Part 2 in the series The Hidden Power of Community - articles that explore untapped social forces for positive change.

The evolution of internet technology is a frequent research topic for me, as I try to make sense of this incredible tool that I believe will change so many aspects of our lives. In an earlier article, I gave a quick summary of internet history, and how web 2.0 has come to represent the emerging edge of this process.

The concept of web 2.0 is spreading into other disciplines. Apparently, its key concepts of decentralization, collaboration, participation, pattern re-purposing, distributed web-based services and many-to-many relationships resonate with people's minds well beyond internet related technologies.

Just one example I came across today is "Enterprise 2.0" (E2.0). It initially appears to be web 2.0 for business, and just as with the term web 2.0, there's controversy as to what it means. Wikipedia even concluded the term to be "too commercial" and decided to delete the term and include as part of their entry for Enterprise Social Software. As with most emerging concepts, it will take some time, some practical experience and individual mind-set adjustment to let this evolve into something useful, perhaps even  massively, disruptively successful. For now, Andrew McAfee, Associate Professor at Harvard Business School, defined it as follows:

Enterprise 2.0 is the use of emergent social software platforms within companies, or between companies and their partners or customers.

 

Social software enables people to rendezvous, connect or collaborate through computer-mediated communication and to form online communities. (compare to Wikipedia's definition).

 

Platforms are digital environments in which contributions and interactions are globally visible and persistent over time.

 

Emergent means that the software is freeform, and that it contains mechanisms to let the patterns and structure inherent in people's interactions become visible over time.

 

Freeform means that the software is most or all of the following:

• Optional
• Free of up-front work-flow
• Egalitarian, or indifferent to formal organizational identities
• Accepting of many types of data

Some examples of E2.0 are company-internal blogs and wikis, idea marketplaces and innovation platforms, internal business tagging of both internal and external useful information.

And how can we talk about E2.0 if we don't define E1.0? A simplified summary in comparison:

Whether E2.0 will be broadly adopted in the enterprise is an ongoing debate. Most interesting to me is the osmosis of the new web technology into the business world. We're slowly moving toward a paradigm where our collective knowledge will become the driving force of how we operate. Ultimately, it is perhaps our common human desire to be part of a larger whole, as well as ensuring justice in a balance between the individual and the group, that will be the hidden driver of this process. The slow discovery of what it truly means to be human gives expression to this process, and will turn out to be an unstoppable force for massive change.

Don't we live in fascinating times? It seems, the future is now.

Bonus: Thanks to James Cascio's (co-founder of worldchanging.com) own website openthefuture.com, I came across this video by Michael Wesch, Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Kansas State University, that puts face on web 2.0 ;-) More than 1.6 million people have already viewed it, and it was ALL over the blogosphere a few weeks ago... Worth your 4 minutes of time if you want to see a very clever presentation with animated images and music.

Clearspace is a groupware solution that is built on top of a web application server. These kinds of servers provide applications of varying complexity and functionality through your web browser. It's interesting to remember that web application servers, in combination with web 2.0 (as covered in The hidden power of community), are the immediate future of the internet as we know it today.

There are many kinds of web application servers out there. The majority of them employ enterprise Java (WebSphere, ColdFusion, JBoss, Resin, WebLogic, WebOjects), but there are platforms that use .Net (Mono, IIS), C++ (Tuxedo), Python (Zope, Webware, Skunkweb, Django, TurboGears), Perl (Mason) and Ruby (-on Rails). Most of these are commercial and proprietary, and thus lock you into a long-term relationship to a vendor and services provider. Some are however open source, and hence most interesting to me.

Clearspace, as it turns out, runs on GlassFish, an open source Java-based application server; (2) has somewhat of a Plone styling; and (3) some of its functionalities are to be found in to my own design for a collaborative tool.

After my initial enthusiasm, reality resurfaced - it's a solution that forces people into a workflow of someone else's mind to the extent that it causes mental chafes and blisters. It makes me wonder whether this one-solution-for-everyone is feasible. Why yet another not-so-good solution? What should a better solution look like?

To resonate more with life itself, the successful approach will need embrace much more flexibility and redundancy, and yes, put more controls in the hands of users. The balancing act is in providing enough scaffolding to prevent users from getting lost, while at the same providing them with enough flexibility to make it their own quickly.

The only way to really arrive at this is in collaboration with a broad range of users who should by definition be somewhat technically challenged. The Catch-22 here is that we need collaborative tools to come up with collaborative tools ;-) I love it! Yossarian would be so happy... Which, in all seriousness, makes this a real challenge, and explains why attempts have not been too successful.

