This book looks at the social aspects of how virtual and geographically dispersed groups work together using information and communication tools (groupware). It introduces the basic concepts and brings together ideas from various disciplines to provide an integrated approach to the evaluation and design of groupware technology.

• Why some collaboration technologies succeed and others fail
• The conditions needed for successful distributed collaboration
• How to take a systematic, user-oriented, design-related approach to the evaluation of computer supported collaboration

Primarily intended for undergraduate and postgraduate students studying Information and Communication Technology, Human-Computer Interaction, Communication Sciences, Human Factors, Interface Design and Multimedia Systems, this book will also be of interest to researchers, practitioners and lecturers in social and organisational sciences.

Contents

• Social Processes and Support Tools
• Implications of Collaboration Technology
• The Role of Technology in Society

• Technology Acceptance
• System Match Theories
• Group Processes
• Innovation and Implementation
• Integration for Evaluation