tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-57888542024-03-07T00:35:43.457-08:00Phoom!Online community and other things that make my head go >phoom!<Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.comBlogger78125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-81360374332569779462009-11-23T14:53:00.000-08:002009-11-23T15:36:52.863-08:00New Job. New Home.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://wiki.answers.com/"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 67px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOUxI7zeqS6tXoaSAMZKEq3kviN4HZW5LtApVregpVjo8MgIitPh7jJWh3aIYcwVYYM2JyEMnJ_suRuZ_SE5UdxiX5koVbhI9VHE0nTSYFgLXFes3fka8R76rZF3Nltf2GHetO_g/s320/answerscom-WARA_logo.gif" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5407443684855213618" border="0" /></a>I have big news! I have just accepted the position of Director of Community for <a href="http://answers.com/">Answers.com</a> (focusing on <a href="http://wiki.answers.com/">WikiAnswers)</a>. I'll be leading a distributed team of 5 folks who have about 15 assistants and nearly 700 volunteers across the globe who are supporting nearly 4 million registered users and over 50 million visitors a month. Whew!<br /><br />As part of the job, I must move to New York. It was not an easy decision to make. I will be moving away from my mother (two hrs away in Merced), good friends, a nice cheap rental in Hayward, and many, many professional friends, colleagues and peers. I will miss seeing them as often as I do now, but I look forward to keeping connected through all our virtual connections.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/76/169367424_f9fbb93902_m.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 160px;" src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/76/169367424_f9fbb93902_m.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>On the other hand, I am moving six hours and $300 closer to Europe. Also, I will be closer to a number of places that are of interest to me such as the Philadelphia (Mütter Museum and <a href="http://www.collphyphil.org/INDEX.ASP">The College of Physicians of Philadelphia</a>) and the <a href="http://www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/index.html">National Library of Medicine</a> in Bethesda, MD. I look forward to trips north and south exploring the other coast.<br /><br />At the center of this, though, is the work to be done. Answers.com is pretty cool and energetic. I get to work with an existing community and staff and help everyone grow and become more empowered at helping answer other people's questions. I look forward even more to how I can help make that happen better, faster, with more people helping each other.<br /><br /><b></b><blockquote><b>I NEED YOUR HELP!</b><br />If you can help me with the following please contact me:<ul><li>Friends/family who live in NYC, especially Brooklyn, who can help me understand the neighborhoods.</li><br /><li>Friends/family who are in real estate, property mgmt, or can recommend a broker in NYC who can help me find a place and understand the ins and outs of renting.</li><br /><li>Recommendations for national movers to help me get the few very precious things I will take with me to NYC safely.</li></ul></blockquote><br />I know this is a surprise to some folks (what else is new) so I hope to answer a few questions. If I miss one you have, add it as a comment or shoot it to me and I will answer!<br /><br /><b>When do you start?</b><br />I start sometime mid-January 2010. I want to finish up some client work and there is a very special winter camping event I want to attend.<br /><br /><b>When do you move?</b><br />No later than mid-February 2010. I hope to have a place lined up by Feb 1 so I can concentrate on my move. I'm not sure if I will be able to stay for my birthday (Feb 19), though.<br /><br /><b>Do you have time to take on any online community work?</b><br />I regret that as of now, I am unavailable to accept any client work. If you wanted to talk about possible work, I do know many online community people who are looking for clients and I would be happy to match you up with one of these fine people.<br /><br /><b>Why do you want to leave California?</b><br />It's not that I want to leave California. It's that working on a project like Answers.com and WikiAnswers is a huge opportunity to be a part of something that will have an impact on people. I recognize that to do the job well, I need to be closer to the people in New York and the office in Israel.<br /><br /><b>Where are you going to live?</b><br />I'm not sure. Brooklyn looks and feels a lot like Oakland and so I am looking there first. I also am not ready for the shock of Manhattan apartment prices. If you know anyone who lives in Brooklyn and can offer me advice on neighborhoods, please let me know!<br /><br /><b>Can stay at your place when I come to New York?</b><br />Sure! As long as you don't mind that I will not be in Manhattan. I will look for a place that will give me enough room for office/guests so please come make use of the space.<br /><br /><b>Can I have your stuff?</b><br />I definitely have to shed stuff from my life. If there is something particular you have been coveting, ask!<br /><br /><b>Are you giving up the VW Thing?</b><br />Yes (sniff!). It's time I come to terms with the fact that I don't have the drive to get the poor darling restored like it deserves. She's been good to me and I'll be looking for a good home ASAP.<br /><br />This is big, really big. So did I miss a question? What do you want to know that I haven't already said?<br /><br /><span style="font-size:78%;">photo of brooklyn bridge by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/seeminglee/169367424/">See-ming Lee</a></span>Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-21026436237908348952009-08-11T21:11:00.000-07:002015-04-13T16:27:42.286-07:00The lost origin of an online holidayFor the past three years, I have been wanting to tell my version of a holiday called Fern Day that is unique to the citizens of a virtual world called <a href="http://www.vzones.com/">Dreamscape</a> which is coming up on its 14th year of operation (I blogged about its <a href="http://phoom.blogspot.com/2005/11/virtual-world-celebrates-10-year.html">10th Anniversary</a> before). It’s the story of how something I helped start was adopted by a community and became a custom or kind of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norm_%28sociology%29">cultural norm</a> that is practiced annually without connection to its deeper origins.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 130%;">What is Fern Day?</span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLePrcUG-ACWbr7QYNBv_zPSaTyaYWWb2krHHX1rACLsbyL2dRZVRVfjpEvwK5wllfH93KW4n0O1CaDthG62N1GhgRRYF0xm7-x88Z3sQXq2mUiao81NLpy7VUrPgxUqxzxUBPCg/s1600-h/Fern+Day+2009+Prizes.png" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLePrcUG-ACWbr7QYNBv_zPSaTyaYWWb2krHHX1rACLsbyL2dRZVRVfjpEvwK5wllfH93KW4n0O1CaDthG62N1GhgRRYF0xm7-x88Z3sQXq2mUiao81NLpy7VUrPgxUqxzxUBPCg/s320/Fern+Day+2009+Prizes.png" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5368926100688960626" style="cursor: pointer; float: right; height: 165px; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; width: 320px;" /></a><br />
