I do not like retweets and spam. I do not like like them Spam-I-am.

My friend Elisa asked me what I thought of the new RT feature of Twitter, since, as she tweeted, I’m an “add value” kind of guy.

Here’s what I think so far: I’m not a big fan. I don’t think I’ll use the feature much if I can avoid it.

But I think I understand the issue that Twitter has on its hands. I just finished writing an article on a security panel composed of federal CISOs last week, where the topic of the secure use of social media dominated the discussion. The conference was on application security, which meant that standards for authentication, identity and verifiability were elevated in importance.

As a DHS security official put it, “one of the fundamental issues with the Internet is that sending a trusted message is difficult. We don’t have any kind of mechanism like that for rapid fire social media communications.”

Trust but verify has been the watchword for me whenever I have decided to RT something for years  now. Is the link safe? Who had control of the account? What other accounts were associated with the tweet and how were they annotated? Tricky, especially in the real-time.

Twitter’s own terms of service are crystal clear about its Impersonation, Trademark, and Terms of Service policies:

“Re-posting other’s content without attribution and without their permission is a violation of Twitter’s rules. Accounts that re-post others’ updates (with or without crediting the author) may be immediately suspended because

• Re-posting others’ updates as one’s own without giving credit to the original author is tantamount to plagiarism
• Re-posting or others’ updates, regardless of stating authorship, is a potential form of spam.”

And yet, we have the RT, which reposts the content of others.

Tricky, no? That’s at least part of the reason that some folks have said that a  RT = Spam.

I think the RT caught on and stuck around because it gave attribution and offered a simple, user-generated mechanism for users to share the content of others using microsyntax. I’ve argued that a RT is social media currency.

In aggregate, many retweets of the same message can build both trust in the content and validity of a link or quote. That implied veracity, given by those phatics of trust, can be in turn dangerous. Messages that went viral and contained a link to a malware-laden page or to a phishing syndicate are like viruses circulating around a Twitter biosphere, given the stamp of approval by the brands of trusted senders.

The number of RTs a message receives has also been one of the most useful metrics used to measure the rapid growth of social messaging on Twitter. If you haven’t read danah boyd’s draft IEEE paper on the RT, “Tweet, Tweet, Retweet,” it’s worth your time if you’re interested in how digital ethnography applies to Twitter.

Earlier this week, Twitter rolled another community generated convention into its code with a new RT button. First came the @reply, which was replaced by @mention. Now, we have retweets. Sort of.

(What follows is a conversation I had earlier this week with my friend, Ed Shahzade, on first impressions.)

When @leolaporte tweeted that ”Twitter would have been better off implementing its “retweet” feature as “like.” That’s all it really is,” I retweeted him, adding “Spot on” before the RT.

Ed @replied to us: “That’s so far off. It’s republishing, not putting a star on the only copy. It’s like adding to a friend’s newspaper.”

“I disagree,” I @replied. “IMHO, the coding isn’t how the community has used RTs. Implementation amounts to a positive rating, removes annotation.”

“Yes, my chief complaint is lack of commentary(option),” @replied @Ed. “They could have listened better. Bear in mind- fraud prevention was a goal.”

“I understand,” I @replied.

That was because Ed is right, after all. Verifiable messaging is an issue as old as human communication. It’s a serious issue for use in crisis response for government. There are unscrupulous criminals and bored teenagers at play in the system.

But the way that this was implemented may really upset the community and users can still be bad actors under the current system. I’d rather see some kind of system where the highest rated tweets can be ranked by meta juice from likes. Xeni Jardin recently tweeted that she’d like a “spam” button IN the tweet, next to reply, RT and Favorite.

I’m not sure about that feature, given the potential for abuse, but a Flag might be helpful as a way of adding a thumbs down or “dislike” feature. That “dislike,” after all, has cropped up on Facebook, along with the “Like” feature that’s so familiar to Friendfeed users.

Perhaps a RT could be attributed in API and still allow the retweeting user to appear inline? The attribution for tweet sourcing is built into the current code. The issue is that substitutions of those that we do not follow in our timelines are jarring to many.

Part of Twitter’s allure, at least for me, lies in having control over your timeline. Follow, unfollow, block, spam, RT, etc.

I don’t like the new RT but I understand that better trust and authentication mechanisms need to be built in to prevent fraud and ensure better online security for Twitter. I do think an audit trail is key, so that users can easily follow RTs to an original and compare if they like. I do that constantly if I need to verify who said what when. And I like to annotate the tweets.

The reason that it’s important to get the coding right on spam, security and authentication, however, doesn’t rest in my usage. I’m an IT journalist, after all. I find Twitter useful, educational and frequently entertaining but I can live and work perfectly well without it. And, to be blunt, I know it will survive without me.

Many enterprises block social networking platforms like Facebook and Twitter precisely because of such security concerns, along with resilient questions about productivity.  Earlier this week, I reported on a study that surveyed senior IT security executives at federal agencies. Outsourcing, an increasingly mobile workforce and cyberterrorism topped the lists of their security concerns, along with unstructured data resulting from social networking platforms and Web 2.0.

If Twitter is really going to be a “global information utility” for government private industry and nonprofits, security and trust will be at issue. So will privacy. Twitter updated its privacy policy to “explicitly include geotagging and to describe the public nature of most of what people post to Twitter.”

For Twitter to effectively compete and thrive, adding features that don’t map to how its community uses them may not be in its best interest. Since I’m a long-time user and have found it useful, I hope that the feedback they receive is replicated in the code.

Amended Google Books Settlement: analysis & reactions

Yesterday, Brad Stone and Miguel Heft reported at the New York Times that the terms of the digital book deal with Google had been revised.

Danny Sullivan has written an excellent post on the amended Google Books settlement, where he liveblogged the press call and links to many other excellent resources, including the discussion on TechMeme.

The Amended Settlement Agreement (11/13/2009) is embedded below.

View this document on Scribd

Google’s official response contained a link to a summary of the changes made here and includes a FAQ. More information is also available at th Google Books settlement page.

The Open Book Alliance has posted its own response to the Google Book Settlement.

Echoing the dismissal of the amendments by the Open Book Alliance, which called it “sleight of hand, Peter Brantley,  (as quoted in the Financial Times) said that “None of the proposed changes appear to address the fundamental flaws illuminated by the Department of Justice and other critics that impact public interest.” Brantley is director of the Internet Archive, which has been archiving digital content for years and has proposed an alternate vision for e-books, OpenLibrary.org.

I’m still reading through the settlement. The amendments would create a trustee for each one of the so-called “orphan works.” As Stone and Helft reported at the Times, “that trustee, with Congressional approval, can grant licenses to other companies who also want to sell these books, and will oversee the pool of unclaimed funds that they generate. If the money goes unclaimed for 10 years, according to the revised settlement, it will go to philanthropy and to an effort to locate rights holders. In the original settlement, unclaimed funds reverted to known rights holders after five years.”

