A really excellent and fun video on the ethnography of YouTube
from Michael Wesh who apparently is Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology at Kansas State University.
His original machine is using us video:
From: Johnnie Moore's blog
A really excellent and fun video on the ethnography of YouTube
from Michael Wesh who apparently is Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology at Kansas State University.
His original machine is using us video:
From: Johnnie Moore's blog
I have just finished reading 'Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing without Organizations' by Clay Shirkyand I enjoyed it so much I thought that I would jot down a few thoughts here. I'm not quite sure how I came across the book, I hadn't heard of Clay Shirky before but he clearly has a deep understanding on how the internet has had an impact on society and how groups behave.
Every once in a while it's good to take a break from the day to day immersion in the here and now and reflect on some of the changes that have happened. I found this book to be a very valuable way of looking at those changes now that the use of collaborative tools are available to anyone that can get online or receive an email.
Here are my favourite thoughts and insights from the book:
If you like all this type of stuff I thoroughly recommend it as a good read.
If you dont have time for the book, here is the author's presentation to the TED conference from 2005 which covers the same themes in around 20 minutes.
I didn't make it to the 2gether08 'unconference' this week but I've been following some of the content coming out of what looked like a very interesting event.
I really enjoyed this short video trying to map the social entrepreneur landscape by Cliff Prior and Nick Temple from Unltd. I particularly liked the analogy of web 2.0 to the arrival of the railways, that doesn't feel too far off. Lets hope that people don't get stuck in the swamp of misrepresentation...
The social entrepreneur landscape from David Wilcox on Vimeo.
I really enjoyed this video (via Kristine Lowe) of Ethan Zuckerman presenting the history of digital community in less than 7 minutes. Well worth a watch.
Something that creates a great deal of debate where I work is the changing role of journalists in online publishing.
My colleague Andrew has some great thoughts on what a new recruit into the rapidly changing world of digital journalism might look like. It sounds like an exciting job...
A good video outlining the case for data portability on social sites to be found below if you haven't seen it already...
DataPortability - Connect, Control, Share, Remix from Smashcut Media on Vimeo.
It is good to see Read/Write web outlining some big trends in their toolkit for 2008.
Their suggestions for the areas to watch this year are;
I would add vertical/niche social networking to the list.
I'm really hoping for a Zeppelin comeback this year; no not that Zeppelin. After watching the Golden Compass over Christmas I found myself asking; Why are more people not getting around in airships?
After all there is a lot to say in favour of this form of transport;
If people's safety fears can be allayed now that they are no longer filled with combustible gas, then why not? There is even a UK company who apparently have a model that can land anywhere aiming for a world tour later this year.
Probably the reason that the Zeppelin / Airship comeback hasn't really taken off yet is that it's a big idea. One that's going to take plenty of mistakes along the way to make successful. One that could completely fail, but if it does 'take off' could really change the world. The type of idea it might be hard to find a financial backer for. It would probably seem easier to go after those small incremental ideas which in the end don't amount to much.
In the online world it would also be good to see some really big bets this year. I loved this post from bubblegeneration on 'think bigger' being a principle for 2008. Let's hope that all that talk in the press about an economic slowdown doesn't stop entrepreneurs and their backers making the big bets that will really move online forward.
So what is the Zeppelin comeback of Social Media? Any big ideas?
UPDATE: Here's an excellent transcript from BBC Radio 4's our own correspondent who recently took a Zeppelin flight
I was interested in this WSJ article this week that pointed out some of the similarities between email and social networking sites which I had not considered before. In many ways bringing together email and 'on-site' social networking features seems to be a good idea. Quite often a short email discussion thread can be a very effective way of sharing information with your contacts and friends.
I'm sure this is the thinking behind startups like Fuser and Grouptivity.
I am a Product Manager for various online products.
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