The Participative Framework as a design model for newsgroups: PartRoOM

The main objective of this paper is to show that a participative-role oriented model (PartRoOM) could be a guideline for designing an innovative kind of newsgroup. We adopt the Participative Framework Model, in which audience roles are distinguished and ranked, according to whether or not the participants are known, ratified or addressed by the speaker. We firstly present here our model (described with UML), then a proposition of implementation of this model in a system. This system permits a user to choose the primary or secondary recipients of his/her message, and to choose if he(she) wants to let his message visible to the ones which are not addressed, or in contrary if he/she wants to have a real private conversation. We also define a profiled interface which permits users to visualize threads sorted by his/her participative role. We finally describe how PartRoOM could fill the lacks of existing newsgroup, and improve discussion management and organizational dynamics. 1. Methodological statements Several studies have already described communication problems with existing newsgroups (we propose a synthesis in section 2). Contrary to some authors who claim that writing bridles communication, we will focus our attention on the communicational model out of which these newsgroups are designed. In fact, our hypothesis is that existing newsgroups are based on a communicational model which is too far from face-to-face model, and which only allows speaking to no one in particular. In order to validate this hypothesis, we propose in this paper a participative-role oriented model, which could be a guideline for designing a new kind of newsgroup. We assume that this type of newsgroup could afford advantage mainly for group communication (and indirectly for collective problem solving or decision taking), especially in intra-organizational context. This thought processes is in accordance with the abstract approach as defined by [7]. These authors identified three different approaches for designing Computer Mediated Communication systems which take care of social cues: • The realistic one, in which the system is designed to overcome lacks of communication due to a limited mutual perception. Face-to-face situations, as for example conversations in small groups ([26]), are simulated. • The mimetic one, in which the hypothesis is that the human-computer interaction would be improved if the computer simulates a human, as, for example, the recent study on the impact of the use of avatars in ([9]). • The abstract one, in which it is admitted that text conveys social cues that are described by a model or a graphical description. In this abstract approach, we can find studies with different goals: • On one hand, some authors aim at structuring conversations, by typing posts regarding to model’s categories. The difference between these studies is the origin of the categories; some are based on speech acts ([28], [18]), and others on Problem-Solving strategies ([20]). • On the other hand, some authors aim at helping the conversations’ reader by presenting the messages and/or the threads sorted by actors’ behaviour or conversational activity. This sort can be visualized graphically, as in Chat Circles or Loom ([6]), or not, as in ([8]), where important members in a newsgroup are put forward, their importance being based both on objective metrics and subjective ones (peers evaluation). We present here another way to follow the abstract approach: we consider that the design of a newsgroup has to be based on a coherent theory of multi-party conversation. In that sense, it seems necessary to take advantage of the theories of multi-party discourses proposed by several researchers, in the field of conversation and discourse analysis (for example [30], [17], [3], [12], [16]). The analysis of multi-party (or polylogal) conversations challenges the postulate that any speech (or utterance) has a specific identifiable function in conversation, whereas a great number of conversational models used for designing discussion tools are based on this postulate. Indeed, in a polylogue, a message could have a specific conversational function for a particular recipient and other functions for the other participants. For example, the same utterance could perform two different illocutionary acts addressed to two different recipients. “Close this window” is at the same time a directive act for the target recipient and an assertion for another participant, who is a mere member of the audience. In fact, analysing the dynamics of multi-party discussion requires the adoption of a model, based on the Participative Framework. In this model, audience roles are distinguished and ranked, according to whether or not the participants are known, ratified (acknowledged but not necessarily addressed), or addressed by the speaker. This model was developed as a tool for conversation analysis by [1], [19], [4] or [5], for example. Fundamentally, it is based on the interactionist micro-sociological concept of production and reception format elaborated by Goffman ([10]). According to him, four categories of potential recipients of a message can be theoretically differentiated: • Ratified recipients: they are the “official” recipients of a message. Two types of ratified participants can be distinguished: direct (addressed) and indirect (unaddressed) recipients. A direct recipient is regarded by the speaker as his main partner in the discursive exchange. In principle, a direct recipient of an utterance is identifiable owing to certain discursive marks, as explicit addressing marks (for example [15]: 86-101). • Bystanders: they compose the audience of a discussion from which they are theoretically excluded. Within this category, an overhearer can be distinguished from an eavesdropper. A speaker is aware of the former’s presence, even if this presence is fortuitous, whereas the latter is an intruder, who listens to a speech without the speaker’s knowledge. These categories and the classifying criteria they obey are summarized in the following table 1, from the most to the less addressed participants. Table 1. Reception roles of a message Known Ratified Addressed Addressed recipient: addressee + + + Non-addressed recipient: auditor + + -