Author: JP

Kyle Mathews, while commenting on a recent post of mine, reminded me of an old Joel Spolsky post on building communities with software.  I remember being very taken with the post when it came out all those years ago, particularly what Joel called “the primary axiom of online communities”:

Small software implementation details result in big differences in the way the community develops, behaves, and feels.

I think that there’s one huge difference between the context in which Joel wrote this and the context in which we live today, a difference that is material to many of the discussions we have.

As a result of the ways we can build software now, we can lower the barriers to entry; at the same time, it is possible for us to keep the cost of change low as well.

Where Web 2.0 meets social software, we’re still at a relatively early stage. A stage where we’re still experimenting. One where we have ardent admirers and passionate critics of everything that’s going on. And it’s too easy to make the mistake of thinking that the message we hear in the media reflects what’s really going on. Because it doesn’t.

There are a lot of people playing in earnest with the software available, be it Facebook or Netvibes or Plaxo or Myspace or Twitter or whatever. And while they play, they learn. What works. What doesn’t work. These people have an answer to the Ugly Question, their observations and criticisms are based on real use. And they provide real feedback.

What occurs to me is that in the past, Joel’s “primary axiom” had some very painful consequences. When people got the “small software implementation details” wrong, the cost of change was immense, and the community suffered as a result. Sometimes the suffering was terminal.

Today things are different. Competitors can enter more quickly and more easily. There is an adaptive feel to what’s going on, and much of that feel is driven by conscious and demonstrable reduction in the cost of change.

More on this later, I suggest you read the Spolsky post for yourself, I’ve provided you with the links above. Also, it looks as if it may well be worth following what Kyle is planning to write about, so do bear that in mind. Kyle also refers to a Clay Shirky post (on communities, audiences and scale) that’s well worth reading again. I particularly like the way Clay distinguishes between audiences and communities. Incidentally, Kyle’s post gives me a new perspective about why I dislike the word “content”; something went a-ha in my head when I saw this:

what is the difference between audiences and communities? Audiences primarily consume content, communities primarily communicate with one another.

Also incidentally, you may have noticed Stephen Smoliar make one of his rare comments yesterday, one that I am still thinking through. I had been revisiting the concept of wasted time, and Stephen reminded me of the prior threads related to this subject, where his noun-verb arguments and some of the product-service arguments had been continuing. This time around, he went on to say:

Thus, there is a deeper problem that arises from this whole shift from a production economy to a service economy. It is not so much a question of wasting time. It may not even be a question of “productivity,” if “production” is not the primary goal of the work. Rather, it is the need for a new model of compensation that is commensurate with both how services are rendered and with what service providers do during their “down time” in order to be better at rendering those services. Are the corporate bean-counters ready to get their heads around that question? :-)

Absolutely.

Lots of stuff to mull over. Which I shall be doing over the next few weeks. With your comments and your help.

Found this video, of a robot controlled remotely over an IP network, at Phil Wolff’s blog via Bill Barnett via Facebook. Fascinating. As usual also available on my VodPod. It’s over nine minutes long.

Waste of time? Perhaps it is, for some people.  As for me, I learn from seeing things like this. They help me imagine and visualise what is possible.  As we learn more, I am sure we will see industrial-strength applications, tools and devices in healthcare, in safety and security, in education, in many walks of life. And with a little bit of luck and a following wind, maybe one or two of those tools and devices will be for nothing more than pure unadulterated fun.

There’s nothing wrong with play. It’s a great way to learn.

Gideon Rachman, who’s been blogging over at ft.com for about a year now, wrote a fascinating little teaser on why he loves Wikipedia. While commenting on the “big division of opinion between people from the rich world and from the developing world”, Gideon states:

But people from Europe and the US were often  more inclined to “Keenian gloom”. They talked about the spread of pornography, gambling, cults — and the destruction of the business models of traditional media and with that the collapse of vital sources of authoritative information”.

I find that fascinating. An avenue that I hadn’t considered deeply enough. There are so many nuances I experience when I read that sentence of Gideon’s. I start wondering whether “western” use of the web for pornography and gambling is really about cultural decadence rather than the availability and proximity I had assumed. I start wondering whether the developing world’s enterprises will derive value from Enterprise 2.0 and social software much earlier than their developed world counterparts, a legacy effect I hadn’t considered before. I start wondering whether the developing world will leapfrog the developed world in the use of social software in general, as they are appearing to do in the mobile and wireless contexts. I start wondering.

That’s why I like being Confused. Thank you Gideon.

An aside. You may have noticed I have carefully avoided linking to anything on or by Mr Keen. I don’t do link-whores.

In today’s print edition of the Financial Times, David Bolchover averred that The self-employed are too busy to go surfing; commenting on the TUC criticism of blocking access to social networking sites, he meanders through the graveyard of worker apathy and ends with the assertion that “you will not find the self-employed immersed on Facebook for hours. The perception of working is irrelevant to them. They are paid for being productive, not for turning up”.

I think he’s managed to miss the point, spectacularly, while coming very close to it.

I agree with him that self-employed people are unlikely to be found “immersed on Facebook for hours”. But why single out self-employed people? This is true for other employed people as well, and probably for students and even for the unemployed. All this talk of immersion is so much hokum, I feel like taking a leaf out of Stephen Smoliar’s book and asking for “hard data”. My hard data is based on the self-employed people I know, who use Facebook without getting immersed or obsessive about it. My hard data is based on my kids and their friends. My hard data is based on watching my colleagues.

I agree as well with Bolchover’s assertion that “the perception of working is irrelevant to [the self-employed],” and that “they are paid for being productive, not for turning up”.  But again why this belief that outcome-driven people must be self-employed? Sure, I’ve seen my fair share of furniture and time-servers in my time, but there are many talented people around. Many whose work ethic is based on results rather than effort, yet without sacrificing their values and their beliefs.

Everyone should be paid for being productive, not for turning up. That’s the whole point. Nothing to do with being self-employed or not, it’s a question of treating the company’s time as if it were your own. Even if you are self-employed.

Being connected is important. Being connected, not channelled, is more important. Being connected, not channelled, supported by appropriate tools, is even more important.

Don’t get my drift? Go read Dave The LifeKludger’s most recent post, Isolation Kills. Speaking from personal experience, he makes a far better case for the use of social software than I ever could, as he describes the important of access as an antidote to isolation.

My thanks to Dave.