Volume 8 |
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1 |
Special Series on
Issues in Informing Clients using Multimedia Communications Series |
Nalin Sharda
Multimedia systems provide multiple modes of
communication for informing clients; additionally, offline, online and
networked multimedia systems provide us with a rich variety of means for
capturing, encoding, collating, and transmitting the messages. This special
series explores novel theories, architectures, models, and technologies that
aim to integrate the art, science and technology of multimedia
communications for enhancing the process of informing clients. |
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3-38 | MECCA: Hypermedia Capturing of Collaborative Scientific Discourses about Movies |
Ralf Klamma,
Marc Spaniol, and
Matthias Jarke The success of collaborative hypermedia systems in business, engineering, or humanities heavily depends on the discursive nature of knowledge creation. Informing systems that assist crossdisciplinary communities of practice in these fields should therefore be able to capture, to visualize, and to support the ongoing scientific discourse to keep participants informed and committed to the knowledge creation process. We present a solution for this issue, using the MECCA discourse support system for a movie research community as an example. MECCA integrates research processes with teaching processes in the humanities. Our study demonstrates that knowledge creation discourses involve a lot of re“writing” (transcription) of discourse artifacts within or across media. We introduce an underlying formal technique to support flexible and adaptable transcription on hypermedia artifacts in the community. Our approach includes a linkage of knowledge to action which aims at seamless decontextualization from action and recontextualization into action. Keywords: Hypermedia, discourse support, humanities, MPEG7, CSCL. |
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39-54 | Informing Clients through Multimedia Communications: An Approach to Provide Interactivity |
One of the key problems in informing clients through multimedia streaming applications over the Internet is to customize the stream of information according to the client’s requests. This is achievable only if client and server can interact along the application lifetime, which is possible only if the communication system supports the rigid timing constraints imposed by these interactive applications on their traffic. In the Internet scenario, these applications are very difficult to support, as the Internet provides a best-effort service to the traffic it carries, which means that the Internet does not make any promises about the end-to-end delay for an individual packet and about the variation of packet delay (network jitter) within a packet stream. These problems are confirmed by several experiments we performed over the Internet, which highlight that interactive applications achieve a quality that is frustrating. The contribution of this paper is the proposal of a novel mechanism to support interactive multimedia streaming applications over the Internet. Our mechanism adapts the multimedia stream transmission to the network conditions, by intentionally and slightly acting on the video QoS. Our mechanism has been validated through several experiments performed over the Internet. Results confirm that the supported interactive applications achieve a satisfactory quality and the user-c344 perceives a video quality only slightly affected by the QoS modification introduced by our mechanism. Keywords: Multimedia communication, Interactive application, Quality of Service, Video Streaming, Consistent Information.
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55-73 |
Exploring the Myths about Online Education in Information Systems |
Suprateek Sarker and Jennifer
Nicholson Rapid proliferation of the Internet along with emerging social and economic imperatives are leading institutions of higher-learning to offer a large variety of online courses/programs in different disciplines. As such education becomes increasingly pervasive and legitimate in society, there is a need to critically examine its merits and pitfalls as well as the underlying assumptions driving the justification, design, and teaching of online courses. In this paper, we take a first step in this direction by uncovering myths embedded in the discourse on online learning. We examine these myths in the context of online education in our own discipline, that of Information Systems (IS). We intend the paper to stimulate awareness and encourage debate regarding the pedagogical, administrative, economic, and societal implications of this novel though untested form of education as practiced in IS as well as in related disciplines. |
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75-86 | Open Source: A Metaphor for E-Learning |
This paper explores open source as a metaphor for e-learning. It builds the case that e-learning and open source movement are rooted in the constructivist movement and the constructivist movement is itself rooted in the pragmatism and instrumentalism that pervades John Dewey’s theories of understanding as applied to learning. As a result, it is recommended that the use of open source as metaphor for e-learning be further explored in three areas: instructional practices, instructional platforms, and instructional philosophy. Keywords: Open Source, E-Learning, Metaphor, Learning Object, Constructivism
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87-100 | An Empirical Evaluation of Visual Metaphors in the Animation of Roles of Variables |
Tuija Stützle and
Jorma Sajaniemi Roles of variables, which describe stereotypic usages of variables, can be exploited to facilitate teaching introductory programming. This paper describes the evaluation of visual metaphors for roles used in a role-based program animator. The evaluation is based on several criteria: properties of the images, metaphor recognition and grading, and effects on learning. The study demonstrates that as a whole the role metaphors facilitate learning. The results also identify ideas for further elaboration of the individual metaphors. Furthermore, the study suggests that the evaluation of animated metaphors may require special measures. Keywords: Roles of variables, metaphor, program animation, computer science education |
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101-122 | Informing Systems in Business Environments: A Purpose-Focused View |
Zbigniew J Gackowski This paper presents a technology-independent rational inquiry into informing systems in business environments. Depending on the primary concerns, informing systems should be examined from either the viewpoint of information disseminators or informing clients. The latter viewpoint is subject to extensive empirical studies within informing science and partially within the MIT Information Quality Program. It focuses mainly on information products, services, users’ preferences, and requirement specifications. The information disseminators’ viewpoint is rarely taken into account. Based on a short review of the most popular MIS textbooks and research in this domain, this paper discusses problems one encounters during examination of informing systems in business environments. It uses an improved version of the purpose-focused framework (Gackowski, 2004a), which covers both viewpoints. Two refinements of the Informing Science Framework as defined by Cohen (1999) are suggested. Keywords: Informing schema, informing systems, information in decision situations, valid information, misinformation, disinformation, purpose-focused view on quality, quality requirements; information effective usability, usefulness, and economic usefulness; refinements to the Informing Science Framework. |
