Topic 6:-

6.1 - Go to http://athene.csu.edu.au/~ajohnsto/ and click "Purpose.docx"

6.2 -

The design of moodle was ok once i had 5 mins or so to play around with it. Afetr that time period it was quite easy to navigate. The colour scheme was terrible - very bland. I didnt like all the dates in the middle that were all unused. I found the whole of moodle to be quite clunky infact. Easy to use but very clunky and mechanicalistic, much like interact when it was first made available.

Moodle includes such features as Site entries (in intereact these would be announcements), a blog, resource tools, a chat tool, wiki, a forum, a list of current online users and a calendar. All of these are also found in Interact. Interact isn't as clunky as moodle is.

Moodle on:-

Usability - Moodle is very usable. It has a high degree and standard of usability. It has a degree of learnability - that is users can learn and adapt with how to use it. It offers some robustness, however it could do with some more. It has flexibility in all the different tools it offers. Flexibility includes all the interactions between a user and moodle and getting info accross. It does succeed in all the tools, such as wiki, blog and the rest.

Sociability - Moodle has great potential for a solid sociability network. This includes interactions between people in real time - via the chat room, but also via blogs and wikis, and collaborative sharing and learning. Moodle has great potential - just needs users to catch on.

Sustainability - How long will it last? Will it convince the pickiest of users? Moodle has great potential for online social networks. Moodle needs to divise a plan or set of goals to achieve acceptance.

6.3

Trust and Reuputation:-

Trust and reputation is centred around a user and their willingness to use a certain product. The factors that contribute to product trust are:-

Credibility consisting of Honesty, Expertise, and Reputation,

Ease of use, and

Risk.

Honesty is about the company or product doing what it says it will. If it is telling you it can fly - it must be able to fly. If it is telling yu it won first prize in a test, when it actually came second, that is lying to sell a product. Consumers are spending hard earned cash in order to by products, and they do not wish to be lied to. If their product doesn't do something that it said it would, the customer would feel cheated, and would not openly trust the company anymore.

Expertise - Things should not be cheaply made. There must be some standard of quality that a user will be happy with the overall product. If the run-time of the product is minimal, the user wil not be happy. It must have some sort of lifetime, and be durable and hardy, and expertly made.

Reputation - Reputation is important because word of mouth is one of the best ways to introduce new customers to your product. Having a good reputation (lets say for example in vaccuum cleaners) - A customer should be able to purchase on in Big W and it is the exact same quality as one purchased in Harvey Norman 2000KM away. Having a good reputation invokes that you can count on the business/product, and in turn trust it.

Ease Of Use - It must be easy to use. If not - people will give up, or feel lost. To make users feel comfortable and included, it is important to make things easy to use.

Risk - What is the risk involved? In a toy - are there small parts that could easily be swallowed? in machinery - Is it durbale enough that it wont break and cause injuries? In IT systems - what are the security measures for attackers/identity theft/viruses/online abuse? What does the company do to protect the user? Ideally a company will have thios online somewhere for the user to see, so they feel like they are in safe hands.