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Google Wave and the nature of conversation
Evil Multifarious
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I just got in on that Google Wave action, and it is great, but mostly I find the potential change in online conversation habits to be very interesting.
Let me frame it for you: here on the PA forums, I find myself occasionally discussing three separate issues with another forumer in three separate threads, and then meta-discussing our discussions in the chat thread or in PMs. We follow entirely different conversational paths in these threads, even while knowing that we are about to discuss something else in another thread. It is a fascinating parallel conversation model.
What Google Wave seems to do is make that exact parallel conversation occur in one place, because as you wave with someone, you are not even necessarily watching what they write and then replying, as you would in an exchange of instant messages. Neither are you reading through a thread on a forum and then inserting a reply at the end of the thread.
Eventually, a conversation splits into multiple threads. Issues that were not immediately addressed can be responded to while the other participant(s) pursue other issues, which you can in turn address at your leisure. GWave also updates you about replies as you receive them, allowing you to monitor the conversation's diverging paths. You can be talking to someone without actually being talking directly to them, as their focus is on a different aspect of the conversation.
In effect, it produces (or at least, approaches) a heretofore unreachable thing: a complete conversation. Every conversation seems to have potential branches of discussion that are never explored, places where one line of thought is sacrificed in order to pursue another one. If you finish one branch, you might move back to another one, but too often the conversation changes entirely into something else, or the previous branches are forgotten.
The fact that this takes place over time, and not just in one single instance like a chat, means that these conversations can grow and grow and grow in multiple directions, and eventually begin to interconnect and reference each other.
Language is generally linear. You start, you read forward, and then you get to the end of that text. GWave seems to really be the first organically non-linear text that is easy to use, and I think it might well change the way its users interact online.
I'd like to hear people's descriptions of their Google Wave experiences as they relate to conversation and flow of information and use of language, and if they've noticed anything strange or interesting or new.
Let me frame it for you: here on the PA forums, I find myself occasionally discussing three separate issues with another forumer in three separate threads, and then meta-discussing our discussions in the chat thread or in PMs. We follow entirely different conversational paths in these threads, even while knowing that we are about to discuss something else in another thread. It is a fascinating parallel conversation model.
What Google Wave seems to do is make that exact parallel conversation occur in one place, because as you wave with someone, you are not even necessarily watching what they write and then replying, as you would in an exchange of instant messages. Neither are you reading through a thread on a forum and then inserting a reply at the end of the thread.
Eventually, a conversation splits into multiple threads. Issues that were not immediately addressed can be responded to while the other participant(s) pursue other issues, which you can in turn address at your leisure. GWave also updates you about replies as you receive them, allowing you to monitor the conversation's diverging paths. You can be talking to someone without actually being talking directly to them, as their focus is on a different aspect of the conversation.
In effect, it produces (or at least, approaches) a heretofore unreachable thing: a complete conversation. Every conversation seems to have potential branches of discussion that are never explored, places where one line of thought is sacrificed in order to pursue another one. If you finish one branch, you might move back to another one, but too often the conversation changes entirely into something else, or the previous branches are forgotten.
The fact that this takes place over time, and not just in one single instance like a chat, means that these conversations can grow and grow and grow in multiple directions, and eventually begin to interconnect and reference each other.
Language is generally linear. You start, you read forward, and then you get to the end of that text. GWave seems to really be the first organically non-linear text that is easy to use, and I think it might well change the way its users interact online.
I'd like to hear people's descriptions of their Google Wave experiences as they relate to conversation and flow of information and use of language, and if they've noticed anything strange or interesting or new.
Evil Multifarious on
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That's how I got mine.
I'm also really interested in having a similar platform for many applications. I think a significant barrier to people adopting new social media (Facebook, Twitter, message boards, whatever) is the signing in process and the myriad formats and contexts that can throw people off. My affinity for the PA board's thread style makes me not appreciate other boards for example. And when I sign up for other boards, it's just one more thing to have to keep track of.
If there was something that could tie everything together, that seems incredibly significant. I don't know if Wave is that thing (having not experienced it, I just pour over articles about it.)