On Aug 1, 2009, Fern Day was celebrated over the course of two days by the inhabitants of the city of Phantasus on the island of Kymer in a dream-like world called Dreamscape. <a href="http://events.theargo.org/staffevent3/day1.php">Two full days</a> of games developed and run by the world-wide community with virtual items given as prizes. And by “full-days” and “world-wide” I mean there are multiple games scheduled each hour from 1am to 11pm which implies multiple time-zones are involved. Additionally, there is a parade through the streets of Phantasus, a dance contest, a blessing of the Ferns, several ceremonies and retellings of the <a href="http://www.redrosesgarden.net/fernday09/ferndayhistory09.html">True History of Fern Day</a>.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 130%;">How Fern Day Started</span><br />
I don't want to take away from what Fern Day is for the citizens of Phantasus and the inhabitants of Dreamscape, I hope that this secret origin of Fern Day will help other community managers and facilitators see ways they can instigate cultural changes in their own communities that will be accepted and adopted by the community members and become part of the cultural make-up of how those communities identify themselves.<br />
<br />
About a month before the first Fern Day was celebrated, Aug 1, 1996, I was one of three community managers (called Oracles) who was trying find a holiday to celebrate during the month of August. The Dreamscape had been operating for just under one year and we knew early on that we wanted to celebrate existing holidays in a way that separated the Dreamscape from the everyday, offline and modern, “waking world”. We recognized that there would be pressure from the modern people inhabiting this virtual world to bring with them the holidays of their culture, nationality and religions and we didn't want to become caught up in disputes (which happened anyway and is another story for another time). Finally, we wanted to recognize natural cycles we cannot avoid, the cycles of the hours, the days, weeks, months and seasons because such cycles help tie people to places, and each other. So, we planned early on to include at the very least recognize holidays on a regular basis.<br />
<br />
It was the nature of the Dreamscape that members of the community could not create objects or artwork on their own as one can today in Second Life or as one could in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_Worlds">Active Worlds</a> in 1996. This meant that all artwork was created by our company. In order to avoid overloading the art pipeline with holiday artwork, we planned to celebrate holidays every two months for one year, shift one month and keep going for another year. That way, in two years, we would have 12 holidays and could recycle art each year (that ultimately was doomed because we needed to refresh or create new art every year to keep interest up). Thus, Christmas, Chanukah and Kwanza were rolled together into a month-long winter fest (which included a very secular Santa Claus (called Kymer Kringle) and a nod to C. S. Lewis’s <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Witch">White Witch</a>) .<br />
<br />
So it was in July of 1996, I was looking for a holiday or set of holidays to appropriate and remix to our budding virtual world. Not finding much, I learned about <a href="http://wattleday.asn.au/about-wattle-day-1">Australia’s National Wattle Day</a>, held Sept 1. Learning that it was a fairly new (less than 100 yrs old) holiday gave me the inspiration to, uhm, appropriate it. I moved it to August 1st and latched on to the only local flora the Dreamscape had in abundance, the fern which was purchasable in a vending machine for 160 Tokens (the virtual currency).<br />
<br />
At the next meeting of the three community managers, the question arose, "What are we going to do about a holiday in August?". I suggested we celebrate "Fern Day". My compatriots looked at me confused and, figuring that the only way this would work is to be so over the top that it will take root, I continued like a carnival barker. "It will be fernomnonal! A full day of fernvolity, celebrating the ferntastic fern-ness of the fern." I may have concluded with, "unless someone has a better idea". Having done my research into the dearth of non-nationalistic holidays for August, I figured there would be none. It took no time for them to start fern puns of their own and the idea took root. Planning for the first Fern Day started.<br />
<br />
On July 31, we publicly announced Fern Day with this message:<br />
<blockquote>
<code>What: Phantasus Fern Festival<br />When: August 1st<br />Time: All day<br />Where: The streets of Phantasus<br />Hosts: Oracles and Acolytes<br /><br />Come one, come all!<br /><br />Help celebrate Phantasus Fern Day--The Dreamscape's first "official" in-world holiday! We will be celebrating with new vendos, new items, and of course...ferns! Bring your ferns or purchase new ones! Search amongst the foliage for hidden items! Fern Fun all day long!</code><br />
<code>The main idea is to have fun with ferns. There will be improptu <i>[sic]</i> games and visits by all three Oracles throughout the day. Here is a schedule of a few events:<br /><br />9:00 AM WAT - Opening </code><code>Ceremony Outside the Temple<br /><br />Noon WAT - Fern Tag (Meet at Temple Street Terrance Lobby)<br /><br />1:00 PM WAT - Drawing for prizes of players in Fern Tag<br /><br />5:00 PM WAT \<br /> - Blessing of the Ferns<br />5:30 PM WAT /<br /><br />9:00 PM WAT - Closing Ceremony Outside of Temple</code></blockquote>
(WAT means Worlds Away Time which happened to be set the same as the servers)<br />
<br />
and got exactly the same reaction from the community that I had gotten from my teammates. Our volunteer moderators (called Acolytes) were really at a loss to explain why all three community managers had just gone collectively insane. We chose not use the rational (and real) explanation of appropriating Wattle Day and instead flooded our poor volunteers with fern-puns, silly enthusiasm, and vague references to the "ancient origins" of a holiday that, until that moment, none of them had ever heard of. In other words, we used the time-honored justification of many cultural customs, "Because that's the way it's always been done".<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 130%;">The First Fern Day</span><br />
