COMPUTER CONFERENCING:
A STEP BEYOND ELECTRONIC MAIL
By Stefanie Kott

Electronic mail is becoming more and more a part of the
fabric of corporate communications. Internal corporate networks
provide easy communication among colleagues. Online electronic
mail services provide communications links among business
colleagues as well as clients.

No longer is business dependent on the time of day or the
locations of people. The benefits are obvious: "Telephone tag"
all but stops. People in New York or London, in Hong Kong or
Sydney, at home, at work, on a business trip, or even on


vacation can stay in touch, assuming they have access to a
computer, a modem, and a telephone line.

All these pluses apply equally to computer conferencing,
also called "computer-mediated communications," which is one
step beyond electronic mail. The benefits of computer
conferencing can best be appreciated when considering just one
drawback of electronic mail: You never know today what message
contains information that will be important to you in the
future.

Electronic mail systems either eliminate messages several
days after they are read or offer a filing system that permits
you to sort and save messages. To deal with this, you either
sift through your electronic mail with the foresight of a
magician--filing and organizing it, printing almost everything,
and organizing a mass of paper--or let the mail go the way of
electronic trash.

Computer conferencing, on the other hand, is topic
oriented, not people oriented. By storing all topic messages in
a data base, it enables you to go back to look at any message,
at any time, within an organized and planned structure. Many
computer conferencing software packages even enable you to
perform keyword searches.

Let's start from the beginning: computer conferencing
enables you to extend face-to-face conversations in an
electronic, topical arena that creates a meetinglike
atmosphere. Communications can be broken down by topic, and
many-sided issues divided into subtopics. Private topics
can be read only by people who are designated to read those
topics.

Upon entering a conferencing system, you are informed of
the number of messages that have come into each topic since you
last signed on. When you have something to add to a topic, you
write a message and send it to the topic, not to the people who
are part of it. And you can also send private messages to
individuals because conferencing systems also have electronic
mail capabilities.

Businesses can use computer conferencing to set up
electronic meetings to keep people at multiple locations in
touch, expand communications with clients, and facilitate the
planning of events. Computer conferencing can be used to
accumulate field research in marketing and sales projects,
disseminate corporate information, inform sales teams on the
road of deadlines and expectations, and continue research and
development projects when meetings end and people return to
their home sites. Whenever people are separated by space and
time, computer conferencing provides a way for communications
to continue, with a depth and an organization that was never
before possible.

Comparative Costs
=================

Charges for electronic mail and computer conferencing are
made entirely differently. Electronic mail services charge by
the page as well as by the number of mailboxes a message is
delivered to. If one message is sent to a number of people on a
distribution list, a charge is incurred for each mailbox it
goes to. On the other hand, electronic computer conferencing
services usually have only one charge: the amount of time you
spend online. There are, however, ways to control the amount
of time spent online. For example, you can prepare messages in
a word processor, then connect to the system, and send (or
upload) the messages to topics. And you can receive (or
download) messages and save and read them offline. As with
everything else, online computer conferencing services come
with any number of different rate structures and services to
users.

Exploring Computer Conferencing
===============================

What would you do if you wanted to know more about
computer conferencing? You can:

Explore the types of conferencing software and services
available--A number of consumer online information and
communication services (e.g., Networking and World
Information [NWI], The Source, Dialcom, and GEISCO) have
computer conferencing facilities. Try a few services to see the
variety of computer conferencing tools available. For example,
some software enables topics to branch off each other, or to
have related topics open off a common root. Some are
item/response systems that allow responses to a specific
message, or item, to accumulate while new items open. Some are
hierarchical systems that keep all messages together in one
topic (similar to a bulletin board), where responses to
specific messages can be identified by number, keyword, or
both.

Put a planning team together--The terms "facilitation"
and "moderation" are common buzzwords related to computer
conferencing, deeply ingrained in the jargon because of their
actual value in making this form of communications work.
Consider hiring people (there is a new breed of consultants in
this area) to help make a computer conferencing project work
most effectively for your organization. People skilled in the
use of the medium, called facilitators, help a business set up
a working structure that best suits its goals. This requires
some in-person meetings initially, and remains an ongoing, but
electronic, process as the network gets under way and grows.
Facilitation also includes assigning access privileges and
creating topic areas. People skilled in moving the flow of
conversation are called moderators. Computer conferences, not
unlike face-to-face conferences, often require the services of
a moderator. Moderators help people familiarize themselves with
the medium, keep the conversation on course, and encourage
participation. They may even try to draw out people reticent to
"speak."

Select a test project--Identify an area of your company
that would benefit from better communication. For example, find
people at multiple sites who were previously unable to
communicate regularly but who could benefit from information
exchange or daily access to each other's input or advice. Or
experiment with a group that is planning an activity requiring
feedback and coordination at various locations.

Get appropriate training--Although computer
conferencing is exciting and productive, it also involves new
ways of thinking. It is important to obtain the necessary
training in basic skills and to improve those skills over time
by continued training.

Conduct posttest analysis--Assuming all the pieces are
put together well, you should find that the enhanced
communications result in increased productivity and greater ease
of information exchange.

Consider buying laptop computers--Once you have a
computer conferencing system and laptop computers, you can stay
in touch with anyone, anywhere. It was once said that nothing
can stop the mail carrier. With a conferencing system and laptop
computers, nothing can stop your business.

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author's note: Stefanie Kott is a consultant and trainer in
computer communications and desktop publishing in her own
company, DesKott Publishing, in Fort Lee, NJ (201-461-3069). Her
services include strategic planning for the setup, use, and
management of desktop publishing and communications
technologies.

Reprinted with permission of _Managing End-User Computing_,
(July 1988), Vol. 1, No. 12, Naomi Karten, editor
(617-986-8148). Published by Auerbach Publishers, a division of
Warren, Gorham & Lamont.