55. #cmToronto
October 24th, 2009
Text
researchers + hackers in the medium for change
56. #cmToronto
October 24th, 2009
Text
Convening researchers + hackers in the medium for change
57. What are some of the
trends you see developing in
the micro-messaging/social
change spaces?
As a group decide on
what you think is the most
significant trend.
58. With your new group share
what your group felt was the
most important/significant
trend.
As a group, discuss your
thoughts on what these trends
mean for the future, where are
we headed, what becomes
possible?
59. With the future possibilities in
mind, discuss what technology
roadblocks exist today that need to
be remedied/overcome to achieve
this future vision.
As you have this conversation
make note of any ideas that could
be used as development projects/
activities for this afternoon’s
hacklab.
Editor's Notes
We’ve seen this before
As Om Malik observed:
“Twitter is ... the start of an interaction society.”
And already it is becoming essential public infrastructure.
Already people are talking about it topping Google
We’ve seen this before
Printing press
Telegraph
Telephone
Radio
Internet
Web
This time is different
In July 2008 at a Nesta Web Science event Sir Tim Berners Lee, inventor of the web, said...
“I no longer understand my own creation”
He also implored the audience...
“Ask not whether we're asking too much of the web, but whether we're asking too much of us”
Indicating that what this is and where it’s going is about people.
This time is different
So simple that grandmas can use it.
Being sms compatible, it can be used anywhere, anytime from mobile phone
And being public
and 1 - 1
Which leads us to...
creating the most accessible, participatory, public medium in history.
Public micro-messaging merges the extensible/emergent nature of the web with the 4B person reach of SMS.
anywhere...
and everywhere.
Which leads us to...
- links to news photos and videos
- primary sources of things that are of interest
- intelligence -> earthquake notification and pinpointing before any other public sources
It also enables unprecedented reporting...
- faster
- more perspectives/sources
- more public engagement (the twitter wall - twittering questions)
#mumbai
#hudson
#iranelection
And finally we have unprecedented opportunities for flash mobilization like #hohoto where, in 18 days, over a dozen people came together over twitter to co-led the creation of a sold-out party to 600 people which raised $25,000 and 2t of food for the local foodbank.
So...
If most of this happened with less than 5million users...
If most of this happened with less than 5million users...
If most of this happened with less than 5million users...
And what happens when Twitter goes down - again - and again.
And what happens when there are more services that we want to use?
How do we access all these public messages?
How do we search for everything everyone is saying about the next major event?
So where do all those public messages sit?
- in Twitter’s private servers
And for how long?
And what what if I want to use a different service like Identi.ca?
Researching what makes the medium work
- how do people use it?
- how can it be used for change?
- how does it change change itself?
And convening labs to experiment and evolve the medium for maximum public benefit.