The order of the readings for a given day is (usually) deliberate, so we encourage you to read them in the order listed. In some cases the first reading is cited by the second or at least adds context to it. We might adjust the syllabus as the semester goes along, but we won't change anything with less than a week's notice.

Most of the readings for the course are available online, usually through one of the many online journal subscriptions that are carried by UC-Berkeley. You can read them on-screen or print copies, depending on what you prefer. To access some of these links from off campus, you will need to use the Berkeley library proxy server. Please contact Andrew if you have any trouble accessing them. Those readings that aren't online are included in a reader available at Copy Central (2560 Bancroft Way at Telegraph, 510-848-8649) for $18.15.

Enter the class password to see and annotate the readings:  

Tue 28 Aug :: Course Introduction, Terminology and Taxonomy — slides

AIR-L mailing list discussion of CMC.

Thu 30 Aug :: CMC in Society — slides

Rheingold, H. (1995) The Virtual Community: Finding Connection in a Computerized World. London: Minerva. (Read introduction only.)

Rice, R.E., Shepherd, A., Dutton, W.H., and J.E. Katz. (2007) Chapter 2: Social interaction and the Internet: A comparative analysis of surveys in the US and Britain. In Joinson, A., McKenna, K., Postmes, T., and U-D. Reips (Eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Internet Psychology. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. (In reader.)

Tue 4 Sep :: Social Presentation and Perception — slides

Goffman, E. (1956) Chapter 1 from The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. New York: Doubleday. (In reader.)

Donath, J. (1998) Identity and Deception in the Virtual Community. In Smith, M., and P. Kollock (Eds.) Communities in Cyberspace. London: Routledge.

Thu 6 Sep :: Social Presentation and Perception — slides

Ellison, N., Heino, R., and J. Gibbs. (2006) Managing Impressions Online: Self-Presentation Processes in the Online Dating Environment. In Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 11 (2).

Herring, S.C., & A. Martinson. (2004) Assessing Gender Authenticity in Computer-Mediated Language Use: Evidence From an Identity Game. In Journal of Language and Social Psychology 23 (4): 424-446.

Tue 11 Sep :: The Nature of Community — slides

Cohen, A.P. (1985) Chapters 1 and 3 from The Symbolic Construction of Community. London: Routledge. (In reader.)

Thu 13 Sep :: Online Communities — slides

Smith, M. (1999) Invisible Crowds in Cyberspace: Measuring and Mapping the Social Structure of USENET. In M. Smith and P. Kollock (Eds.), Communities in Cyberspace. London: Routledge.

Haythornthwaite, C. (2007) Social networks and online community. In Joinson, A., McKenna, K., Postmes, T., and U-D. Reips (Eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Internet Psychology. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. (In reader.)

Kollock, P. (1996) Design Principles for Online Communities. In Harvard Conference on the Internet and Society. (Optional.)

Tue 18 Sep :: Trust and Trustworthiness — slides

Riegelsberger, J., Sasse, M.A., and J.D. McCarthy. (2007) Chapter 5: Trust in mediated interactions. In Joinson, A., McKenna, K., Postmes, T., and U-D. Reips (Eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Internet Psychology. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. (In reader.)

ASSIGNMENT DUE: Problem and justification memo for final project.

Thu 20 Sep :: Trust and Trustworthiness — slides

Cheshire, C., and K.S. Cook. (2004) The Emergence of Trust Networks: Implications for Online Interaction. In Analyse and Kritik 28.

Tue 25 Sep :: Reputation — slides

Nakashima, E. (2007) Harsh Words Die Hard on the Web: Law Students Feel Lasting Effects of Anonymous Attacks. In The Washington Post, 7 March 2007.

Yamagishi, T., Matsuda, M., Yoshikai, N., Takahashi, H., Y. Usui. (2004) Solving the Lemons Problem with Reputation: An Experimental Study of Online Trading.

Thu 27 Sep :: Reputation — slides

Resnick, P., Zeckhauser, R., Swanson, J., and K. Lockwood. (2006) The Value of Reputation on eBay: A Controlled Experiment. In Experimental Economics 9 (2).

Fiore, A.T., Lee Tiernan, S., and M.A. Smith. (2002) Observed Behavior and Perceived Value of Authors in Usenet Newsgroups: Bridging the Gap. In Proceedings of ACM Computer-Human Interaction.

Tue 2 Oct :: Media Richness — slides

Dennis, A.R., and S.T. Kinney. (1998) Testing media richness theory in the new media: The effects of cues, feedback, and task equivocality. In Information Systems Research 9 (3).

Walther, J.B., & Slovacek, C., & Tidwell, L.C. (2001) Is a picture worth a thousand words? Photographic images in long term and short term virtual teams. In Communication Research 28 (1), 105-134.

Thu 4 Oct :: Media Richness — slides

Kahai, S.S., and R.B. Cooper. (2003) Exploring the Core Concepts of Media Richness Theory: The Impact of Cue Multiplicity and Feedback Immediacy on Decision Quality. In Journal of Management Information Systems 20 (1).

