Backchannel is the use of networked computers to maintain a real-time online conversation alongside the primary group activity or live spoken remarks. The term was coined from the linguistics term to describe listeners' behaviours during verbal communication.
The term "backchannel" generally refers to online conversation about the conference topic or speaker. Occasionally backchannel provides audience members a chance to fact-check the presentation.
First growing in popularity at technology conferences, backchannel is increasingly a factor in education where WiFi connections and laptop computers allow participants to use ordinary chat like IRC[1][2] or AIM to actively communicate during presentation. More recent research include works where the backchannel is brought publicly visible, such as the ClassCommons,[3] backchan.nl[4] and Fragmented Social Mirror.[5]
Twitter is also widely used today by audiences to create backchannels during broadcasting of content or at conferences. For example, television drama,[6] other forms of entertainment [7] and magazine programs.[8][9] This practice is often also called live tweeting. Many conferences nowadays also have a hashtag that can be used by the participants to share notes and experiences; furthermore such hashtags can be user generated.
Victor Yngve first used the phrase "back channel" in 1970 in a linguistic meaning, in the following passage: "In fact, both the person who has the turn and his partner are simultaneously engaged in both speaking and listening. This is because of the existence of what I call the back channel, over which the person who has the turn receives short messages such as 'yes' and 'uh-huh' without relinquishing the turn."[10]
Such systems were widely imagined and tested in late 1990s and early 2000s. These cases include researcher's installations on conferences[11] and classroom settings.[12] The first famous instance of backchannel communications influencing a talk occurred on March 26, 2002, at the PC Forum conference, when Qwest CEO Joe Nacchio famously lamented the difficulties of raising capital. Journalists Dan Gillmor and Doc Searls posted accounts, from the audience, in real-time, to their weblogs. Buzz Bruggeman, a reader of Gillmor's, emailed information about a recent sizable transaction that had made Nacchio very wealthy; both Gillmor and Searls updated their weblogs with that information.
In her article referring to the "," PC Forum host Esther Dyson wrote, "around that point, the audience turned hostile." Many commentators later attributed the audience's hostility to the information people shared while surfing and communicating on their laptops during Nacchio's remarks.
Effect
Research has demonstrated that backchannels help participants to feel as contributing members, not passive followers[13][14] and make them feel more social.[15] However, the research is mixed on the nature of this discussions, and especially regarding social interaction on the backchannels: some cases report vast interaction where as others highlight that interaction on the platform was considered low.[16][17] There are indicators that these tools however engage different members of the audience to provide their input.[18]
Use in education
Since its inception in 1998 at Argonne National Laboratory, the Internet2 initiative known as the Access Grid (a large-format presentation, video conferencing and interactive environment) has used backchannel communications to permit the node operators to pass URLs for display at another site, troubleshoot problems and even discuss what's for lunch at their location. The Access Grid backchannel has evolved from the use of a MOO to XMPP.
In 2009 Purdue University developed a tool called Hotseat that enabled students to comment on the course lectures in near real-time using social networking tools such as Facebook and Twitter.
Using a backchannel for educational purposes can function as a formal class activity or even an independent discussion without instructor participation and awareness. Aside from the normal discussion, a backchannel can also be used for note taking, asking questions, offering suggestions on different topics, and sharing resources with other students and faculty members. There are many different media networks out there that can be used as a backchannel. Including Twitter, Facebook, Yammer and Instant Messaging.
Experiments
Joichi Ito's HeckleBot includes an LED text panel displaying phrases sent from the chat room to catch the attention of the speaker or audience. The USC Interactive Media Division has experimented with "Google Jockeys" to feed visual information and search results between the speakers and the backchannel, projected on multiple screens surrounding their seminars. Software like SubEthaEdit allows for more formal backchannel: collaborative notetaking. In 2007 the Building Learning Communities Conference in Boston, Massachusetts used tools such as Twitter and Skype to create backchannels that included participants who were not on location and at times in remote parts of the world. At times presenters were not aware of the backchannel and other occasions the presenters themselves were involved in the backchannel.