Analogous to going from one dimension to two, I now believe we'll need two things to pull this off, and it may need to start with the second: the (human) wetware. Once the right mindset and group-process is in place, the choice for which software to use becomes one of availability and personal preference.

It is through the Forum (the wetware), a nascent problem-driven geo-distributed consultation think-tank that attempts to catalyze and facilitate grass-roots driven solutions to grass-roots challenges through a process of collaborative enquiry, that I believe this Holy Grail of groupware will be created. Initially started as thought experiment in 2006, it has since slowly developed and is currently engaged in facilitating its first (wetware-software based) projects.

To be continued ;-)

A society in which participation will be the key organising idea rather than consumption and work, and where people will want to be players not just spectators - part of the action, not on the sidelines - is the central premise of Charles Leadbeater's forthcoming book We-think: The Power of Mass Creativity. It is about these new forms of mass-, creative collaboration. In it, he "charts the rise of mass, participative approaches to innovation from science and open source software, to computer games and political campaigning." Interestingly, he has pre-released his manuscript to invite participation from people before it goes to press.

Below, I'm sharing the talk he gave at the 2005 Ted Conference (Oxford) as it is enlightening -  definitely worth a 20-minute investment if you want to hear more about innovation coming from the masses. Compliments of Google video:

Now, this isn't to say all Bahá'ís everywhere are (1) aware of this, or (2) that every Bahá'í community reflects every point, or (3) that I'm observing things correctly. But generally, I'm pleased to report that many aspects are reflected in the overall design Bahá'u'lláh defined about a century-and-half ago, and most recent developments do resonate with the overall trend that is now visible everywhere.

The implications of this social tectonic shift are barely discernable but momentous and far-reaching beyond what we can currently imagine. Perhaps all "we can reasonably venture to attempt is to strive to obtain a glimpse of the first streaks of the promised dawn that must, in the fullness of time, chase away the gloom that has encircled humanity", Shoghi Effendi wrote in 1938, referring to the evolution of the Bahá'í objectives.

I remember starting to play with lego when I was about six years old. Of course it was fun to discover how I could connect the various blocks into towers, cars and planes. But soon enough, I started wondering how I could make functional things. Sure, I could make a little plane out of those long thin pieces. But a container to hold the plane was MUCH more interesting.  And - inspired by the puppet series the Thunderbirds - I was intrigued by space planes, and to make them so they could have little runabouts as well as external contraptions that clipped onto them... This inclination, later applied to grown-up toys, career and the internet, has never left me. How can I improve this? Can it connect to other things? What else can it do? An obsessive curiosity seems to accompany me wherever I go ;-)

Thirty-three years later I'm still playing, in a way. In the grown-up world, you could call this kind of play the exploration of larger, interconnected complex organic systems. An example of such a system is the internet, and there are very few systems more in flux and undergoing relentless development than internet technology. So let's look at this "system" and explore some thoughts on this constantly evolving area of human endeavor, and how, in my mind, it will release and channel enormous potential forces in civilization.

A brief internet history

The first graphic internet browser for home computers - NCSA Mosaic - burst onto the world stage in 1993. I remember seeing Mosaic that year at a Dutch University and it was simply amazing. I had browsed the text-only "internet" before, with gopher, and through browsing remote directories using various specialized software, and all of it rather painful: you had to use a slow modem to dial into systems remotely. It was a long-distance phone call, paying by the minute. Once connected, there was no graphics, no mouse, no hyperlinks, really. It was difficult to use, and it had a steep learning curve.

Mosaic changed all this - it made the internet accessible for the public and caused a true revolution: the information age was upon us, almost overnight. It allowed us to use hyperlinks in texts and articles that enabled us to instantly connect to other items on the internet with ease. Suddenly, an enormous electronic library became available that connected "everything" to "everything else", just one mouse click away. Mosaic went on to become Netscape in 1994. And its underlying design was the root of Microsoft Internet Explorer, released in 1995 as part of Windows 95.

This, our first collective experience with the internet, was a period of discovery. As more and more people and organizations started to use the internet, it became very diverse: every topic of the human experience could soon be found - with much difficulty. Directory listings became important; then search engines started to appear to help us find things. The "web", as it started to be called, soon became even more graphical. Color photos, art, and animations started to infuse the internet. Advertising started to appear, and usage metrics started to emerge. File downloading - mostly photos - became popular. And then, around 2004, high-speed internet access, sound and small movies completed the first iteration of our multimedia-enhanced internet experience.

