Common Ground as Privacy Mechanism in the use of Awareness Systems

The core functionality of an awareness system is to collect information about the activities of one individual or group and present it to another. These people may or may not be geographically separated, and the purpose of capturing the information can vary, from work purposes, monitoring the well being of a lone elderly, to affective communication, etc. By their nature, awareness systems tend to complement other communication media that support task oriented communications, acting as a pre-cursor, a trigger or a prop to support communication through other means [18]. Collocated workers may be triggered by an increased awareness of the activities of their colleagues to discover common interests and seek collaboration. Remote workers, may find it easier to engage in communications that can become more frequent and more effective [4]. Remote family and friends may also feel more connected and can be prompted to initiate a communication through other means, e.g., email or telephone [15].