Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

["Alan MacHett" <machett AT ibiblio.org>]

Michael D. Thomas said:
> I think it is time for you to figure this problem out. Email is
> constantly being mis-interpreted ...
>
> I personally think that that email needs some form of client-side
> data/presentation transformations, ...
>
> I'm looking forward to seeing this problem solved and I'm glad that
> you've volunteered your time and energies to uncover the solution.
> Just remember that when you email us your solution, don't expect anyone
> to understand what you are trying to do. Email is really bad for that
> kind of thing.

ROTFLMAO, Michael.
However, your post got me thinking and googling.  You're absolutely right
and we've known this not only since the inception of BBSs and email but
since the use of telephone and radio.  Although telecommunication allows
for greater bandwidth, it loses on content.  This inherent fault seems to
have hardly been addressed over the years, though.  I've included some
links below that I believe are well worth reading (mostly .pdf, sorry).

In line with Tim Berners-Lee's Semantic Web concept, I envision Emotive
Messenging.  As it stands, an author must explicitly include emotional
content to a message: emoticons[:)] or markup[/grin/] or those stupid
little smiley faces in AOL's Instant Messenger.  What if the email client
included the emotive context for you?  What if the emotional content were
reflected by, say, color, or if it automatically inserted the
markup[/grin/] for you?  The client would include an editing tool that
would allow you to correct any misinterpretations or to add any missing
ones.  And you would be able to install and select "dictionaries" as
needed to reflect cultural differences in interpretation, say, if you were
going to write one message to your peeps in South Central and another to a
business contact in Nigeria. (The latter part of that last sentence, for
instance, would be colored orange, for humor... :) /grin/)

It wouldn't even have to be built into the email client.  The pseudo-AI or
rulesets could be a seperate package that could be installed on any
platform: email, IM, ICQ, text-messeging, HTML, any digital text system. 
Users would have the option of choosing between seeing emotional content
conveyed through either colored text or standard markup[/grin/] (for the
color-blind, for instance).  There could even be a visually-impaired
add-on with a library of inflection-specific voices.  Perhaps the
libraries/dictionaries would be rather slim* to begin with, but would have
an author-assisted Bayesian learning system.

*Admittedly, such a scheme would be rather complex -- creating algorithms
or rulesets or whatever to interpret emotional content based on textual
context.  One would hope that the field of linguistics would have covered
this aspect already. (Maybe not, based on this post:
http://www.linguistlist.org/~ask-ling/archive-1998.7/msg00866.html
and work is being done on emotional content in speech recognition; perhaps
that could be applied to text as well:
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/news/03/06/juliaHirschberg.html )
Still, I figure if MSWord's little pop-up-paperclip-thingy can tell me my
grammar is bad, then something else should be able to color my text with
emotive context.

What does everyone think?

_________REFERENCES:__________

http://www.teleinstitut.de/journal/Nonverbal%20cues%20in%20cmc-enviroment.pdf
IMPLEMENTING NON-VERBAL CUES IN CMC-ENVIRONMENTS
Bernd Wiest, 10/96
"The relational level is a meta-level communicating HOW the sender of the
information wants the message to be understood by the recipient. This
level is used to express feelings and transfers the non-verbal cues."

"The difference between succesfull and less succesfull email-courses seems
to be because of the implicated non-verbal cues, too (among other things).
Teachers and moderators are using them. They describe processes and
non-verbal reactions implicitly and provide a 'more human,' warm, and
motivating learning environment.
"So if we are able to use these opportunities, we can also improve our
communication and interactions and avoid misunderstandings that may cause
problems.
"This is just a first step in developing ways to improve the
'media-richness' of Computer Mediated Communication. Nevertheless it is a
way showing us, that we do not have a 'lack of nonverbal cues' because of
the media, but because they are not implemented, yet."
______________________________

