From Social Issues Surround Social Software:
"While the answer may be elusive, panelists at the Supernova 2004 conference here agreed that the social dynamics around the use of burgeoning collaboration tools such as online social networking services, Weblogs and wikis are often as important as, if not more important than, the technologies themselves."
I would like to make one corrections to the above quote: it isn't that social dynamics (and social structures) are often as important, they are always as important if not more important. And this isn't true only for social software and collaboration tools, but it is true for all types of interactive information and communication systems, and technology in general. The technology meant to aid people's tasks is meant to be used by people in various contexts. As such, the technology by itself cannot deliver the sought after results. It is the interaction between the technology and the human factors in a given social structures and context, including the properties of the task, that hopefully results in the desired outcomes.
Once and for all we need to get over the irrational idea that social structures, human actions, and tasks can be bent to fit the technology. Yes, they can, but don't expect the desired results...