Come August 1, 1996, the citizens of Phantasus were tentative about what was happening, but they became enthusiastic when the price of <a href="http://www.vplanet.org/archives/articles/trading/tr90731c.html">ferns</a> were dropped from ~160 Tokens to a mere 10 Tokens. The scheduled game of Fern Tag was simple: find someone without a fern, give them a fern and them drag them to the game host who would record both names as part of a raffle. People were buying ferns fast and furious and zipping around the world handing them out and drawing more innocent bystanders into the chaotic whirlwind of fern-ness.<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipoRUPW4__WsgZJzPAHsy917cWPL3-3EjPDdtx0APDOnJrZaBgTxiIZWt5qi3VuC8ZDjzvy_XVgPwR06mzb42Fj2DSsTEVYtYU6OibhicOixn07Pj6Fmpqmr39XXvO7myudAETUg/s1600-h/fernday96.gif" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipoRUPW4__WsgZJzPAHsy917cWPL3-3EjPDdtx0APDOnJrZaBgTxiIZWt5qi3VuC8ZDjzvy_XVgPwR06mzb42Fj2DSsTEVYtYU6OibhicOixn07Pj6Fmpqmr39XXvO7myudAETUg/s320/fernday96.gif" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5368926610668303026" style="cursor: pointer; height: 202px; margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; width: 320px;" /></a></div>
Then disaster struck. It seemed that there was a memory leak with the vendos that dispensed ferns. But this memory leak was on the *server* side. That means that the more people bought ferns, the slower and slower the servers hosting the entire virtual world were running until they eventually crashed, booting everyone out. Even when the world was brought back, it immediately crashed again. It looked like it would take many hours before the world could be brought back up so fern day would be over before it had a chance to even exist. People were feeling left out and understandably angry (likely the most angry were the poor developers who gave us no end of grief over what turned out to be an unscheduled load test on a Saturday). There was only one thing to do: apologize and make amends.<br />
<blockquote>
<code>Dear Dreamscape Customers,<br /><br />This is a letter to discuss the most recent and unfortunate events which occurred on Fern Day.<br /><br />The terrible problems we experienced with our servers on what was quickly turning into an extremely festive occasion was as emotionally draining for us as it may have been for you. The Dreamscape was unavailable from 2:00 AM WAT - Noon WAT and from 2:00 PM WAT - 8:00 PM WAT. We have been working continuously to find the source of the problem and make the Dreamscape available to you. Unfortunately, at this time, we have been unable to determine the exact source of the problem. We are still investigating the situation and have implemented some changes which should keep the service stable. We deeply regret the inconvenience and imposition on the fun promised.<br /><br />The Oracles have every intention of getting as much out of Fern Day as we hoped. To this end, we have extended the Fern Day Festival to Noon, August 2. We encourage you to come out as often as possible during the next 16 hours to celebrate Fern Day as we had intended to celebrate. We hope that those who had initially captured the spirit of Fern Day will regain it and sponsor or participate in the variety of games which were spontaneously popping up. At Noon, there will be a closing ceremony at the Main Doors of the Temple and soon after, the vendos will be removed from the streets. Even after this, we hope you will enjoy the ferns you have and the good memories which we will all share.<br /><br />The Oracles and the Forum Sysops thank you for your generous patience and support in this matter and wish you a very happy Fern Day! We would also like to thank the Acolytes and the Forum Staff who helped out so much during the times in which the Dreamscape was unavailable.<br /><br />Most sincerely,<br />Oracle Uni<br />Oracle Vaserius<br />Oracle Teresias<br />WorldsAway Community Forum Sysops<br />WorldsAway Team</code><br />
<div align="”right”">
</div>
<div align="right">
from SUCKUP.TXT</div>
</blockquote>
The next day, folks turned up, amends were made, and the new closing ceremony included a recognition of the troubles we had all encountered. As an aside, it also meant that two community managers came in for an extra day of work when only one had been regularly scheduled (this is what you do when you are in customer and community service). Fern day was wrapped up, prices returned to normal, and we put it away until the next year.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 130%;">How Fern Day really started</span><br />
The next year, in preparation for the second annual celebration of Fern Day, Marianne G, who ran one of the newspapers for the virtual world posted a story of the "true history" of the origins of Fern Day which included the nickname “Crash Day”. We, the community managers, knew none of us had a hand in her history but it took only seconds to agree that we would support and even adopt her story as the origins. To do otherwise would discourage creativity and we thought her version was as good as any so we took the same, "because that's the way it's always been" attitude. Aug 1, 1997 was my last Fern Day in Dreamscape. In another two years, the last of the original community managers who stared blankly at me that July day had also moved on.<br />
<br />
But by 1999, the community had claimed Fern Day as their own and over the next <a href="http://www.google.com/#hl=en&q=%22fern+day%22+site%3Awww.vplanet.or">10 plus years</a>, the citizen-created history, games, parades, and ceremonies have evolved to include early beta testers (who never received official recognition for being pioneers – mea culpa) and even a group who call themselves <a href="http://www.vzoners.com/natives/">Natives</a> and claim to have inhabited this virtual world before even the beta testers. It's literally taken directions I never imagined it would. I could not be happier about it.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-89396263237059738212009-08-10T12:24:00.000-07:002009-08-10T17:54:40.396-07:00OCTribe Call for Participation - Tuesday Topic<b>How OCTribe works</b><br />Each 2nd Tuesday and 4th Tuesday of the month, one of the bloggers in the loosely defined OCTribe group makes a call for posts related to a particular topic of online communities. Then the same blogger posts a summary and links to the submissions. <br /><br />Write something related to the topic tomorrow (Tuesday, August 11), tag it <i>#octribe</i>, and your post will be linked from the recap page. This conversational project is just starting, so please join in!<br /><br /><b>The Aug 11 Topic: Fostering culture in and around online communities</b><br />Share your experiences and ideas around any of these:<ul><li>fostering or identifying emerging customs or taboos in an online community (for example, here's a story of an academic who discovered "that game rules encouraging competition and varied tactics hardly mattered to gaming community members who wanted to <a href="http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2009/07/loyola_university_professor_be.html">preserve a deeply-rooted culture</a>."