References
^McCarthy, Joseph F., and Danah Boyd. 2005. "Digital Backchannels in Shared Physical Spaces." In CHI ’05 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems - CHI '05, 1641–1644. New York, New York, USA: ACM Press. doi:10.1145/1056808.1056986
^Yardi, Sarita. 2006. "The Role of the Backchannel in Collaborative Learning Environments." In Proceeding ICLS ’06 Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Learning Sciences, 852–858. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1150034.1150158.
^Du, Honglu, Mary Beth Rosson, and John M. Carroll. 2012. "Augmenting Classroom Participation through Public Digital Backchannels." In Proceedings of the 30th ACM International Conference on Design of Communication - SIGDOC ’12, 127. doi:10.1145/2389176.2389201
^Harry, Drew, Joshua Green, and Judith Donath. 2009. "Backchan.nl." In Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - CHI 09, 1361–1370. New York, New York, USA: ACM Press. doi:10.1145/1518701.1518907
^Bergstrom, Tony, Andrew Harris, and Karrie Karahalios. 2011. "Encouraging Initiative in the Classroom with Anonymous Feedback." In Proceeding INTERACT’11 Proceedings of the 13th IFIP TC 13 International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction, 627–642. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2042053.2042116.
^McPherson, K.; K Huotari; Yo-Shang Cheng; David Humphrey; Coye Cheshire; and Andrew Brooks. 2012. "Glitter: A Mixed-Methods Study of Twitter Use during Glee Broadcasts." In Proceedings of the ACM 2012 Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work Companion, 167–170. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2141569
^Highfield, Tim; Harrington, Stephen; Bruns, Axel; Industries Precinct, Creative; Ave, Musk; Industries, Creative; Grove, Kelvin (2013). "Twitter as a Technology for Audiencing and Fandom" (PDF). Information, Communication & Society. 16 (3): 315–339. doi:10.1080/1369118X.2012.756053. S2CID 27959441.
^Hawthorne, J.; Houston, J. B.; McKinney, M. S. (2013). "Live-Tweeting a Presidential Primary Debate: Exploring New Political Conversations". Social Science Computer Review. 31 (5): 552–562. doi:10.1177/0894439313490643. S2CID 62631987.
^Larsson, Anders Olof (2013). "Tweeting the Viewer—Use of Twitter in a Talk Show Context". Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media. 57 (2): 135–152. doi:10.1080/08838151.2013.787081. hdl:10852/41499. S2CID 53575629.
^Yngve, Victor. "On getting a word in edgewise," page 568. Papers from the Sixth Regional Meeting [of the] Chicago Linguistic Society, 1970.
^Rekimoto, Jun, Yuji Ayatsuka, Hitoraka Uoi, and Toshifumi Arai. 1998. "Adding Another Communication Channel to Reality." In CHI 98 Conference Summary on Human Factors in Computing Systems - CHI ’98, 271–272. New York, New York, USA: ACM Press. doi:10.1145/286498.286752
^Ratto, Matt, R. Benjamin Shapiro, Tan Minh Truong, and William G. Griswold. 2003. "The Activeclass Project: Experiments in Encouraging Classroom Participation." In Proceedings of the International Conference on Computer Support for Collaborative Learning 2003, 477–486. doi:10.1007/978-94-017-0195-2_57
^Du, Honglu, Mary Beth Rosson, John M. Carroll, and Craig Ganoe. 2009. "I Felt like a Contributing Member of the Class." In Proceedinfs of the ACM 2009 International Conference on Supporting Group Work - GROUP ’09, 233–242. New York, New York, USA: ACM Press. doi:10.1145/1531674.1531709
^Rekimoto, Jun, Yuji Ayatsuka, Hitoraka Uoi, and Toshifumi Arai. 1998. "Adding Another Communication Channel to Reality." In CHI 98 Conference Summary on Human Factors in Computing Systems - CHI ’98, 271–272. New York, New York, USA: ACM Press. doi:10.1145/286498.286752
^McPherson, K; K. Huotari; Yo-Shang Cheng; David Humphrey; Coye Cheshire; and Andrew Brooks. 2012. "Glitter: A Mixed-Methods Study of Twitter Use during Glee Broadcasts." In Proceedings of the ACM 2012 Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work Companion, 167–170. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2141569.
