Communities

communities of interest and practice

The social aspect of bookmarks

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This coming week (#2) at Work Literacy we will be discussing social bookmarks. I wrote about the basics of social bookmarks last year in Step 1: Free Your Bookmarks, which discussed how to get your data onto the Web cloud.

I think that social bookmarks and RSS aggregators are the two basic tools for using the Web for personal knowledge management. For those with limited social media experience, I usually suggest these two tools to get the hang of information flows on the web, which can feel like a tidal wave.

Dave Pollard, who is participating in the Connectivism and Connected Knowledge course notes how social media can have a connectivist aspect:

Refocusing Social Tools: Just as Knowledge Management is now shifting focus and attention from collection to connection, social media need to turn their attention to enabling more, more effective, more informed, more valuable conversations. They need to help us identify ‘the right people’ (to live with, make a living with, love, and talk to) and then connect with them in real time in simple yet powerful ways that mimic, as much as possible, face-to-face conversations. They also need to help us make these conversations and meetings and social interactions more effective — bring more clarity and context, reach consensus, enable stories to be told and remembered, capture non-verbal communication, and pick up from where we left off at the end of the last conversation — keeping us connected, all the time, everywhere.

Social bookmarks are but one aspect and one way to keep connected online, and in my experience one of the easiest ways to get started with web social media.

Getting your bookmarks out on the Web where you can easily access and search them definitely can help with personal productivity. It’s just easier to find things. However, it is only after some time when you have a number of pages marked with your tags and comments and when you have connected with other people that you realize that social bookmarks are more than just a heap of personal links. Other people start connecting to your network and they can annotate a link for members of their network. Suddenly, who you know becomes as important as what you know. If someone in your network knows that you’re interested in an area, perhaps they’ll find and mark a reference that you would never have found. Serendipity can happen, but only once you’ve engaged in the social space.

Here is an example of some recommendations from my network:

Learn the language before you speak to me

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Stuart Henshall says that you should Use the Tools First: Then Talk to Me:

I just walked out of one session where the presenter made a joke about Facebook. I checked; I’m fairly sure he’s not on it. That’s a big problem that exists here. You cannot talk about the impact of wikis, blogs, social bookmarking, tagging, even search unless you actually use them.

I agreed with this as soon as I read it and then wondered why. You don’t ask a doctor to have first suffered a disease before discussing how to treat it. Many academics in business school have never started a company, yet they can talk about the fundamentals of business.

Why is the Web, and especially social media, so different?

I think that one fundamental difference about social media is that they have a strong influence on the user, very much in a McLuhanesque medium/message/massage way. Those who come to web media for the first time are like adults learning a new language. You cannot start with the same advanced mental models and metaphors that you have in your primary language. Furthermore, if you do get to an advanced level in your new language, you may not have noticed it but the language, with its idioms, metaphors and culture, has had a strong influence on how you think in that language.

Social media change the way you communicate. Write a blog for a year or more and your writing (and thinking) will change. Use Twitter for some time and you will get an immersed sense of being connected to many people and understanding them on a different level. Even the ubiquitous Facebook changes how you may think of being apart from friends. Social media can change the way you think.

When you adopt a web social medium you are also starting on the bottom, or at the single node level. You have to make connections with what will become your network, either by connecting to existing relationships or doing something that helps to create new relationships, like writing a post. Starting over again, in each medium, can be daunting, especially for someone in a position of authority who is concerned about image or influence.

Yes, you need to use the tools first. You have to understand what it’s like to be a node in a social network. There is almost nothing like it in the industrial workplace or school system to prepare you for this. Therefore you won’t know what you’re talking about until you learn the new language of online networks. The only way to learn a new language is through practice. Social media are new languages.

PS: I took Stuart’s advice and downloaded the social web browser, Flock, from which I wrote this post.

Selecting Social Network Platforms

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At the Work Literacy course (starts today, with 365 people registered) we’re using Ning as our social networking platform. According to my co-facilitator, Michele Martin, “Online social networks facilitate connections between people based on shared interests, values, membership in particular groups (i.e., friends, professional colleagues), etc. They make it easier for people to find and communicate with individuals who are in their networks using the Web as the interface.” That’s an okay working definition and gives those new to the concept an idea of what I’m talking about.

We chose Ning because it is easy to manage as a completely hosted service. It’s been around long enough to have the major kinks worked out, the company is well funded and all of the facilitators have used it before. We also don’t expect this community to be active for long after the 6 week course is over, though we could be surprised. We didn’t expect to have so many people sign up either. Our initial idea was to use Ning as the connector, while writing on our own blogs, or the Work Literacy blog. For communities that are going to be around for a longer period of time, a different platform could be more suitable.

