Remarkk!

Will Pate links to a really great PBS Frontline documentary, Growing Up Online:

If you want to understand the generation gap between us Gen Y kids and our Baby Boomer parents, you can’t beat this show. You can literally see in the eyes of the parents their fear at how fast their kids are evolving, their frustration at the amount of their kids lives kept private from them but made public on the internet, their media-fueled paranoia about child predators, the pain of realizing their son used the internet to get the know how and the support he needed to take his own life before he was old enough to drive a car. Kids are changing too fast for their parents to possibly keep up, and that’s not a good feeling.

[From Gen Y Growing Up Online | Will Pate’s Blog]

And what of us Gen X’ers who only partially get it?

Along with my co-authors Jay Goldman and Eli Singer, I am proud to announce the publication of our article titled Sick Transit Gloria in the February issue of Harvard Business Review. The article shares the story of Toronto TransitCamp with a general business audience and is included in the 2008 edition of HBR’s annual The HBR List: Breakthrough Ideas section. There are many great ideas in there, so do yourself a favour and pick up a copy. (TransitCamp is also nominated by BlogTO in the Best of Independent Toronto Survey. Vote here!)

This short piece tells the tale of a community and a public agency coming together to solve problems in an innovative new way, using social web technology, social media and design methods together with the Barcamp unconference framework. The approach helped to shift the relationship between the organization and its customers and community stakeholders. That organization was the Toronto Transit Commission and the event and the open creative community that emerged from it was called Toronto TransitCamp. You can read the article in Harvard Business Review, or visit this wiki page for links that provide a comprehensive overview of the background, the design, the experience, the media coverage, the conceptual foundations and the influence of TransitCamp.

The authors want to make clear that while our names may appear in the byline of the article, the ideas and the event itself come from a community of participants and peers. We were also inspired by many talented global thought leaders. We would like to acknowledge these contributions and inspirations here:

Our friends who helped make TransitCamp happen: Robert Ouellette, ReadingToronto; Tim Shore, BlogTO; David Topping, Torontoist; Matt Blackett, Spacing; Adam Giambrone; David Crow; Bryce Johnson; Joey Devilla; Madhava Enros; Michael Glenn; Misha Glouberman; Julia Breckenreid; Ryan Feeley; Kieran Huggins; Andrew Moore; Kevin Bracken & Lori Kuffner, Newmindspace; Rannie Turingan, photojunkie; Patrick Dinnen;