<br /><li>establishing or fostering culture within the organization hosting an online community<br /><li>culture clashes between online communities or between community and host organization<br /><li>offline and online culture influencing each other (for example, the prevelance of <a href="http://www.gauravonomics.com/blog/caste-based-communities-on-orkut-mirror-indias-splintered-society/">caste based groups on Orkut as a mirror of India's society</a></ul><br />You might also find inspiration from <a href="http://www.onlinecommunityreport.com/archives/434-Online-Communities-Establishing-a-Communitys-Culture.html">Forum One's Online Community Culture study</a> conducted Oct 2008.<br /><br />How to participate:<ul><li>Post your thoughts on online communities and culture sometime between now and Tuesday, Aug 11.<br /><li>Tag your posts, tweets, photos, slides with #octribe<br />- shoot me a quick email to make sure I include your post in the round up.<br /><li>Come back Wednesday, Aug 12 to see what your fellow Online Community Tribe members have to say.</ul>If you would like to host a future OCTribe topic, email <a href="mailto:bjohnston@forumone.com" title="email">Bill Johnston</a>.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-17956536455539727732009-07-28T20:01:00.000-07:002009-07-28T20:14:55.104-07:00Create value metrics for both host and communityThis post is part of the OC Tribe series. Each 2nd Tuesday and 4th Tuesday of the month, online community practitioners are be encouraged to explore a particular topic via blog, video blog, twitter, or whatever suites their fancy. The topic for Tuesday, July 28 is <a href="http://redplasticmonkey.wordpress.com/2009/07/27/octribe-topic-valuing-participation-in-online-communities/">Valuing Participation in Online Communities</a>. Check the post and tag your musings with <a href="http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23octribe">#octribe</a>. A recap will be hosted at the originating blog later this week. This ad-hoc group is just starting up, so please join in! #octribe<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0aqkBlySechFpB0YarmTc5gFop0Pei_1iyerTIFvVGUai4nnrorJPufDftQE7ywx3nS2Q8g-iZ-vwjINqufrIHu6s55fwCFH1yvGXQmPU7MZWpyqMpzhKHnrphjMWz_McQs7l6g/s1600-h/tescobitter.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 178px; height: 192px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0aqkBlySechFpB0YarmTc5gFop0Pei_1iyerTIFvVGUai4nnrorJPufDftQE7ywx3nS2Q8g-iZ-vwjINqufrIHu6s55fwCFH1yvGXQmPU7MZWpyqMpzhKHnrphjMWz_McQs7l6g/s320/tescobitter.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5363713335560003122" border="0" /></a>Some discussion of assigning value to members in a community tend toward how valuable a particular community member is to the host of the community (be they a brand, reseller, or even non-profit). This often raises concerns that community members are being taken advantage of. The AOL volunteer lawsuit gets thrown out as one of the third-rail types of stories -- danger! do not touch! What is often lost is that AOL ran volunteer programs for a long time before the lawsuits with few issues. What changed? Part of the answer is that AOL was using free access as a perk for their volunteers. However, when AOL went from a rated service (access charged by the hour) to a flat-rate (unlimited access for a monthly fee), the <a href="http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/1999/04/16/aol_community/">value of that perk plummeted</a>. It's not the whole reason some volunteers stood up against AOL, but it certainly added to some of the resentment.<br /><br />What if we add another level to the idea of ascribing value to the contributions of a community member? Let's say we are a bookseller. People who write reviews are valuable to our business, not because they buy books in large quantities (in fact, we might even send them books to review), but because their reviews help sell books to people who will appreciate them. Even by steering some people away from a book, the reviewer can help the bookseller build long-term relationships with book buyers. It's pretty easy to see who we might ascribe a value to the reviewer -- sales of books after viewing a particular review (or, better, after marking it "helpful" and then going on to purchase the book).<br /><br />So where's the value to the reviewer? Part might be that the seller puts high-value reviewers at the top of promotional book give-aways. So reviewers get more books. Reviewers might even be allowed a small percentage of the sales of books they review. And, of course, there is notoriety in being a highly ranked reviewer.<br /><br />Is there value for the community at large, particularly, those community members who might not receive a high valuation in this scheme. Perhaps so. After all, they want to spend their money wisely and so are likely to also find the high-value reviewers helpful, useful, valuable.<br /><br />Granted, I cherry-picked a fairly easy business and model for my example, but I challenge my fellow community managers and facilitator. What other kinds of positive feedback loops can we create that build value for different aspects of our communities such that even if the value were quantified as a number, people would still be willing to contribute?<br /><br /><div cc="http://creativecommons.org/ns#" about="http://www.flickr.com/photos/55935853@N00/3648865970/"><a rel="cc:attributionURL" href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/55935853@N00/">Tesco Bitter photo by Ewan-M</a> / <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/">CC BY-SA 2.0</a></div>Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-4660652950548337042009-06-18T18:43:00.000-07:002009-06-18T18:46:43.501-07:00Some notes on Sway by the bros. BrafmanRecently, at a webinar, <a ref="http://twitter.com/Fgossieaux">Francois Gossieaux</a> recommended the book <a href="http://www.librarything.com/work/4963786">Sway</a> by Ori & Rom Brafman. I decided to take the rest of the afternoon off and see if the <a href="http://library.ci.hayward.ca.us/">Hayward Public Library</a> had a copy. They did and it was such a slim book and a quick read that, well, here we are.<br /><br />As I read the first few chapters, the authors introduced terms such as "value attribution" and "diagnosis bias". The descriptions sounded familiar as Fundamental Attribution Error and Confirmation Bias, so I googled the terms and, lo, found very little in the way of formal definition of their terms. While I think the concepts in the book are very interesting, I admit I am a bit annoyed at dressing up known or familiar concepts in new terms without acknowledging or improving upon the terms or concepts.