Presence Indicator tools
From [[http://cpsquare.org CPsquare]], the community of practice on communities of practice.
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Definition
A presence indicator lets you know who else is active (on their respective computers) or logged on (to a system on which both parties are working). It is universally integrated with IM and chat and is often useful in combination with other tools. Issues addressed by the feature set include: variable definitions of presence, what contact is enabled by "presence", and how members control visibility of their "presence".
Uses in communities of practice
A presence indiator makes the activity level in a community more visible and increases access to colleagues, while limiting possible distraction from non-colleagues. Having a feeling of "company" is extremely important to some communities and some people. A presence indicator is an excellent stimulus to contacting someone with whom to bounce ideas in the community. Presence indicators are also useful to getting organized for synchronous events such as a phone call or chat. We have found that it is not very useful to be able to see who else is online unless participants are also able to easily contact the people they see online. (Sending them an email does not feel like making contact.)
Tool Polarities
- Together/apart, Synch/Asynch:
- Interaction/publication:
- Individual/group:
Key features
Useful definitions of presence
- Manual definition of presence allows people to specify how their presence is announced (e.g., available, away, busy, on the phone, hidden, etc.) or not.
- Gives people control over how they are seen and gives an opportunity for community standards to evolve. Requires people to remember to change status as needed.
- An automated definition of presence shows members who are logged on or who have been "active" in a given window of time (for instance, by listing only people who have downloaded a page within the last three minutes).
- Being able to see that others are working at the same time gives a sense of community and encourages synchronous communication. Different definitions can result in false presence or absence, reducing the utility of the indicator.
- Individual buddy-lists or black-lists allows control by individual name. Shows online presence only for specific people chosen by the user.
- For very large communities, users may want to limit presence indication to specific people they care about or may want to avoid certain people.
- Scope of presence indication. Some systems can make presence visible depending on a user's activity or the location of that activity. For example, activity in a private or a restricted area may not be visible beyond that area, giving a kind of privacy. Presence at the desktop vs. presence on a common community site have different meanings and functions.
- The reciprocity implied by seeing someone's name as "present" suggests that they can see you as present as well; for most people that suggests that they can see the page or content that you are seeing. The symmetry of who is seen by whom is important when the community space has many different areas or segments related to projects, content, or role.
Follow-up or acting on presence
- The ability to invite people who are "present" to chat or exchange messages lets people easily initiate interaction with one or more visible members (i.e., by clicking on their name).
- The function of a presence indicator is not only to suggest that others are active at the same time, but to enable synchronous interaction.
- See what another is doing Gives you information about where another person is in the online space or what they are doing at the current moment
- When others' activity is likely to lead to productive interaction. The meaning of this kind of feature depends on the level of trust in the community.
- Invite to a page -- is this more related to IM or chat? Lets you take a member to a page where you are
- Synchronous view of "the same thing" is likely to provoke learning.
Related material
Other tools