The settlement also reduces the number of books that Google may proceed to digitize into its catalog at Google Books to books published in the United States, Britain, Australia or Canada.

“The changes will mean that 95 per cent of all foreign works will no longer be included in Google’s digital book archive,” said Richard Sarnoff, chairman of the Association of American Publishers, as quoted by Richard Waters in the Financial Times.

As Waters also pointed out, the settlement “also means that ,illions of out-of-print works that could previously only be found in a handful of university research libraries.” For researchers like Alexis Madrigal of Wired Magazine, who wished earlier for the parties involved to find a way to preserve Google Books, this settlement is one step closer to a successful resolution.

For authors or their trustees, it’s more complex. Whether amendments go far enough in providing other Internet companies with the means to successfully compete in providing an index of digitized books is not immediately clear. There’s going to be scrutiny of the settlement from the Department of Justice over the coming weeks, not to mention Congress. If Google remains as only company able to offer a comprehensive archive of all digital books to online readers, antitrust concerns may force further adjustments by the search giant.

When “we are the media,” how does it change us or society?

The changes that smartphones with camera and an Internet connection are wreaking in society have been both thoughtfully reported upon, relentlessly evangelized and ruthlessly derided, depending upon the angle or intent of the commentator.

The past days will occupy a few lines in the history books. Last night, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a milestone healthcare bill. And earlier in the week, a soldier killed fellow servicemen and women at Fort Hood.

Today, Paul Carr wrote that “citizen journalists can’t handle the truth at TechCrunch.

I agreed with him on a few things. The video from “This American Life” (below) that Carr embedded was deeply affecting on this point, in terms of what becoming an observer can do to our involvement in what we are filming.

Changing an avatar to green or changing a location to Tehran did not, despite good intentions, prove to substantively help students escape repression. I gather from reading accounts from journalists that the solidarity demonstrated by doing so was both noticed and appreciated there. And there was a tipping point in terms of the use of the platform to bring attention to a political cause.

Where I was left frustrated is in Carr’s suggestion that those who are watching should be doing something more, whether in the hospital or, in the case of Neda, on the streets of Tehran, instead of documenting events with the digital tools at hand.

Mathew Ingram posted a thoughtful response about this notion on his blog, “Citizen Journalism: I’ll take it, flaws and all.” David Quigg wrote   a thoughtful reply to Carr’s post as well. Dave Winer was less charitable.

I found the example of Neda to be unworthy of the point I think Carr was trying to make.

It also brushed off two key factors: the effect that the release of that video had in revealing the death of a protester and that of the bullet’s impact itself on her heart.

As Suw Charman-Anderson pointed out in her detailed critique and debunking of Carr’s post, “Killing Strawmen,” (which I won’t repeat here), there was a doctor on-site, who was unable to do anything because of the massive trauma to her chest.

In my limited experience, you provide the standard of care to which you are certified and are able to deliver, ceding primary responsibility to others more able as they arrive on scene. As an EMT couldn’t do much more, for instance, than to gauge consciousness, stanch bleeding, stabilize injuries, provide oxygen and transport people. Your choices must change if someone is in the wilderness but in most scenarios, that’s accurate. Paramedics, nurses, doctors and surgeons each have progressively more expertise and responsibility.

In all of that, communication with the nearest hospital and ER docs available is crucial. Transferring information to both medical professionals and law enforcement is something a bystander can and should do.

And to some extent, communication and documentation is precisely what a member of the public equipped with a cameraphone can contribute, despite the vigor with which Carr has chosen to deride that role.

I don’t doubt that seasoned correspondents, armed with an understanding of the ethics and laws that pertain to reporting, are needed to convey information from the battlefield or to analyze the meaning of the trends that confront us.

In fact, Brock Meeks, one such trusted newsman, made a comment on my post about Twitter lists that emphasized just how important getting the facts right is to both the audience and media.

I was left wondering about other situations where the “citizen journalists” Carr derides are providing an important function in the newsgathering ecosystem, whether in reporting national disasters, disease, voting irregularities or consumer sentiment.

A more calm approach might consider whether models of “hyperlocal” journalism that marry traditional media to online platforms might have a chance of success.

My intention is not to suggest that observers couldn’t play a useful role in a crisis. It was to say that when there are qualified staff on scene, documenting what is happening in the absence of mainstream journalists may be useful for those that follow – including news outlets that may use video or audio gleaned on site.

I agree with Paul that running images shouldn’t occur without a full understanding of the ethics or privacy rights involved.

Unfortunately, many tabloids have shown a poor grasp of either historically.

The fact that technology changes behavior doesn’t make it inherently bad. We’re all struggling to make sense of exactly what living in a modern panopticon created by one another will mean. It changes news, our conception of privacy, and even our perception of self.

The traits for good character and decency that the Greeks described millennia ago remain applicable, however, just as the ethics taught in journalism schools pertain to modern reporters armed with Flip cams, iPhones and a direct line to YouTube.

There will continue to be moments when war correspondents are confronted what choices about how covering conflict, versus participating in it, will mean.

Similarly, people driving by an accident will need to be thoughtful about “playing paparrazzi” as opposed to making sure that those involved are receiving the aid they need. Anyone who has a conflict about whether to “tweet or treat” might to do well to consider what basic human decency means to them, personally.

Does an event need to be documented? Or does calling 911 and then moving to help trump rendering assistance?

Citizens are looking for truth, honesty and facts, where ever we can find them.  That need was frequently the subject of discussion during Public Media Camp, after which I wrote that “2009 is the year of We, the Media.”

Perhaps, as news organizations and citizens alike contribute to the body of knowledge online, a new model for collaborative journalism will emerge that serves each better.

Twitter Lists: We are informed by those we follow. We are defined by those who follow us.

Groucho Marx via last.fm

“The power of Twitter is in the people you follow.”-@nytimes

You’ll find that quote at NYTimes.com/Twitter, where the New York Times has built a page of Twitter lists curated by its editors, its writers and, presumably, the help of its considerable audience.

As this feature has rolled out, I’ve read knee jerk criticism, thoughtful analysis, wild evangelizing and observed “lists of lists” be collected as sites like Listorious and Listatlas.com spring up to rank them.

Tech pundits, plaudits and, rapidly, news organizations have all created lists that offer apply new taxonomies, imposed human-defined categories onto the roiling real-time tweetstream.

Readers are defined and informed by the diversity of the information sources that they consume. In a user-created Web, we are defined by those who choose to follow us, including any lists or tags that they associate with  our names.

It’s been exciting to watch. And if you’re a reader of David Weinberger, author of “Everything is Miscellaneous,” you might recognize this emergent behavior as a familiar phenomenon. Twitter users are using lists to organize one another into understandable taxonomies. Folksonomies, to use the term coined by Thomas Vander Wal.

