Electronic conferencing—issues beyond software selection

ABSTRACT

Electronic Conferencing is rapidly becoming a popular medium for communication. We have witnessed wide-spread installations of Electronic Conferencing systems on college campuses and in academic settings that provide information and resource sharing in a variety of ways. Probably you have already made the decision to purchase or develop an Electronic Conferencing package for your site. You may already be using it to meet some of the demands of your user community. But once the conferencing software has been chosen and installed, there still exists the potential for a myriad of problems to arise. Anticipating these issues and planning for them before-hand could determine whether Electronic Conferencing is considered a success at your installation. This paper examines a variety of issues on a multi-level basis. It focuses primarily on problems that are dealt with at the administrative level and at the individual conference-coordinator level. Issues such as qualifications of conference coordinators, selection procedures of coordinators, proposal guidelines for creation of new conferences, accessibility, and establishment of conference etiquette are discussed. The paper also looks at issues at the conference-user level, such as how first-time users react to the new medium and the degree of involvement of the users in the planning process. Every institution is unique in its resources, its climate, and its purpose. The types of issues raised by this paper are the kind that have unique answers for each community posing the questions. This paper discusses scenarios that can be resolved to satisfaction in many ways, depending on your own situation. It also presents a checklist of administrative-level considerations, and describes an example of a successful implementation of Electronic Conferencing.

INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.4 INFORMATION SYSTEMS APPLICATIONS
      H.4.3 Communications Applications
          Subjects: Computer conferencing, teleconferencing, and videoconferencing

General Terms:
Management