Thoughts on Kuznicki’s “Birth of Swarm Intelligence”

January 12th, 2009 • Comments Communities, Toronto Social Media

Mark Kuznicki has written a fantastic post regarding Twitter, its ability as a platform to allow us to work together, and the problems faced from that sort of scenario. At the time, I somewhat facetiously told him that I thought it was the best post of ‘09 thus far (when it was posted at Jan 5th); upon further reflection and seeing discussion on it, both on Twitter and his blog, I still feel quite strongly about it. Read his post, and then come back for my thoughts below.

Twitter as a platform, for any of you who haven’t used it, carries many different possibilities for usage. When it was first introduced, it was pitched as a micro-blogging platform, and as a way for you to let your friends and colleagues know what you were doing. (In fact, that’s still what Twitter promotes as their model; witness their catchphrase still being “What are you doing?”) However, in certain geographic areas, Twitter is becoming more of a tool for conversations, and from these conversations become action. Mark talks about a few Toronto-centric examples, and I’ve had discussions with a few people on the difference between using it to update versus to converse. I think that both the ability to reach a large network instantaneously but be forced to be clear and eloquent as you are confined to 140 characters has contributed greatly to the sense that anyone can collaborate without it seeming like too much of a timesink. In essence, because it doesn’t seem like you’re spending time doing work, and because you’re working together to co-create things, you’re able to be far more efficient and get far more done.

Mark raises a few different questions that the advent of this going forward would raise, mainly in the split between the connected and the non-connected:

To realize the potential of this collective intelligence, we have problems to solve:

1. How do we involve, include and reflect the values of the non-connected periphery in our hyper-connected core?
2. How do the myriad fleeting ideas that emerge find stable structures to see them through to execution?
3. How will existing structures have to adapt in order to allow this new potential to be realized and harnessed?
4. Whose interests are served by the new emergent order and whose interests are harmed? How will those conflicting interests be negotiated?

Out of these four questions, I find the fourth the most interesting, and tied in directly with the previous three. When looking at the conversational elements of these networks, tied in with the ability to move things forward through virtual communication, you do end up leaving a lot of people by the wayside. At present moment, who you end up serving are those in the tech community, and whatever interests they may have and share. There is some pushback on whether you will need to adapt these methods to ensure inclusion.

However, I’m going to take the approach maybe expected of a tech-savvy 20-something, and say that those of us currently using this tool to accomplish these goals shouldn’t have to change anything. Should we continue to prove its effectiveness in getting things done and providing meaningful change, the world will learn to adapt to us. Twitter is not a difficult tool to use by any means; if it continues to be successful, people will educate themselves on how to use it. In the meantime, in order to get some of those voices we may desire on certain projects, it falls upon the community to reach out to convince these voices of the necessity of their inclusion, and of the benefits that being included may provide to them. That’s not an unrealistic proposition. Shall they not want to be included, both we and they will have to find alternate means to accomplish the goals we all set forward. I’m not approaching this with a “my-way-or-the-highway” mindset; merely demonstrating that outreach can occur in both ways, but if swarm intelligence proves to be the way to go and you aren’t responding to it, there shouldn’t be an expectation of the community to have to bring you into the fold.

In case it isn’t obvious, both Kuznicki’s post and my commentary should be propelling you towards using Twitter; if you currently aren’t using it, and have no desire to do so, I’d be curious to hear your reasoning behind it.

A Much Needed Kick in the You-Know-What

January 10th, 2009 • Comments Miscellany

Well to say that it’s been an interesting few days is probably a little bit of an understatement. Aside from the fact that I spun out on the 401 at 120 km/h yesterday, causing my life to flash in front of my eyes (which is actually a cool experience, once you get over the fear), things have been a little tumultuous. Thursday morning I was laid off from my job; ordinarily, this would be a negative thing. However, not only was I mentally prepared to leave, I NEEDED to leave. I was severely unhappy there, yet couldn’t get myself to pull the trigger to go.

Now that I’m out of the downwards spiral my career attitude was going in, I couldn’t be more motivated. Going back to the freelance side with a whole new mindset, at a time when there is a lot of excitement in the local community, couldn’t really offer any more promise. Since Thursday morning, I’ve had a lot of leads come across, set up a meeting or two for potential work, and been lucky enough to have been offered a space to work out of. My severance package keeps me fed and housed in the short term, so I’m able to go out and look for these really interesting things.

What is probably going to be the best part of all of this will be the ability to gain new skills. I’m looking to work a whole bunch of “odd jobs” – web design, eMarketing, social media, writing, and many other things – that will challenge me in different ways, and that will enable me to learn a whole ton of different skill sets. (If you’ve got anything you think I might be useful for, let me know.) It’ll also help keep things interesting, and let me do things I may not have known about, or that I possessed some sort of talent in.

Will things be easy doing this? No way; I’m going to have to work harder than ever. However, after the last 2 months of work where I felt like I was losing my soul, I can’t be looking forward to this new challenge any more.

A Confirmation of Sorts (Really, it’s more like “A Short Entry of Sorts”)

January 5th, 2009 • Comments Uncategorized

Never have I been so sure that I was making the right decision about something as I am today. That was a relief as much as anything else. I spent the weekend thinking and discussing various moves in my life, so going back to work today was going to end up as a test of sorts no matter what. Luckily, it seems that I passed this test with flying colours (although I could’ve done without destroying the left side of my face trying to shave this morning.)

Never have I been so sure about what it is that I’d like to end up doing. A great conversation with a friend in a pretty ill-planned trip to Blue Mountain yesterday allowed me to think a little bit more about the transitionary period that will need to occur for me to accomplish my goals. Still working on some transitionary stuff before I can really reveal anything (Google is a useful tool; work is important right now, as rent is a cruel mistress), but I’m excited to be able to share with you guys a solid plan as to where I’m going in my life, and how I’m going to get there.

Thanks again to everyone who has commented and e-mailed me over the last little while in regards to some of my posts and requests. I really do appreciate everything that you all say, and keep it in mind. If you ever want to contact me about anything, the e-mail’s at the top right of the menu bar above.

That’s really all I’ve got – back tomorrow, hopefully.