Dejá vû - beyond traditional media

The development of the internet has followed a path analogous to media development of an earlier age. To give you a five second summary: after the invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg in the 1440s, books gradually went main stream during the industrial revolution, around the mid 1850s. Newspapers, advertising, and magazines followed. Then color magazines, radio, television and more advertising were upon us, bringing us to the close of the 20^th century.

If you (somewhat arbitrarily) ball-park this earlier development during the  industrial revolution to take about 150 years, the internet revolution took only ten to get to the point well beyond what those older media could provide. The web is fast taking over the roles of the traditional media, and then some - it has completely invaded our lives: it is our destination for our banking and our tax returns; we use it for communication (skype, aim); our email (gmail, yahoo) and our address book (plaxo). It is also our source for advice on insurance, investing, loans, cars, homes, education and healthcare. And we order our books (amazon), plane tickets (travelocity), gifts (any catalog) and pictures (shutterfly) online, as well as anything else you would want to buy unseen. Within the span of only ten years, we have become completely dependent on this technology - could you even imagine functioning without it?

What else can it do?

In 2005, the term Web 2.0 (via Tim O'Reilly) came to typify the web's "next level". At first seemingly a buzz word, the somewhat vague term has gained serious traction and now refers to a number of characteristics that frame the next chapter in our information age:

• Services that let people collaborate, participate, and share information online (flickr, youtube, wikipedia, skype, digg)
• Services that give you much more of an instant desktop-application-look-and-feel. You could call them internet applications, as opposed to desktop applications (google docs & spreadsheets, google calendar, google email)
• Services that enable many-to-many communication, decentralized interest groups, the freedom and ability to share and link to each other, each others' work and to and constantly re-purpose content (myspace, blogger, facebook, podshow)

Suddenly, it has become relatively easy to share and collaborate, across many geographical and social boundaries. And fancy desktop or laptop computers are hardly necessary anymore: the browser has become the only essential application that enables all services any time, anywhere: no more need for Word, or Excel, except for rather specialized uses.

Truly new ways of sharing are evolving, in ways that have never been possible before in human history. Let's consider some examples.

Social Networks

It is not unusual for teenagers to have a few hundred myspace friends. Chances are, they're spread out over various continents. This will affect our global culture in ways we can not foresee, but it may break down cultural barriers, as well as flatten cultural diversity...

Interest Sharing

Sharing your interests online is quickly evolving: Librarything, for example, allows book lovers to create an online catalog of their books, seek out recommendations, find others with similar libraries and discuss genres... Who knew it could be so much fun to look at other people's book collections? It's like being in their house looking at their bookshelves - almost.

Knowledge Sharing

"Since its creation in 2001, Wikipedia has rapidly grown into the largest reference website on the Internet. The content of Wikipedia is free, written collaboratively by people from all around the world. This website is a wiki, which means that anyone with access to an Internet-connected computer can edit, correct, or improve information throughout the encyclopedia, simply by clicking the edit this page link." It has grown at an astonishing rate and now includes 1.4 million articles in English (September 2006). Localized versions are available in 228 other languages.

How will we apply these new resources for the common good? Can you imagine how this will change our communities? I feel that there is an enormous hidden potential in all these incoherent and asynchronous efforts and I will explore this further through a series of articles called The Hidden Power of Community.

It seems, the future is now.

Fundamental Build Principles

utilize existing technology
open-source,

ip protection

open standards
everything needs to be scalable, load balancable
web 2.0 where possible
learning attitude - adapt according to user feedback
release early & often

Content

project spaces

papers
theses

discussions

interviews

images/maps

multimedia (talks, music, podcasts, lectures, video)

online presentations, both synchro (live webcast) and a-synchro (recorded)

conference/meeting announcements

Structure

Revolves around Project Spaces:

project space can be for one or more researchers

peer collab space (many-to-many)
mentor/student collab space (one-to-many-to-many)

exchange: connect problems to  solutions/researchers

User toolset

personalized news frontpage, various sig categories
annotate online

search / search annotations / search people / search skills

xref content

online presenting (multicast, screens, backchannel commentaries) social networking option

user tagging

IP protection options (CC, (c), alternatives) 

Reference Repository (centrally maintained)

original Writ in Persian, Arabic, Turkish

facsimile repository
reference translations

search function (Vink)

After witnessing the birth of the internet in 1994, about 12 years ago, I got an idea. It involved the internet in a major way, and I wasn't sure if I had just had a dream and whether it would ever be feasible or not. Internet technology has been developing at breakneck speed ever since, and only now do I feel it within reach to reconsider that dream.