<br /><br />So here's a very short summary of the concepts in the book with more common terms and links where I could find them.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Chapt 1</span> - aversion to loss - <a href="http://sunk-cost.behaviouralfinance.net/">Sunk Costs Fallacy</a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Chapt 2</span> - commitment (even in the face of mounting loss) - <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escalation_of_commitment">Escalation of Commitment</a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Chapt 3</span> - value attribution - <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error">Fundamental Attribution Error</a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Chapt 4</span> - diagnosis bias - <a href="http://confirmation-bias.behaviouralfinance.net/">Confirmation Bias</a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Chapt 5</span> - chameleon effect - <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pygmalion_Effect">Pygmalion Effect</a> & <a href="http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=3296576">Golem Effect</a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Chapt 6</span> - process justice - Perceptions of fairness and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultimatum_game">The Ultimatum Game</a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Chapt 7</span> - the paradox of rewards - neuroscience of personal pleasure (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Knutson">Brian Knutson</a>) and altruism (<a href="http://www.physorg.com/news88610651.html">Dharol Tankersley</a>). prospect of reward is stronger pleasure center stimulant than receiving the reward.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Chapt 8</span> - group conformity and dissenters - <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asch_conformity_experiments">Asch conformity experiments</a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Epilogue</span> - advice on avoiding each of the above "sway" forces. However, advice on avoiding being swayed by rewards was not included. I would have liked to see much more on this with the advice backed by research.<br /><br />I'm glad I read <i>Sway</i>, it's a bit like a crib sheet of behavioral psychology and economics, so it works as an introduction, but there are deeper resources out there and I'm looking forward to digging into them.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-73285236555830740042009-04-27T01:17:00.000-07:002009-04-28T06:12:35.224-07:00Questions to Ask When Building an Online CommunityToday, I am attending the <a href="http://www.blogger.com/www.nten.org/ntc">NTEN Conference 2009</a> and speaking on a panel, "Building and Sustaining Vibrant Online Communities".<br /><br />This is the 15-20 minute presentation I will give. I recommend clicking through to the full view so you can see my notes on the slides. I'd love to hear feedback on the questions (and special thanks to Brooks Brown and Mike Rowland for feedback on the draft).<br /><br /><div style="width: 425px; text-align: left;" id="__ss_1152537"><a style="margin: 12px 0pt 3px; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,Sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 14px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; display: block; text-decoration: underline;" href="http://www.slideshare.net/scottmoore/scott-moore-questions-for-online-community?type=presentation" title="Questions to Ask When Building an Online Community">Questions to Ask When Building an Online Community</a><object style="margin: 0px;" height="355" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://static.slidesharecdn.com/swf/ssplayer2.swf?doc=scottmoore-questionsforonlinecommunity-090316134043-phpapp01&stripped_title=scott-moore-questions-for-online-community"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"><embed src="http://static.slidesharecdn.com/swf/ssplayer2.swf?doc=scottmoore-questionsforonlinecommunity-090316134043-phpapp01&stripped_title=scott-moore-questions-for-online-community" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="355" width="425"></embed></object><div style="font-size: 11px; font-family: tahoma,arial; height: 26px; padding-top: 2px;">View more <a style="text-decoration: underline;" href="http://www.slideshare.net/">presentations</a> from <a style="text-decoration: underline;" href="http://www.slideshare.net/scottmoore">Scott Moore</a>.</div><span style="font-size:100%;"></span></div>Update: Lessons learned. This was not a 20 min presentation. The slides may be simple, but my supporting details were, well, detailed. I guess that's good. I'm thinking about presenting this at the <a href="http://www.forumone.com/content/calendar/detail/3027">Online Community Unconference, June 10th</a>. If you have an opinion on that, let me know.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-67489528648721522009-02-17T23:36:00.000-08:002009-02-18T00:07:24.444-08:00Social Psychology 101 for Community ManagersThese are my speaking notes for my session at the Online Community Unconference East 2009. I believe the <a href="http://www.socialtext.net/ocue2009/index.cgi?online_community_unconference_east_2009">wiki is publicly available for viewing</a>.<br /><br />These are totally messy. I am trying to break my desire for unattainable perfection and allow drafts of my thoughts to be out there. If there seems to be interest, I may turn these into a better formatted series.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Intro</span><br />- I am not a social scientist, just a Community Manager who has been learning as I go.<br />- I want to share the moments of, "I know that! It has a name?" with you.<br />- The format is definitions, examples and some practical applications.<br />- The main goal is to get you started in learning from other disciplines.<br />- The secondary goal is to improve ourselves as community managers and participants as community members.<br /><br />(Additional notes: there is a community manager in Poland named Darek Kłeczek who blogs at <a href="http://kleczek.wordpress.com/">Leadership in Social Networks</a>. I came across his post, <a href="http://kleczek.wordpress.com/2008/09/16/10-social-psychology-tips-for-managing-online-communities/">10 Social Psychology Tips for Managing Online Communities</a> while searching if anyone else had approached this topic yet. He's worth keeping an eye one as he develops ideas about how we can encourage leaders to develop in our communities.)<br /><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Fundamental Attribution Error</span><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Definition:</span><br />People tend to presume the actions of others are indicative of the "kind" of person they are rather than their actions being caused by a situation.