Using Conversational Analysis to ascertain whether commercially available synchronous messengers can support real world ad hoc interactions

Conversational analysis was used to ascertain that two student project meetings conducted using CuSeeme chat and video, contained sufficient discussion to progress the projects. The findings were that conversational "rules" were followed and chains of discussion occurred. These findings support the literature reviewed that shows remote groups need effective communication channels for planned and ad hoc meetings. Research in progress will use conversational analysis to analyse the interactions occurring during Instant messenger (IM) encounters, and evaluate the usefulness of IM for promoting more ad hoc lecturerstudent and student-student encounters over the next academic year.