that they’re online).

Chat also tends to be more conducive to informal conversation than using email or a bulletin board. I think this is because the messages are perceived as being more ephemeral than email, as most people are aware that email in particular can be stored. (While chat messages can also be saved, it’s not a prominent feature and I think we’re generally less conscious of this.) On the Bulletin Board people tend to choose their words more carefully, as it’s a persistent record.

This mode of internet communication can also get fairly close to synchronous communication.  For example, there are pauses as in any normal conversation, and you can see when someone’s about to say something (they’re typing). Because chat is almost synchronous, people tend to have shorter messages and use more abbreviation. I think this reflects an awareness that people’s attention can be limited, so people need to keep messages short and punchy to hold people’s attention.

 

Newsgroups May 19, 2008

Task:  Search through various newsgroups and find one that interest you. Follow your chosen newsgroup for a couple of days, and then post a message to the group. Cut and paste a copy of the entire message, including the header information.

Log entry:  I joined a Google Groups newsgroup - alt.games.warcraft. It’s a fairly active newsgroup, with several new posts and comments each day. Most people making posts appear to be genuinely interested in sharing information and helping other members of the group. However, it doesn’t seem to be moderated, and has a lot of spam advertising posts.

Here’s my post: 

And of course, a big downside to joining a newsgroup is that it’s yet another distraction from my uni work

 

Email lists May 19, 2008

Task:  Explore some of the types of email lists available. What are the pros and cons of email lists versus discussion boards? Are there certain kinds of communication or purposes more suited to one than the other?

Log entry: 

Email lists

• Positive:
  • Gives you access to a broad range of views, particularly if it’s a list with many active members
  • Good for keeping a small number of members informed and able to exchange views – e.g. for clubs
• Negative:
  • It can be hard to manage so many emails, particularly if there are emails each day.
  • Can seem more impersonal
  • It can be harder to keep track of the thread of a conversation – e.g. an email sent in a digest form may appear out of context without the remaining discussion.

Discussion boards

• Positive:
  • Gives you access to a broad range of views
  • Can be easier to navigate/search than an email list
  • Online discussion boards have features such as ‘ratings’ systems, which allow viewers to easily see the most popular or helpful posts  
  • If moderated, reduces likelihood of spam advertising and ‘flaming’
  •  You can view posts without signing up to be a member

•  Negative:
• • Online discussion forums provide a persistent record – this may make exchanges more formal, or may make people less inclined to post questions
  • You don’t always need to be a member to view posts on a discussion board – this may raise privacy concerns for some members

In general, I think email lists are well suited to a small, discrete ’community’. Their main advantage is that they provide a safer, less public forum for discussing ideas and sharing information. Discussion boards can be very useful because they provide a record of previous posts and are accessible to a wider audience. Both, however, get their value from the input of their members – and this doesn’t necessarily vary between an email list and a discussion board.

 

Email tasks May 19, 2008

Task:  Undertake the Ohio State University Email Tutorial, then answer the following series of reflective questions.

Log entry:

1. What information about a user’s email, the origin of a message, and the path it took, can you glean from an email message?  
   • The email address can give us information about the sender – for example, the domain name may indicate the company the person works for.  It may also indicate the country the person is from – e.g ‘.au’ for Australia, and the type of organisation – e.g. ‘gov’, ‘edu’ or ‘com’. 
   • The message header can also tell when the message was sent, and whether it’s a reply or has been forwarded from someone.
   • The body of the message may also include the thread of previous emails, or portions of previous messages.
   • As emails can also be edited to change information from previous messages (and sometimes the email address), however, we also need to careful not to assume too much by the content of the email.
2. In what cases would you find it useful to use the ‘cc’, ‘bcc’ and ‘reply all’ functions of email? 
   • The ‘cc’ function can be used when you need to send the same information or message to a number of people, but generally implies that it is for information; those ‘cc’d’ do not need to take action.
   • The ‘bcc’ function is useful if you need to copy a message to someone but don’t want to let the sender know the identity of the other recipients – for example, an email to a client may be ‘bcc’d’ to the area manager for information, but you don’t want the client to have the manager’s email address.  It can also be useful if you want to send a group email but don’t want to share everyone’s email addresses with the whole group. In practice, I think ‘Bcc’ should generally be used sparingly, as it could imply a breach of trust where the addressee is not aware that the message is being sent to others. Good netiquette suggests that people should generally be aware of who a message is being sent or copied to.
   • The ‘reply all’ function is useful if you want to send the same message to a number of people. It implies that the message is for their action or comment.
3. In what ways can you ensure that an attachment you send will be easily opened by the receiver? 
   •  Some steps to ensure that the receiver will be able to option your attachment are to:
     • don’t assume that the recipient has the program or a program reader needed for the file – check first, even for more ‘common’ programs like Word and Excel and pdfs.
     • if the file is large, consider ‘zipping’ it – this may be particularly useful if the receiver is on dialup or behind a firewall and may have difficulty accessing a large file
     • if the attachment is a document, consider sending it in plain text (ASCII) or rich text (rtf) format
     • a document could also be sent in html format, although some people’s computers may have difficulty reading these, and some people elect to view emails in plain text format. 
4. What sorts of filters or rules do you have set up, and for what purpose?
   • Filters and rules can be useful if you receive a large number of emails, particularly if you like to keep a fairly empty inbox.  Some examples of rules and filters I use are:
     • Sorting email from newsgroups – I send these straight to a separate folder, so I can go through them at my own pace. Rules such as this can be useful for sorting emails that are not time-sentitive. Although this can make it easier to lose track of new messages, the folder icon notifies when I have unread emssages.
     • A rule that applies a coloured flag to emails from particular people – e.g. a red flag for my boss or a green flag from a friend. 
5. How have you organised the folder structure of your email and why?
   • I generally organise my email folders by subject, and this seems to be the most logical way to keep my mail organised. I may set up sub-folders according to date or sub-topic.
   • If I’m working on a large project, I also generally establish a separate folder for that project, perhaps with sub-folders on specific issues that arise – e.g. contracting, research, appointments.
   • I also try to review and re-organise my folder structure fairly often, especially if I’ve added a lot of new folders and I’m not using others as often.