Exploring , Understanding , and Designing Innovative Socio - Technical Environments for Fostering and Supporting Mass

Mass collaboration involving large number of people working and learning together is emerging in the digitally networked environment. Socio-technical environments fostering mass collaboration are facilitated by the technical infrastructure of the Internet, and they support collaborating participants to solve problems, share information, and engage in the joint construction of artifacts and knowledge. Based on our conceptual, empirical, and design-based research over the last decade, this chapter (1) explores needs and opportunities for mass collaboration, (2) outlines theoretical frameworks (including: cultures of participation, meta-design, richer ecologies of participation, and different models for knowledge creation, accumulation, and sharing), (3) describes specific application domains (including: CreativeIT Wiki, SAP Community Network, and Massive Open, Online Courses), and (4) identifies research challenges grounded in findings “how things are” to provide design requirements for “how things could or should be” in the years to come.