Wikipedia's Success and the Rise of the Amateur-Expert

The Free Online Encyclopedia, as Wikipedia calls itself, is a radical departure from traditional encyclopedias and traditional methods of knowledge creation. This chapter is an examination of how a community of amateurs on Wikipedia has challenged notions of expertise in the 21st century. It does so by first looking at the roots of Wikipedia in a phenomenon known as the “wisdom of the crowds” and in the open source software movement. The reliability of Wikipedia is examined as are the claims made by major critics of the project. Throughout, epistemological questions raised by Wikipedia are addressed.

Child Security in Cyberspace through Moral Cognition

The increasing number of threats in cyberspace has meant that every internet user is at a greater risk than ever before. Children are no exception to this exploitation, incurring psychological and financial stress. Technology is on a persistent pursuit of offering exquisite solution to address the problems associated with children on the cyberspace. With every new product for parental control to secure children, comes a new technique to trespass the same. Consequently it summons an approach to look beyond technology; this paper aims to explore the relevance of moral cognition to decision making capability of children on the internet & the possibility of minimizing related risks using the observation. The authors establish a correlation between cognitive moral development and the cyber vulnerability level of children of age between 12 and 16 years, based on an empirical research using a comprehensive set of questionnaires and standard tests. The findings also paves path for future researchers to further analyze and implant features in the parental control software that would stimulate moral cognition, thereby redefining parental control software as parental care software.

Networked Knowledge Workers on the Web

With the growing popularity of online services that allow individuals to consume and contribute Web content with social groups of self-selected affiliates, the socio-technical geography of the Web has become increasingly complex. To map some of this space in a productive way for organizations and online researchers, we focus our attention on a particular segment of Web 2.0 services, publicly available online services (PAOSs) used for work purposes. After defining this segment and its relationship to other kinds of online services, we report the results of an annual survey that looks at who is using such PAOSs for work as well as the nature of that work. As our survey results indicate, how often PAOSs are used for work differs depending on the company size and office location of individuals. To frame our findings, we differentiate among the multiple PAOSs that respondents report using by classifying them as different genres of services, which we find provides a productive typology for understanding such services and their roles in organizations.

The Role of Social Networking Sites for Language Learning in UK Higher Education

This paper seeks to assess the potential for Social Networking Sites (SNSs) to play a role in language learning in the UK Higher Education (HE) sector. These sites are characterised by certain features including learning materials, synchronous and asynchronous video and text chat facilities, a peer review feature, and some sites also incorporate an award system, in the form of points (http://www.livemocha.com) or ‘berries' (http://www.busuu.com). This serves to motivate participants by rewarding them for their progress and for their peer review activities. In order to consider if, or how, to integrate SNSs into the UK HE curriculum it is important to consider the views of practitioners and learners towards such sites and whether they consider them to have a potential role in HE language education. The paper will report on the outcomes of two small research projects which have sought to establish the view of both practitioners and students towards SNSs in the HE context. When considered overall the practitioners were more positive about the site than the learners.

Empirical Study of Cyber Harassment among Social Networks

The growth of Online Social Networking sites has brought new services and communication methods to consumers. However, along with benefits, serious problems such as online cyber harassment have recently come to the forefront of the electronic media. This behavior can have significant negative effect on individuals, businesses and the social networks. Some sites have begun to provide some levels of protection and create specific anti-harassment policies in their terms of service along with implementing protection technologies. However, these protective measures are not consistent among social media, leaving some consumers at greater risk. This study analyzed 60 worldwide social sites and determined the level of cyber-harassment protection. It reviewed statistical differences among geographical-based social networks. The results showed significant gaps among various social networks, but suggests methods for improving consumer safeguards to provide consistent levels of protection.

Usability Impact Analysis of Collaborative Environments

This chapter will focus on the application of usability principles in a corporate collaborative environment in order to show improvements in utilization. Collaborative applications create a two-way communications structure as opposed to the one way communication method of traditional web environments. Collaboration applications can vary in the complexity from discussion forums to complex social software integration. Usability principles have been applied to web sites, but very little research has been done on the implications of usability in collaborative environments. Collaborative environments create a unique set of opportunities that create a different set of user goals. End users want a more collaborative environment that is easy to use and engaging. Organizations need to ensure the business goals stay at the forefront while improving the collaborative nature of the company.

The Pedagogical Considerations in the Design of Virtual Worlds for Organization Learning

An increasing number of organizations have established presences in Second Life or virtual worlds for organizational learning. The types of activities range from staff training, annual meetings, to leadership development and commercial transactions. This chapter reviews relevant literature on how virtual worlds, especially Second Life, are utilized for organizational learning. The discussions include leveraging the affordances of virtual worlds for learning, integrating design principles of 3D immersive learning, and examining examples of actual workplace learning in virtual worlds. Specific emphasis will be placed on the translation of applicable learning theories into the pedagogical design of virtual worlds. Furthermore, the chapter examines student perspectives of an actual course on immersive learning that took place in Second Life. Student perspectives are summarized in six strands: challenging and informative learning, engagement, activity structures, transformation, collaborative and democratic participation, and new opportunities. The six themes are important factors for designers of 3D learning environments to ensure quality immersive learning experiences.

Users' Involvement in the Innovation Process through Web 2.0

Organizations are inserted into a competitive environment in which innovation is an essential factor in gaining temporary competitive advantages. The search for external sources of knowledge, which can contribute to the innovation process, has become a constant among the organizations. One of the actors involved in this search is users, who often play an important role in the development of new products. This chapter develops a framework for the analysis of users' involvement in the innovation process through Web 2.0. The research method used a unique case study conducted in a Brazilian automotive company that developed a project of a concept car involving users through Web 2.0. The presented study case was analyzed according to the framework. The obtained result shows that users can contribute not only with idea generation, but also with involvement in the innovation process, depending on which steps of the New Product Development (NPD) process they take part in. Moreover, increasingly users' development, participation, and collaboration are essential factors in this process.

Cyber-Bullying, Personality and Coping among Pre-Adolescents

The aim of this study was to investigate the association of personality (Five Factor Model), coping and cyber-bullying/victimization experiences among 300 Greek pre-adolescent students attending the upper two primary school grades. Boys reported more frequent involvement in cyber-bullying incidents, while there were no significant gender differences in terms of cyber-victimization. In terms of participant roles, non-involved students scored higher in Conscientiousness, and cyber-bully/victims in Emotional Instability. The latter also tended to use maladaptive coping strategies more frequently, while cyber-bullies reported using more aggression and resignation to cope with interpersonal conflicts. Multiple regression analyses indicated that low conscientious boys who use passive avoidance and aggression were more likely to cyber-bully, while those who use aggression, passive avoidance and situation control to cope with interpersonal stressors were more likely to be cyber-victimized. Implications of the findings are discussed.

An Innovative Approach to Enhance Collaboration in the Biomedical Field

Web 2.0 technologies applications have been suggested as potential enablers for the accumulation of multidisciplinary knowledge, for instance in the biomedical field. Such applications offer new ways of creating, collaborating and sharing user-generated content online. Under this context, the authors' present an innovative Web 2.0 approach that exploits prominent high-performance computing paradigms and large data processing technologies to meaningfully search, analyze and aggregate data existing in diverse, extremely large and rapidly evolving sources. The underlying tool is designed to support the entire life cycle of a biomedical collaboration, with specifically implemented services. Preliminary evaluation results are also presented and discussed.