Here are some of the things I learned via twitter this past week:
Think Tweets are simple, 140 character messages? Think again via @TammyGreen [interesting annotated map]
With annotations, Twitter could become a platform for sharing anything, not just 140 characters of text. What will developers do with that data? We can only imagine. Perhaps new apps will allow users to share media like photos, videos and music? Or they’ll add more details about a tweeted link? Will you tag your tweets? Share vCards? Create polls? These sorts of innovations will launch shortly and we expect to be surprised and delighted by what the developers come up with.
—
@charlesjennings “Less is More: A different approach to learning & development (L&D) in a world awash in information” [requires free membership to access]
So, what are the core skills we need to help people develop so they can operate in this ocean of information?
To be honest, I don’t have a definitive list. But I think I know some of the capabilities L&D should focus on. If we help people develop these, at least they’ll be on a solid footing to extract positive and practical use from the volumes of information they come across each day:
|
a. Search and ‘find’ skills
|
To find the right information when it’s needed
|
|
b. Critical thinking skills
|
To extract meaning and significance
|
|
c. Creative thinking skills
|
To generate new ideas about, and ways of, using the information
|
|
d. Analytical skills
|
To visualise, articulate and solve complex problems and concepts, and make decisions that make sense based on the available information
|
|
e. Networking skills
|
To identify and build relationships with others who are potential sources of knowledge and expertise, within and outside the organisation
|
|
f. People skills
|
To build trust and productive relationships that are mutually beneficial for information sharing
|
|
g. Logic
|
To apply reason and argument to extract meaning and significance
|
|
h. A solid understanding of research methodology
|
To validate data and the underlying assumptions on which information and knowledge is based
|
—
@EskoKilpi “I rewrote my post about communication and competition”
Social networks provide problem-solving capability that results directly from the amount of communication and level of diversity in communication. Most organizations would soon fail if all employees thought alike or had little, or no contact. There are two new challenges: First is to understand the need for (net)working with difference. The second challenge is even bigger because of reductionist thinking: our assumption has been that by understanding the parts in detail, we understand the whole. This is simply not possible! What happens in interaction between the parts is more important than the parts. The whole is the emergent pattern of that interaction.
—
@dsearls “If we see the Net as a medium rather than as a place, we risk losing it. Here’s why: How to Keep the Carriers from Flushing the Net Down the Tubes”
We need to make clear that the Public Domain is the market’s underlying geology–a place akin to the ownerless bulk of the Earth–rather than a public preserve in the midst of private holdings. This won’t be easy, but it can be done.
We need to make clear that the Net is the best public place ever created for private enterprise, and that the success of the Net owes infinitely more to personal initiative than to the mesh of pipes in the ground beneath it.
We need to stress the fact that the primary “end” in the Net’s end-to-end architecture is the individual. The Net’s success is due far more to the freedoms enjoyed by individuals than to the advantages enjoyed by large companies whose existence predates the Net.
We need to remind policy makers that the Net’s biggest success stories–Amazon, Google, eBay and Yahoo–are the stories of Bezos, Page, Brin, Omidyar, Yang and Filo.
We need to make clear that the Net is the best public place ever created for private enterprise, and that the success of the Net owes infinitely more to personal initiative than to the mesh of pipes in the ground beneath it.
If Twitter gains value by allowing people to include more content than can be contained by the 140-character limit, why are we accepting the 140-character limit to begin with?
If the constraint is good, why try to make an end-run around it? If it’s not, why accept it to begin with?