Users have some control over which Twitter lists they appear upon. If you block a user, for instance, you can remove yourself from that user’s lists, if for some reason you don’t want to appear on it.

What we can’t control, once we make ourselves public there or elsewhere on the Web, is how others tag or list us.

This goes back to what Weinberger (along with Doc Searls, Rick Levine and Christopher Locke) wrote about in “The Cluetrain Manifesto” ten years ago. “Markets are conversations.”

I suspect that in the weeks ahead, both companies and individuals may find themselves on lists that they perhaps would not wish to define as part of their brand identities.

“I would not join any club that would have someone like me for a member”

As I quote Groucho Marx, today, I feel fortunate, for two different reasons.

First, to date, I’ve been included on 176 lists, none of which I’m embarrassed or insulted to be on. You can see all of them at “memberships,” which is a friendly way of describing inclusion.

Thank you. I’m humbled.

Second, most of the lists are being used by an individual user to categorize others for providing particular sort of information.

Overall, I’m most closely associated with technology, journalism, security and media. That’s  a good sign, given my profession! I was glad to see that the account I maintain at work (@ITcompliance) has been added to 33 lists, primarily compliance, information security, cybersecurity and GRC.

I’m talking about the right things in the right places.

Certain lists, however, have meant that many more people reading me than would have otherwise because of the hundreds or thousands of people that have chosen to follow them, due to the influence of their creators.  I’m thinking about lists like these, some of which have gone on to become popular at Listorious.com.

@palafo/linkers

@palafo/newmedia

@kitson/thought-leaders

@jayrosen_nyu/best-mindcasters-i-know

@Scobleizer/tech-pundits

@Scobleizer/my-favstar-fm-list

Thank you, fellas.

Like any other tools, lists will no doubt be used for good and ill. An outstanding article by Megan Farber, “Fort Hood: A First Test for Twitter Lists” in the Columbia Journalism Review, shows how news organizations can leverage the feature to curate the real-time Web for the online audience.

The lists—which offer a running stream of information, updates, and commentary from the aggregated feeds—represent a vast improvement over the previous means of following breaking news in real time. In place of free-for-all Twitter hashtags—which, valuable as they are in creating an unfiltered channel for communication, are often cluttered with ephemera, re-tweets, and other noise—they give us editorial order. And in place of dubious sources—users who may or may not be who they say they are, and who may or may not be worthy of our trust—the lists instead return to one of the foundational aspects of traditional newsgathering: reliable sources. Lists locate authority in a Twitter feed’s identity—in, as it were, its brand: while authority in hashtagged coverage derives, largely but not entirely, from the twin factors of volume and noise—who tweets the most, who tweets the loudest—authority in list-ed coverage derives from a tweeter’s prior record. Making lists trustworthy in a way that hashtagged coverage simply is not.

Farber goes further in exploring what role lists may play in journalism’s future, as organizations collaborate with both their audience and one another in curating user-generated content. It’s a great piece. Pete Cashmore, of @mashable, has written more about this at CNN in “Twitter lists and real-time journalism.”

Individuals and news organizations alike can create lists as needed. For instance, as the House debates a historic health care bill here in Washington, you can follow the discussion at @Mlsif/healthdebatelive

As Cashmore points out, in the social, “people-centric Web,” we use our friends as a filter. As Paul Gillin observed,  everything that you’ve learned about SEO may be useless in a more social Web. Google’s new Social Search shows how, if we choose, our search results can be populated with content from our circle of friends.

On Twitter, we can now use the lists from trusted friends and news organizations to curate the real-time Web. That makes them useful, immediately.

And after a week full of public grief here in the U.S., that’s good news.

A night at the Spy Museum: What keeps cybersecurity experts awake at night?

Last week, I enjoyed an unusual evening: a panel of some of the nation’s preeminent cybersecurity experts at the International Spy Museum. I didn’t have to practice any spycraft to learn more about the risks posted to national security and business in cyberspace.

Michael Assante, chief security officer for the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC),  warned of cybersecurity threats and risks to the smart grid.

Melissa Hathaway, President Obama’s former”" called for more public and private cybersecurity partnerships.

James Lewis, director and senior fellow of the Technology and Public Policy Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, described how new rules for cyberwar are being defined as cybersecurity threats grow.

Those interested in cybersecurity may find the article and posts linked to above useful.

When asked “what keeps them up at night,” each panelist responded thoughtfully.

Melissa Hathaway is worried about “our overall economic competitiveness” due to corporate cyberespionage. Assante is concerned about restoring a lack of confidence after a massive cyberattack. And James Lewis is concerned that a scenario from World War II might repeat itself in a future cyberwar.

“Think of Germans in WWII,” he suggested. “The Brits were able to break the Enigma machine through Program Ultra. That probably shortened the war by two or three years. I worry that whomever we might be fighting would know what we’re going to do before we do it.” Lewis is concerned about more than anticipation: what if opponents were to change the data, replicating the “fog of war” online?

“Look at the DOD’s ‘Blue Force Tracker – if that were compromised, the first thing is that you’d shoot your own folks,” he said. “Second, every commander would slow down.” ( The New York Times‘ excellent “At War” blog published a post today about the digital fog of war, in fact, though its author focused on the challenges of using technology in the background, not the scenario wherein it is compromised.)

Keith Epstein, the veteran investigative journalist who moderated the “Emerging Cyber Threats” panel, observed that he’s noticed a reluctance of people to really talk about this. What can be done? Assante calls the lack of public discussion a “plague of suffering and silence. “In the electric system, our regulations require entities to, if they have a cyberattack, to report them.” Despite the concerns of some in Congress, he suggested that agencies reconsider safe harbor. “We have to be willing to share information with our allies.”

What are the scenarios that will enable cybersecurity to move forward?

Start with raising public awareness, said Lewis, which would require the mainstream media to cover cybersecurity with the seriousness that the threat deserves.

“There’s a bunch of other things we could do too, “ he said. “Make better use of the DoD. Define their role in a way where they can defend cyberspace. Work with the private sector. There are many things we can do to incentivize better cybersecurity. International engagement: Reach out to allies – and maybe to opponents.”

Hathaway observed that “we are considering a national data breach law. Our allies are considering similar legislation.” S.1490, the Personal Data Privacy and Security Act of 2009, would require data brokers and companies to both establish and implement data privacy and security programs. Hathaway said that “we need to start talking about the issue: the fleecing of America.”

In her view, it’s not just consumer behavior that’s at issue: “We have the Tylenol scare in all of our computers. It’s there and they’re not telling us.”

Sunday meditation: a media meal in a news snacking universe

On Friday, Dan Conover wrote a terrific long-form narrative essay about long-form narrative, in which he made a case for “a non-narrative future for journalism.”

