Couple thoughts/questions. Do you think the 'real time' nature of a wave brings anything to the table? Seeing people type a reply in real time? I'm not sure it does...I think the only thing it might do is cause people to get self-conscious about typos. :)
I do think the "Playback" feature has some value. If you're trying to make sense of a wave that you got to late, hitting the playback button to watch the wave 'grow' can add context to the actual content of a wave. Seeing when someone added a branch to a wave, visually...there seems to be some subtle value there.
scopique
· 2 months ago
You're right; the real time nature doesn't give any real benefits, although perhapse in some cases, editing a blip at the same time as someone else might allow you to refocus your thoughts in response. Even as far back as IRC, there hasn't really been a massive "real time" collaboration platform like Wave (AFIK), which why we might not be sure about it's value at this early stage.
I can see the playback feature being used if you want context to your discussion, yes. It's especially useful if you suspect that people aren't threading the conversation as they should (for tracking who's replying to what).
andy stewart
· 2 months ago
Online collaborating and teaching can work, If you have trust and the right tools. I recently tried http://www.showdocument.com - good app for uploading documents and working on them in real-time. Most file types are supported and it needs no installation. - andy
scopique
· 2 months ago
Indeed. I saw one poster on a Wave mention that it would be great platform for a college lecture, where everyone can record their notes in a single Wave. That way, everyone would have access to everyone's notes. The downside is that it would be really, really tempting to just stay home and get real-time updates :D
We've been using Zenbe Shareflow (http://www.zenbe.com/shareflow) for the time being. It's not as fancy as Wave, and the comment system needs a little more work to really be intuitive, but it's been a great experience so far.
Longasc
· 1 month ago
I somehow feel that people are hesitant to type anything if they feel they are getting "watched". I think the problem is that you have to invite people to threads and that threads, even if public, are hard to find. This is worse than in a newsgroup or the usual BB forum and I think this is stopping Wave from really starting to fly.
I was quite pessimist about Wave from the get go, but so I was about Twitter. Still, it was much easier to get used to Twitter, blogs, forum, newsgroups... and I still wonder what I should really do with wave.
Maybe I should more see it as some new form of e-mail. Right now I am trying if it can replace newsgroups or forums for posting / uploading screenshots.
scopique
· 1 month ago
Keep in mind, though, that Google's gated access might be hampering people's ability to "get things started" with their established groups. Since my usual non-Twitter compatriots gained access, we've been using it non-stop during the day.
It seems, though, that a LOT of people are asking the same thing: "Who do I DO with Wave?" I think there's some kind of sheen on the thing that drives people to view it as a web app that SHOULD do more then it does. Yeah, in essence, it's email, forum and comment system rolled into one.
Do we NEED to have these rolled into one? No, probably not, but like a lot of Google products, taking several different systems and bringing them together under one roof may have inherent value, regardless of the real-time simultaneous editing features, or other nifty tricks they throw in.
All Comments
I do think the "Playback" feature has some value. If you're trying to make sense of a wave that you got to late, hitting the playback button to watch the wave 'grow' can add context to the actual content of a wave. Seeing when someone added a branch to a wave, visually...there seems to be some subtle value there.
I can see the playback feature being used if you want context to your discussion, yes. It's especially useful if you suspect that people aren't threading the conversation as they should (for tracking who's replying to what).
I recently tried http://www.showdocument.com - good app for uploading documents and working on them in real-time.
Most file types are supported and it needs no installation. - andy
We've been using Zenbe Shareflow (http://www.zenbe.com/shareflow) for the time being. It's not as fancy as Wave, and the comment system needs a little more work to really be intuitive, but it's been a great experience so far.
I was quite pessimist about Wave from the get go, but so I was about Twitter. Still, it was much easier to get used to Twitter, blogs, forum, newsgroups... and I still wonder what I should really do with wave.
Maybe I should more see it as some new form of e-mail. Right now I am trying if it can replace newsgroups or forums for posting / uploading screenshots.
It seems, though, that a LOT of people are asking the same thing: "Who do I DO with Wave?" I think there's some kind of sheen on the thing that drives people to view it as a web app that SHOULD do more then it does. Yeah, in essence, it's email, forum and comment system rolled into one.
Do we NEED to have these rolled into one? No, probably not, but like a lot of Google products, taking several different systems and bringing them together under one roof may have inherent value, regardless of the real-time simultaneous editing features, or other nifty tricks they throw in.