(will be at: http://www.suck.com/dynasuck/96/03/18/ )
In particular, it cites Chip Morningstar, who is behind communities.com,
which is behind E (which is avail on NT today).
Rohit
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> Chip Morningstar's and Randy Farmer's seminal paper on
> virtual communities, "_The Lessons of Lucasfilm's
> Habitat_," provides a clue to the root of chat room
> banality. Habitat was the precursor to _Club Caribe_,
> the Commodore 64-based multi-user virtual world offered
> by QuantumLink, a service later christened America Online.
> In a section titled, appropriately enough, "Get Real,"
> Morningstar and Farmer answer the criticism of a colleague
> who claimed that "most of the activity consisted of inane
> and trivial conversation." Admitting that the observation
> is "largely correct," the authors go on to say:
>
> __In a real system that is used by real people, it is a
> mistake to assume that the users will all undertake the
> sorts of noble and sublime activities which you created
> the system to enable. Most of them will not.