Milliongenerations talk:Environment for the contributions

For discussion:

• Is the prize concept beneficial? Discuss here.

• Think it would be great if we could deliver a newspaper feeling. Larger and smaller articles on the same page, not complete, but the essence. Not only vertical lists but horizontal columns and tabs for the sections. Even as one article is selected, smaller references to related articles accompany it on the side. Always same format but varying content.

• Should be able reference parts of external links e.g., a few sentences out of a certain blog entry.

• Have a rosetta mode, where people can improve on a (machine) translation of an entry while viewing the original or a translation accepted as good next to it.

• Environment to implement something in the direction of the million (clicks) for a million (generations) competition created in collaboration with an open source movement, such an environment should preferably be available for other questions (open/copyleft!)

Examples to learn from (and lessons)

• The blogosphere

• Cohere software/system for Collaborative Argumentation/Contested Collective Intelligence (CCI) Initiated by Simon Buckingham Shum, described in detail here.

• Compendium Institute

• Collaboratorium

• Design for the First World engages "Third World minds" to generate creative solutions to "First World Prob­lems" such as obesity, aging population and the integration of immigrants. The competition en passant exposes the narrow view we often acquire of other groups / countries and the pater­nal­is­tic attitude often underlying aid, forgetting that there is only one type of human on earth. Inspired initiative, thesis project of Carolina Vallejo. Great effect even before the proper competition achieves anything.

• Global Sensemaking (GSm) is "a group of people dedicated to helping humanity address complex, interrelated global problems—such as climate change, energy policy, poverty, and food security—by developing and applying new web-based technology to assist collaborative decision making and cooperative problem solving." - "Humanity faces an emerging mess of global challenges (often called wicked problems) — such as, climate change, poverty, peak oil, population pressure, water shortages, declining biodiversity, and failing food supply — that are the product of patterns of thinking and behavior that no longer make sense. We need new tools of thought if we are to adapt to the scale and complexity of these challenges; tools that augment individual intelligence with the structured insights of many minds. We are building those tools." - "We are guided at the outset by a voluntary steering committee currently consisting of: Mark Aakhus, Mark Klein, Simon Buckingham Shum, George E. Mobus, Jack Park, David Price, Andy Streich, Jeff Conklin, and Mark Szpakowski. Further volunteers are welcome." - "To realize our vision, we are creating a web portal, developing open source software, and fostering international standards to create a scalable, collaborative, deliberative, and global discourse environment (e.g. web-based global sensemaking platforms) for addressing the most pressing problems of our time."

• Hypography Science Forums
  • pretty cool, constructive
  • seems heavy on administration effort,
  • registered users only, selection breeds quality

• LearningEmergence.net

• LedFace.com - Answers to questions using 'Collective Intelligence', removing the 'ego factor'

• LimeSurvey (thanks DS)

• Open Innovation e.g.,
  • Fellowforce
  • Hypios
  • InnoCentive (broad, spun out of Eli Lilly)
  • Innoget
  • Innovation Exchange
  • InnovationXchange
  • MillionBrains
  • NineSigma
  • One Billion Minds (initially a student initiative to engage a billion young people to change the world by solving challenging problems in Business, Technology and Social Innovation posed by Corporations and Non Profits)
  • PRESANS (focus R&D)
  • Starmind
  • Vertical*i (focus: software)
  • yet2.com

• openmethodology / Method for an Integrated Knowledge Environment (MIKE2.0) is an open source delivery framework for Enterprise Information Management. It provides a comprehensive methodology that can be applied across a number of different projects within the Information Management space. Wiki concept.

• The Oil Drum
  • civilized, content specific discussion
  • registered users can comment. Only editors can post

• Quora 'continually improving collection of questions and answers created, edited, and organized by everyone who uses it.'

• Stack Overflow
  • intricate concepts, works well on the target group of programmers
  • The collaborative concepts of stackoverflow.com would seem to have many features for such an environment. The concept seems to combine aspects of wiki's, blogs, fora and digg. It's about programming, not milliongenerations, but the concept might translate to other areas. Stackoverflow attracted programmers, so the concept may also be attractive to those with strong conceptual, philosophical and analytical thinking that would seem useful for significant contributions to milliongenerations. There certainly are differences, stackoverflow questions are more confined, specific and can be answered in a short time and it may still be more forum than wiki like. It is somewhat complicated. But it seems a great place to learn from and start, should try to get the advice of these people. Thanks for the tip, Harm!

• SpaceCollective.org
  • Attractive appearance
  • Linking of contributions
  • Registered Members, by invitation only

• twitter
  • minimal functionality, great effect
  • 140 chars forces conciseness
  • a lot seem to talk more than to listen
  • Spamming possible through following

• Wikipedia, obviously
  • widest scope, great idea
  • a lot of effort, many dedicated volunteers

• 6BillionOthers.org
  • great appearance, powerful message
  • video contributions possible, somewhat limited contributions, main content is from organization

• Aardvark / Vark.com Answers to questions from a person in a network

• X-Prizes
  • Leverage of prize: legitimacy, attention, interest, investment

• Reactions by contributors to posts
  • The Oil Drum (see above)
  • TED
  • YouTube