^McPherson, K.; K. Huotari; Yo-Shang Cheng; David Humphrey; Coye Cheshire; and Andrew Brooks. 2012. "Glitter: A Mixed-Methods Study of Twitter Use during Glee Broadcasts." In Proceedings of the ACM 2012 Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work Companion, 167–170. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2141569.
^Du, Honglu; Mary Beth Rosson; and John M. Carroll. 2012. "Communication Patterns for a Classroom Public Digital Backchannel." In Proceedings of the 30th ACM International Conference on Design of Communication - SIGDOC ’12, 127. New York, New York, USA: ACM Press. doi:10.1145/2379057.2379081
^Nelimarkka, Matti, Kai Kuikkaniemi, and Giulio Jacucci. 2014. "A Field Trial of an Anonymous Backchannel Among Primary School Pupils." In Proceedings of the 18th International Conference on Supporting Group Work - GROUP ’14, 238–242. New York, New York, USA: ACM Press. doi:10.1145/2660398.2660399
Further reading
Cliff Atkinson. The Backchannel: How Audiences are Using Twitter and Social Media and Changing Presentations Forever, New Riders, 2009.
External links
The companion website to The Backchannel book by Cliff Atkinson
Confessions of a Backchannel Queen - Liz Lawley's backchannel manifesto
backchannel, this, article, about, backchannels, conferencing, information, technology, unofficial, diplomacy, track, diplomacy, other, uses, disambiguation, networked, computers, maintain, real, time, online, conversation, alongside, primary, group, activity,. This article is about backchannels in conferencing and information technology For unofficial diplomacy see Track II diplomacy For other uses see Backchannel disambiguation Backchannel is the use of networked computers to maintain a real time online conversation alongside the primary group activity or live spoken remarks The term was coined from the linguistics term to describe listeners behaviours during verbal communication The term backchannel generally refers to online conversation about the conference topic or speaker Occasionally backchannel provides audience members a chance to fact check the presentation First growing in popularity at technology conferences backchannel is increasingly a factor in education where WiFi connections and laptop computers allow participants to use ordinary chat like IRC 1 2 or AIM to actively communicate during presentation More recent research include works where the backchannel is brought publicly visible such as the ClassCommons 3 backchan nl 4 and Fragmented Social Mirror 5 Twitter is also widely used today by audiences to create backchannels during broadcasting of content or at conferences For example television drama 6 other forms of entertainment 7 and magazine programs 8 9 This practice is often also called live tweeting Many conferences nowadays also have a hashtag that can be used by the participants to share notes and experiences furthermore such hashtags can be user generated Contents 1 History 2 Effect 3 Use in education 4 Experiments 5 References 6 Further reading 7 External linksHistory EditVictor Yngve first used the phrase back channel in 1970 in a linguistic meaning in the following passage In fact both the person who has the turn and his partner are simultaneously engaged in both speaking and listening This is because of the existence of what I call the back channel over which the person who has the turn receives short messages such as yes and uh huh without relinquishing the turn 10 Such systems were widely imagined and tested in late 1990s and early 2000s These cases include researcher s installations on conferences 11 and classroom settings 12 The first famous instance of backchannel communications influencing a talk occurred on March 26 2002 at the PC Forum conference when Qwest CEO Joe Nacchio famously lamented the difficulties of raising capital Journalists Dan Gillmor and Doc Searls posted accounts from the audience in real time to their weblogs Buzz Bruggeman a reader of Gillmor s emailed information about a recent sizable transaction that had made Nacchio very wealthy both Gillmor and Searls updated their weblogs