The hows, whys and wherefores will spill out before too long under separate cover, but let me give you my crystallized thoughts first: with the internet, we've arrived at a new juncture in human history. For the first time in its history, humanity can collaborate instantly and unaffected by practical obstacles or distance.

Interestingly, this possibility has been foretold in the Bahá'í Writings: "A mechanism of world inter-communication will be devised, embracing the whole planet, freed from national hindrances and restrictions, and functioning with marvellous swiftness and perfect regularity." (World Order of Bahá'u'lláh, Shoghi Effendi)

And as important as attaining technical and organizational potentiality is in itself, it is not sufficient. Just like literacy does not imply wisdom. A right kind of animating spirit is required alongside it, to enable thought-seeds to germinate and grow into beautiful trees and flowers. "In order to respond adequately to the spiritual needs of their neighbours, Bahá'ís will have to gain an in-depth understanding of the issues involved. The effort of imagination this challenge requires can be appreciated from the advice that is perhaps the most frequently and urgently reiterated admonition in the writings of their Faith: to "meditate", to "ponder", to "reflect"."
(One Common Faith, Universal House of Justice, para.22)

To encourage this animating spirit to become stronger, I took the ideas of consultation and collaborative inquiry and poured them into the concept of a consulting Forum, a virtual think-tank, but one that resonates intrinsically with the same characteristics: to collaborate instantly, unaffected by practical obstacles or distance. All consultation, on all important topics, all the time. Thus: a central area around which a new civilization can develop - the Forum. And here is my attempt to capture its characteristics:

The Forum is a problem-driven consultation think-tank.

The Forum only truly exists through its loose collective of change-agents committed to finding solutions to the world's problems on any scale. Its recommendations vary, from impacting just a single neighborhood, to suggesting new educational approaches for whole states or countries.

The Forum's task-forces and special interest groups frame their collaboration and discussions around specific problems or problem areas.

The Forum's task-forces and special interest groups use collaborative inquiry to merge practical and theoretical knowledge, wisdom, spiritual perception into implementable recommendations.

The Forum's modus operandi is the internet and all associated technologies.

The Forum provides tools to all task-forces and special-interest groups through its website(s), online "collabs" (collaborative laboratories), and social networking technologies.

The Forums engages both pro-bono and commercial work. Where commercial work has remuneration, all profits will be directly divided among task-force members who formally adopted that particular project.

The Forum's work avoids partisan politics. It is however fully engaged in politics where this is defined as any effort having serious potential impact on society.

The Forum tries to assist in:

• identifying the spiritual needs of the people
• developing consciousness
• cultivating spiritual approaches to problems
• obtaining a mature relationship with our Creator

The Forum's Inputs:

• collaborative inquiry
• ever changing, ever evolving project teams
• practical and theoretical knowledge
• wisdom and experience
• spiritual perception, based on life and "the book of God" (any of His Messenger's Works and/or Creation itself)
• deepenings, conferences
• long view, always trying to address root-causes and looking toward the end of all things
• enthusiasm, love, zeal, embracing diversity
• accepting varying levels of understanding
• respectful and civilized behavior at all times

The Forum's Outputs:

• recommendation papers, articles, books
• deepenings, conferences
• spin-off task forces, non-profits and schools, to implement recommendations where sensible.

Framing the work: 

If Bahá'ís are to fulfil Bahá'u'lláh's mandate, however, it is obviously vital that they come to appreciate that the parallel efforts of promoting the betterment of society and of teaching the Bahá'í Faith are not activities competing for attention. Rather, are they reciprocal features of one coherent global programme. Differences of approach are determined chiefly by the differing needs and differing stages of inquiry that the friends encounter. Because free will is an inherent endowment of the soul, each person who is drawn to explore Bahá'u'lláh's teachings will need to find his own place in the never-ending continuum of spiritual search. He will need to determine, in the privacy of his own conscience and without pressure, the spiritual responsibility this discovery entails. In order to exercise this autonomy intelligently, however, he must gain both a perspective on the processes of change in which he, like the rest of the earth's population, is caught up and a clear understanding of the implications for his own life. The obligation of the Bahá'í community is to do everything in its power to assist all stages of humanity's universal movement towards reunion with God. The Divine Plan bequeathed it by the Master is the means by which this work is carried out.

(Commissioned by The Universal House of Justice, One Common Faith, p.51, para.67)

The Forum only truly exists through its loose collective of change-agents committed to finding solutions to the world's problems on any scale. Its recommendations vary, from impacting just a single neighborhood, to suggesting new educational approaches for whole states or countries. 

Problem-driven approach through collaborative inquiry