To further illustrate his point in practice, he also created a three-page, home-printer-optimized PDF for readers “who prefer to read long-form essays on paper” and “a shorter, semi-structured online summary” that is remarkably like a Gawker post, sans snark.

I think he’s on to something, both in approach, example and analysis of news consumption in the present. I’m not alone in comparing consuming media on the real-time Web to dining:  Steve Rubel described Twitter as “a sushi boat moving at 100 mph.” Fine dining, fast.

And since I enjoy cooking, dining and reading, the following metaphor for news flow and how we consume our daily “media meals” came readily to mind.

If reading were like dining:

An amuse-bouche is like a tweet. It’s the essence of the cook’s art, delights the palate and leaves you wanting more.

An appetizer is like a blog post. That could be a microblog post, too. Appetizers can be either light or heavy.

An entree is like a long-form narrative article. Sides include video, graphics and comments.

Dessert is like a money quote, figure or key analysis. It’s something the reader can savor, including a link to save or share.

Of course, there’s plenty of flexibility in the concept.

As @stevebuttry suggested today, for instance, an interactive database might be a recipe.

News organizations are now considering how to deliver news in a way that provides value, draws readers and perhaps solvency.

I suspect making it easy for readers to” consume media” as the readers wish may be as important for the success of online media outlets as making dining enjoyable has been for restaurants during the recession.

Time to go enjoy Sunday dinner: reading feeds & enjoying a smorgasbord of vegetables, cheese, brown beer and sausage.

 

Imogen Heap reanimates Thriller, just in time for Halloween

Haunting. Gorgeous. And completely different from Michael Jackson’s iconic version.

[First played on the BBC. Hat tip to Popeater, via Kirstin Butler via Steve Silberman]

At the NPR and PBS unconference, 2009 is the year of “We, the media”

John Boland at Pubcamp

“TV, radio and pro journalism still matter in this new ecosystem”-John Boland, PBS.

This past weekend, I attended Public Media Camp, an unconference at American University in Washington, D.C.

I came away from the two days of sessions, talks, informal discussions, random encounters and rapid-fire information exchange inspired, exhilarated and a bit exhausted. That last is why it took a day to get a post up. By its nature, I couldn’t go to everything. What I did attend, I tried to take notes upon and livestream to Livestream.com and uStream. When it comes to the archiving that video, unfortunately, I endured two crashes and suffered from the lack of a decent mic. Happily, much better video will be coming online from other sources over the next week. What follows are my thoughts, links and video from “Pubcamp.”

Citizen Journalism and public media

The first session of the day remains one of the most memorable. Citizen journalists and local bloggers have much to learn from – and about – one another. “We the media” is a theme I pick up later in this post. Suffice it to say that democratization of the tools for information sharing has taken some producers unaware and left many stations understaffed, at least at the level it takes to effectively engage with those in the community creating the content. That said, many NPR editors and writers are doing quietly effective work in finding, engaging and collaborating with bloggers in the community. I mentioned Universal Hub in Boston, although I’ll leave it to Adam Gaffin, Radio Boston and WBUR to relate exactly how well that relationship works.

@jessieX referenced the tensions in this session in her post on generational differences, “My Takeaway,” where she captures the insight she shared with me in person.

Video of the  citizen journalism session is available on-demand.

Tools for curation of audience-generated content

This was one of the best attended sessions of Public Media Camp and, due to any number of reasons, one of the best, at least in my view. The standing room-only group was organized into as a circle and shared dozens of useful tools and services that can aid stations and editors in aggregating, organizing, filtering and curating pictures, video and text generated from listeners.”We all want to open up the floodgates to UGC and crowdsourcing but there’s issues of trust,” said Andrew Kuklewicz.

My favorite metaphor from Public Media came from Andy Carvin here, in the idea of “trust clouds,” or the social network of people around us that represent who we can believe, retweet, link or otherwise invest with our own reputation. A tool for doing just that if at Trustmap.org. Newstrust.net also came up as “a guide to good journalism.”

Such tools and relationships are critical to both the use of user generated content by stations and the decision of readers and listeners to trust and, in the social media world, pass on information. As I commented during the session, increasingly consumers of media follow bylines, not masthead. To borrow David Weinberger’s phrase, “transparency is the new objectivity.” By showing readers how and where the audience was sourced in real-time, media organizations can make a stronger case for the veracity of such information.

Tools included:

• Google Moderator for call-in shows
• Gigya.com
• Addthis.com
• The NPR API. Daniel Jacobson wrote more about the NPR API at the Programmable Web.
• The Google Analytics API
• Etherpad
• Disqus
• Publish2
• ProgrammableWeb
• YahooPipes
• WordPress
• SuperFeedr
• Drupal

Greg Linch shared the approach to curation that Publish2 takes: “Social Journalism: Curate the Real-Time Web.”

Social Media Success

The most obvious case study in social media success may be Andy Carvin himself. The impact of his efforts have been deep and far-reaching throughout NPR’s shows and staffers. As Amy Woo put it, “I feel the same way about Andy and his tweeting as I do about Diane Rehm.”

Carvin offered compelling examples of success, like an NPR partnership with content discovery service Stumbleupon to create a reciprocal connection w/Twitter. With a little tweaking, a retweet can equal a stumble.

Another site, criticalexposure.org, “teaches kids to take pics as a way to be advocates for social change,” said Carvin.

He also said that NPR’s Facebook fan page generates some 8% of NPR web traffic. Their testing shows 1 post every 60-90 minutes is ideal for audience. That connection came courtesy of a listener, at least at the outset: The NPR fan page on Facebook was created by a fan. That fan then gave it back to the organization, says Jon Foreman. Carvin’s curation of public radio content took it to the next level.

Hurricanewiki is likely to be cited as a classic case in social media success, where more than five hundred people came together, organized through Twitter by @acarvin. You can see the results  at Hurricanewiki.org. Carvin also created a hurricane resources community for Gustav on Ning, built in about 48 hours.

One example that came up in multiple sessions is NPR’s Vote Report . Jessica Clark and Nina Keim wrote a report on it: “Building #SocialMedia Infrastructure to Engage Publics.” And while Carvin pointed out where Vote Report fell short, the idea behind enabling listeners to “help NPR identify voting problems” holds some promise. The use of social media for election monitoring is spreading globally now, as can be seen in Votereport.in in India.

The was a different issue with InaugurationReport:- volume. Carvin said that there was simply “too much social media content to effectively curate.” By way of contrast, even a few hundred engaged listeners could effectively use the #factcheck hashtag by http://npr.org/blogs/politics to fact check the U.S. presidential debates in real-time.

Greg Linch shared a collection of social media guidelines curated at Publish2, including NPR’s social media guidelines. There’s a careful eye keeping watch here on the ethics that go with the new territory: the @NPR ombudsman was present (she’s @ombudsman on Twitter) and brought attention to how the public will relate to any perceived bias shown on social media platform.

