Information Design of Community-Building

Vaughan and Schwartz (1999) suggest that involving the user population in the information design process is key. Along the same lines, Rosenbaum (1998) states that community networks must find out from their user population what they want in the way of products and services (517). Vaughan and Schwartz point out that too often one or at most a very small number of expert users have total responsibility for designing an entire community network from the ground up, and that too often the people who are supposed to benefit from the network, average users, are left out of the design process (588). This leads to the network not serving the needs of the users it had hoped to attract.

There are some potential problems with involving end-users in the design process. One problem is that they may not be familiar enough with the Web and its capabilities to be able to contribute usable design ideas; but this can be managed by finding ways to introduce proposed end-users to Web technology (Vaughan and Schwartz 1999). Another problem is pointed out by Andy Carvin in a 1998 keynote speech, when he comments that "it's impossible to move ahead [with a design] when there is a multitude of voices yet no individual leadership making the final call." Carvin states further that "a community network really needs to have an individual who can articulate a vision, focus on a mission, and take responsibility when things go wrong, and receive the appropriate kudos when things go right." So, it is important to draw a line between soliciting user opinion in the design process and making final decisions between what may be very divergent ideas generated during the process. Someone must make the final decision or the project will be significantly hampered. The goal is the product, not the process. To sum up, as Anderson (1999) says, "collaboration is dynamic, often messy, confrontational, uncomfortable, and chaotic" (248), but can be well worth the time and effort.

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