THE FUTURE OF BUSINESS CONFERENCING:
An Interview With Phil Moore

by Lisa Kimball


Phil Moore is a business executive who has been using computer
conferencing for the past five years. He's so convinced that this medium
provides valuable services to business that he's set up a new system which
will link a Participate conferencing system to data base services *and*
the over 2 million Telex terminals world-wide. I thought we should find
out just what intrigued Phil enough to enter the business!

LISA KIMBALL(LC): Is this medium going to ever really take off in the
business market?

PHIL MOORE(PM): I believe that this medium will take off in the business
market simply because it is one of the most effective tools for the job of
communication. It is self documenting, easy to learn and use, convenient
because of the removal of time as a consideration in moving through the
sequence of events that are needed to accomplish a project, convenient
because it drastically reduces the need for face to face - or phone
conversations and the correspondent travel and delay that are associated
with each of those mediums.

LC: How were you introduced to computer conferencing?

PM: I have been using electronic information and communication services
for the past five years. The benefits of electronic search services are
well known and discussed - and they were my introduction to the world of
conferencing. When I took a job at Sony a couple of years ago - I found
myself with an immediate need for support to produce documentation and
opinion in a very short timeframe. Though I had hire-tickets, I did not
have any good candidates - and the time needed to interview, hire and
familiarize was prohibitive. I turned to Parti on The Source and joined
and read the conferences related to my field of work and picked out the
two best minds I could find about marketing and engineering as it relates
to IBM computers. Then I checked the "Consultants Conference" and found
the people listed there! Going further, I checked profile, and members on
the Source - guess what - I picked Mike Greenly and Steve Gibson - whose
association has opened a new world for me.

We put up a document - they commented - I revised - they revised -
and over time it was done. A complete project, the hiring of two
consultants, meaningful results and profits for them - and we had never
met face to face.

LC: Have you used the medium in setting up your new system?

PM: In establishing Parti on NSI [Phil is currently President of NSI]-
there was a single meeting with Sherwin in early February (or late
January). From that meeting we used Parti on another service to do all
the work needed to bring the capability to NSI. Competitive analysis,
pricing analysis and proposals, engineering issues, staffing issues,
contract terms and conditions and negotiation - all these were done before
the next person to person meeting. Between early February and April 6 -
the date of the opening of the system to a select group of users - only
one additional meeting was held - Parti actually was the tool to create
another Parti at NSI.

I think that is a fantastic statement about the power and utility of
this medium!

LC: Many business folks use data bases already. What's going to woo them
over to conferencing?

PM: Conference capability and databases are simply a point of convenience.
Why go one place for stock quotes and investment information - and
another to discuss what you learn? It is part of a well rounded system
that recognizes that effective communication and information consumption
is a multi-sourced phenomenon - it addresses a real need once the barriers
of overcoming change have been surpassed.

As far as interacting is concerned - business people are interested
in interacting - about topics they find interesting, profitable, relevant
to their lives and so on. Just like people who interact for social
reasons, they congregate around topics that are germain to their lives and
needs. I believe that in business the interaction goes on - but is
shielded from view by private conference structures. Just because it
isn't public it doesn't mean that it isn't there.

LC: What are the current obstacles to expanded use of CC in business?

PM: Obstacles to use are principally education. Conferencing can be
executed by the secretary on behalf of a "boss" - the executive does not
have to be the one to interface with the technology - though I think it is
more effective if they do. Typing problems and the inborn shyness of many
people are barriers - but I think that the shy barrier is greater than the
typing barrier. I have often seen people with excellent typing skills who
were nervous about "exposing themselves" online. Not because of typing -
because of - 'what will they think of me?'.

I have always believed that ease of use is a key ingredient for
acceptance of any technology. Conference interface is improving rapidly -
and will continue to do so. Things to be built into the system are things
that make the system respond the way people interact - tolerance for the
variety of ways that different people approach the same event - whether
vocabulary differences or perception.

It can be justified - in real dollars.

--

LC: The new system you are developing has the special feature of being
able to link Telex to PC conferencing. What problems do you think that
will solve for international businesses?

