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Online learning critically relies upon good communication between engaged parties in order to convey ideas, meanings, and values. Emerging technologies in collaborative virtual environments are providing new affordances in establishing greater online presence and, in turn, greater abilities to communicate and learn. This study examines how learners perceive, follow, and recall information presented in discussions in both a 2D and a 3D collaborative environment, Elluminate (now known as Blackboard Collaborate) and Second Life respectively. This exploratory study shows that learners observing discussions in Second Life have a tendency to better organise ideas, better identify who said what, and better recall what information was said throughout the discussion, than with similar discussions in Elluminate. On average, participants in this small scale study were able to follow and recall conversations in Second Life 10-13% better than the discussions in Elluminate. While findings produced positive trends towards Second Life, additional testing is required as the scale (n=42) was small and the frequencies of statistical results in excess of .05 were limited. Still, collectively they do point towards valuable insights for online educators in how they choose to deliver content, conduct synchronous class discussions, and communicate with their students.

In-depth interviews were conducted with Chinese and American users of a knowledge sharing system, pseudo-named Knowledge Everywhere (KE), being employed by a Fortune 100 company with operations in over 100 countries. The intent of these interviews was to identify factors influencing knowledge sharing behaviors among Chinese and American users of the KE system. Interview questions were framed using the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (Ventakesh, et al., 2003). Three primary conclusions emerged from the findings generated from the interviews. First, there is a perceived disconnect between knowledge sharing system usage and daily job performance.Second, language appears as a one-way barrier to knowledge sharing and not two-way as many practitioners believe. Third, cultural conservatism and perceived differences in practices hinders Chinese users' willingness to share and as a result gives the false impression that Chinese employees hoard information. IntroductionThe knowledge-based theories of firms view organizations as knowledge systems wherein organizational knowledge provides a synergistic advantage that can help keep organizations competitive in their market (Brown & Duguid, 1998; Hung & Lien, 2005). In this increasingly competitive global environment, knowledge is often regarded as the critical resource of firms and economies (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995), because knowledge and its application are the means by which creativity can be fostered (Davenport & Prusak, 1998; Mac Morrow, 2001). The globalization of business over the past two decades has raised awareness of the importance of knowledge sharing within subsidiaries located in different countries with differing cultures (Chase, 2004). In order to leverage the knowledge within employees all over the world, multinational organizations are implementing distributed knowledge sharing systems to help their members share knowledge regardless of space or time (Heier, Borgman & Manuth, 2005). These online systems are intended to fill the "structural holes" in networks (Ardichvili, Page & Wentling, 2003;Burt, 1992) and help organizational members take advantage of the "strength of weak ties" (Granovetter, 1973) to get richer information and solve problems more quickly. Unfortunately, despite the importance of cross-cultural considerations in knowledge sharing, the literature is almost silent on this dimension (Bhagat, Kedia, Harveston & Triandis, 2002; Glisband & Holden, 2003) and only very few recent studies have explicitly concentrated on the discussion of national cultural factors that influence knowledge sharing (Ford & Chan, 2003; Hutchings & Michailova, 2004).To better understand cross-cultural knowledge sharing and encourage employees from different countries to use knowledge sharing systems, we need to know: what factors influence employees' online knowledge sharing in cross-cultural contexts? Some researchers have explored how national cultural differences impact knowledge sharing; for example, researchers use national culture models, ...

An e-Learning team within an insurance corporation established a research partnership with three researchers to inform the renewal and innovation of their e-Learning solution. The research focused on management's perceptions on the future of e-Learning, learners' perceptions of their use of the e-Learning system, and administrators' perceptions of their management of the e-Learning system. Results revealed that management saw opportunities for innovation and renewal with knowledge creation and sharing, interaction and collaboration, decreasing course design and development time, testing of new technologies and alignment of all education experts with one e-Learning strategy. Learners, on the other hand, provided insights on their usage patterns, learning preferences, and experiences with e-Learning system. Administrators identifi ed training, searching for and selecting of employees, and course descriptions as factors that impacted their performance, and that if improved, could assist their administration of the e-Learning system. The triangulated knowledge source (managers, learners, and administrators) gave the e-Learning team a broad array of opportunities for innovation and renewal. The intent and design of this study can be used by e-Learning teams in their innovation and renewal efforts.