http://www.brightlycoloredfood.com/2003/04/25/wheres-the-humanity-in-social-software/ Tue, 18 Nov 2008 09:41:27 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5.1 http://www.brightlycoloredfood.com/2003/04/25/wheres-the-humanity-in-social-software/#comment-65 Brian Dear Tue, 03 Jun 2003 05:32:12 +0000 http://www.brightlycoloredfood.com/wordpress/?p=175#comment-65 Amen to that. But it's even worse than you think. The level of ignorance about what's been done in the past, what's been discovered to work and not work so well, is pretty profound. I'm writing a book about the history of one system most people have completely forgotten -- PLATO -- yet this system is one of the seminal influencers for the whole field of social software, CSCW, and groupware. Heck, Lotus Notes emerged right out of PLATO, as <a href="http://www.ozzie.net/blog/" rel="nofollow">Ray Ozzie</a> says every time he talks about his background. (See <a href="http://www.platopeople.com" rel="nofollow">www.platopeople.com</a> for more on my book project.) Amen to that. But it’s even worse than you think. The level of ignorance about what’s been done in the past, what’s been discovered to work and not work so well, is pretty profound. I’m writing a book about the history of one system most people have completely forgotten — PLATO — yet this system is one of the seminal influencers for the whole field of social software, CSCW, and groupware. Heck, Lotus Notes emerged right out of PLATO, as Ray Ozzie says every time he talks about his background. (See http://www.platopeople.com for more on my book project.)

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