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123-142 | A Reflexive Model of ICT Practices in Organizations |
This paper reports a study of information and communication technology (ICT) use in Norway and the United States. Forty-two depth interviews completed in both countries provide the data source. Using grounded theory as a research method, and Adaptive Structuration Theory as our conceptual base, we analyze these interviews to generate an empirical model of ICT use. The 1490 incidents identified in our analysis are first reduced to 49 categories. These categories are further reduced to four: satisficing, communication channels, communication structure, and environmental agents. These four categories comprise the major parts of the reflexive model. The findings suggest that the parts of the model are interdependent and mutually causal in that individuals consider and even reconsider the use of multiple communication channels within and between tasks. As a conclusion we address future research including, credibility and time issues in ICT use. Keywords: media choice, organizational communication, cross-cultural communication, adaptive structuration theory, reflexivity. |
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143-158 | The Impact of National Culture on Worldwide eGovernment Readiness |
Zlatko J Kovačić The Open Polytechnic of New Zealand, Wellington, New Zealand Diffusion of information and communication technologies is a global phenomenon. In spite of rapid globalization there are considerable differences between nations in terms of the adoption and usage of new technologies. Several studies exploring causal factors including national cultures of information and communication technology adoption have been carried out. The focus of this paper is slightly different from other studies in this area. Rather than concentrating on the individual information technology an overall eGovernment readiness is the focus. This research conducted an analysis of the impact national culture has on eGovernment readiness and its components for 95 countries. eGovernment readiness assessment used in this study is based on the UN Global eGovernment Survey 2003, while the national cultural dimensions were identified using Hofstede’s model of cultural differences. The research model and hypotheses were formed and tested using correlation and regression analysis. The findings indicate that worldwide eGovernment readiness and its components are related to culture. The result has theoretical and practical implications. Keywords: National Culture, eGovernment Readiness, Cross-Cultural Studies, Information Technology Adoption, Diffusion of the Internet, Hofstede |
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159-172 | Developing a Framework for Assessing Information Quality on the World Wide Web |
Shirlee-ann Knight and
Janice Burn The rapid growth of the Internet as an environment for information exchange and the lack of enforceable standards regarding the information it contains has lead to numerous information quality problems. A major issue is the inability of Search Engine technology to wade through the vast expanse of questionable content and return "quality" results to a user-c344's query. This paper attempts to address some of the issues involved in determining what quality is, as it pertains to information retrieval on the Internet. The IQIP model is presented as an approach to managing the choice and implementation of quality related algorithms of an Internet crawling Search Engine. Keywords: Information Quality, IQIP, Data Quality, Information Retrieval, Search Engines |
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173-187 | Modular Inference Trees for Expository Reports |
Jens Mende When people write a report that involves a complex argument towards a conclusion, they can use a design tool called the inference tree, which enables them to outline the argument, and quickly detect reasoning errors in the outline. Yet when the argument is very complex, the inference tree may spread over several pages, so that writers may often have to flip back and forth between those pages. To prevent unnecessary flipping, they can draw the tree as a hierarchy of modules, similar to a modular hierarchy of program flowcharts or structure charts, where a major module controls several minor modules. In drawing the tree, writers can adopt four principles of Computing: modularity, the criterion of minimal coupling between modules, and the methods of forward and backward chaining to draw all the modules. Keywords: homological transfer, report writing, expository report, report outline, complex argument, inference tree |
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189-210 | The Poverty of Empiricism |
Jens Mende Many researchers – and their advisors on research method – adopt a doctrine called empiricism, which claims that researchers may only use empirical methods. This restrictive doctrine impoverishes any academic discipline where it is dominant. The main reason is that a discipline only qualifies for the status of a science after it has progressed beyond empirical generalisations to explanatory theories; but although empirical methods are useful for discovering the former, they are inherently useless for creating the latter. So the empiricist doctrine retards scientific progress. Researchers should be aware of this danger, and research methodologists should attempt to counter it. Keywords: Empiricism, Positivism, Research Methodology, research methods, empirical research, theoretical research |
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211-244 |
Information Politics and
Information Culture: A Case Study |
Bob Travica
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245-262 | Informing Citizens in a Highly Restrictive Environment Using Low-Budget Multimedia Communications: A Serbian Case Study |
Aleksandar Spasic and
Miloje Nesic
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263-279 | A Cognitive Approach to Instructional Design for Multimedia Learning |
Stephen D. Sorden
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281-302 |
Informing the HR Hiring Decision of IT Personnel: The HR Professional’s View of IT Certification, Education, & Experience |
This study examined the importance of IT Certification from the HR Professional’s perspective, specifically the value of certification in relation to education and experience in a hiring decision. We found that an increase in formal education was subsidized by a decreasing emphasis on experience until a balance was reached. The relative weight of certification, however, was generally stable. A repeated measure analysis showed a statistically significant main effect and interaction effect. An exploratory factor analysis yielded five underlying dimensions which may be possible value drivers of IT certification on HR Professional’s hiring decisions: internal organizational benefits, external organizational benefits, same-job employee benefits, different-job employee benefits, and certification credibility. A mixed-design analysis also yielded five statistically significant interactions which shed further light on possible moderators of the value drivers of certification value: years of management experience and certification perception. Key Words: IT Certification, HR Manager, Value of Certification |
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