(2002-06-19) c

Esther Dyson on future Collaboration Ware: "In ten years there will be Wi-Fi wireless Internet access everywhere," she says. "I will have a good software tool for filtering my e-mail and categorizing it. My calendar will be integrated with my address book. Everything will be quicker. I'll have a cloth to put on my lap as a keyboard. The little device that serves as my cellphone-cum-PC will be incredibly light. And I'll know where my luggage is because it will have a chip in it." She notes that she currently doesn't use any new collaboration software, but sticks to EMail.

Likewise, Steve Yost of QuickTopic thinks that people revert to EMail because If one person in a group can't or won't use the new tech, the forum reverts to the least common denominator - ubiquitous email. That's an interesting point, but I think there are a couple approaches that might help.

• the way Round Up generates a per-thread email list/archive makes it easier to manage email-based collaboration. But it's still largely email-based. But, on the other hand, other parties to a thread can occasionally do some housekeeping by providing structured data around the thread.

• one possible reason people revert to email is that they want to have a single in-box to monitor. Under that theory, they'd be more open to using additional applications/processes if everything came together in a Universal Inbox.