Tue 9 Oct :: Visual Interfaces — slides

Donath, J. (2001) Mediated Faces. In M. Beynon, C.L. Nehaniv, K. Dautenhahn (Eds.). Cognitive Technology: Instruments of Mind: 4th International Conference.

Donath, J.S., & F. Viégas. (2002) The Chat Circles Series: Explorations in designing abstract graphical communication interfaces. In Proceedings of Designing Interactive Systems.

Erickson, T., and W.A. Kellogg. (2000) Social translucence: an approach to designing systems that support social processes. In ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction 7 (1). (Read sections 1 and 2 only, up to middle of p. 65. The rest is optional.)

Erickson, T. (2003) Designing visualizations of social activity: six claims. In Extended abstracts of ACM Computer-Human Interaction.

Thu 11 Oct :: Analytic Visualizations

Viégas, F., Dave, K., and M. Wattenberg. (2004) Studying Cooperation and Conflict between Authors with History Flow Visualizations. In Proc. ACM Computer-Human Interaction.

Viégas, F., Golder, S., and J. Donath. (2006) Visualizing Email Content: Portraying Relationships from Conversational Histories. In Proc. ACM Computer-Human Interaction.

Tue 16 Oct :: Collective Action — slides

Bimber, B., Flanagin, A.J., and C. Stohl. (2005) Reconceptualizing Collective Action in the Contemporary Media Environment. In Communication Theory 15 (4).

Hardin, R. (2003) The Free Rider Problem. In E.N. Zalta (Ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2003 Edition). (Skim.)

Thu 18 Oct :: Collective Action — slides

Welser, H.T., Gleave, E., Fisher, D., and M. Smith. (2007) Visualizing the Signatures of Social Roles in Online Discussion Groups. In Journal of Social Structure 8.

Lanier, J. (2006) Beware the Online Collective. In Time Magazine, 12 Dec. 2006.

Fri 19 Oct :: (3 pm) Assignment due

ASSIGNMENT DUE: Interim report and project drafts.

Tue 23 Oct :: Information Pools and Collaborative Editing — slides

Cheshire, C., and J. Antin. Order, Coordination and Uncertainty: A Field Study of Contributions to an Online Information Exchange System. (Only the first 18 pages are required; the rest is optional.)

Zhang, M., and F. Zhu. (2006) Intrinsic motivation of open content contributors: the case of Wikipedia. Working paper, MIT.

Thu 25 Oct :: Information Pools and Collaborative Editing — slides

Antin, J., and C. Cheshire. (2007) Designing Social Psychological Incentives for Online Collective Action. In Proc. General Online Research, Leipzig, Germany.

Viégas, F., Wattenberg, M., Kriss, J., and F. van Ham. (2007) Talk Before You Type: Coordination in Wikipedia. In Proc. 40th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences.

Tue 30 Oct :: In-class strategy game

IPDLX software.

Thu 1 Nov :: Marc Smith guest lecture

Neustaedter, C., Bernheim Brush, A.J., Smith, M.A., and D. Fisher. (2005) The Social Network and Relationship Finder: Social Sorting for Email Triage. In CEAS 2005.

Smith, M.A., Davenport, D., and H. Hwa. (2003) AURA: A mobile platform for object and location annotation. In Ubicomp 2003.

Tue 6 Nov :: Linking games and game theory — slides

Smith, J.H. (2006) The Games Economists Play — Implications of Economic Game Theory for the Study of Computer Games. In Game Studies 6 (1).

Smith, J.H. (2007) Tragedies of the ludic commons — understanding cooperation in multiplayer games. In Game Studies 7 (1). (Optional.)

Thu 8 Nov :: Games — slides

Ducheneaut, N., Yee, N., Nickell, E., and R.J. Moore. (2006) "Alone together?": exploring the social dynamics of massively multiplayer online games. In Proc. ACM Computer-Human Interaction.

Golder, S.A., and J. Donath. (2004) Hiding and Revealing in Online Poker Games. In Proc. ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work.

Tue 13 Nov :: Intimate Relationships — slides

Whitty, M. (2007) Chapter 3: Love letters: The development of romantic relationships throughout the ages. In Joinson, A., McKenna, K., Postmes, T., and U-D. Reips (Eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Internet Psychology. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. (In reader.)

Fiore, A.T., Taylor, L.S., Mendelsohn, G.A., and M.A. Hearst. (2007) Assessing Attractiveness in Online Dating Profiles. Working paper.

Thu 15 Nov :: Intimate Relationships

Gibbs, J.L., Ellison, N.B., and R.D. Heino. (2006) Self-Presentation in Online Personals: The Role of Anticipated Future Interaction, Self-Disclosure, and Perceived Success in Internet Dating. In Communication Research 33 (2).

Norton, M.I., Frost, J.H., and D. Ariely. (2007) Less Is More: The Lure of Ambiguity, or Why Familiarity Breeds Contempt. In Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 92 (1).

Tue 20 Nov :: Final Project Roundtable Discussions

Thu 22 Nov :: Thanksgiving Holiday

Tue 27 Nov :: Final Project Presentations

Thu 29 Nov :: Final Project Presentations

Tue 4 Dec :: Final Project Presentations

Thu 6 Dec :: Final Project Presentations