User-centered design (UCD) is gaining popularity in both the educational and business sectors. This is due to the fact that UCD sheds light on the entire process of analyzing, planning, designing, developing, using, evaluating, and maintaining computer-based learning. "User-Centered Design of Online Learning Communities" explains how computers can be used to augment human intellect for productivity and innovation, both nationally and globally. This book gives guidance to all stakeholders involved in online learning: organizations and businesses, developers, tutors, students, and evaluators; as well as provides best practices for the different phases of developing online learning communities from the analysis and design phase to the development, use, evaluation, and maintenance stage. It contains 16 chapters: (1) User-Centered Design of Online Learning Communities (Niki Lambropoulos); (2) Did We Become a Community? Multiple Methods for Identifying Community and Its Constituent Elements in Formal Online Learning Environments (Richard Schwier and Ben Daniel); (3) User-Centered Design Principles for Online Learning Communities (Ben Daniel, David O'Brien and Asit Sarkar); (4) Quality Models of Online Learning Community Systems (Effie Law and Ebba Hvannberg); (5) Designing Online Learning Communities to Encourage Cooperation (Miranda Mowbray); (6) Videoconferencing Communities (Dianna Newman, Patricia Barbanell and John Falco); (7) Online Communities of Practice as a Possible Model to Support the Development of a Portal for Science Teachers (Anne Jelfs, Jen Harvey and Ann Jones); (8) Developing Evidence-Based Criteria for the Design and Use of Online Forums in Higher Education in Hong Kong (Carmel McNaught, Kin Cheng and Paul Lam); (9) Evaluation (Frances Bell, Elena Zaitseva and Danuta Zakrzewska); (10) Tools and Methods for Supporting Online Learning Communities and Their Evaluation (Maria Rigou, Spiros Sirmakessis, Dimitris Stavrinoudis and Michalis Xenos); (11) Evaluation of Attitudes towards Thinking and Learning in a CALL Web Site through CMC Participation (Andrew Laghos and Panayiotis Zaphiris); (12) Evaluation of an Online Community (Elizabeth Hartnell-Young, Keryn McGuinness and Peter Cuttance); (13) Iterative Design and Evaluation of a Web-Based Experimentation Environment (Anh Nguyen-Ngoc, Yassin Rekik and Denis Gillet); (14) Understanding Participation in Online Courses (Noppadol Prammance); (15) Exploring the Influence of Instructor Actions on Community Development in Online Settings (Christopher Brook and Ron Oliver); and (16) Promotion of Self-Assessment for Learners in Online Discussion Using the Visualization Software (Toshio Mochizuki, Hiroshi Kato, Satoru Fujitani, Kazaru Yaegashi, Shin-ichi Hisamatsu, Tomoko Nagata, Jun Nakahara and Toshihisa Nishimori).