I came across Grou.ps recently and set up a demo community. I like the interface and the various options for modules. Grou.ps also includes a wiki module. Like Ning, it is not open source, but the company says that an OS version is coming. Grou.ps has already donated a fair bit of code back to open source projects. I prefer using open source based platforms for any community site that has the potential to scale. With open source you keep the option of migrating the platform to your own servers where you can maintain better control of service.

Another new player that I’ve only looked at quickly is Buddy Press, a social networking framework built on WordPress MU (multi-user). An example of WordPressMU used for education is edublogs. Since I’m already using WordPress and wordpress.org has always been open source, I’m quite excited about this new set of tools. BuddyPress is in Beta at this time, so it may not be best for your first company-launched community. Let the geeks test it out first.

Finally, an older player in the open source community space is Elgg. The free Eduspaces service offers Elgg as a hosted service, which you can test out and connect with the educational technology community.

There are several options to test out social networking online as well as some open source platforms that won’t break the bank and will allow you to tinker with what’s under the hood. As far as the technology is concerned, there are few excuses not to try out social networking for work or learning. Notice that I didn’t have to mention the really big social networking platforms that are getting all the mainstream media attention?

Being Local

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I spent the weekend helping out with a few community events. We had our Fall Fair, with some great entertainers and also had a farm field day that saw over 5,000 visitors, followed by an environmental trade show on the street – Green4Generations. The latter included a free showing of Who Killed the Electric Car, with David Swan, one of the engineers on the original GM project. David brought along a Toyota RAV4 electric car:

On Sunday I remembered what Lester Brown had said the night before – that there will be a trend toward local energy and local food. We already have our own solar energy specialists in the area, at Ener-green Coop:

We are also supporting local farmers through the Sackville CSA:

Being local doesn’t mean being out of touch with the Web and the global community. You may have noticed that I’ve used WordPress to set up a few of our local websites, keeping costs to a minimum at only $15 per year for a domain name. Our local sustainability initiatives include communicating what we are doing to anyone who may be interested and learning from others. All of this was started by a local outdoor shop, Wanderlust Outfitters. The idea of Community Supported Agriculture is not ours, but we’ve adapted it for local conditions. As Lester Brown wrote in my copy of his book, “Let’s do it!”.

“Climate change is the result of a massive market failure” —LB

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If you want to address climate change, then the best thing you can do is get politically active, according to Lester Brown, founder of the Earth Policy Institute, speaking here in Sackville on Saturday evening.

Some highlights of his presentation:

  • How many failing states do we need before we have a failing civilization?
  • It is possible to cut carbon emissions by over 80%; we just lack the political will (and Brown has the numbers to prove it).
  • We may be reaching a tipping point in our willingness to do something about climate change but the major obstacles are at the political level.
  • New thinking is happening today and even the oil companies are starting to focus on renewable energy.
  • The trend is toward localisation, for both energy and food. Our food choices will decrease and we’ll move back to seasonal products.
  • We are in a race between tipping points — natural and political. If we can tip the political will, then we can stop the natural tipping points, such as the meltdown of the Greenland ice cap, which will increase sea levels by 23 feet.
  • Based on the advice of prominent scientists and economists around the world, the best way to significantly reduce our carbon emissions are 1) reduce individual income taxes, while 2) increasing carbon taxes.

I picked up a copy of Lester Brown’s latest book, Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization and look forward to reading it.

Finally, some memorable advice:

Saving civilization is not a spectator sport.

Atlantic Social Media

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Third Tuesday NB had a great meetup last night in Moncton, with CommandN TV on-site. They are an excellent example of folks from Atlantic Canada who have worked hard to create their own niche in this market, with growing success. Even though Jeff is the only one on the team who currently resides here, I think that that we may be able to lure them, and many others, here with a simpler lifestyle, cheaper housing, bigger yards, and lots of clean water (more water than we wanted this year).

I engaged in several conversations with start-ups and even was able to connect a few folks. I’m more positive about this business/social/tech gathering, which is very much a grassroots efforts, than many others that have been attempted in our region in the past decade. We had several people drive up from Halifax, which added to the mix. The Meetups cross over industries and disciplines and the inclusion of marketing & communications specialists has given techies a bit more shine. The conversations are just more interesting.

moncton meetup

Speaking of social media, there is a good review of Seven Social Media Consultants on R/WW, even highlighting a Canadian! Check out links to their blogs and podcasts for some more interesting perspectives.

Community Platforms

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Dion Hinchcliffe has a good overview of the leading technology platforms for communities of practice, ranking Joomla and Drupal at the top. I’ve used Mambo, from which Joomla developed (forked) and have used Drupal in several cases. I find Drupal to be exceptionally powerful but it requires a skilled team to implement it. If Joomla is like Mambo, it’s easier to get up and running but is not as flexible as Drupal. Anyway, it’s not really about the technology, but good tools can help the community grow and get its work done. Hinchcliffe also offers this example of the lifecycle of a CoP:

I’ve seen communities and members at these various stages and this is a good analogy. In my experience though, progression is not linear and people can depart from all levels. Here are some conclusions from a community of practice/interest I worked with five years ago:

  • A sense of community cannot be forced;
  • communities are self-defined;
  • communities are conversations; and
  • communities evolve over time.
  • Face-to-face contact can be the impetus for online conversations, while online contact can be the impetus for face-to-face meetings.
  • Communities of individuals have stronger bonds than communities of companies;
  • blogging helps to define dispersed communities; and
  • password-protected web sites do not encourage conversation.

