sociocorpus
notes on the evolving life of the socius online
transition alert: sociocorpus is emerging in the place of the 'Knowledge Management', 'eLearning' and 'Online Groups' blogs on this site
30 October 2003
we produce as much content as we consume
USATODAY.com - E-mails, digital media produce data mountain
The publication of content by a single source for mass consumption was an artefact of the industrial revolution. Now, as in pre-industrial societies, each of us expresses and ingests ideas in our own network of relationships. It's just that those networks are no longer as limited by space or time as they were.
A University of California study has found that in 2002, people around the globe created about 800 megabytes per person of new information.
How can we organise this stuff so that it can be made use of?
Here are the usual methods:
1 - in structured repositories - libraries, filing cabinets and file systems all allow you to have each item in one place; these work well for single source-multi-consumer content but are too restrictive for producer-consumers
2 - meta-data - enables you to navigate to an item via multiple taxonomies as in document management systems; this is great but relies on the producers attaching meta-data, which we often don't
3 - storing items by content-type - emails here, files there, images in a third place; meets technical requirements specific to each format very well but doesn't make it easier to find things (or people)
4 - Google - an good panacea for the ills of the above but requires you to start from scratch each time and isn't much good at pushing relevant content towards you; works much better in conjunction with the methods above
Other ways are emerging:
1 - online collaboration; when people and documents are visibly associated with the groups and communities that they work and learn in, the knowledge they can provide inherently becomes much more accessible
2 - collaborative filtering; makes connections between people based on their individual consumption and production patterns
3 - topic maps, affinity mapping and other approaches that integrate technology and ontology
posted by Dan Randow 10:41 AM permanent link
14 October 2003
The sociocorpus differentiates due to adverse conditions.
Shirky: File-sharing Goes Social This is an excellent article by Clay Shirky... highly perceptive of the evolution of the socius online.
posted by Walter Logeman 6:03 PM permanent link
03 October 2003
Organic Knowledge Management
Thanks to the The Big Idea (an online community of New Zealand's creative industries) for this transcript of a Radio NZ Interview with David Snowden on Organic Knowledge Management.
Snowden says create attractors and set boundaries. People will naturally self-organise to maximise their gain from interaction. Where cultural groups are too isolated to see that each other have points of view, a common language can begin to form around 'common denominators' ie stories that make sense in both cultures. Sometimes you have to go low to find the highest one.
posted by Dan Randow 10:25 AM permanent link
Seradigm KM Web Log
Here is the KM Web Log of my friend a colleague, Julian Carver of Seradigm. Julian is a seasoned knowledge management strategist and a connoisseur of KM-related software.
posted by Dan Randow 10:19 AM permanent link
OpenOffice 1.1 Released
Word on the street is that OpenOffice 1.1 is "much better". Easier to use. Better compatibility with MS Office. Nice features like output to PDF or even Flash. It's XML-based and free. All it needs is critical mass. 1.1 seems a good step closer to that.
posted by Dan Randow 10:10 AM permanent link
MIT OpenCourseWare Launches 500 Courses
Pursuing their mission "to advance knowledge and education, and serve the world in the 21st century", MIT's OpenCourseWare has the content for 500 regular MIT courses online for free access.
Does this really lower barriers to accessing knowledge or is it a bold test of whether it's content that makes the difference?
I will be interested to observe the processes and communities that evolve to create and share knowledge using this. Are there already self-managing communities of people 'doing' the courses? Will other institutions run programmes using MIT's materials and providing their own learning context and credentials?
As a note, OCW runs on Micrsoft Content Management System 2002.
posted by Dan Randow 10:04 AM permanent link
