A Proposed Model for Professional E-Mail Groups

by Ian Pitchford

In the beginning. . .

The original ethos of InterPsych was encapsulated in the phrase "There is someone wiser than any of us, and that is all of us". If you remember I included those words in the original introduction to the "Psychiatry and Abnormal Psychology Discussion Forum", launched on the Mailbase listserv at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne on that fateful day in February, 1994. There is no doubt that InterPsych has met a real need - 200 people subscribed to the _Psychiatry_ forum in the first week alone, and now we have 38 separate fora and thousands of individual members from all over the world, but other than bringing people together to talk what does InterPsych hope to achieve?

The Internet is *the* most astounding mode of communication yet devised. We can express ourselves in text, colour, 3D, audio, video, graphs, charts, emoticons, and so forth. We can communicate one-to- one, one-to-many, and many-to-one. We can span the globe in seconds; we can collaborate with people we have never met - but most importantly we can be exposed to ideas that we would *never* encounter in our day-to-day reading, research and conversation. Even exposure to a simple anecdote can bring about a fundamental change in our perception, and in the direction of our research. As Marty Seligman and David Rosenhan say in _Abnormal Psychology_, "Anecdote is the richest source of hypotheses and insight".

So what are you talking about?

Well we have:

Thousands of members from many disciplines

Unique modes of communication via the Internet

Some organizational structure

Some first class ideas

So what's the problem?

Clogged communications

Hierarchichal structure off-putting

Volunteers stretched to the limit

Local concerns and needs not adddressed

Contraints of US commercial and legal considerations

Many potential collaborators want to deal face-to-face

Lack of access to facilities and to a hierarchy

Is there a solution?

Yes, set up autonomous regional branches of InterPsych composed of enthusiasts in those areas who can:

obtain local computing and other facilities

operate in linguistic, cultural and academic context

set up many projects around the world without reference to a central body

set up face-to-face meetings with collaborators and sponsors and respond quickly to enquiries

Proposed autonomous branches of InterPsych

Current participation in InterPsych suggest that it would be possible to meet local demands intially by setting up:

EuroPsych

AfroPsych

AsiaPsych

I have taken steps towards the setting up of these branches. They will be autonomous, and I will not be playing a major role in governance.

Other branches can easily be added as and when they are needed.

InterPsych would continue to thrive as the central hub, and could eventually form the international executive body as nominees are appointed by the regions. All of the activities of the various groups can be integrated by the InterPsych Virtual Campus. No central control is necessary, and indeed such control would be ininimcal to the generation of enthusiasm, to the production of creative ideas, and to the inspiration of volunteerism. People work most effectively when they are left to work on their own ideas, but have access to the proper tools, to information, and to support and inspiration.

Ian Pitchford, Department of Biomedical Science, University of Sheffield, Western Bank, SHEFFIELD, S10 2TN, United Kingdom

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