Friends and inspirations: Alec Saunders, Iotum; Amber MacArthur; Alex Lowy; Andrew Baron, Dembot; Anthony Williams; Arieh Singer; Audrey Carr, Between Us; Austin Hill, Billions with Zero Knowledge; Ben McConnel and Jackie Huba, Church of the Customer Blog; Bianca Goldman, A Wee Bit Skint; Bonnie, Ernie & Rachel, GreatCycling; Brian Oberkirch, Like it Matters; Cambrian House; Chris & Jessie, Istoica; ; Chris Anderson, The Long Tail; Chris Messina, FactoryCity; Colin Henderson, The Bankwatch; Colin Smillie; Cory Doctrow, Craphound; David Eaves; David Gray, Communication Nation; David Pritchard; David Weinberger, Everything Is Miscellaneous; Doc Searls; Don Tapscott, New Paradigm; Elspeth Roundtree; Eric Goldman, Napoleon’s Gambit; Ev Williams, Evhead; Greg Wilson, The Third Bit; Guy Kawasaki, How to Change the World; Howard Rheingold; Hugh MacLeod, gapingvoid; Iris Glaser, Tailor Communications Design; Jason Kottke; James Bow, Transit Toronto; James Cherkoff, Modern Marketing; Jeannette Hanna & ; Jeff Howe, crowdsourcing; Jeff Jarvis, BuzzMachine; Jeremiah Owyang; Jesse Hirsh; Jevon MacDonald, socialwrite.com; Mike Beltzner; Joe Clark; John Battelle, Searchblog; John Moore, Brand Autopsy; Johnnie Moore; Joseph Thornley, Pro PR; Karen Quinn Fung; Kate Trgovac, My Name is Kate; Kathy Sierra, Creating Passionate Users; Kelly Seagram; Kenyatta Cheese, Braintag; Lawrence Lessig; Lee Goldman; Lee Odden; Leila Boujane, Idee, Inc.; Lloyd Alter, treehugger; Maggie Fox, Social Media Group; Mark Dowds, Mark Evans, A Canadian Take on the Web; Mark Raheja; Mark Surman, commonspace; Martin Cleaver; Matt Mason; Matt Mullenweg, Photo Matt; Matthew Dewall, Maybe Sorta Kinda; Matthew Ingram; Michael Anton Dila, Torch is Wicked; Michael Lenczner; Michael O’Connor Clarke; Michael Geist; Michael Seaton, The Client Side Blog; Michelle Perras, Shot From the Hip; Mitch Joel, Six Pixels of Separation; Nicholas Carr, Rough Type; Nikki Goldman; Om Malik, GigaOm; Peter Francey; Phil Hood; Richard Florida; Riccardo Cambiassi; Rob Hyndman; Robert Scoble, Scobleizer; Rochelle Latinsky; Ryan Coleman Found in Translation; Saul Colt, The Smartest Man in the World; Scott Beale, Laughing Squid; Sean Howard, Craphammer; Sean P. Aune; Sean Wise; Seth Godin; Shel Israel, Global Neighbourhoods; Steve Munro; Steve Rubel, Micropersuasions; Stowe Boyd, /message; Stuart MacDonald; Sulemaan Ahmed; Tara Hunt, HorsePigCow; Michael Arrington and Erick Schonfeld, Techcrunch; Thomas Purves; Tim O’Reilly; Todd Defren, PR Squared; Tom Davenport, Make IT Matter; Tom Williams, the $5 philanthropist; Tom Peters; Will Pate; Yochai Benkler

open creative communities, transitcamp, jaygoldman, elisinger, hbr, torontotransitcamp, sicktransitgloria, remarkk, markkuznicki, enterprise2.0, government2.0, barcamp

Amber MacArthur, Canada’s leading digital media host and tech web personality, left her gig with CityTV/Rogers a while back. Now she tells her side of the “he-said, she-said” story in an interview at Digital Journal. I think it provides great insight into the changes happening at the edge of digital content, where talent just doesn’t need the production and distribution arms of traditional media outlets to reach its audience.

[From Digital Journal - Digital Journal TV: Up Close and Personal With Internet Star Amber MacArthur]

For additional background, check out the BlogTO story and comment thread, where Amber’s fans speakout and a brave Rogers exec engages with the fans in a way that is truly admirable.

Scoble has an interesting video podcast up at Fast Company reviewing the social media tactics of the U.S. presidential campaigns, which brought my attention to how these campaigns are using leading social media tactics and are a great source for best practices. To paraphrase Scoble, political campaigns have a really strong market signal to engage their audiences - they have 18 months to get to launch or close up shop.

Uploaded with plasq’s Skitch!

Scoble’s “social media starfish” is a useful way to conceptualize the multi-headed and distributed network nature of effective social media engagement. Rather than just a shotgun list of tactics and platforms, it’s useful to think about how the different arms work together and facilitate engagement and convergence across media to influence audience behaviour and calls to action - in this case to donate, vote and volunteer.

I’m looking at the lessons of these campaigns for practices that bridge the online, mass media and events spaces in a way to make change. (In case you hadn’t heard, 2008 is the year of change so join your friends in the change drinking game at the next Democratic debates.)

Read Capitan Kirk, “Your privacy is an illusion.” on Alex Sirota’s NewPath blog A Path to Success.

Alex raises some important questions. My thoughts are that there is an opportunity for innovation here, but also a collective action problem.
On one hand, I think that the new web is about transparent identity, which requires a certain amount of disclosure and mutual sharing of info. But we don’t have the standards and the trusted intermediaries we need. We also haven’t established clear principals that I own my data and that value derived from it should somehow flow back to me; nor the mechanisms to make that principal a reality.

So is the solution a technical one, matter of personal choice and education or regulatory? I don’t know, but it is an interesting and increasingly important problem area in need of new ideas.

