Empirical evidence of information overload constraining chat channel community interactions

Quentin Jones, Mihai Moldovan, Daphne Raban, Brian Butler

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contribution

29 Scopus citations

Abstract

Prior work has demonstrated that the impact of individual information-processing limits can be observed in dynamics of mass interaction in asynchronous collaborative systems (Usenet newsgroups and email lists). Here we present the first evidence of such impacts on synchronous social interaction environments through the analysis of an Internet Relay Chat network. We highlight how shared public discourse in chat channels appears to be limited to 40 posters in any 20 minute interval, even as the number of channel users increases well into the hundreds. We discuss our findings in terms of understanding the relationship between online community space types and the user interaction dynamics they support.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publicationCSCW 08 - Conference Proceedings, 2008 ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work
Pages323-332
Number of pages10
DOIs
StatePublished - 2008
Event2008 ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work, CSCW 08 - San Diego, CA, United States
Duration: Nov 8 2008Nov 12 2008

Publication series

NameProceedings of the ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work, CSCW

Other

Other2008 ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work, CSCW 08
Country/TerritoryUnited States
CitySan Diego, CA
Period11/8/0811/12/08

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Software
  • Human-Computer Interaction
  • Computer Networks and Communications

Keywords

  • Chat
  • Computer mediated communication
  • IRC
  • Information overload
  • Online communities
  • Synchronous communication

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