feedback to Open Co-op project (part 2)

Here's some more from my discussion with Gary Alexander. The main text is my own. His words are marked by ">>", my words from my previous mail by ">>>>".

>> I also would like to see software which is created from its core to suit the kind of social networks we are envisioning, and I think that might happen at some stage.

I feel my core contribution to any project will be to muse on how the information architecture and user experience of the online product can embody the functionalities and characteristics required by the project in the most simple, transparent and integrated way possible, and similarly to look at online/offline integration from the same point of view. So if we can dialogue around that in a "blue skies" way, perhaps we might get a sense of if and when an original software development project might make sense. An open or shared-source project would allow the development of common core functionalities (content and social network management system, UI etc.) with branching into our's and others' projects' requirements.

>> To give us a quick start we are using tikiwiki because a)out of the box it can give us a lot of the immediate functionality we want so we can start without waiting for a major development project, b)the developer community behind tikiwiki is solidly with us (or we are solidly with them?) so the tools we want to see soonest - trading and governance, are what they are working on now.

It's funny, it's like you're saying "we haven't got time to wait for an ideal online platform" and I'm saying "we haven't got time not to maximise the effectiveness of the online dimension at the outset"! : )) I do totally understand where you're coming from in wishing to manifest your vision and having faith that the human beings of the network, in all their amazing creativity, will find ways to make the system work—go for it!

But then at the same time: "as above, so below". My vision of the online and offline dimensions of i-together is a mutually transformative, symbiotic relationship. The online platform provides virtual "blueprints" for offline community dynamics: complete creative and relational freedom within a perfect respect for boundaries; transparent and organic evolution of community; flexible expression of identity along a scale of individual to collective. The offline roots the online in real situations and real people's relationships and experience, which in turn feed back into the evolution of the online network.

>> Also, they say that tikiwiki, in its ramshackle structure, is very easy for open source developers to work on a little bit at a time. A more integrated structure would create an intellectual barrier that would put off casual helpers. (i.e. learning an extensive set of object classes)

Isn't that a bit like saying Kingdom Brunel should have built his bridges from driftwood and string and with a general intention that they span to the other side of the rivers they were to cross rather than with iron girders and a proper blueprint, in order to encourage volunteers to help out? ; ) A different age, for sure, but isn't strong leadership (albeit emerging from chaotic, impassioned and distributed debate) and clear focus a hugely important part of the challenge we are setting ourselves?

My hunch is that, ironically, the very potential power of a deeply integrated online/offline combination such as you are proposing could massively amplify any distortions or lack of integration in the infrastructure of either dimension, like a feedback loop, causing chaos and friction. Who knows? Maybe that's a valid part of the process of evolution. But I don't think all the changes in our world have to play out chaotically—it all depends how clear and centred we can be in it all.

>> It may be that when we are up and running, and have some of the social structures and protocols worked out not just in theory but tested by practice, we (i.e. the whole network) will commission a totally new, from the ground up, software system. Or maybe we will be so entrenched in our make-do system that we simply carry on using it, much as we humans make do with our backbones evolved mostly for 4 legged creatures and brains in which, for example, the smell system has become the deeper cognitive system!

Interesting comparison! It's a great point about working out the social structures and protocols in practice to inform the online platform's development, and that's why we're growing i-together from the roots up with a blog network for Global Generation.

>>>> allows tracking of organic connections to others within network
>>Nice concept, but how? Do you have an algorithm in mind?

So to achieve that, you need to be able to track all the interactions
within the system—links, comments, collaboration, ratings, whatever—and
then integrate the search function with the resultant database of
relationships (whilst at the same time allowing users to withhold the
personal information of their choice for data privacy), and make the whole
accessible through an intuitive and consistent UI.

>> Your statement, again, is very evocative but not knowing the fullness of what you have been thinking, it is not enough for me to work with. Can you give me a few examples of how you imagine this functioning? Two or three imaginary stories illustrating different uses of it? Maybe we can come up with something simple which easily gives some of the power of it.

Ok, let's take the example of our discussion about the Open Proposal. It's a paradoxical example, which supposes our debate is taking place in the context of the system I am evangelising to you. : ) Back to the future.

Firstly, consider the dynamics of our discourse as it is now. Gary and Oli know each other well and have met and conversed in the physical world.