with that information In her article referring to the Parallel Channel PC Forum host Esther Dyson wrote around that point the audience turned hostile Many commentators later attributed the audience s hostility to the information people shared while surfing and communicating on their laptops during Nacchio s remarks Effect EditResearch has demonstrated that backchannels help participants to feel as contributing members not passive followers 13 14 and make them feel more social 15 However the research is mixed on the nature of this discussions and especially regarding social interaction on the backchannels some cases report vast interaction where as others highlight that interaction on the platform was considered low 16 17 There are indicators that these tools however engage different members of the audience to provide their input 18 Use in education EditSince its inception in 1998 at Argonne National Laboratory the Internet2 initiative known as the Access Grid a large format presentation video conferencing and interactive environment has used backchannel communications to permit the node operators to pass URLs for display at another site troubleshoot problems and even discuss what s for lunch at their location The Access Grid backchannel has evolved from the use of a MOO to XMPP In 2009 Purdue University developed a tool called Hotseat that enabled students to comment on the course lectures in near real time using social networking tools such as Facebook and Twitter Using a backchannel for educational purposes can function as a formal class activity or even an independent discussion without instructor participation and awareness Aside from the normal discussion a backchannel can also be used for note taking asking questions offering suggestions on different topics and sharing resources with other students and faculty members There are many different media networks out there that can be used as a backchannel Including Twitter Facebook Yammer and Instant Messaging Experiments EditJoichi Ito s HeckleBot includes an LED text panel displaying phrases sent from the chat room to catch the attention of the speaker or audience The USC Interactive Media Division has experimented with Google Jockeys to feed visual information and search results between the speakers and the backchannel projected on multiple screens surrounding their seminars Software like SubEthaEdit allows for more formal backchannel collaborative notetaking In 2007 the Building Learning Communities Conference in Boston Massachusetts used tools such as Twitter and Skype to create backchannels that included participants who were not on location and at times in remote parts of the world At times presenters were not aware of the backchannel and other occasions the presenters themselves were involved in the backchannel References Edit McCarthy Joseph F and Danah Boyd 2005 Digital Backchannels in Shared Physical Spaces In CHI 05 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems CHI 05 1641 1644 New York New York USA ACM Press doi 10 1145 1056808 1056986 Yardi Sarita 2006 The Role of the Backchannel in Collaborative Learning Environments In Proceeding ICLS 06 Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Learning Sciences 852 858 http dl acm org citation cfm id 1150034 1150158 Du Honglu Mary Beth Rosson and John M Carroll 2012 Augmenting Classroom Participation through Public Digital Backchannels In Proceedings of the 30th ACM International Conference on Design of Communication SIGDOC 12 127 doi 10 1145 2389176 2389201 Harry Drew Joshua Green and Judith Donath 2009 Backchan nl In Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems CHI 09 1361 1370 New York New York USA ACM Press doi 10 1145 1518701 1518907 Bergstrom Tony Andrew Harris and Karrie Karahalios 2011 Encouraging Initiative in the Classroom with Anonymous Feedback In Proceeding INTERACT 11 Proceedings of the 13th IFIP TC 13 International Conference on Human Computer Interaction 627 642 http dl acm org citation cfm id 2042053 2042116 McPherson K K Huotari Yo Shang Cheng David Humphrey Coye Cheshire and Andrew Brooks 