Choosing a suitable platform can make your job easier but any technology will constrain the community in certain ways. It’s best to put off the technology selection to as late as possible, once you’ve got the pulse of the people, the work, the values and the vision.

LearnNB President calls for Humility

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I’ve been involved in some way with LearnNB since its inception in 2003. For the most part, it’s been very much a maintenance of the status quo kind of professional/industrial association. There have been some interesting conferences but the association has produced few tangible results.

I worked as a paid contractor for LearnNB this Spring, after a long arm’s-length relationship (some of which I explained in Rx for NB Learning). The main reason I took on this contract was because of the integrity of Kathy Watt, President of LearnNB. In her latest message, Kathy addresses some real issues facing those of us in the workplace.

Think about this: professional management was born from the desire to optimize and control, not to lead waves of change. You may be familiar with the names of a couple of fathers of modern management theory, Frederick Taylor and Henry Ford. “Oh, not us,” you may say. “Just last year the whole senior management team spent two brain-numbing days tearing apart the strategic plan with the sole purpose of renewing leadership and thus, heightening innovation within our organization.” Dr. Phil’s now well-worn question is still appropriate, “So, how’s that workin’ for ya?’

Her advice includes this – “... we need to experience some personal and professional humility, and admit that we don’t really know how to solve some of the complex challenges that we are facing.”

This is a very refreshing perspective and I hope that others take up the conversation and see what we can do when we discuss our issues openly and candidly.

Unmeeting

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I attended a learning conversation on Unmeetings with Jay Cross and several other very interesting people today.  This will be the first of a series of dialogs on Learnscape Architecture. Jay said initially that, “The conversation will go where it wants to, but we’ll begin by considering how unmeetings can facilitate learning.”

My reflections and notes from the hour-long conversation follow. Unstructured conferences allow people who wouldn’t normally speak up an opportunity to do so. There was a reference to the book Why Work Sucks and the notion that all meetings should be optional. A point was made that the core question around unmeetings was how much structure does it take to create value. More discussion led to the observation that set agendas may not be necessary and may even impinge on learning. An example is the World Cafe, a model where everyone has a voice, not just the official speakers.

A key to good meetings, including unmeetings, is more so in the facilitation, not any set agenda.  A facilitator is someone who can watch the flow. The idea of  flow from one type of tool to another came out. Perhaps we need some paths to enable better work flow, starting with unmeetings/openspace, which can produce artefacts such as visualisations/mind maps. These can then lead to participative structures like blogs/wikis and finally, once the path is clearer, to project management.

Blogs and social media for beginners

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I was asked the other day how an established company could start using blogs, but I soon found out that they meant any social media. As a start, I’m going to tie together a few threads from my Delicious bookmarks.

Dave Snowden’s pithy advice is a good place to begin, when considering blogs for sharing knowledge across the company:

  1. Install software for blogs (designed for blogs that is, not a general package with blogs tagged on).
  2. Learn from what other people have done using blogs, but under no circumstances copy what someone else has done—no matter how successful. Your context is different.
  3. Now be patient.
  4. Find out what is working and what is not.

As Jon Husband says, when discussing the government’s use of social media, “It’s about finding and using pertinent information more quickly and more easily, and letting people do what they do best when addressing an issue using curiosity, common sense and a desire to do their work well. ”

I’ve mentioned the benefits of blogging for myself and any business that wants to show leadership in its field should consider the medium, as noted by Business Blog Consulting:

As you continue to build your blog over time, creating great content in a specific niche, Google’s more likely to return your blog as a result when a journalist starts researching a column or article. I’ve never hired a PR firm, and I work out of the top right corner of the US us locals call “Maine”, but I’ve gotten quotes in Inc., BusinessWeek Small Biz, and other periodicals and the local evening news because of our Web marketing blog.

Blogs and wikis can be used to organise knowledge and facilitate communication. They can also be ways of connecting with customers and sharing amongst fellow practitioners. They aren’t a one-way medium to direct your message to your “target market”, so learning by trying is highly recommended, especially if you’re used to one-way print, radio or TV media.

The bottom line is that it’s not about the technology and all about the organisation’s culture. The last question should be, “what blog platform should we use?”.

Related posts:

The business of social media

An ecosystem of knowledge

Blogs at the core of KM and collaboration

What business are you in?