Well, Wave has two things going for it in that regard. First is that wave servers can communicate with one another, so that if (for example) PA's forums were converted somehow into Wave software you could log into Google Wave and still communicate with PA Wave.
The other is, of course, Wave's extensibility. So even if PA didn't convert to Wave software someone could probably write some sort of tool that would make it easier to keep up with threads.
If there is one lesson to take away from the last few years of user-created content is that there is no telling what people can come up with. Actually, thinking about it, didn't the original presentation video show it interfacing with Twitter or am I misremembering?
That's like saying technologies like flight have harmed transportation.
Well, people aren't bowling in groups anymore.
Of course, I think Putnam is full of shit. I would buy an argument that TV harms social discourse, but the Internet? Hell, I find much more intelligent discourse on political and social issues RIGHT HERE than I would anywhere near me in real life.
I would say it's a give and take. Communication in person is better than over the internet, though the people you can find on the internet can be better to communicate with than people in person. You just simply have a larger selection of people, and on here a better chance of finding at least semi-intelligent people capable of forming sentences.
Now that I'm thinking about it, he really doesn't say that much negative about the Internet (other than "bloggers should be held accountable if they commit libel, slander, or distortion of the facts").
I never really quite understood his point there, because he seemed to be focusing on activities that, while social, may be falling out of favour for other reasons. Nobody shot paintballs at shit in the 50's but you don't see dissertations about what a travesty that is. Meanwhile newer forms of media are creating similar communities, just ones that are different. Not to mention the upsurge in the amount of charitable volunteerism that exists in our generation when compared to previous ones and abloo.
There was a level from which the quality and clarity of expressing complex ideas in written form could sink from? I mean, seriously? Read some ye olde journals. People being shitty at writing and expressing themselves isn't anything new.
My ability to write has done nothing but improve since I started conversing online. I was never absolutely terrible, likely given my background as a heavy reader, but I'm extremely confident in my abilities these days, and can crank out papers on pretty much anything in a really short time. The internet has done nothing but refine my ability to put ideas, complex or otherwise, into text.
He said, suddenly acutely aware of the possbility of ironic poor writing on his part.
In terms of quality of information, I find communication better on the internet than in person. On the internet, you can have multiple conversations at the same time, clarify what you are saying before actually saying it, and do quick research on your topic. In person, I find that jokes tend to fly better because people read your non-verbal communications to pick up on jokes, sarcasm, and etc. However emotionally, hearing someone's voice is better than reading their words.
You may want to link the 80 minute long Wave demo in the OP. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_UyVmITiYQ&feature=player_embedded
Oh, and what's a poster gotta do to around here to get an invite?
You watch the thread over at Moe's! And you read the bloody OP, because people seem to have decided that doing so is not for them.
You meant this thread: http://forums.penny-arcade.com/showthread.php?t=96191
I would say PA has too many sub-forums, but then I think about what it would look like without any sub-forums.
What are the chances that major business and organizations would get in on this eventually? Because it would solve a lot of problems with separate programs used individually for the same purpose.
Let 'em eat fucking pineapples!
Which would be contradicted by another study showing how such things have increased, given the marked increase in using written content as a communication medium.
There are some people for whom talking in person is just better. I find talking to some of my friends infinitely easie in person, mostly because we are both so....similar in our....okay....how to say this.
Similar in our lateralness.
That we can say shit that makes no sense to anyone else to each other and get it.
In addition, misunderstandings are easily resolved through talking. I have a habit of saying the wrong word or being a little vague or unclear. Online this requires multiple edits (and conscientious double checking of my own posts) and can be confusing for people talking with me. In person there is this constant interaction where I can inform the other person what is going on, read their body language and hear their responses, in order to get across what I mean faster. I find it a lot easier to use my body language to express ideas in the air as I talk, creating shapes and imaginary flowcharts or thought bubbles.
And because it is my body, it all happens extremely fast.
Now, this thing is impressive. It really is. It's amazing.
But it wont be as fast.
