Category: Web 2.0

Are You a Talker or a Doer — Do Some Good Now

Good Works, Smart Bloggers, Web 2.0

I have been watching the gang at Decisive Flow for almost as long as I have been writing this blog — which is now well over two years. In start up world, that is about 10 years. And when you consider that Nat and Tim and the gang are based in New Zealand, far away from the spotlight and funding of Silicon Valley, then their successes are magnified several times over.

Why have Decisive Flow succeeded in a world of cut throat agencies, design shops and digitial sweatshops? I would like to say because they are nice folks … because they are clever. Because they do good work. Well it is more than these things … sure good work is important. Sure you need smart folk, good talent and it helps to be pleasant. But clearly, Decisive Flow deliver results. They identify gaps in the market and then seek to fill them. They create value for themselves, their clients and the consumers that they serve. They go beyond the mere creation of websites and applications, tapping into a global movement that aligns personal conviction with global need. It is the difference between talking and doing.

This project is a great example of how content, need, strategy and action come together in a Web 2.0 world. For every 100,000 visitors to THIS site between now and July 1st, one mason will be trained by LJ Urban to build houses in the land locked country of Burkina Faso (in Africa). That’s right … all you need to do is VISIT the site and encourage others to do so. This will make a REAL difference to the lives of a family. Learn more in this video …

And while the first step is to visit, there are many more options for action:

  1. Blog about this site. Let your readers know what is going on. Encourage them to visit.
  2. Write emails to your friends. Bookmark the site. Create traffic.
  3. Visit the blog and comment.
  4. Go the whole hog — buy a house and train a mason

Oh, and obviously, if you have a digital project that you need to activate. Give Tim and Nat a call. I am sure their simple and loveable approach will ring true for your business and your customers.

Get Your Head Out of the Clouds!

Innovation, Smart Bloggers, Social Media, Web 2.0

Day 86 – Head in the Clouds
Originally uploaded by margolove

Greg Verdino’s challenging post Beyond Knowledge has generated some great discussion on the nature of knowledge and the impact of the Internet/Web 2.0 on how we all tap into this massive "crowdsourced brain". I have been fascinated by the concept of knowledge management for years and actually ran a KM group for IBM years ago — and what I learned then (and what Greg clearly identifies upfront) is that knowledge is not the domain of technology (yet) but of people.

You see, there are lots of really smart people out there in the world. They can be working in your business, they might be sitting in the cube next to you, or they could be on the other side of the planet. But how do you know what they know? How can they manifest this in a way that allows their expertise to shine out and reach the person who needs it? For this to happen you need a couple of things — you need:

  • A platform for communication
  • A method of organising the data
  • A way of connecting it all up

In the web 2.0 world, we have platforms coming out our ears — we have blogs, wikis, video sharing sites, podcasts etc. We also have tagging and bookmarking to categorise and share our interests. And we have search engines and rating systems etc to connect it all up. But all this lives in the cloud and is the domain of cloud computing.

It is using all these elements that you, dear reader, are able to find my often misguided marketing meanderings. It is what allows the thoughts and ideas of one individual to reach out beyond the circles of life limited by time and geography. But why does this breakthrough? As Greg points out, I think it has to do with seeing the value in a shift from knowledge to conversation (or as Greg says, "connection").

When I worked at IBM we held seminars and meetings. Lots of them. We showcased ideas and project work. We wrote about them on the intranet. We championed the individuals whose efforts and breakthroughs made innovation possible. And we talked. And the thing that worked most effectively was the lunchtime meetings … having one person tell the story of how they solved a problem. It was like a lightening rod … conversation erupted, ideas leaped across the room. It was great.

So we decided to go bigger. While the virtual meetings were well subscribed, there was a demand for face-to-face storytelling. Everyone loved the ideas but also wanted to see the face behind the innovation — and our first series of seminars filled lecture halls to overflowing.

We were building a forum for ideas. But there was a business purpose here … I was also looking at commercial viability. I needed to be able to see a future opportunity — a patent perhaps or the licensing of code. But I also needed to see something else — a personal champion. As Greg points out, with knowledge freely available it becomes a commodity. A great idea can string separate knowledge chunks together — but it takes a resilient person and a network of supporters to push through the barriers of innovation apathy to turn an idea into something tangible. It’s no longer a case of "what you know" nor of "who you know" but of:

"who knows you + knows what you know".

And this is where Web 2.0 comes in. It is now far easier to create and enable these conversations via technology (in fact, this post is part of a conversation that is also occuring points out) or the sheer human pull of a good storyteller to make knowledge valuable.

Greg Verdino also promises another couple of posts extending this topic. I am looking forward to more conversation!

Blending Trends and Brands in 2008

Digital Strategy, Innovation, Social Media, Web 2.0

Trendblend2008Today was a bit of a Ross Dawson fest for me. Not only did I listen to the podcast that he recorded with Stan Relihan, I also found this cool Shanghai Tube-inspired map of trend predictions for 2008 (download the PDF here).

While I don’t necessarily agree with the mainline destinations on the map, they do provide great food for thought. However, I do like the way that different trend lines intersect (eg where politics and demographics meet at a level crossing on the outskirts of a town called Anxiety), and the use of a recognisable map structure to convey a complex information architecture and messaging is brilliant.

The podcast, on the other hand, contained some gems. Ross talks about the way that social media is the future of organisations — positing that enterprises now manage conversation flow in, through and out of the organisation in ways that traditional media companies do. This means that similar disciplines and approaches need to be put in place to harness, transform and unleash this information/knowledge as a way of delivering competitive advantage (my explanation).