2012 Glitter A Mixed Methods Study of Twitter Use during Glee Broadcasts In Proceedings of the ACM 2012 Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work Companion 167 170 http dl acm org citation cfm id 2141569 Highfield Tim Harrington Stephen Bruns Axel Industries Precinct Creative Ave Musk Industries Creative Grove Kelvin 2013 Twitter as a Technology for Audiencing and Fandom PDF Information Communication amp Society 16 3 315 339 doi 10 1080 1369118X 2012 756053 S2CID 27959441 Hawthorne J Houston J B McKinney M S 2013 Live Tweeting a Presidential Primary Debate Exploring New Political Conversations Social Science Computer Review 31 5 552 562 doi 10 1177 0894439313490643 S2CID 62631987 Larsson Anders Olof 2013 Tweeting the Viewer Use of Twitter in a Talk Show Context Journal of Broadcasting amp Electronic Media 57 2 135 152 doi 10 1080 08838151 2013 787081 hdl 10852 41499 S2CID 53575629 Yngve Victor On getting a word in edgewise page 568 Papers from the Sixth Regional Meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society 1970 Rekimoto Jun Yuji Ayatsuka Hitoraka Uoi and Toshifumi Arai 1998 Adding Another Communication Channel to Reality In CHI 98 Conference Summary on Human Factors in Computing Systems CHI 98 271 272 New York New York USA ACM Press doi 10 1145 286498 286752 Ratto Matt R Benjamin Shapiro Tan Minh Truong and William G Griswold 2003 The Activeclass Project Experiments in Encouraging Classroom Participation In Proceedings of the International Conference on Computer Support for Collaborative Learning 2003 477 486 doi 10 1007 978 94 017 0195 2 57 Du Honglu Mary Beth Rosson John M Carroll and Craig Ganoe 2009 I Felt like a Contributing Member of the Class In Proceedinfs of the ACM 2009 International Conference on Supporting Group Work GROUP 09 233 242 New York New York USA ACM Press doi 10 1145 1531674 1531709 Rekimoto Jun Yuji Ayatsuka Hitoraka Uoi and Toshifumi Arai 1998 Adding Another Communication Channel to Reality In CHI 98 Conference Summary on Human Factors in Computing Systems CHI 98 271 272 New York New York USA ACM Press doi 10 1145 286498 286752 McPherson K K Huotari Yo Shang Cheng David Humphrey Coye Cheshire and Andrew Brooks 2012 Glitter A Mixed Methods Study of Twitter Use during Glee Broadcasts In Proceedings of the ACM 2012 Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work Companion 167 170 http dl acm org citation cfm id 2141569 McPherson K K Huotari Yo Shang Cheng David Humphrey Coye Cheshire and Andrew Brooks 2012 Glitter A Mixed Methods Study of Twitter Use during Glee Broadcasts In Proceedings of the ACM 2012 Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work Companion 167 170 http dl acm org citation cfm id 2141569 Du Honglu Mary Beth Rosson and John M Carroll 2012 Communication Patterns for a Classroom Public Digital Backchannel In Proceedings of the 30th ACM International Conference on Design of Communication SIGDOC 12 127 New York New York USA ACM Press doi 10 1145 2379057 2379081 Nelimarkka Matti Kai Kuikkaniemi and Giulio Jacucci 2014 A Field Trial of an Anonymous Backchannel Among Primary School Pupils In Proceedings of the 18th International Conference on Supporting Group Work GROUP 14 238 242 New York New York USA ACM Press doi 10 1145 2660398 2660399Further reading EditCliff Atkinson The Backchannel How Audiences are Using Twitter and Social Media and Changing Presentations Forever New Riders 2009 External links EditThe companion website to The Backchannel book by Cliff Atkinson Learning From and About the Backchannel Backchannel Modes Confessions of a Backchannel Queen Liz Lawley s backchannel manifesto Bridging Diverse Groups danah boyd s backchannel considerations Audience Gone Wild Sample of a backchannel chat BackChannels in The Netherlands Europe Inviting Coworkers Linking Scholars of Atlantic Canada on the Twitter Backchannel by Katherine O Flaherty and Robert Gee Acadiensis vol 41 no 2 Summer Fall 2012 What Is a BackChannel Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Backchannel amp oldid 1124856368, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,