Technorati Tags: privacy, web+standards

Via libelchill.ca, a good piece on CBC’s The National about the issue of Canada’s libel laws and the chilling effect their abuse by plaintiffs is having on legitimate political speech, with a particular focus on blogs. The piece features the story of Kate Holloway, a neighbour of mine here at the Centre for Social Innovation. Kate was formerly a Green Party activist, works with Green Enterprise Toronto, CarbonZero and now Liberal Party candidate for Provincial parliament in Trinity-Spadina.

A recent example of this chilling effect when netneutrality.ca, an activist site arguing for Internet network neutrality principles to be protected in Canada, was taken down after the site’s owner Kevin McArthur was targeted by an undisclosed plaintiff. For a couple of months, the site languished and the dialogue about this important issue was stifled as a new home was sought for the site. It was only brought back to life when Michael Geist took it over and was prepared to defend it. However, there has been no real activity since, and its founding voice appears lost.

These suits are known as SLAPPs, “Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation”. California has enacted an anti-SLAPP statute to offer defendants an early option to strike the complaint on free speech grounds.

Not every issue has a law professor willing to step into the fray and draw the fire. Legitimate public discourse and a vibrant democracy requires the freedom to express opinions, and Canada’s democracy is endangered by anything that threatens speech. Canada needs more free speech and a more engaged electorate able to find its voice and embrace new forms of expression like the web.

I encourage you to learn more about the state of libel law in Canada, it’s chilling effect on political speech and the impact to the Canadian blogosphere. Check out LIBELCHILL.ca.

Technorati Tags: canada, netneutrality, libelchill.ca

The Toronto BarCamp scene is one of the most vibrant in the world. Until recently Toronto was also the most active Facebook network in the world. So what happens when you bring the two together: a massive gathering of developers and others who can’t get enough of all things Facebook and with an itch to create.

Unfortunately, a huge pile of work waiting for my return and my status as a non-developer TorCamper kept me away. With a 400 capacity crowd in MaRS’ main auditorium plus a 70-person overflow room with closed-circuit coverage, they certainly didn’t need another warm body. Congratulations to the organizers and presenters on a milestone event.

AmberMac covered it for City News International.

And for the technically minded among you, Craig was nice enough to upload a couple of the presentations to Slideshare:

Technorati Tags: barcamp, facebook, facebookcamptoronto, torcamp

We know it when we experience it. The fluid coordination of many disparate parts. It can be like jamming or improv. But sometimes you need planning and a choreographer. While I have an interest in the self-organizing nature of creative communities, we must recognize that the application of skill and talent in a more formally coordinated fashion is the only way to experience the seemingly effortless flow of collaboration like this (via Luis Suarez):

Technorati Tags: collaboration, enterprise2.0

The Ontario government has banned Facebook for all Ontario Public Service employees. This is bad information policy, bad organizational strategy, bad public policy and bad political strategy. Of course Facebook will continue to strike fear into the autocratic management style that tends to occupy the corner offices, and other large organizations will surely follow.

This is part of a bigger issue of IT policy: employee access to basic Internet tools, including personal email. As Tom Purves has argued, “If you can’t trust your own employees and knowledge workers to use the tools you give them responsibly, who can you trust?”. Colin Henderson at TheBankwatch.com put the strategic alternatives in sharp relief: Web 2.0 or 1984?

Technological change is blurring the lines between home-life and work-life. How many employees banned from checking in on their friends during the day are expected to return emails on their Crackberry during their personal time? This is about real breathing human beings and their relationship to work; a new generation of employees who increasingly refuse to subsume their independent identity to that of The Company. Employee Internet access policy needs to be carefully rethought in the context of an organization’s talent, communications and innovation strategy.

Interestingly, the Ontario government’s ban scoops up government MPPs while opposition MPPs and their staff escape the ban by virtue of their network segment being controlled separately. So the Liberals have put themselves at an electoral disadvantage in the months leading up to a fall election by eliminating a communication channel with a growing section of the electorate that is increasingly difficult to reach through traditional media. Dumb.

Technorati Tags: facebook, productivity, ontario