<br /><br />Based on experiment by Edward E. Jones and Victor Harris (1967). Coined by Lee Ross (1977). Sometimes called "correspondence bias", but not by all social scientists.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Examples:</span><br />- Community makes error against their own: First time posters who make a social mistake being considered a troll.<br /><br />- Community applies attribution error to community host: Considering the host uncaring/out of touch when tech changes occur suddenly or when the host makes a decision about Terms of Service (accused of playing favorites).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Reducing the Effect:</span><br />The attribution error occurs usually because there is not enough information about the situation. Studies have shown that when victims of crime learn more about the criminal's circumstances views tend to shift from desiring harsh penalties to compensation for losses.<br /><br />To prevent yourself from committing the fundamental attribution error, gather situational information:<br />- Do people tend to behave the same way in the same situation?<br />- What would I do in the same situation?<br />- *Ask* the person for help in understanding their situation.<br /><br />To reduce the effect when others are applying the fundamental attribution error to you, disseminate the situational information.<br />- publicly realign yourself/your org with community goals/values.<br />- clarify the way the situation is leading to types of behavior.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Examples:</span><br />- ask potential spammers for personal situation before assuming they are evil. (They may be enthusiastic and not realize the norms of your community)<br /><br />- Explain situation behind any changes to your community before the changes are implemented. (You may also enlist aid from community to float preferable changes.)<br /><br /><br />--------------------------------------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">INTERMISSION: A note about conflict management/mediation</span><br />--------------------------------------------------------<br />I will not be covering conflict management or conflict mediation, though many examples involve these skills. I am willing to help anyone with questions about resources. For the wiki, this might be a good place to compile some resources.<br /><br /><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Actor-observer bias</span><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Definition:</span><br />We tend to attribute our own behavior to the situation, but the behavior of others to the "kind" of person they are.<br /><br />Developed by Edward E. Jones/ Richard E Nesbett (1971) as the flip side of Fundamental Attribution Error.<br /><br />However, Bertram F. Malle questions actor-observer bias because of a lack of evidence (2006).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Example:</span><br />- "I am not a bad person."<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Reducing the Effect:</span><br />- Awareness that this may be happening (on your part, on the part of the person judging you, on the part of two community members towards each other).<br /><br />- Use the same methods as the Fundamental Attribution Error: learn more about the situation.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Examples:</span><br />- This is as much about self-reflection as it is observation of others.<br />- I once had an argument with a vendor that seemed to be about their customer service attitude when the truth was I (and our organization) were asking more than the vendor could give. Realizing this allowed us to enter future vendor deals with realistic expectations, fewer conflicts and better results.<br /><br /><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Confirmation Bias</span><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Definition:</span><br />We tend to look for, or better remember, information and evidence that supports our preconceptions and avoid/overlook/forget evidence that counters our beliefs.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Examples:</span><br />- Good luck charms, people who believe in psychics/cold readers, belief that a computer problem is because of a virus transmitted by your web site<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Reasons:</span><br />- We may be wired this way. If a successful survival strategy works, it's better to repeat the strategy than experiment. If a prehistoric tribe succeeds in hunting a deer, they are likely to stick with it rather than risk going hungry. But it's a short jump from attributing the successful hunt to a pretty stone instead and thus the good luck charm is born.<br />- The person facing evidence to their belief may feel shame, stubbornness or hope.<br />- Other factors that may filter counter-evidence may include tradition, taboos, religion, ideology.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Reducing the Effect:</span><br />- View information impartially. Welcome counterarguments. ("Strong opinions, loosely held" - ******** )<br />- Combating this in yourself: imagine a deamon, similar to Maxwell's Deamon that acts as a gatekeeper to your senses, allowing agreeing facts in and deflecting facts that counter your beliefs. (aka Morton's Deamon)<br /><br /><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Social Facilitation</span><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Definition:</span><br />We tend to do simple tasks that we know well better with an audience than alone. But, we tend to do new or complicated tasks worse in the same situation.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Examples:</span><br />- Performance anxiety<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Reducing the Effect:</span><br />- Encourage practice.<br />- Provide graduated experiences such as encouraging poll voting or rating before submitting opinions, reviews or other content. Also, allow people to create content and control ever-widening circles of who sees the content.<br />- Compliment when a new or difficult task is *attempted*.<br /><br />Examples:<br />- Warm welcomes without correction when someone contributes for the first time.<br /><br /><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Social Loafing</span><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Definition:</span><br />When work is pooled and individual performance is not known, people in groups tend to put in less effort.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Reducing the Effect:</span><br />Reveal individual performance for simple tasks (to avoid problems in Social Facilitation). For complicated tasks, keep performance private until proficient.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Examples:</span><br />- Badges in online game systems. Simple acknowledgment of simple accomplishments and difficult accomplishments. People sometimes complain when a game does not provide badges showing the power of revealing individual performance.