So for me, I would still prefer an intellectual conversation in person in terms of having had a satisfying conversation.
But I'm still hella interested.
That's not easy to do with an audience watching your every spelling error and use of backspace.
And the whole nested discussion was done way better in Fidonet, 20 years ago.
As an email client, it wouldn't be a huge improvement over existing stuff, though the way it integrates pictures and maps and stuff is pretty awesome and certainly much better than attachments. As an IM client I don't think it will take off, since most people I know don't leave their web browser open - they would prefer an IM client like AIM, which runs in the background constantly.
I said it in the other thread, but I'll say it here too: where Wave will really shine is in collaborative work environments.
oh yes
the editing liek that is fantastic
although it would be really fucking annoying if i was working on something and somebody started deleting shit halfway.
so you would still need good organisation to utilise it properly, which will come with time im sure.
but yes thats a really amazing feature and one ive always wanted
I realized this when I was talking to my fiancée over G-chat video. We were both sitting in rooms with other people (our roommates), and we both had headphones on. I realized that the "conversation" we were having was so far evolved from a normal conversation it was just bizarre.
• I can't hear my roommates because my headphones drown out their voices. But my fiancée can, because their voices travel into her headphones.
• My roommates can't hear her, and her roommates can't hear me.
• Her roommates can hear her, and my roommates can hear me. But not if we type instead of talk.
• Our conversation—both spoken and written—depended heavily on hypertext.
Our conversation had more "vectors" and "privacy settings" than I could keep track of in my head, but over time I got used to it and we both even started including roommates in the conversation. Like, I would yell something to my roommate, he would yell something back—which I wouldn't hear, because of my headphones, but which my fiancée could hear, and then relay back to me.
I think Google Wave just continues this evolution. Communication is the exchange of information. Information used to flow uniformly, from a speaker to whoever else was in earshot. The internet has fundamentally changed that, and now we can consciously "channel" the flow of information, split it into multiple, directed streams, and stop it at certain places. The topology of information flow has become more complicated.
Arch,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_goGR39m2k
Not only allowed, but linked on the last page. But do please read more carefully there than you have here; they're complaining about people failing to read the rules as is.
This is most likely Positive Positive cell bias(I.E. confirmation bias) combined with a far bit of filtering sample problems and a misunderstanding of language microevolution/memetics.
Basically they saw what they wanted to see, which they wanted to see because the good literature/writing from the past has been filtered to the point where we don't often see the bad, making attaining a representative sample of the writing of the era quite hard[better documents are more likely to survive etc]
On top of this, it assumes that there is some "better/Worse" criteria that writing and language can have, when in fact, the entire idea is pretty much bunk. Language can be better/worse at some things, and heavily abbreviated and misspelled words, so long as the meaning is understood, simply represent a change in language to meet differing needs. This process happens via language evolution/memitcs, which is to say, people pick up on certain useful/liked aspects of a language and start using it more.
The only way that writing can really get better/worse is in orientation issues, since effective communication often requires the right orientation. And truthfully, i cannot see anything but improvement in orientation over time.[I.E. you orientation/Me orientation goes a long way to not sounding accusatory]
Google Wave is extremely customizable. You can turn off the real-time updating, and many people will. I probably will, although the ability to see what someone is writing and "interrupt" them without really interrupting makes conversation extremely, extremely rapid, efficient and interestingly fluid.
edit: just to be clear, you can't turn it off in the current beta version, but the video mentions that they plan to integrate it. especially since there will be plenty of feedback about how self conscious it makes people feel.
the first comment on that article is also important; google wave is a protocol that will be extremely useful for open development.
So this has the power to annoy parents even more now?
-Working together on stuff simultaneously. No, I don't want to take a subway an hour downtown just to work on the paper; I want to sit in my boxers in front of my computer and click away
-I don't want to be a part of Facebook, Aim, Gchat, several forums, blogs, etc. It'd be nice if at least some of those could be truncated... it would certainly make me use them more often.
The version that I and other early entrants have access to is a basic preview build.
Isn't Google documents already like that? And I can see some massive power struggles going on because of this thing.