Preface for the Third Edition - Read

330 B. Concepts and Theories
networked group video conferencing rooms: in the beginning of tele-conferencing,
many multinational organizations (e.g., IBM, Siemens) or telecommunication
companies (e.g., Deutsche Telekom) installed the expensive video
conferencing equipment in a separate room, a video conferencing studio
(Hansen 2001, 431). The immobile installation of professional video equipment
provides high quality pictures and sound. With the advent of cheap and
powerful desktop video conferencing systems, the use of video conferencing
studios is limited, e.g., for electronic group meetings of managers or of two
and more geographically dispersed work groups or project teams,
audio conference: is the electronic equivalent to the telephone. Two or more
participants communicate via electronic networks. If the Internet is used as the
communication medium, audio conferencing is also sometimes called Internet-telephony
(Vaughan-Nichols 1997, 204ff, Horn 1999, 223ff). Examples
for audio conferencing tools are Surf&Call (VocalTec) or the audio part of
NetMeeting (Microsoft),
group conference management: functions for a management of tele-conferences
support a person to moderate a group discussion. A dedicated moderator
can for example restrict access to certain participants, ban unwanted contributions
or participants, thread contributions, administer votings and the like.
Examples for software tools supporting the moderation of text chats are the
moderation module of SpinChat (Spin) or the MBone moderation tools (Malpani/Rowe
1997, Perry 1997, 13ff),
instant messaging: is the synchronous form of email. A participant can send a
text message to a person (or a group of persons) that is delivered immediately.
The best known systems supporting this function are ICQ–“I seek you” 531 ,
the AOL Instant Messenger 532 (see Horn 1999, 49) or the Microsoft Messenger
533 ,
chat: is a form of text-based tele-conferencing. A chat is a synchronous forum
for discussions which displays all contributions immediately after they have
been typed by the participants. Internet-based public chat server, so-called
IRC (Internet Relay Chat), offer thousands of theme-specific channels, socalled
conference rooms, and are visited by many thousand people daily. Web
portals such as YAHOO! (URL: http://www.yahoo.com/) or web.de (URL:
http://chat.web.de/) offer overviews over chat offerings (Horn 1999, 48ff).
Apart from these public on-line discussion groups many organizations internally
use chat software to support text-based conferences about certain topics
or as a brainstorming tool. One example for commercial chat software applied
in organizations is SpinChat (Spin).
electronic whiteboard: is part of a tele-conferencing system. It offers functionality
similar to a simple paint software (e.g., Windows Paint) that can be
531. See URL: http://www.icq.com/
532. See URL: http://www.aol.com/
533. See URL: http://messenger.msn.com/