A standard for conduct matters. It’s not all peaches and cream, after all, given the ugliness that online discourse descend into on many occasions. “Posting on our site is a privilege, not a right,” said Carvin regarding the scrum on comment trolls, online spammers & NPR sites.

Video of the social media success session is available online at uStream.com.

Public Media and Gaming

One of the more entertaining and creative sessions at Public Media Camp was the hour on gaming. Educational gaming can raise literacy rates in children, after all – could NPR deliver further by reaching into this interactive medium? Nina Wall (@missmodular) said, in fact, that PBS Kids will soon have available an API similar to NPR’s for educational games.

An excellent summary of this discussion can be found at AmericanObserver.net. Video of the public media and gaming session is available online at uStream.com.

PictureTheImpossible is one intriguing example of the genre. The online, community-based game jointly developed by RIT & the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle.

The discussion also included  Kongregate and their “social gaming” model, which provides a platform & revenue share for developers. Could NPR follow suit?

Or what if NPR created a fantasy league for news? Points could be accrued for newsgathering, with players trading shows or writers.

It’s been done for politics – check out the case study of an @NPR fantasy league, from Julia Schrenkler: Minnesota Public Radio’s “fantasy legislature.”

My favorite suggestion, however, came from Andy Carvin: a social “Wait, Wait, don’t tell me!” game where the audience can create news quizzes and then challenge one another on Facebook or the Web.

Social Media FAIL

The first FAIL from Andy Carvin? When the hype around crowdsourcing with Amazon’s Mechanical Turk didn’t deliver. Here’s the Wired story on questions about crowdsourcing.

Video of the social media FAIL session is available on-demand. Amy Woo and other attendees offered many more examples of failures.

Apps for Public Media

The last session of Pubcamp kicked off with a description of @AppsForDemocracy by Peter Corbett. Interesting examples about:

ParkItDC helps people find parking in DC, including which meters are broken.

AreYouSafeDC shows potential threats.

StumbleSafely is a guide to bars & avoiding crime in DC.

FixMyCityDC is a web-based application that allows users to submit service requests by problem type.

And the winner, DC311, enables iPhone access (download from iTunes) to the District’s 311 city service site, coupled with a  Facebook App.

There’s more to come: In 2 years, the vision laid out by Corbett  includes “muni data standardization, open civic app ecology and the ‘real-time muni web.’ And in 5 years, the vision for includes ideas seemingly lifted out of science fiction: augmented civic reality, AI-driven civic optimization & “virtual flow working.”

What could be created for public media? Apps that enable listeners to create channels from the API for specific topics. Apps that combine real-time data feeds from government sources with local bloggers and radio stations. Apps that allow listeners to help filter the flood of information around events, like the Vote Report project.

Why develop such apps? Andy Carvin believes that  “the line between content, services & apps is blurring. To create a more informed public, it now takes more.” To not create such innovation would, in effect, be irresponsible.

More posts, eclectica and public media resources

The PBS News Hour has partnered with the Christian Science Monitor on “Patchwork Nation.”

The work of Doc Searls at the Berkman Center on “vendor relationship management” came up, mentioned by one Keith Hopper. More details at http://projectvrm.org.

FrontlineSMS.com is a free group text messaging tool for nonprofit that is useful in disaster and crisis response.

Swiftapp.org was shared by @kookster: free, #opensource toolset for crowdsourced situational awareness.

Plenty of social media application develop is going on at PBS. Their social media guru, Jonathan Coffman,  pointed to the tools at PBS.org/engage.

The Participatory Culture Foundation has launched Videowtf.com.

Economystory.org is a cooperative effort of public media producers to provide financial literacy.

Check out Radio Drupal and Radioengage.com for open source public netcasting information.

Session notes for @PublicMediaCamp are going up at the wiki at PublicMediaCamp.org and are being aggregated under #pubcamp on Delicious.com by Peter Corbett.

My Takeaways

There a lot of smart, savvy, funny geeks in public media, passionate about delivering on the core mission of education, media literacy and good  journalism.

This same cadre is pushing innovative boundaries, whether it’s engaging the audience, creating new technology platform or expanding the horizons of computer assisted reporting. Database journalism is alive and well at NPR – just look at this visualization of the U.S. power grid.

Vivian Schiller said during her keynote that “2009 was the year everything changed.” Out of context, that statement drew raised eyebrows online. In person, there was more clarity. The massive disruption to the newspaper and traditional media industry is now resulting in significant layoffs and a seachange in how people experience events, share information and learn about the issues. Despite the issues presented by ingesting a torrent of new sources of information, the concept of “We the media” has deep roots, given that so many more people now have the ability to contribute news and help analyze it now that the tools for communication have been democratized and often made freely available online.

What’s missing in that fluid mix of updates, streams and comments is trust in veracity. As we all move into the next decade of the new millennium, the central challenge of public media may be making sense of the noise, taking much the same approach that it has in the past century: report on what’s happening, where it happened, who did it and why it’s important, with a bit more assistance from the audience. Given the loyalty of tens of millions of listeners, “we the media” might just have some legs.