I also found Ross’ definition of Web 2.0 refreshingly simple. He says, Web 2.0 "… transforms mass participation into something valuable". From a brand and advertising point of view, this has some obvious implications:

  • What is valuable to your brand
  • What kind of situation/event would prompt your audience/consumers to participate
  • How will you measure this

With these three questions in mind, make sure you ask your agency/marketing team how participative media/web 2.0 is going to transform your business this year. Run these answers across the Trend Blend map and you may well have the seeds of a digital strategy sitting in the palm of your hand. It is already shaping up to be an interesting year.

Why the Cluetrain Still Rings True

Web 2.0

howard barker
Originally uploaded by christheobscure

I remember first reading the Cluetrain Manifesto. I remember drinking in the 95 Theses and feeling like my senses were tingling. They were tingling, yes, but it did not seem to be a surprise.

What the collaborators were talking about — participation and activism — was something I had been studying for years. It was just that I was studying Theatre, not Marketing, not Technology. You see, I had just written a thesis on the brilliant English playwright, Howard Barker, and one of his most powerful pieces of critical writing was called "49 Asides for a Tragic Theatre". In this statement, written when Thatcherite Britain was at its zenith, Barker called for challenging and provocative theatre — a theatre of participation.

Ideology is the outcome of pain.
Some people want to know pain. There is no truth on the cheap.
There are more people in pursuit of knowledge than the accountants will admit.
There is always the possibility of an avalanche of truth-seekers.

Many years on from the publishing of the Cluetrain, we are still living in an age where the promise of a revolutionary form of conversation still has power. It has power because, despite its popularity, the ideas contained within the Cluetrain are hard to manifest. Consequently, the Cluetrain remains a marginalised tract.

I was reminded of this recently when I presented at InterestingSouth. I had interspliced text from the Cluetrain with images taken by my four year old daughters. And, to me, the words seemed to float out across the audience who were hearing this, perhaps, for the first time. It made me tremble. It made me focus more precisely on the words. This three minutes seemed much more important. Urgent.

What I like about the Cluetrain is its immediacy. It restores you to yourself — an individual experiencing the tragedy and beauty of everyday living. As Barker would say:

It dares to be beautiful. Who talks of beauty any more? They think it is to do with the costumes.

And it is because of this immediacy. Because of its daring. And because it continues to question the structures of power and influence, the Cluetrain will continue to maintain its relevance. At least for some. Again, from Barker:

People will endure anything for a grain of truth.

Russell Takes Over the Blogosphere

Web 2.0

We have all noticed that Technorati has been having some problems … the pings are slow to update (if they update at all), inbound links don’t seem to aggregate and changes in personal details are often lost in the ether. Imagine my suprise when I checked Technorati to find that Russell Davies has now taken over the ownership of all my favourite blogs. Now I know he is prolific, but really!

What You Need to Know About Your Privacy and Social Networks

Web 2.0

It’s fun being part of a social network. It can be great to participate in movie polls, in music quizzes and to attract others of like mind through widgets, games and discussion boards. But it is important to remember that EVERY single piece of data that you share contributes to your seen and unseen profile. That’s right, your interaction, your engagement and your PREFERENCES are captured by the massive databases that power the sites that we love such as Facebook and Google.

Colin from Canuckflack shares this brilliant presentation that explains exactly what happens to your information. Now, it is fine to play and engage with these sites … it is just important to do so in full knowledge of the mechanisms that SUBSIDIZE the "free" nature of the systems. Remember, there really is no such thing as a free lunch.

We March Backwards into the Future

Web 2.0

Sorry folks, I forgot to post this one … thanks to Doug Meacham for reminding me of it!

It feels like Michael Wesch Week here at ServantOfChaos. First of all there was the Information R/evolution and then a post at MarketingProfs.

He also explains that he started producing the video on the fly, so the mistakes were included. As the piece evolved, he realised that the mistakes were an important element which then caused a shift in his own thinking. He need to "plan mistakes".

In another nod to the past, Michael also explains that Kevin Kelly’s We Are the Web piece from Wired in 2005 — perhaps this is also partly why Katie claims there are no such thing as IDEAS.

Rate Your Professor

Web 2.0

Ratemyprofessorscom It must be the season for it! Every day I see a blog post or a tweet talking about presenting social media / web 2.0 to students. In fact, I did the very same recently.

But when we think about Web 2.0 and its applicability to the education system, we often think about enabling systems — about pushing education and content to students in an open and collaborative environment. And while this is great, it is very structured around learning. One of the clever Facebook strategies has been to enable students to systematise the LIFESTYLE aspect of studying. But what if this was applied in a new direction — back onto the college/university itself. What about your teachers? Now you can even RATE your professors. If only this was around in my day! Via etcetera.

The Business of Web 2.0

Web 2.0

Just finished giving a presentation to a group of MBA students at Macquarie Graduate School of Management (thanks to Dennis Price). It was the first time that I had the reason to think through the idea of the NEW B2C — brand to community (thanks to Geoff Moore) — using the Age of Conversation as a case study. Hope you enjoy it (PS I have speaker notes if you need them).

Thanks to the following for their ideas which were woven together:

Social Activism and iTunes U

Web 2.0

Normally I complain about Apple and iTunes, but today I have a positive story. I was checking out iTunes U and found some great free content on sustainability, environmentalism and global warming. This series is free to download and features luminaries such as Al Gore (The Earth in the Balance) and William McDonough (Cradle to Cradle Design).

And, of course, following the hypertext love, there are links through to Stanford’s Social Innovation Review site. There is plenty of great insight (some subscription only) here around non-profits, foundations and socially responsible businesses. They even have a blog.

Update: There are also some great seminars, chats, poetry etc also available on iTunes U. Check out "Consciousness, Creativity and the Brain", UC Berkeley campus event featuring David Lynch.