KEY POINTS:
The promise of online collaboration on the internet should help teams or groups of people work faster, more efficiently and more creatively without having to be in the same place.
The reality is that a lot of the tools and processes supposed to achieve that haven't really worked.
So what has worked?
"Email has won. You have to use email," says Dan Randow of Christchurch company OnlineGroups.net.
However, email isn't so good for many-to-many communication.
Randow believes what's needed is email list servers with really good web interfaces.
Google Groups and Yahoo! Groups offer list servers but they brand them and set the rules, and use the interface to deliver content for their real customers - the advertisers.
The software is free but users can't build their own branded site with it.
That's why OnlineGroups.net has come up with GroupServer, a GPL open-source application available to anyone who wants to use it.
"Its primary function is to allow people to run email groups with a really good interface," Randow says.
There are more than 10,000 users from the onlinegroups.net site and Randow says the firm doesn't know how many other sites have picked up the software. "We never really pushed its uptake or tried to encourage a development community because it was too immature, but we're just finishing an enterprise version," he says.
The open source model has still worked because any functionality developed for clients makes its way back into the core product.
"Our business model is we sell associated services: hosting, geekery and wrangling."
OnlineGroups.net will host an entire implementation or people can just go on to onlinegroups.net and start a group.
Randow says interest has mainly come in the area of e-democracy, e-learning and organisations wanting to encourage discussion among employees, members or stakeholders.
"One customer provides post-graduate business learning for accountants to fulfil the requirement of the chartered accountancy qualification," he says. "The programme emphasises collaboration, so there's lots of teamwork. Online groups allow them to do that teamwork."
OnlineGroups.net is in partnership with United States-based advocacy group e-democracy.org to power its online public interest forums.
"The internet is the battleground for this year's local government election. We're moving into online politics 2.0," says Randow, who has set up canterburyissues.org.nz - a forum for debate on Christchurch elections.
If you want people to collaborate online, you have to give them technology they know how to use - ideally they will already have it.
It also needs to be interoperable, so all flavours talk to all flavours. That's why email is successful, as is Skype.
For online collaboration to work, Randow believes each group needs a centralised repository.
Member data needs to be kept centrally, so everyone in the group doesn't need to adjust their records if someone's email address changes.
There should be rich metadata on content because, in a successful group, there is likely to be a lot of content that needs to be searchable.
Randow is also looking for clear boundaries, so trust can develop, and clear purpose, so people will be motivated to join and participate.
Randow believes Microsoft's big play for the collaboration space, Sharepoint, suffers from the same flaw that has doomed so many other attempts - that it requires people to leave their email program and access content through a browser.
"They're trying to fight email.
"We embrace email and look for ways to get round its shortcomings."
Randow says technologies that prevail on the web are those which allow themselves to be used as platforms or other applications.
The Community Sector Taskforce, an independent body of community representatives which works to develop the relationship between government and the sector, has been using GroupServer for its website and forums since May.
National development manager Iris Pahau says the software allows it to have conversations with people around community issues, particularly those in more remote areas.
"If people raise issues, we as a task force can advocate for them and people feel protected," Pahau says.
"People can tell their stories for other people to learn from.
"It can be a good mentoring environment, where people ask questions and get answers."
