What Still Matters about Distance?

At the tenth anniversary workshop of the Human-Computer Interaction Consortium the Olsons reflected on the past, present, and future of the role that geographical distance plays in the work of teams (subsequently published as Olson & Olson, 2000). A decade has passed, filled with research and technology development relevant to the issues raised in that paper. Indeed, the 555 Google Scholar citations of the “Distance Matters” paper are a good entry point to much of this research. Our current goal is to review where things stand with respect to these challenges after a decade of activity, reflecting on both the current situation but again looking at the prospects for the future of distributed team work.