Show: 781 new items – all items Show: Items with comments – all shared items Mark all as read Refresh Feed settings… Switch to “Comment view” » « Back to “Friends’ shared items” Translated by Google – View Original show details You have subscribed to “Twitter / digiphile.” Last 30 days Time of day Day of the week Items posted Items read Items posted Items read Items posted Items read Oct 18, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Now live at the treasure trove of #socialmedia tools at #pubcamp: http://livestream.com/digiphile | Here comes curation. – digiphile: Now live at the treasure trove of #socialmedia tools at #pubcamp: http://livestream.com/digiphile | Here comes curation. Oct 18, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: #Cloudcomputing, Windows 7 & forecasts for @Microsoft’s future: http://bit.ly/4oh4fo #business #tech – digiphile: #Cloudcomputing, Windows 7 & forecasts for @Microsoft’s future: http://bit.ly/4oh4fo #business #tech Oct 18, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: “How Private Can Electronic Data Ever Be?” http://j.mp/4kqRye “De-anonymization” is a crucial #privacy issue. – digiphile: “How Private Can Electronic Data Ever Be?” http://j.mp/4kqRye “De-anonymization” is a crucial #privacy issue. Oct 18, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: “Why have 33% of American households that have access to broadband elected not to subscribe?”-Randall Stross http://j.mp/2s4gp3 – digiphile: “Why have 33% of American households that have access to broadband elected not to subscribe?”-Randall Stross http://j.mp/2s4gp3 Oct 18, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: “TV Stations Start Broadcasting to Mobile Gadgets” http://j.mp/2LvjUO | http://openmobilevideo.com | Convergence escalates. – digiphile: “TV Stations Start Broadcasting to Mobile Gadgets” http://j.mp/2LvjUO | http://openmobilevideo.com | Convergence escalates. Oct 18, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: No shock: monitoring live online video is still the Wild West. @BradStone reports on Stickam.com & sex crime: http://j.mp/1FeojO – digiphile: No shock: monitoring live online video is still the Wild West. @BradStone reports on Stickam.com & sex crime: http://j.mp/1FeojO Oct 18, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: The rain *finally* ceased. Beautiful, cool & calm fall morning for my walk in to Day 2 of @PublicMediaCamp at American University. #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: @jayrosen_nyu I wish you could have been at #pubcamp. Open APIs, ethics, citizen journalism, social media, data-driven reporting & insight. Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Given the volume of #socialmedia, @jdevo25, my guess is that COPE will effectively syndicate, not oversaturate: http://bit.ly/XaMin #pubcamp – digiphile: Given the volume of #socialmedia, @jdevo25, my guess is that COPE will effectively syndicate, not oversaturate: http://bit.ly/XaMin #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Like @stevegarfield, I #blamedrewscancer that every tweet that has #beatcancer in it today raises money for cancer research. Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: “So this one time, at #pubcamp…” Enjoying ribald conversations with unconference goers at Cactus Cantina, next to a bachelorette party. Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: “Thanks to all that came to my NPR API session. Here’s my @programmableweb post (w/diagram)” – @daniel_jacobson http://bit.ly/XaMin #pubcamp – digiphile: “Thanks to all that came to my NPR API session. Here’s my @programmableweb post (w/diagram)” – @daniel_jacobson http://bit.ly/XaMin #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Learned about http://economystory.org from @kkemple — cooperative effort of public media producers to provide financial literacy #pubcamp – digiphile: Learned about http://economystory.org from @kkemple — cooperative effort of public media producers to provide financial literacy #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: @jayrosen_nyu @jeffjarvis Archive of my livestream of Vivian Schiller’s talk at #pubcamp: http://livestream.com/digiphile Quote in context. – digiphile: @jayrosen_nyu @jeffjarvis Archive of my livestream of Vivian Schiller’s talk at #pubcamp: http://livestream.com/digiphile Quote in context. Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: @ksablan W/scarce resources, I wonder if news orgs would do better to build evergreen wikis internally, like http://whorunsgov.com at WaPo? – digiphile: @ksablan W/scarce resources, I wonder if news orgs would do better to build evergreen wikis internally, like http://whorunsgov.com at WaPo? Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Simple game, big impact: mention of http://freerice.com here at #pubcamp. Correct answer = food donations via UN: http://wfp.org – digiphile: Simple game, big impact: mention of http://freerice.com here at #pubcamp. Correct answer = food donations via UN: http://wfp.org Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: OH: “The more we engage with our audience online, the more willing they are to contribute philanthropically” <-Drawing correlations #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Map of @Solar_Decathlon on National Mall on @OpenStreetMap: http://j.mp/18N5HQ “mapping transient features”~ @rekha6 #pubcamp – digiphile: Map of @Solar_Decathlon on National Mall on @OpenStreetMap: http://j.mp/18N5HQ “mapping transient features”~ @rekha6 #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: @IsCool Research suggests educational gaming raises literacy rates. If @NPR games >> interactions w/news, could be potential. #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: @USSJoin Bring in the foreign correspondents for ringers for #FantasyNPR: Sylvia Poggioli + Anne Garrels. Unstoppable. #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Interesting case study of an @NPR fantasy league, from @juliaschrenkler: @mpr’s http://bit.ly/minn-fantasy-legislature #pubcamp – digiphile: Interesting case study of an @NPR fantasy league, from @juliaschrenkler: @mpr’s http://bit.ly/minn-fantasy-legislature #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Broke into a huge grin at #pubcamp: @acarvin suggesting an @NPR fantasy league. Points accrued for newsgathering, can trade shows or writers Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Open question to those listening & following #pubcamp: what kind of game would YOU play if @NPR made one? iPhone app? Flash social game? Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Checking out http://picturetheimpossible.com – an online, community-based game developed by RIT & Rochester Democrat & Chronicle. #pubcamp – digiphile: Checking out http://picturetheimpossible.com – an online, community-based game developed by RIT & Rochester Democrat & Chronicle. #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: YES please. Shared. RT @acarvin I still want a social @waitwait game where people create news quizzes, challenge each other on FB #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Discussion of http://kongregate.com & their “social gaming” model here at #pubcamp. Provides a platform & revenue share for developers. – digiphile: Discussion of http://kongregate.com & their “social gaming” model here at #pubcamp. Provides a platform & revenue share for developers. Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: RT @greglinch Open source software session at #pubcamp. Examples: Investigate MP expenses http://bit.ly/4sTdES RapidSMS http://bit.ly/4EMwop – digiphile: RT @greglinch Open source software session at #pubcamp. Examples: Investigate MP expenses http://bit.ly/4sTdES RapidSMS http://bit.ly/4EMwop Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: @markstencel I bet most at #pubcamp are glad Bike DC ended & that streets are open. Can we do something about the rain? Shoes still squelch. Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: As referenced by @acarvin at #pubcamp, here are IBM’s Social Computing guidelines: http://j.mp/p0tdH #socialmedia – digiphile: As referenced by @acarvin at #pubcamp, here are IBM’s Social Computing guidelines: http://j.mp/p0tdH #socialmedia Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: “Posting on our site is a right, not a privilege”~@acarvin on the scrum on comment trolls, online spammers & NPR sites #socialmedia #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: @juliaschrenkler Yes, I’m streaming (&, in theory, recording) the #socialmedia session at @uStream: http://j.mp/3nvY5N #pubcamp – digiphile: @juliaschrenkler Yes, I’m streaming (&, in theory, recording) the #socialmedia session at @uStream: http://j.mp/3nvY5N #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Collection of journalism-related #socialmedia policies & guidelines curated using @Publish2, via @GregLinch: http://bit.ly/smlinks #pubcamp – digiphile: Collection of journalism-related #socialmedia policies & guidelines curated using @Publish2, via @GregLinch: http://bit.ly/smlinks #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: The @NPR ombudsman is here (she’s @ombudsman!) & brought attention to how the public will relate to perceived bias on #socialmedia. #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Policy comes up here at the #socialmedia session. @acarvin notes @NPR’s is published online for all to view: http://j.mp/y8Qjv #pubcamp – digiphile: Policy comes up here at the #socialmedia session. @acarvin notes @NPR’s is published online for all to view: http://j.mp/y8Qjv #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: The use of #socialmedia for election monitoring is spreading globally. @acarvin cites http://votereport.in in India. #pubcamp – digiphile: The use of #socialmedia for election monitoring is spreading globally. @acarvin cites http://votereport.in in India. #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Different issue with http://inaugurationreport.com – volume. @acarvin said “too much #socialmedia content to effectively curate.” #pubcamp – digiphile: Different issue with http://inaugurationreport.com – volume. @acarvin said “too much #socialmedia content to effectively curate.” #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Next up from @acarvin’s presentation of #socialmedia successes: @VoteReport: “Help NPR Identify Voting Problems” http://j.mp/1fysxf #pubcamp – digiphile: Next up from @acarvin’s presentation of #socialmedia successes: @VoteReport: “Help NPR Identify Voting Problems” http://j.mp/1fysxf #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 digiphile: Next up from @acarvin’s presentation of #socialmedia successes: @VoteReport: “Help NPR Identify Voting Problems” http://j.mp/1fysxf #pubcamp from Twitter / digiphile digiphile: Next up from @acarvin’s presentation of #socialmedia successes: @VoteReport: “Help NPR Identify Voting Problems” http://j.mp/1fysxf #pubcamp Add starLikeShareShare with noteEmailKeep unreadAdd tagsSend to Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: More #socialmedia success: #factcheck hashtag by http://npr.org/blogs/politics to fact check the presidential debates in real-time. #pubcamp – digiphile: More #socialmedia success: #factcheck hashtag by http://npr.org/blogs/politics to fact check the presidential debates in real-time. #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Another resource is @hurricanewiki: http://hurricanewiki.org | 500+ people came together, organized through Twitter by @acarvin. #pubcamp – digiphile: Another resource is @hurricanewiki: http://hurricanewiki.org | 500+ people came together, organized through Twitter by @acarvin. #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: “Here’s what happens when you don’t plan” says @acarvin, pulling up http://gustav08.ning.com Built in 48 hours. #socialmedia #pubcamp – digiphile: “Here’s what happens when you don’t plan” says @acarvin, pulling up http://gustav08.ning.com Built in 48 hours. #socialmedia #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: “I feel the same way about @acarvin & his tweeting as I do about Diane Rehm”~@AmyWoo, offering kudos to @NPR’s #socialmedia guru at #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Fascinating. @acarvin talks about how @NPR has partnered with @Stumbleupon. Reciprocal connection w/Twitter. A RT can = a stumble. #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: @planetrussell uStream may have less hunger-inducing ads. Picture quality isn’t terrific but at least the stream is staying up. Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: RT @lmasri NPR Facebook fan page testing shows 1 post/ hour is ideal [for audience] & generates 8% of NPR web traffic #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Livestream is borked. Switched to @uStream for #socialmedia success stories at #pubcamp: http://j.mp/3nvY5N [Frustrating.] – digiphile: Livestream is borked. Switched to @uStream for #socialmedia success stories at #pubcamp: http://j.mp/3nvY5N [Frustrating.] Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: The @NPR fan page on @Facebook was created by… a fan. He gave it back to the organization, says @jonforeman. #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: #socialmedia success: http://criticalexposure.org – “teaches kids to take pics as a way to be advocates for social change”~@acarvin #pubcamp – digiphile: #socialmedia success: http://criticalexposure.org – “teaches kids to take pics as a way to be advocates for social change”~@acarvin #pubcamp Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: 3 word intros @ #pubcamp. SO much talent & diverse experience. Check out Radio Drupal: http://groups.drupal.org/radio http://radioengage.com – digiphile: 3 word intros @ #pubcamp. SO much talent & diverse experience. Check out Radio Drupal: http://groups.drupal.org/radio http://radioengage.com Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: “TV, radio & pro journalism still matter in this new ecosystem”-John Boland, PBS #pubcamp [HT @beyondbroadcast] http://yfrog.com/5dokavj – digiphile: “TV, radio & pro journalism still matter in this new ecosystem”-John Boland, PBS #pubcamp [HT @beyondbroadcast] http://yfrog.com/5dokavj Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: We’re live here at #pubcamp! @acarvin is making introductory remarks before the unconference gets rolling: http://livestream.com/digiphile – digiphile: We’re live here at #pubcamp! @acarvin is making introductory remarks before the unconference gets rolling: http://livestream.com/digiphile Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: For those who aren’t here at @PublicMediaCamp, the wiki is here: http://wiki.publicmediacamp.org Livestream: http://j.mp/MgyAh – digiphile: For those who aren’t here at @PublicMediaCamp, the wiki is here: http://wiki.publicmediacamp.org Livestream: http://j.mp/MgyAh Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Arrived at #pubcamp. Bedraggled. Sitting in the front row. I’ll livestream VIvian Schiller’s opening remarks http://livestream.com/digiphile – digiphile: Arrived at #pubcamp. Bedraggled. Sitting in the front row. I’ll livestream VIvian Schiller’s opening remarks http://livestream.com/digiphile Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Journos should update Wikipedia, @stevebuttry & @ksablan? http://bit.ly/4s9WWU Good idea (w/caution) but how about building wikis in-house? – digiphile: Journos should update Wikipedia, @stevebuttry & @ksablan? http://bit.ly/4s9WWU Good idea (w/caution) but how about building wikis in-house? Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Headed to @PublicMediaCamp at American U. Busy sched at #pubcamp: http://twurl.nl/ky01h8 Would feel martyred but @acarvin was up at 5:48 AM – digiphile: Headed to @PublicMediaCamp at American U. Busy sched at #pubcamp: http://twurl.nl/ky01h8 Would feel martyred but @acarvin was up at 5:48 AM Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Business #innovation through IT: “Computers create more productivity” http://j.mp/100cPc – digiphile: Business #innovation through IT: “Computers create more productivity” http://j.mp/100cPc Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: @davewiner Given how early the list beta is, I’d say that’s a lot. And since list counts are rather like the new follower numbers, congrats. Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: @eric_andersen The mac n’ cheese at Silvertone is among Boston’s best. The steak tips are great, too, along with an excellent spinach salad. Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: “James Bramford, the world’s expert on the NSA, reviews a new history of the e-int agency in @NYBooks” ~@jason_pontin http://bit.ly/3wiwxu – digiphile: “James Bramford, the world’s expert on the NSA, reviews a new history of the e-int agency in @NYBooks” ~@jason_pontin http://bit.ly/3wiwxu Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: Met a former ad exec on the Metro who now works on http://research.gov for the National #Science Foundation. Grant writing galore. #gov20 – digiphile: Met a former ad exec on the Metro who now works on http://research.gov for the National #Science Foundation. Grant writing galore. #gov20 Oct 17, 2009 Twitter / digiphile   digiphile: “For the next hour, using #beatcancer & #genesistoday in ANY tweet will generate $1 to fight cancer”~@cfnoble 10 minutes left. No more items in Offline mode.Go online to check for new items. No more items. Previous item Next item more than 60 items