<br /><br /><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Bystander Effect</span><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Definition:</span><br />Individuals are less likely to offer help in an emergency situation when other people are present.<br /><br />Specific to online communities, groups don't handle conflict situations when there is a perception that someone else will handled it faster or with more authority.<br /><br />Originated around Kitty Genovese who was stabbed to death in 1964 and "no one helped". The story is dramatic, but not entirely true. The media failed to contact the police for information before reporting the story and possibly committed confirmation bias in avoiding information undermining the belief in the bystander effect. In fact, the police were contacted at least once during the attack and "bystanders" heard, but could not see the attack.<br /><br />The Bystander effect was demonstrated in experiments in 1968 by John Darley and Bibb Latane.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Examples:</span><br />In the late 80's the a gaming service called The ImaginNation Network was having problems with users harassing each other. There was no formal reporting process so members were a bit on their own with few ways to contact the service. The service added a "report abuse" button and, quickly, the number of reports increased. The members stopped trying to resolve the problems themselves and resorted to the abuse button first.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Reasons:</span><br />- Social influence. We tend to look at how others are reacting in situations for cues on what to do. If everyone is waiting to see what others do, no one will act.<br />- Assumption that others will intervene and feel no special responsibility.<br />- Fear of being evaluated (Social Facilitation), embarrassment, or being superseded by someone more skilled.<br />- Uncertain help is wanted.<br />- In online communities, when authority moves fast or decisively.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Reducing the Effect:</span><br />- As a Community Manager, drag your feet a little. Give the space for others to step in and encourage them when they do. (Once I had someone who was great at helping in the community in a specific way, he was so fast and so good, others were commenting on him "beating them to it". I praised him for being a great example and ask him to be a little slower off the mark. When he did, others were able to step in. This took the pressure off him and eventually lead to a strong culture of helping in a specific way.)<br />- As a Community manager, do not use your admin tools first or often. Resolve conflicts publicly as a way to demonstrate to others how they too can handle them. This woudl be a literal empowerment of your community.<br />- Instill a sense of responsibility and empower the members by following up when they help or get in over their heads. Allow the community to help you spot spam and deal with items they flag. IF someone attempts to resolve a conflict and has trouble, then step in (and later privately help the person improve their skills).<br /><br /><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Other social theories</span><br />-----------------------------<br />These were not covered during the session. They are presented briefly to provide some background to common terms a community manager will encounter as they read deeper into social psychology and sociolgy.<br /><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Small World Experiment</span><br />-----------------------------<br />- Stanley Milgram<br />- Average path length for social networks<br />- Dropped letter with a note asking to send to person they know who is likely to know the target on letter.<br />- Multiple factors could have accounted for the average path length he found<br />- Milgram never used the phrase "six degrees of separation"<br />- Work in disease transmission indicates that removing the supernodes of a network has little impact on average path length.<br /><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Dunbar Number</span><br />-----------------------------<br />- Robin Dunbar<br />- Theoretical cognitive limit to the number of people humans can maintain a *stable* (grooming) relationship.<br />- Based on primate grooming habits. Max grooming contacts seems limited to volume of neocortex.<br />- 1992 - Dunbar extrapolated up to human size brain and derived the number 150<br />- Then compared this to human groups (tribes, basically)<br />- Dunbar says communities must have high incentive to remain together (stable relationships). Speculated that humans may spend up to 42% of their time in social grooming.<br />- For a look at group sizes with numbers from online communities, I highly recommend Christopher Allen's six-part series on group sizes starting with: <a href="http://www.lifewithalacrity.com/2004/03/the_dunbar_numb.html">The Dunbar Number as a Limit to Group Sizes</a> and finishing with his two-part <a href="http://www.lifewithalacrity.com/2008/09/group-threshold.html">Community by the Numbers</a>.<br /><br /><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Fixing Broken Windows</span><br />-----------------------------<br />- George Kelling and Catherine Coles<br />- Fix small problems to dissuade larger problems and, eventually, huge problems<br />- NYC Experiment:<br />- NYC Transit Authority 1985 - 1993+<br />- Guliani's zero tolerance 1993 -<br />- Major crime *did* go down. But it also went down in cities that did not have zero tolerance policies. (See Confirmation Bias)<br /><br />-----------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Robert Cialdini - Influence</span><br />-----------------------------<br />(this is a mash up of ideas from Dr. Cialdini's book "Influence" and articles he has written that I blogged previously at: Community Doesn't Sell and <a href="http://phoom.blogspot.com/2004/10/persuasion-revisited.html">Persuasion Revisited</a>.)<br /><br />Appeal to majority<br />- "Many guest waste towels. Please don't." - Little effect on reusing towels.<br />- "Most guests reuse towels. We thank you." - Increase in reuse of towels.<br /><br />Influence reciprocation<br />- When a waiter brings mints with the check, there is a slight increase in tips.<br /><br />Commitment<br />- Learned from NPO event days. If you ask people to sign up, but do not charge, attendance will be significantly lower than expected. If you ask people to pay $20 during sign up, attendance will be much closer to expected.<br /><br />Conformity - social proof<br />- monkey see, monkey do.<br />- Be the alpha monkey<br />- Teach others to be the alpha monkey.