Sunday, May 6, 2007

Networked Book Adhocracies -Turning conversation into action

In Paul Hawken's forthcoming book Blessed Unrest, he describes a growing social phenomenon that is sweeping "civil society".

Here's an excerpt:
"I now believe there are over one million organizations working toward ecological sustainability and social justice. Maybe two.

By conventional definition, this is not a movement. Movements have leaders
and ideologies. You join movements, study tracts, and identify yourself with
a group. You read the biography of the founder(s) or listen to them perorate
on tape or in person. Movements have followers, but this movement doesn¹t
work that way. It is dispersed, inchoate, and fiercely independent. There is
no manifesto or doctrine, no authority to check with.

I sought a name for it, but there isn't one."
Alvin Toffler had a name for it in his 1970 work Future Shock. He called these "purpose governed" groups Adhocracies, and predicted they would replace bureaucracies as a way of organizing work and civil society. Adhocracy enables "mass collaboration", turning the structured conversationbases of NetworkedBooks into social action.

Adhocracy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia



Gmail - Paul Hawken: To Remake the World (Orion)

Friday, April 27, 2007

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Powers of Ten with text - the iftf networked book visual interface. ????



Powers of 10 for words in a networked book the pdf is a really interesting pan and zoom with the textual components of the book - well worth considering as another "way" into the networked book.

GAMER THEORY � Blog Archive � TextArc

Thursday, April 19, 2007

MediaWiki - Meta

MediaWiki - Meta
MediaWiki is wiki software, released under the GPL, that is used by Wikimedia projects and others. It is an implementation of a wiki, a content pool that anyone can freely edit. It is developed using MediaZilla (our version of BugZilla).

/Success stories - how has Wikimedia changed your life? - Meta

Communication Projects Group/Success stories - how has Wikimedia changed your life? - Meta

Planet Wikimedia - Meta

Planet Wikimedia - Meta

A clear explanatory wikipage describing a new offering from the Wikimedia folks a good example of a conversation base tied to weblog feeds.

Amazon "Search Inside"

WisBlawg - From the UW Law Library: January 2006 Archives

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Steve Gillmor’s GestureLab � Affinity Services

Steve Gillmor’s GestureLab � Affinity Services

Michael H. Goldhaber

Michael H. Goldhaber

Service Provider Page | AttentionTrust.org

here's the process for capturing your gestures on the internet.Service Provider Page | AttentionTrust.org

LTFSDY's /Vault - Root.net

LTFSDY's /Vault - Root.net a vault for attention data.

AttentionTrust.org: a Declaration of Gestural Independence


The original treatise on Gestural Value. this is the essence of the Attention Trust and Open ID mashup.

If we are creating a Peer Production processes where new value is created through mass collaboration, we need to find a way to hook into the ATX and Open ID and make them part of our value sharing incentive system.

TRANSPARENT BUNDLES by Seth Goldstein: AttentionTrust.org: a Declaration of Gestural Independence

TRANSPARENT BUNDLES by Seth Goldstein: AttentionTrust.org: a Declaration of Gestural Independence

Here's the originall article about the AttentionTrust

There is a market mechanism for "securitizing" ATX trades that I have to rediscover - I guess Steve Gillmor is the key person to be contacted, or Goldstein- the author of this articale.TRANSPARENT BUNDLES by Seth Goldstein: AttentionTrust.org: a Declaration of Gestural Independence

AttentionTrust.org

AttentionTrust.orgheres the link to follow uponthe user controlled OPen ID - this is the other side of the equation.

Partners - Ping Identity Corporation

Partners - Ping Identity Corporation

It's been a while since I checked out Andre Durand's company,

SSO and Open ID is coming - we should make it a part of our P2P wikinomics structure. Ties in with Attention Trust too.

Investigation is under way

The TAO of Topic Maps

Learn about the power of XML based topic maps and how they might apply to Networked Books.
The TAO of Topic Maps

We are smarter than me -Peer Production of a new Networked Book

Another bigger project on We Are Smarter.org and the creation of a Networked Book - Peer Production in a big way supported by a topline publisher.

Authoring from the edge - THIS belongs in the Wikinomics playbook. I need a bookmarking tag to remind me to return to this post. I am sure Critt can help.

We Are Smarter Than Me: Home

Original link here from a search on google images for a diagram of page rank. Weird?

Blogs for Companies � Miscellaneous

Monday, April 16, 2007

fair use continued....

If the blog is to continue the use of posting low-resolution digital images taken from flickr or from googleimage search where the image is usually found connected to a specific blog post, use of a "fair use" disclaimer could use either the wikipedia fair use bug shown in the previous pos or another similar one from Creative Commons if there is one.

The "fair use" disclaimer could refer automatically to tags included in the post. This is particularly important when the blog is used as a reconstruction platform for Networked Books in which "snippets" of audio,video, text, presentation slides, are used as an attention-saving device for users who may/or may not wish to buy a full copy of the book.