Business innovation through IT: “Computers create more productivity”

During the roaring 90s, technology evangelists convinced business owners to drop millions on IT equipment to cash in on productivity gains and chase digital goldmines online. A decade later, MIT professor Eric Brynjolfsson has published a new book entitled “Wired for Innovation: How Information Technology is Reshaping the Economy.”  He also recently co-authored “The New, Faster Face of Innovation” in the Wall Street Journal/Sloan Management Review.

Professor Brynjolfsson presented the findings from his book at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation in Washington earlier today. After breaking down the components of a large IT project, the bulk of which consist of implementation and deployment, he examined  Dell Computers as a case study in IT innovation.

Professor Brynjolfsson visited a Dell factory, a bustling manufacturer where most PCs are built to completion in one day. During his visit, he noticed that the back third of the factory empty. He suggested to the Dell executive that was taking him on the tour that perhaps that space wasted.

The reply? “We used to use it but don’t need it any more. We’re producing more in less space.”

Brynjolfsson said that Dell had implemented i2 software and completed a business process redesign to gain these efficiencies. Orders are transmitted customers go right to suppliers, which deliver new parts to the facility every 4 hours in a classic case of “just-in-time manufacturing.” Managers are able to both see problems earlier and fix them, leading to a substantial improvement in efficiency.

The exec called up Brynjolffsson later to let him know Dell was now using that extra space, producing twice as much from the factory as a year earlier. In essence, says Brynjollfson, Dell had “built a second factory” – except that it was made of business processes and software, representing intangible assets. “That’s a microcosm of what’s been going on in the US economy,” he observed.

Image via Wikipedia

In that larger context, “computerization” has a greater effect than computers.

Brynjollfsson used the metaphor of an iceberg to describe the role of organizational assets. In that sense, IT capitol and other technological investment are the visible portion of  much vaster organizational complements below the surface. As he put it, “intangible assets are more important in the information economy”

Brynjollfsson cited an broad analysis by MIT of organizational assets, including 1167 large firms over 10 years and 10,473 observations.

The analysis colllected4 principle types of data:

1. Revenue/market value.
2. Computer capital from computer intelligence.
3. Ordinary capitol, labor, other assets, R&D.
4. Organizational assets.

Results?

Brynjollfsson cited three key findings, including identification of a distinct set of business practices common to heavy IT users.

1. The “digital organization.” That concept describes a distinct corporate culture and organizational process are found at most (but not all) heavy users of computers and the Internet
2. Higher productivity and higher market value. Firms that adopt this digital organization have higher performance
3. IT and the digital organization are complements. Firms that adopt the digital organization and simultaneously invest more in IT have disproportionately higher performance.

According to Brynjollfsson, there are 7 identifiable practices of digital organizations:

1. Move from analog to digital business process.
2. Distribute decision-making rights.
3. Foster open information access.
4. Link incentives to performance.
5. Maintain focus and communicate goals.
6. Hire the best people.
7. Invest in human capitol.

If these practices are better – and they’re noticeably better, says Brynjollsson – why aren’t they being adapted? The dispersion between successes and failures has been growing, if anything, in recent years. What’s the story?

A member of the audience suggested a well-known model at MIT, system dynamics, where a feedback loop that of poor practices trapped organizations in negative spirals.  Byrnjollfson observed as well that decisions that can be quantified or structured are becoming more centralized. Older & bigger firms had a harder time, both in terms of company & employee age. “Most of our metrics were focused on business performance: productivity, profitability, market value. When we asked about employees, we found employees were also better off.” According to Byrnjollfson, firms which adopt the tenets of digital organizations have higher pay, from top to bottom and are less likely to have turnover.

The bottom line, in terms of the professor’s findings, is that information technology is a catalyst for a productivity surge but that  organizational change is the bulk of the iceberg, so to speak. Payoffs only come when investments are made in both IT infrastucture and training, education and incentives in a coherent sytem.

He cautioned, however, that the IT investments of some organization were both overstated and overvalued during the dotcom bubbles, where intangibles were used to justify stratospheric valuations.  Many companies invested beyond an optimal point, and in assets that inevitably decreased in both value and utility over time.

These gains are also realizable only in the context of talented, educated knowledge workers. “Technology investments require more skilled workforce,’ he said. “If you make investments in IT education, you help narrow the wage gap.”

He ended by making an analogy to the invention of  microscopy by Anton Van Leeuwenhoek, which in turn led to a revolution in medicine and biology. In Professor  Brynjollfson’s view, the revolution in data flows inside companies and bureaucracy has the potential to lead to substantial improvements in public policy. The paradigm of managing large organizations through the analysis of real-time manufacturing data can be applied to economic policy, healthcare and energy, to name a few areas of far-reaching potential.

National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) launches in DC

This afternoon, I was privileged to be at hand at the National Press Club today when Secretary of Agriculture Vilsack launched the National Institute of Food & Agriculture (NIFA).

Agriculture Secretary Vilsack speaks at the National Press Club

The new institute’s website is http://nifa.usda.gov.

And, it being 2009, you can followed NIFA at @USDA_NIFA on Twitter.

According to Secretary Vilsack, ” NIFA will be the Department’s extramural research enterprise. It is no exaggeration to say that NIFA will be a research “start-up” company – we will be rebuilding our competitive grants program from the ground up to generate real results for the American people. To lead NIFA, President Obama has tapped a preeminent plant scientist from the Danforth Plant Science Center in St. Louis – Roger N. Beachy, winner of the Wolf Prize in Agriculture and a member of the National Academy of Sciences.”

As I mentioned on Twitter, @FoodSafety and @USDAFoodSafety are  already up and tweeting.

Among other many agricultural science initiatives, secretary Vilsack emphasized that this new USDA institution will identify agriculture opportunities in U.S. that, within 10 years, will be “net carbon sinks.”

“USDA science will support our efforts to radically improve food safety for all Americans,” said secretary Vilsack. “Each year in the U.S. alone, food-borne pathogens like E. coli kill 5,000 people and sicken 75 million more; the cost to the economy from these infections exceeds $35 billion.”

Following the Secetary’s remarks, Rajiv “Raj” Shaw, Under Secretary of Agriculture for Research, Education, and Economics (REE) and Chief Scientist at the United States Department of Agriculture, provided an overview of the different areas agricultural science could positively affect both the energy policy of the United States, food security and, in time, hunger at a global scale.

Raj Shah at the NIFA launch

Following Shah, the @WhiteHouse science advisor, Dr. Holdren, t, leavened the event with casual humor of an agricultural variety, punning his way into a wave of chuckles.

Dr. Holdren was clearly inspired by what he’d seen at the “Astronomy Night” at the White House last night.

More information and video of that event is available at http://blog.ostp.gov, courtesy of @WhiteHouseOSTP.

Video of the event, including the remarks of all three men, is archived and available on demand at VisualWebcaster.com: NIFA launch at National Press Club.