I have emailed you both and spoken to Gary on the phone, but never met either of you. I read about the Project on the wiki (a collaborative space), where each of you has posted content. I then emailed you both (in a single mail) with info about i-together and Global Generation, including hyperlinks to my blog (a personal but socially permeable [through comments] platform) and their website. I didn't post a message directly on the wiki from a tacit sense that the ideas I was presenting were too divergent from the wiki's content, and that the wiki was intended for the group of people with a tangible involvement in the project. The three of us have started to exchange emails (a private medium), and I have now begun to post copies of my mails to you guys on my blog, adding links where appropriate (to your wiki, for example).

Now, how would we have been able to go about the same discussion within i-together (for which read the potential "blueskies" online Open Co-op?) Let's make it more real by using the present tense. : )

I come across your Open proposal by searching the whole of i-together for "sustainable economy". As administrators of your Open Project Discussion Space, you have set "Active Identity" access permissions so that both anyone in the administrators' "Open Project Members" favourites folders (i.e. the Open Project Members!) and any i-together member receiving an outgoing interaction (link, comment, message, rating etc.) from Open Project Members can contribute content; any other visitor may leave comments on content or messages in the mail box (which is just another content repository with Active Identity privileges set to "content viewable by... Open Project Members"). That way, the community boundaries around the Space are porous, but more so to people who are of interest to and trusted by the Project Members, as expressed through their organic interactions.

I leave a message in the mail box, telling you of my ideas, and with a link to my own Space, for which I've set blog-like "Active Identity" boundaries—only I can post, but anyone can comment or leave a message. Interested by my message, you each reply individually, and Oli proposes that we discuss our mutual ideas in a third Space set up for the purpose—a neutral zone if you like—which he duly sets up with permissions for anyone to contribute content. Let's call it the "Blue Skies" Space. We each set up RSS-enabled "Doorways" (a combination of link and feed into a single interactive metaphor, allowing inline previewing of content) within brief posts about the background to the discussion on our respective Spaces, thus encouraging anyone else who interacts with our Spaces to follow us to the new Space and join the debate. We also add Doorways to our personal mail boxes to make sure we know when something new is posted in the Blue Skies Space (Gary and Oli also have personal Spaces within i-together, which mirror content they create in the Open Project Discussion Space by means of bi-directional RSS feeds hooked spliced into content Containers [for which read blog-like dynamically organised spaces]).

As our discussion continues, people begin to flow into the Blue Skies Space from our respective Spaces (including Gary's personal Space, as the post he advertised the Blue Skies Space with on the Open Space is mirrored in his own Space; perhaps Oli, being human, neglected to post about the discussion on his own Space). People interested in stuff related to Open also find the discussion by searching i-together for any Space that is one outward-bound interactive remove from the Open Project Space—that saves them from plowing through all the content with inline links (which have largely replaced the static link lists typical of old-fashioned Blogs and Wikis etc. : ) These people in turn link to the discussion from their own personal and group spaces, and an organic community begins to form around the discussion. As enough people join the discussion, even if only passively as readers and linkers, the more persuasive ideas begin to percolate up the search rankings for a progressively broader swathe of i-together users and bloggers/wiki-users on the wild seas of the web (because we support open standards and granular/permalink URLs, so Google and Technorati can track our network too). Yeeeeha! Beautiful ideas explode across the virtual world and begin to seed projects in the real world, while being informed by already-manifested projects and relationships.

I could go on building the picture, but I have to go out now!

>>>> Perhaps a combination of organic and declarative (ratings) systems could work, so you could check
>>>>out the organic connections between a rater and a rated person?
>> I'm trying to work out what you mean here. How's this? I see reputation as multi-dimensional. In my talks I suggest 3
>> possible measurable dimensions, based upon ongoing ratings - 'wisdom' - coming from ratings of people's comments in >> public discussions (as in Slashdot), 'service' - as coming from hours freely given to the community on various tasks, and >> 'integrity' - being an eBay rating on their exchanges with other people. Another, unmeasurable dimension would be an >> overall sense of 'trust'. Is that what you mean by 'organic'?

Briefly on this point—here organic means the aspect of relationship rooted in actual interactions within the system rather than declarations of relationship and evaluation ("friend", "a good worker", "a nice person", a description of a service rendered etc.).