Multimodal Semiotics and Collaborative Design

their perceived effects on networked virtual communities, often by consulting ethnomethodological
methods (i.e. Damer 1998, Boostrom 2008, Ostrander 2008, Boelstorff 2008).
Anthropology professor Tom Boellstorff’s (2008) detailed ethnographical analysis of SL’s
communities and their socio-cultural practices of communication, collaboration, and co-creation is
among the most influential examples of such literature. Through his extensive fieldwork,
Boellstorff claims that “virtual worlds are distinct domains of human being, deserving of study in
their own right” (Boelstorff 2008: 238). Creativity and user-generated content is central in
Boellstorff’s framing of SL’s digitally mediated culture, while the many forms of social interaction
they provide can herald the transition from the “2D web” to the “3D web”, or more specifically:
from network to place.
Within Roskilde University’s ‘Sense-making strategies and user-driven innovation in VWs’ research
project, a wide trajectory of approaches have been used by co-researchers, including sense-making
methodology (Reinhardt and Dervin 2010), participant ethnographies on collaborative user/gamer
practices (Jensen 2008a, 2009, Frølunde 2009, 2012), co-production and participatory design
(Jensen 2008b, 2012b;), and user-driven innovation (Jensen 2008c, 2011). Another visible stream
in qualitative VW studies focuses on particular platforms and/or technologies, and attempt to
analyze their affordances and limitations - potentials and pitfalls for specific use contexts - by
focusing on user-interfaces, communication tools and virtual environments. Such studies have
been focused on SL, as well as other collaborative platforms, such as Open Sim or Active Worlds
(i.e. Schroeder et al. 2001, Corbit 2002, Dickey 2005, Moore et al. 2009). There is also a significant
number of recent studies on collaborative content creation in CVEs that us SL as platform, a
number of other studies also emphasize design practices in other platforms such as LambdaMOO,
Activeworlds, Everquest, and processes of world-building where they actively participate in the
design of new platforms (i.e. Rosenman et al. 2007, Wadley and Ducheneaut 2009, Kohler et al.
2009). Although such examples have similarities with my analytical framework, most of these
studies have different analytical foci than social semiotics, and they are not necessarily interested
in co-production of meaning potentials within multimodal sign systems.
For instance, scholars from distance education field Parvati Dev and Decker Walker (1999) study
evolutionary design of a virtual learning environment in which design and use of virtual
artifacts/worlds are parts of a curriculum. Through participatory observation and analysis of
multimodal archives (i.e. images, conceptual figures) they conclude on the value of early design
studies in the development of educational innovations. Science communication and education
researcher Margaret Corbit (2002) analyzes building of a 3D multiuser virtual science museum
with a particular focus on accommodating the needs of several interconnected user groups, and
provides feedback for design improvement, factors that affect participation and collaboration.
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