Full Circle Associates

I'm in a gatherer mode today - bringing together some links and blog posts that reflect some of the thinking I'm doing in my work. Commentary at the bottom.

Knowledge-at-work: Knowledge exchanges in the blogosphere
Denham writes:

Do blogs really provide an easy, effective medium for deep dialog, creative abrasion and sincere knowledge exchanges?

IMO voicing, personal publishing (= push?), journalling, ephemeral commentary and cross-linking to like-minded blogs, is but a small facet of effective exchange.

At times I think k-logs are hyped by a few evangelists. If you look closely at the record, things are not all that rosy

* reciprocity is very poor - bloggers tend to say this does not matter, it is more important to be heard, to 'voice' or 'push' and publish your view - but reciprocity and a compact record help preserve the memory and emergent meaning

* 'community' happens from individual enclaves - bloggers retreat to their personal spaces to reply, the common 'space' is then fractal, distributed and walled - it lacks cohesion and persistence

* the 'record' is fragmented even categories and RSS feeds do not produce a coherent easily readable discourse that flows

* empathy is low - most times it is about branding and spreading memes and personal opinion rtaher than engaging in dialog.

Feel you need a more neutral container, a safe 'knowledge' space to commune, a 'Ba' to build trust and sustain dialog, equal edit access to encourage true collaborative writing (annealing / refactoring / facile annotation), an easier turn-taking flow to practice persistent conversation before you can have full sharing, develop the cohesion & trust to enable creative abrasion, supply sufficient context for sharing meaning and a pull space for deep listening / reflection.

K-logs are great for gathering news, RSS certainly helps with being informed, blog tools assist with finding memes - somehow I still feel blogging lacks the structures to engage in deep dialog. A cursory look shows little sustained turntaking, blog writers seldom reply directly to comments in their own blogs and themes 'die' quickly as individual writers move on to the next big item. Bloggers offer opinions rather than ask questions - inquiry and exploration are essential ingredients in knowledge formation.

I don't question the basic belief about the social construction of knowledge. But I do question a few of these points. For example, I would not say that empathy is always low. I think empathy is much a factor of one's network (extent, quality or lack thereof) than the medium in which the interaction takes place.

I agree that we are still seeking the structures that bridge from information sharing to sense making. No new opinion from me on that. Flog that blog!

As to bloggers offering opinions rather than asking question, I'm not sure of the extent of that behavior -- I have no data. I have seen that when I ask questions in this blog, I get responses. And I try to respond. (There are some tool issues involved, as well as time!)

What I am wondering about outloud now is how I use my blog. Do I come at it from a more social construction from past experience and thus get a more community based experience out of it? Does my past inform my blogstyle? How do I find others who share this communal approach in a more explicit way?