http://www.wmich.edu/grad/gatraining/SAemail.htm
When and How to Communicate Electronically
Information Technology Digest
April 8, 1996 (Vol. 5, No. 4)
"Lack of Context
"A note stuck to your door is informal; a signed memorandum on
departmental letterhead is official. The way a message is sent tells the
recipient a lot--people have learned to recognize the status of a message
from its context and formatting cues.
"In e-mail, however, both kinds of message look the same. You can't send
an e-mail message on letterhead or on scented stationery. As a result,
your recipient not only lacks the non-verbal content of your speech, but
he or she also lacks the traditional symbols that would show its status
and context. If people in your department receive an e-mail message saying
'Please get all grades in by the 25th,' they don't necessarily know
whether it is an official statement of policy or a plea for help from an
overworked administrator.
"As we start to use e-mail interchangeably with all of the other
communication methods available to us, we have to develop ways of making
the context of the message clear. Eventually, we may have 'electronic
letterhead' for verifiable official messages. Until then, the best
solution is to explain your message's status and context right up front.
You might, for example, state 'This is a formal announcement from the
office of the director,' if indeed that's what it is."
______________________________

http://portal.acm.org/ft_gateway.cfm?id=260068&type=pdf&coll=GUIDE&dl=ACM&CFID=14178046&CFTOKEN=38839323
Conveying emotion in remote computer-mediated-communication
(alas, they want money for the actual article)
______________________________

http://berkeley.intel-research.net/paulos/pubs/papers/Connexus%20Workshop%20(CSCW%20200).pdf
Connexus: An Evocative Interface
(an interesting communications concept from Berkeley)
______________________________

http://tangible.media.mit.edu/pape
rs/LumiTouch_CHI01/LumiTouch_CHI01.pdf
(another, not-as-complex idea from MIT)

--Alan

Michael D. Thomas said:
> I think it is time for you to figure this problem out. Email is
> constantly being mis-interpreted. Think of how much better the world
> would be if all the humor that was intended was actually perceived?
> Don't worry about the naysayers that say that email has intrinsic
> communication problems -- they don't get it. I'm sure that the crux
> of this email communication problem is very simple and easily solved.
> The only reason we still have any issues at this point in history is
> that no one has looked at it with a clear head -- that's where you come
> in. It shouldn't take you more than an hour or two to solve it. You
> might have to turn off the TV and really focus, though.
>
> I personally think that that email needs some form of client-side
> data/presentation transformations, i.e., client-side XSLT
> transformations. Instead of just sending some text, you send two
> documents: a data document and a presentation document. The data
> document is the raw data of your argument -- facts and figures, how
> you want your argument perceived. Then the receiver of your email
> will combine the two on the client side.
>
> In any response to your message, the client-side processor that was
> used to render the message should be noted. Some people are always
> going to use their angry, defensive processors when reading email,
> while others will tend to use their "assume goodwill" processors. By
> knowing what processor was used in the generation of a response, you
> can appropriately discount those that are close-minded and/or generally
> ill-willed.
>
> In a more advanced iteration of this messaging architecture, you could
> use some kind of content negotiation. If you know someone is going to
> be using their angry, defensive processor to interpret your message, go
> ahead and send them a variation of the presentation that will really
> tick them off. Their response probably won't be constructive anyway,
> and the angrier responses would have more humorous value for everyone
> else.
>
> Also, processors tend to have well-known bugs, e.g, tendencies not to
> read or remember prior posts in the thread, to always take an attacking
> tone even when the previous tone of the conversation was constructive,
> to not be particularly concerned with technical accuracy and to focus
> on undermining other processors by using various rhetorical tactics,
> such as straw man arguments. In an ideal world, the source code of such
> processors could be downloaded and examined. Unfortunately, you couldn't
> hope to just upload some patches for troublesome processors -- humans
> tend to be resistant to such uploads and such an upload could cause
> problems to cascade through their entire being. But what you can do is
> attempt to normalize messages from such errant processors. In some
> cases, you can use a source code analysis to determine that all
> messages from such processors should be ignored as noise.
>
> Anyway, my ideas here have a variety of flaws, I'm sure. First and
> foremost, human communication isn't as neatly layered and self-
> identifying as computer communication.
>
> I'm looking forward to seeing this problem solved and I'm glad that
> you've volunteered your time and energies to uncover the solution.
> Just remember that when you email us your solution, don't expect anyone
> to understand what you are trying to do. Email is really bad for that
> kind of thing.