Why CSCW applications fail: problems in the design and evaluationof organizational interfaces
CSCW '88 Proceedings of the 1988 ACM conference on Computer-supported cooperative work
Portholes: supporting awareness in a distributed work group
CHI '92 Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
A generative development-process pattern language
Pattern languages of program design
Physical spaces, virtual places and social worlds: a study of work in the virtual
CSCW '96 Proceedings of the 1996 ACM conference on Computer supported cooperative work
Distributed scientific group collaboration across biocontainment barriers
Proceedings of the ACM 2012 conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work
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This paper discusses a three-year experiment to build a distributed research group, equipped with state-of-the-art computing facilities, spread over three cities in Australia. Despite the provision of the sorts of facilities to be expected in cooperative buildings, such as high-speed networks and videoconferencing, significant synergy (i.e., closely-coupled collaborations) among the distributed subgroups did not develop. This was not only due to the problems of distance, but was exacerbated by several political and organizational issues. An important lesson is that successful 'cooperative buildings' will depend not just on the technology but also on an appropriate managerial, organizational and political climate in which these resources can be meaningfully exploited. The paper outlines the experiment, discusses why synergies did not emerge, and points to implications for cooperative buildings and design paradigms based on the notion of pattern languages.