Digital Habitats for Webheads in Action Online 09

Making sense of the technology landscapefor groups &communities

Nancy WhiteFull Circle AssociatesFor WIAO09

May 22, 2009

Digital Habitats

Tech + Social:Tech + Social:Technology has

fundamentally changed how we can be together

http://www.flickr.com/photos/martin_heigan/1470060584/sizes/o/

?

What the %&*# is a

technology steward to do?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dani3l3/364684710/

Nancy WhiteFull Circle Associates

enable people to…

• discover & appropriate useful technology

• be in and use communities & networks (people)

• express their identity

• find and create content

• usefully participate

Digital Habitats Orientation Spidergram Activity

From: Digital Habitats: stewarding technology for communitiesEtienne Wenger, Nancy White & John. D. Smith, 2009http://www.technologyforcommunities.com

http://www.flickr.com/photos/viamoi/3221971368/

http://www.technologyforcommunities.com/

… meetings

… relationships

… community cultivation

… access to expertise

… projects

… context

… individual participation

… content publishing

… open-ended conversation

Community activities

oriented to …

Base material from: Digital Habitats: Stewarding technology for

communities© 2009 Wenger, White, and Smith

• Meetings – in person or online gatherings with an agenda (i.e. monthly topic calls)

• Projects – interrelated tasks with specific outcomes or products (i.e. Identifying a new practice and refining it.)

• Access to expertise – learning from experienced practitioners (i.e. access to subject matter experts)

• Relationship – getting to know each other (i.e. the annual potluck dinner!)

• Context – private, internally-focused or serving an organization, or the wider world (i.e. what is kept within the community, what is shared with the wider world)

• Community cultivation – Recruiting, orienting and supporting members, growing the community (i.e. who made sure you’re the new person was invited in and met others?)

• Individual participation – enabling members to craft their own experience of the community (i.e. access material when and how you want it.)

• Content – a focus on capturing and publishing what the community learns and knows (i.e. a newsletter, publishing an article, etc.)

• Open ended conversation – conversations that continue to rise and fall over time without a specific goal (i.e. listserv or web forum, Twitter, etc.)

Base material from: Digital Habitats: Stewarding technology for communities© 2009 Wenger, White, and Smith

OrientationsWhat do they mean?

activities oriented to …

Example: The Birdwatchersof Central Park


… meetings

… projects


… relationships

… context… community cultivation



Weekly bird walks, winter bird feeding fillings, irregular celebrations and events…

Advocacy drives, adopt parts of the park, bird counts…

The participation of the “Big Guns,” and “Regulars.” Mostly F2F

Note when people missing… Invite people in

Internal and External focus: Publishing, the “Register,” available to media…

While everyone pays attention to the community, no centralized efforts…

Anyone can bird watch, but sharing what you see/know is important…so the community accommodates both

The “Register” (print) is central to community…

Bump into another bird-watcher? Have a conversation…

Base material from: Digital Habitats: Stewarding technology for communities, © 2009 Wenger, White, and Smith


Community Name: KM4Devglobal knowledge sharing network


… meetings

… projects


… relationships






With only one meeting a year, large size and diversity, KM4Dev focuses on enabling individual participation.

Community knowledge wiki, content management system to bring together resources.

Email list is core of community activity

Once a year and only about 10% do/can participate.

When funding allows. E.G. supporting ShareFair

Informally via the email list by asking/answering questions.

Relationships mostly via meetings and core group. Strongly

external – all resources public/shared.

While everyone pays attention to the community, no centralized efforts…

What can we do with this?

• Identify where your community/group/team is now to assess for design, facilitation and technology stewardship.– Refocus activities to increase engagement– Identify tools and processes to support current

activities

• Identify where your group wants to go as a planning tool.

• Look backwards and forwards as a reflection tool.



Birdwatchers and KM4Dev-ers


… meetings

… projects


… relationships






• Meetings – Web meeting tools for online, shared calendars and wikis for planning, wikis, blogs, images/audio/video to capture and share during and after.

• Projects – Email lists/forums to coordinate, shared calendars, project management trackers, blogs to journal/report.

• Access to expertise – Online profiles, social networking sites, “yellow pages,” discussion forums, blogs.

• Relationship – Twitter/IM to share small frequent messages, member directories, Skype/VoIp for conversation.

• Context – Public, open websites for outward facing. Password protected for inward facing groups.

• Community cultivation – Outward facing web sites to attract members, Twitter/IM to feel connected, Skype for voice.

• Individual participation – RSS/aggregators, tagging, so people can craft what content they get, customizable settings on web tools, using synch and asynch

• Content – content management systems, blogs, wikis, podcasts, social bookmarking, tags, video/audio, images, mindmapping.

• Open ended conversation – email lists, forums, Twitter, chat.


OrientationsWhat tools?

How?

addressing inherentcommunity tensions

Group

IndividualInteracting

Publishing

asynchronous synchronous

discussion boards

teleconference

chat

instant messaging

member directory

wikiblog

telephony/VoIP

individualprofile page

e-mail

e-mail lists

scratch pad

RSS

“new” indicators

subscription

podcast

contentrepository

presenceindicator

buddy list

security

Q&A systems

RSS aggregator

newsletter

calendar

videoconference

application sharing

whiteboard

site index

participation statistics

search

subgroups

personalization

communitypublic page

versioncontrol

documentmanagement

UseNet

contentrating

scheduling

polling

commenting

networking tools

tagging

bookmarking

sharedfiltering

geomapping

interestfilter

2007 Etienne Wenger, Nancy White and John Smith

Togetherness Separateness

Interacting Publishing

Individual Group


Community Name:


… meetings

… projects


… relationships






Put a mark on the arrow to indicate how important a particular orientation is to your community. The more important the orientation, the further out on the arrow the dot should be placed. Then draw a line between the dots. See the next example.


Community Name:


… meetings

… projects


… relationships






• Meetings –

• Projects –

• Access to expertise –

• Relationship –

• Context –

• Community cultivation –

• Individual participation –

• Content –

• Open ended conversation –


OrientationsQuestions?

Observations?

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Digital Habitats for Webheads in Action Online 09