Category: technology stewardship

CPSquare Platforms for Communities of Practice Event

My friends and colleagues over at CPSquareCPSquare, the community of practice on communities of practice, are launching a member driven event next week, Platforms for Communities of Practice. Since I’m often rambling about technologies for communities, I thought some of you might be interested. Here’s some snippets about the event which is all online – from the comfort of you computer, in your jammies if you please…

We’re exploring a half dozen platforms together — attempting to look at the software through the eyes of a community that’s been on that platform for a while. Currently we’re expecting to visit:

* xPERT eCommunity (Q2learning)
* CompanyCommand – Eco (Tomoye)
* TBA – Web Crossing
* TBA – drupal
* CIARIS – Custom-made using Ruby on Rails
* Story-telling in Organizations – Ning
* Best practices in e-learning community – Moodle and Facebook

For each platform / community combination we’re having several levels of engagement:

* Read a post about the community and the platform, written by a knowledgeable person
* View a video that represents a tour of the aforementioned community
* Self-register to use a “play space” where you can get a sense of what the software is about and how it works
* Participate in a discussion on the platform itself with community members about their community and their experience of using the platform
* Participate in asynchronous discussions back here that summarize or reflect on all the foregoing
* Participate in a synchronous phone conference about all of the above
* (Might be follow-on summarization and reflection and meta-conversations)

Rather than asking which platform is “the best” we are asking, “what kinds of communities thrives on each of these quite different platforms?” We’re inviting community leaders, technology stewards, and software vendors to all spend three weeks together thinking about issues of common concern.

The event is organized by CPsquare members and is open to guests who register here. (CPsquare members who are presenting or facilitating can bring a guest for free.)

Just a note: if you are not a CPSquare member and can’t get in for free, you may want to consider becoming a member. Full membership is $150 with discounts for students and others. So it may be cost effective to join and then participate for free!

What about the freaking book?

Some of you know that Etienne Wenger, John Smith and I have been working on a book about technology for communities of practice for what seems like an eternity. Well, there IS progress. We are working on the final round of writing and editing. We desperately need a graphic designer who can help us turn our images into something useful. The focus is information graphics.  (Yes, with a very small budget!) If you are interested, ping me. In the meantime, John posted a wee update on the book blog… Technology for Communities » Time marches on. One of the things he did was share a couple of graphics we are using. (These are examples of the work we need someone to improve upon!)

What is an API?

I have been doing little editing/clean-up bits for the upcoming “Stewarding Technology for Communities” book and one of the things we want to get right are the technical terms – and we want them to be understandable to people who may not be techies. One that I was chasing down yesterday was API, or Application Programming Interface. I wasn’t clear if APIs opened up access to functionality, the actual code, or both. I decided to ask my Twitter friends. Here is what I learned – I thought I would share it with you.

reply to NancyWhite

  • davecormier @nancywhite it’s like exposing the underside of a lego block. if you make your block to fit the holes, you can connect to it 04:27 PM January 02, 2008
  • D’Arcy Norman dnorman @nancywhite: APIs expose functionality so you can write your own code to incorporate it. 01:17 PM January 02, 2008
  • Chris Lott fncll @NancyWhite also depends on what is meant by “access” to code– a proprietary system w/API can provide access to code 11:13 AM January 02, 2008
  • Chris Lott fncll @nancywhite APIs provide access to existing functions, code and data, any or all of which can be used to further functionality. 11:12 AM January 02, 2008
  • Scott Leslie sleslie @nancyWhite forget what I just said. I thought you were asking a different question. Just waking up. 11:42 AM January 02, 2008
  • Scott Leslie sleslie @NancyWhite both, it depends. Some API’s focused around giving you functionality, other’s around data (though w/ data, there are other ways) 11:41 AM January 02, 2008
  • Jan Karlsbjerg JanKarlsbjerg @NancyWhite API’s make FUNCTIONALITY accessible to other programs/programmers. 11:38 AM January 02, 2008
  • Lion Kimbro LionKimbro @NancyWhite: APIs make functionality accessible. Even if code is available, I wouldn’t necessarily call it “accessible.” 12:21 PM January 02, 2008

Hoosgot: Reciprocity and Community Indicator Rolled into One

Dave Sifry is filling the quiet end-of-year time with a project that makes it easy to ask and answer with and for each other online in a variety of ways. Sifry’s Alerts: Announcing Hoosgot: Resurrecting the Lazyweb

Today I’m unveiling a new service that I put together over the last 48 hours. It’s called hoosgot.com. Hoosgot (pronounced “who’s got…”) is a simple way to ask who’s got what you’re looking for. Just put “hoosgot” in a blog post or a Twitter tweet and it’ll show up on Hoosgot. Send a twitter to @hoosgot, it works as well. You can tag a post with hoosgot or lazyweb, and we’ll pick it up as well, as long as your blog is indexed by Technorati. It’s meant to give you a place to send the requests for all of those things that you’ve wanted, but just can’t find – chances are, what you want already exists and someone else out there in the ether knows about it (or has built it!)If someone’s got what you’re looking for, or a clue in that direction, they post a comment. RSS feeds flow from the posts and the comments.

For example, you might ask:

hoosgot an easy-to-use pencil sharpener that has suction cups on the bottom so I can stick it anywhere?

or:

hoosgot a simple camera bag that you can stick a laptop in, and still carry over your shoulder without knocking over pedestrians? Note I’m not looking for a knapsack or a backpack, I want it to act like a messenger bag…

And so on.

It works if you work it: Give back to the web

Of course, you should subscribe to hoosgot, it has RSS feeds (the main feed and the comments feed) so you can watch and participate – for Hoosgot only works if you comment on the questions posed. Happen to know where someone can find the information they seek? Interested in collaborating with them on creating that invention described when the person invoked hoosgot or the lazyweb? Leave a comment on the entry, and give back to the web that has given us so much.

Hoosgot is a great community indicator in that it has its roots in the work of an earlier community (Lazyweb) and many individuals, it is offered as a gift to the world, and it lives that value in the very service it offers. Pretty sweet. Thanks, Dave.

Repost: Blogs and Community, Launching a New Paradigm

One of the hassles of moving between blog software is the difficulty of finding old stuff in the archives. Today someone was looking for this article, Blogs and Community – launching a new paradigm for online community? and it was really hard to find. So I’m “reprinting” it here on the WP part of my blog for easier future finding!

Blogs and Community – launching a new paradigm for online community?

First published 2006 in the Knowledge Tree
Edublog award winner, best paper, 2006

In September, the following article of mine was published on the The Knowledge Tree. I decided I’d like to have a copy on my website, so I’m reproducing it here. I’ve added a little postcript to the end. Plus I learned yesterday that the paper was nominated for an Edublog award. More on that in a separate post.

Just a note to those seeing it as I first put it up, I have some work to do to put the graphics on my site, so it may be funky till I work out the tweaks. The tables about 3/4 of the way down are easier to read in the word/PDF versions. I’ll also get a PDF up here as well, but in the short term I’ll link to the copies on the Knowledge Tree site!

For downloads of hard copies (word and pdf, go to the Knowledge Tree site. Click to access the recording of the live gathering and conversation in which we furthered this exploration.

Continue reading Repost: Blogs and Community, Launching a New Paradigm