PM: I am not really clear on all the problems facing businesses which are
in the international arena. I can only speak from personal experience in
dealings primarily with Japan - but that is better (I suppose) than
nothing. With Japan there is a language barrier which is most prevalent
in spoken communications. As is the case with most of us who have a
second lanquage - it is far easier to read it than to converse - no matter
what language is being used. If you set aside the problems of time
differences - which are formidable - and you actually do make a phone
connection - the time it takes to convey a point speaking pigeon english,
repeating things over and over, and still getting only a percentage of the
total information into the mind of the listener is overwhelming. The
bills reflect the difficulty.

Written communciations are far more effective because:

They create a record of the event -

They completely convey the idea -

The recipient has the time to study and comprehend -

They afford the opportunity to get translation if
needed!

If all these benefits are there - why doesn't it happen more
frequently? The biggest reason is the structure you have to endure to
convey a point. The information has to be written to be transferred to a
secretary who types it on a fax form or into a telex - which has to be
proofed before transmission (removing the feeling of immediacy) - and then
it leaves your span of control to be subjected to the whims and priorities
of the mailroom who is the final link in the communication.

Nobody likes bureaucracies - and so - you pick up the phone and let
the company pay the premium charge. Even if you have to do it from your
home at weird hours!

With the telex connection that NSI offers - the PC user can put up
the communication (or ask his/her secretary to do it) under local control
- you don't have to interface with the structure of the organization. In
addition - all the benefits that we have become so dependent on accrue.
But - if there is no effective way to transmit - or retrieve - on the
other end - it goes nowhere. That is where the telex comes in. Now - the
PC can be directly connected to the telex - without the intermediate steps.

This existed before - but at premium charges that made it effective
only for person to person communications - not person to many. Linking
conferencing into the telex environment solves that problem. In addition
- the NSI system will let you look up a user by name - irrespective of
equipment type at the remote site - much better than the MCI/Compuserve
link that forces seperate directories - or the MCI link that forces
different mailing lists - categorized by PC or printed delivery which must
be separate from telex recipients.

LC: Why hasn't CC spread faster and farther already?

PM: I think that the benefits of CC haven't spread for a number of
reasons. Few business computers are equipped with modems - and if they
are - they are veiled in a mystique that says that communications is
difficult - the area of magic and mirrors. The result of electronic
communication attempts is preconceived to be frustration and time lost -
not satisfaction and time saved! Prejudice sets us up for a wary approach
to the environment - and like all humans - it is refreshing when we are
proven right because the first attempt doesn't work. Once proven right -
why take a chance on trying again!

The answer lies in education - but that is a mission that is
difficult to undertake - since few people want to pay for it. Unless there
is a (BIG) pot of gold at the end of the session few want to spend the
time either. One of the biggest barriers to profitability in the old Word
Processing industry was the need to train the operators - an need that
persisted in the face of declining prices for equipment (and declining
margins). Yet the buyers still expected free training for the operator.

This industry (CC) will probably grow similar to the way word
processing developed as an industry - user groups - or vertical markets
that derive immediate return on invested dollars and time will become the
beachheads that get written up. Slowly, awareness will build - and
interface will become simpler, until they cross to make the application of
the technology more horizontal.

LC: What applications do you think will be first to take off?

PM: There are today many intercountry industries and organizations. These
are already the early adopters o{f_ the technology. Companies like EXXON,
Coca Cola, and others. Industries like commodities (import and export),
shipping, telecommunciations, are also probably early adopters - though I
don't have data to support that statement.

The applications that will take off first are hard to predict! My
experience has been that the CC techniques are equally valuable for all
types of communications - irrespective of the end product (manufactured or
service) that is desired. Because the ability to enter the arena of CC is
dependent on equipment - it will probably be most prevalent first in the
industries that by their nature use the PC's which make communications
easier.

This means that service industries who deal with finance, investment,
etc. (spreadsheet applications), or word processing intensive industries
like consulting, research, etc., or terminal intensive applications like
programming will be the first to realize the benefits - and pioneer the
industry.

----- Author's note: The address for NSI, Inc. is 800 East Connecticut
Blvd., East Hartford, CT 06108.