Wikinomics is particularly interesting in this light since the authors :

• provided an e-book pdf for free download of Chapter One of the book

• Issued a specific challenge to readers to engage in augmenting the book through posting to
what the author's entitled " The Wikinomics Playbook" which carries this invitation in the
printed version of the book, and is also issued verbally by Don Tapscott in his presentations
about the book and the author's memes presented there.

The likely result of the NetworkedBook process is to create a larger market for the author's books, increasing the book's value to both author and publisher - so that "infringement" of the author's IP could not be claimed on the basis that the fair use of images, text, audio and video reduced the market share and profitability of the author's books or other related IP by limiting the NetworkedBook such "fair use" content as selected presentation slides,and snippets of audio/video content from longer works.

A related question is the use of NetworkedBooks as educational platforms for stimulating learning and application of the action-oriented content of the books and other author's IP as learning objects - a practice which is allowed under the fair use statutes.

We may need to visit with Creative Commons to find a specific CC deed and license suitable for what we plan to do. This will also apply to the IP content of visual interpretations by graphic facilitators under contract to perform their services and the resulting images and their repurposing as user interfaces to the underlying content - This needs to be made part of any contractual relationship with these professional artists. If the contract is made clear about the ownership of the images being held under contract by the organization/person who pays for the work to be done, and restricts the artist from reuse without permission or under a
CC 2.5 license allowing free use with attribution but no commercial application. by the artist.

Fair use Icon from Wikipedia




Here is a clip from Wikipedia where the item editor posts this low resolution copy of the cover of The Selfish Gene.

It describes how the editor justifies the "fair use"of the image, and is worth reading for its detailed description of the justification.

Could it be that all Networked Books should use a similar fair use statement and the wikipedia icon?

"This image is of a book cover, and the copyright for it is most likely owned either by the artist who created the cover or the publisher of the book. It is believed that the use of low-resolution images of book covers

qualifies as fair use under United States copyright law. Other use of this image, on Wikipedia or elsewhere, might be copyright infringement. See Wikipedia:Fair use for more information.

To the uploader: please add a detailed fair use rationale for each use, as described on Wikipedia:Image description page, as well as the source of the work and copyright information. Please include in your fair use rationale details of the particular edition (publisher, market & year of publication) of the edition you have used, and also acknowledge any cover artist if such artist is acknowledged in that edition's frontmatter. If the book cover is in the public domain (see Wikipedia:Public domain), then use the appropriate public domain tag rather than this one.

[edit] Fair use rationale for The Selfish Gene and Richard Dawkins

This image of the book cover of The Selfish Gene, The Selfish Gene3.jpg, is being linked to both from the article on the book and the article on the author. Although the picture is subject to copyright I (Mikker (...)) feel it is covered by the U.S. fair use laws because:

  1. it is a low resolution copy of a book cover;
  2. it does not limit the copyright owner's rights to sell the book in any way;
  3. copies could not be used to make illegal copies of the book;
  4. the image on the cover is significant to both articles because it is the author's most well known work and, as the cover of the original edition, illuestrates important aspects of the articles."

Friday, April 13, 2007

Wikinomics on my bookshelf at Shelfari



Shelfari - Details on Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes... by Don Tapscott, Anthony D. Williams

Click on the show more... on the above link for a concise and useful review of wikinomics which ends with this:

" An important look into the future, Wikinomics will be your road map for doing business in the twenty-first century. "

if:book: dismantling the book

if:book: dismantling the book

Obviously, a big part of the consumer market that book publishers have owned for 200 years want the nuggets, not a narrative. They're going, going, gone. The skills of a "publisher" -- developing content and connecting it to markets -- will have to be applied in different ways.

Peter: I agree that it is not the mechanical act of interconnection that is to blame but the demand side preference for chunks of texts. And the demand is probably extremely high, I agree.

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

RSS on AppleTV - source: Wired


This new "hack" for AppleTV provides RSS feeds direct to HDTV and could serve up ConversationBase content without having to archive the material on iTunes.

Future versions of the plugin will include audio and video feeds so that the entire multimedia content array could be automatically syndicated using the RSS plugin as a customized feed reader

Imagine the Networked Book custom-fed to your HDTV with user attention data being captured by Grazr and fed back into the conversation. An RSS fed TiVo ? You can follow the ant trail below to learn more, and if you have an AppleTV you can download the RSS plugin.

Cult of Wired News

Monday, April 9, 2007

10 Newspaper Myths Deconstructed



Another cogent view from Oliver Reichenstein, the author and a prinicipal in Information Architects Japan.

While the article is an analysis of the disruption of the Newspaper business and a debunking of the "straw man" myths listed by Oliver it is useful as a model for analyzing the old media book publishing business.


Information Architects Japan � iA Notebook � 10 Newspaper Myths Deconstructed

Sunday, March 25, 2007

GAM3R 7H30RY

I think this passage offers a pathway from the world of textual to videoscopic to algorithmic - capturing in a few sentences the dramatic difference between books, video and games.

