Multi-user domains and virtual campuses: implications for computer-mediated collaboration and technical communication

ABSTRACT

Despite being the focus of 170 articles in the Fall of 1993, few researchers have documented how the Internet, an environment that attracts over 6000 new users per month, will affect the technical communication profession. In particular, researchers have devoted little attention to the rapid emergence of an Internet tool that has the potential to increase collaboration among professional technical communicators. This paper represents one such attempt and describes an electronic tool we are building at NCSU called the TechComm-VC (Virtual Campus), a Multi-User Domain, or MUD.

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.5 INFORMATION INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION (I.7)

Additional Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.4 INFORMATION SYSTEMS APPLICATIONS

  I. Computing Methodologies
  I.3 COMPUTER GRAPHICS
      I.3.7 Three-Dimensional Graphics and Realism
          Subjects: Virtual reality

General Terms:
Documentation, Human Factors, Theory

Keywords:
computer-mediated collaboration, email, internet, multiuser domains, productivity, virtual communities