Open audio/video links as means for coordination - two case studies

• From the multitude of workplace studies that we have seen during the last decades, it has been shown that a common environment to a large extent supports coordination of work. The use of common artifacts and awareness of the co-workers activities effortlessly afford communication of the current state of work. Inevitably, a question arises: how can we get similar support for distributed groups? One idea has been to use a continuously open video and/or audio link, i.e. a media space, to support the informal coordination possibilities that are lacking in a distributed setting. In this paper, two cases from air traffic control are presented, where the long-term use of video and audio links plays an important role for communicating real-time updates of the state of work. The possibility to overhear and oversee what the colleagues are doing in remote positions reduces to a large extent the amount of obtrusive and time-consuming phone calls. The features and the successful use of these so-called focused media spaces are discussed in this paper.

Subject headings

TEKNIK OCH TEKNOLOGIER  -- Elektroteknik och elektronik -- Telekommunikation (hsv//swe)

ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY  -- Electrical Engineering, Electronic Engineering, Information Engineering -- Telecommunications (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Air traffic control

Computer supported cooperative work

Decision support systems

Distributed computer systems

Real time systems

Remote control

Video conferencing

Voice/data communication systems

Telecommunication

Telekommunikation

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

kon (subject category)