GAM3R 7H30RY: "f the novel, cinema or television can reveal through their particulars an allegory of the world that makes them possible, the game reveals something else entirely. For the reader, the novel produces allegory as something textual. The world of possibility is the world of the linguistic sign. For the viewer, the screen allegory is something luminous. The world of possibility is the world of mechanical reproducibility. For the gamer, the game produces allegory as something algorithmic. The world of possibility is the world internal to the algorithm.

So: a passage from the topic to the topographic, mediated by the novel; a passage from the topographic to the topological, mediated by television; a passage, mediated by the game, from the topological to as yet unknown geographies, a point where the gamer seems to be stuck."




Understanding this shift from text, to video to games is a key to where we are being "taken" by our algorithmic journey. Are we "stuck"?

Friday, February 23, 2007

As We May Think - The MEMEX




Vannevar Bush was the Director of the Office of Naval Research in 1945 when he wrote about his vision for the MEMEX which inspired me in my work in computer-assisted document retrieval systems in the 1970's and was the seminal text that inspired Doug Engelbart in his promethean work that led to the development of the Internet, graphical user interfaces, hyperdocuments and the mouse. Here is a clip:

"There is a growing mountain of research. But there is increased evidence that we are being bogged down today as specialization extends. The investigator is staggered by the findings and conclusions of thousands of other workers—conclusions which he cannot find time to grasp, much less to remember, as they appear."

Sound familiar? As We May Think:

Diagram - The power of Visual synthesis



The synthesis of books in a visual format is a critical component in the NetworkedBook project
so I have included these 3 "posters" by the artist Adelheide Mers as examples of the visual synthesis that is possible when linking the talents of an interpretive artist with the thematic material of an author's book.

Here is how Adelheid Mers describes her purpose in diagramming the book Moral Politics by George Lakoff.


ABOUT MAKING DIAGRAMS Mers says: I diagram essays and books because this is how I make sense of the texts I read. I read these texts to help make sense of what I experience. I have all kinds of questions and seem to have a knack for finding answers in print. As a visual artist, I am intrigued by the richness of imagery that is contained in all language, popular or academic, spoken or printed. Text is never dry, it is always brimming with figures of thought, some obvious, some subtle and waiting to be extricated. I make pictures from texts. As important as the content of the diagrams is to me personally, and as excited as I am if someone shares my interests, in the end I am involved in a formal endeavor. I think that "making sense" is one of the central human activities, and that we "make sense" by comparing stories. We frequently seem to need a fresh vehicle to tell our stories through, to stay alert and engaged, and I am working out what I hope is one contemporary way of "making sense".

DIAGRAM :: Adelheid Mers

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Multitouch and the Future of the Book.


Here;s another post about MT technology by Kim White at if:book to quote Kim:

It's going to be three-pronged: screen technology, networked content, and 3D visualization. And it's going to be very, very cool.
I think it's worth it to read the full text of Kim's remarks here:
if:book: the sea change is coming...

The convergence of the concept of the Networked Book and the MT technology IS very,very cool.

The Future of Media - updated


Click on this image to get a bigger view of the diagram prepared for the Future of Media Summit in July 2006. The post is updated from my original in July 2006.

The podcast by Art Kleiner is a gem -

VIOSTREAM - powered by Viocorp - Communicating Better: "

as is the research report you can get by clicking below:

::..Future of Media Summit 2006 - Research ..::

WIKINOMICS-another "Networked" book example


Wikinomics, by popular business thought leader Don Tapscott , is another example of the emerging publishing process called the "networked book" see:Thoughts Illustrated: The Pulse Project The Networked Book

As Tapscott writes: " A new art and science of collaboration is emerging—
we call it “wiki-nomics.” We’re not just talking about creating online
encyclopedias and other documents. A wiki is more than just software for
enabling multiple people to edit Web sites.

It is a metaphor for a new era of collaboration
and participation, one that, as Dylan sings, “will soon shake your windows
and rattle your walls.” The times are, in fact, a changin’.

These changes, among others, are ushering us toward a world where
knowledge, power, and productive capability will be more dispersed than
at any time in our history—a world where value creation will be fast, fluid,
and persistently disruptive. A world where only the connected will survive."

"Wikinomics has 11 chapters, but only ten have yet been written. Chapter 11, The Wikinomics Playbook, will be written by you: a community of readers and experts like yourself who will share ideas about how to embed key Wikinomics concepts and principles in 21st century organizations and business enterprises." WIKINOMICS | WIKI:

The Pulse Project The Networked Book



Click here to learn more about the Networked Book - this is a good example of using the web as a platform for conversation between the "author" and the audience. The project is being produced by names@work - an internet marketing and SEO service provider.

This project offers a design format for a
conversational publishing system.
The Pulse Project � Pulse