Community Mobilization

Crowdsourcing great hotel rooms

I am avid user of Seat Guru and have been flying so much (carbon off-sets help me sleep at night) that I have almost memorized the seat maps for my carrier. However I do end up in hotels fairly often and Tripkick is going to be a rather fun site for me over the next few years. Tripkick encourages travelers to rate individual hotel rooms, in the spirit of crowsourcing information.

I think that there will be a further sociological tapping of peer-review and crowd suggestions in everything from restaurants to contractors. Already Angie's list has been a reasonable popular community based recommendation portal, and of course Last.FM is a music suggestion site. I believe that categories (food, hotels, car rentals, attractions) will continue to see specific sites dedicated so a narrow focus as opposed to general spaces like Angie's List. The driver in this trend is partly due to competition, but also the desire to have narrowly focused deep searches as opposed to wide and shallow information.

INSNA Conference in St. Pete Florida

I'm in ST. Pete for the International Network for Social Network Analysis. A jammed packed conference of papers, presentations, and workshops.  I am going to try and to live blog this but please be patient with me as there is going to be so much information!

IBM Lists Next 5 Trends

IBM released their take on the next 5 big innovations. They website has a number of report links at the bottom with  research on the trends but what is interesting is that I did not seem to see them tied together in any way. I am real disappointed that they did not take a few of the major issues facing the world and overtly showcase how any one or combination of trends would make an impact on them. Health care, global warming, aging populations, water shortages are all major global concerns that are easily tied into the Next 5 but I believe that IBM did not want to go to far out on the limb to showcase the great impact that these advances could have.

Dopplr Opens Up Registration

Dopplr is one of my new favorite web applications. I use it to catalog all of my travel and post it online so that all of the others that I have invited to use Dopplr can see where I am and when. It makes a lot of sense for people in a similar field because I know who is going to what conference and meeting and can actively try to get face time with them. The BBC reported that at Le Web Dopplr announced that it was opening up to anyone who wants to register. Joi Ito Invited me to Dopplr originally and I continue to add friends I know in the technology and social space field. Privacy is truly gone for those of us who work in the social field so why not open up everything? Part of the comfort level with being open is that we respect each other's space and information.

Small Airport - Big Service

I am sitting in the Charlottesville Regional Airport somewhere in the middle of Virginia and enjoying free wifi - something I do not have the luxury of in major market airports. Sure I can pay for a T-Mobile hot spot connection but why? It is the same thing that bugs me when I go to a Hampton Inn and have free wifi while my Marriott hotel that costs 4 times as much charges me $11.95 for internet access. Better yet I just heard The Talking Heads and now Pixies on their overhead sound system - are you kidding? How progressive can you get?

Update - Flock of Seagulls is blasting overhead and although I may miss my connection in Atlanta I am rocking out.

Comeptition in Virtual Worlds Conferences

I received my usual weekly update from Chris Sherman and the Virtual Worlds Weekly newsletter (really good publication)and was surprised to see a section from him regarding an event I assumed was being produced by him in London, but is actually not. Competition in the virtual worlds conference space is heating up and getting fierce. Below is Chris's comments on the naming, and production of the London event.

Editors Note: We are not producing the Virtual Worlds Forum, clearing up any confusion

I cannot tell you how many people have asked me if we are producing upcoming show in London.  We are not.  The Virtual Worlds Forum is not produced by Virtual Worlds Management. The organizers of that event have repeatedly referred to it as the Virtual Worlds Conference, inviting confusion with our Virtual Worlds Conference and Expo which was just held in San Jose and our Virtual Worlds 2007 Conference in New York earlier this year. Given the confusion I decided to register to attend the event in London but Sasha Frieze, the event's organizer, emailed me, telling me I'm not allowed to attend because I am a competitor. Not cool since she attended our Virtual Worlds Conference in New York in March. She even asked for and received a discount for that show. I'm all for fair competition but Virtual Worlds Forum management has pushed this to the edge, deliberately creating confusion in the marketplace. I'm trying to be proactive with this post.  I hope this clears the issue. We are however hosting a London party:

Healthy competition, or riding the coat tails? I am not going to be able to attend the London event but certainly enjoyed the San Jose event and the New York event tremendously. Heres to advancing the Metaverse!

Future of Work

Business Week has a number of articles on the future of work recently.1 2 3.  I got me thinking back to a presentation I did about a year ago for a Division Board of Directors on the future of work. In the presentation I laid out the differentiating features of Knowledge work and set a long term realm of possibilities for the future of knowledge work. Technological advances have really created an environment ripe for mobile and off site workers. Moreover the upcoming generation is steeped in technology know-how, and the keyboard and phone are the preferred input devices over the pen and paper.

The workforcre will drive the future of work, but the future of management is more important. How will a 20th century management structure integrate a 21st century workforce? How will cities adjust to the new reality? A 21st century workforce is distributed all over the world because talented people will live where they want to live and work for whom they want to work. Drivers such as health care, cost of living, diminishing cost of broadband access, wireless technology, and mobile computing are changing the self employment landscape for many.  Below is a mind map of the drivers and outcomes of the knowledge workforce. Download end_of_the_workplace.jpg

Allergy Translation Cards

I know it is not very community oriented but is is personal and it is cool. When my wife and I traveled Europe two years ago we had to go to Babblefish and translate some basic sentences regarding her allergies (shellfish and peanuts) in a number of languages. I could swing Italian, but German, French, Dutch, and Flemish are out of my area of language expertise. In short, somehow the translation program mixed up the word nuten, and muten in the German translation leading to a very embarrassing dining experience in Switzerland. I am just glad the next time we travel internationally we will have these allergy translation cards!

Second Life Community Convention puts out Standards

SLCC recently put out their Community Standards. It is a real honest attempt to insure the best possible experience for the presenters, attendees, and the board. It was not easy to come by and there were numerous considerations including Union rules. media broadcasting agreements, and holding everyone to a minimum standard of behavior conducive to community building. I'm proud of the baseline we have and have seen good feedback so far.

Puerto Rico

I'm on vacation in Puerto Rico, and hoping to run into some of the folks from ICANN, before their meeting starts.