<br /><br />Scarcity<br />- In the midst of a credit crisis with people being told to stop using their credit cards, what does VISA do? They create a new "exclusive" card. The VISA Black Card. The exclusiveness will generate desire despite rational.<br /><br />Relationship awareness (a version of commitment)<br />- When one member of a couple is trying to convince the other to make a change, those who mention the existing relationship before requesting the change had better success. Think to current Obama phrasing that our problems are "American problems". Reminding us of current relationship as Americans before asking Republicans for change.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-35136641360476075632008-07-03T10:43:00.000-07:002009-02-18T00:07:16.278-08:00Remembering my first timePhil Plait, the Bad Astronomer, asks <a href="http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/07/03/what-was-your-first/trackback/">"What was the first [celestial] object you ever saw through telescope"</a> and in leaving a comment, I realized that it was pulling up some memories that strayed from the original question. So, what the heck. Here are a series of my "firsts".<br /><br />I am pretty sure my very first was the moon, but what I remember more is the telescope. It was a WWII-era US Navy 16x spyglass. Nearly 3 feet long, wrapped in black cord, heavy as all get out and no tripod. As a 98lb weakling, I could hold it up to the sky for only a minute at a time before I gave up and just pointed out constellations. <br /><br />Beyond of the moon, my first look through a proper telescope was in a summer class on astronomy with Dave Olsen at Merced Community College. He set it all up so we could see the sun safely during a period of sunspot activity. He also offered community astronomy viewings where I saw saturn for the first time.<br /><br />Despite wanting a telescope for myself, my parents always balked at the cost. By the time I had my own paper route, I had turned back toward the earth and computers. (Actually, it was because I wanted a computer that I got a paper route. I'm not just a geek, I am a nerd!)Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-24743660221473819972008-06-13T18:09:00.000-07:002009-01-07T11:48:35.905-08:00Tish Grier on Effective Community ManagersWho says Friday the 13th is unlucky? And to underscore that point, <a href="http://spap-oop.blogspot.com/">Tish Grier</a>, Chief Community Officer for Placeblogger and Online Community Developer for NewsTrust offers us <a href="http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=31&aid=145283">Seven Traits of Highly Effective Community Managers</a><br /><br />Mainly aimed at news organizations considering engaging their readers beyond being readers, there are some great observations are hidden within each of Tish's listed habits:<br /><br /><blockquote>"...if your site's mission is primarily to drive traffic to your site, you should rethink creating your online community in the first place. Site traffic tends to be driven more by better site design and search engine optimization than by getting all interactive on the citizenry."</blockquote>Online Community is not a hammer looking for a nail. Experienced folks know what community is good at and what is it not. Tish's advice to reconsider your community strategy even before you hire is sound.<br /><br /><blockquote>"...your potential community manager should be open, congenial, and can handle difficult situations with tact and diplomacy (not like a cop or Marine sergeant)."</blockquote>There are exceptions to this, but mostly when working with young teens in a competitive (gaming, sports fans) arena. I personally love Optimus Rhyme's nerdcore song <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTLwiccIOxI">"Obey the Moderator!"</a> but I would not hire someone with attitudes of controlling the community from the top-down.<br /><br /><blockquote>"...don't confuse liking technology with loving it beyond everything else."</blockquote>This is especially true for those of us living close to cities that innovate technology. I am considered a bit backwards because I don't have an iPhone yet. When interacting with your community, your community team will likely be giving a leg-up to others who are experiencing networking, connecting, trust and community online for the first time (or giving it a second try after a bad online experience). Knowing when to dial the techno-lust back several notches is vital to not alienating valuable people.<br /><br /><blockquote>"...any editorial work or reporting should be secondary to the community, because community work can be very demanding."</blockquote>Recent discussions with people considering hosting community or networking online have shown me that people still underestimate the amount of work that can go into fostering trusting relationships within a community and with your organization.<br /><br /><blockquote>"7. Life experience trumps youthful enthusiasm."</blockquote>I quoted only the header for this last one because the entire paragraph is worth reading. In fact, it should be the first paragraph you read.<br /><br />I'll add to it, though. It's not as hard as you might think to teach people how to use technology. It's harder to teach people how to manage conflict, build trust, recover and learn from mistakes. When looking for a community manager, look for activities that include group leadership, improvisational skills and the ability to handle projects with large groups. The best community managers I have seen and hired are people who had some aspect of these in their past experience: improvisational theater, leading volunteers, organizing long-term groups based on a hobby or activity.<br /><br />I'm wondering if a session on hiring a community manager might be a welcome for next week's <a href="http://ocu2008.eventbrite.com/">Online Community Unconference</a>.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-47528317832226255442008-06-10T23:26:00.000-07:002009-01-07T11:49:14.628-08:00Open Comment Season on John McCain siteWhile riding home from another excellent Online Community Roundtable, I read this tweet from <strong><a href="http://twitter.com/penguinasana" title="Megan Keane">penguinasana</a></strong>: "<span class="entry-content">Someone left the john mccain store comments unmoderated: <a href="http://tinyurl.com/5p3b35" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://tinyurl.com/5p3b35</a>".<br /><br />Yup. Take one part political candidate, one part open review system, and <span style="font-style: italic;">two days</span> of not moderating said commenting system and you get a repeat of the 1997 Amazon Family Circus reviews.<br /><br />When I took these screen shots there were over 60 reviews along these lines:<br /></span><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6qonlfooX2Tnv7zAPnOgOu8F2COvn_jaCSDlisFXO5c_cNdMgklyrMLUioffqGDDUaHiiNEosDW_wKgaJOE2iqGw3CPrcNhrtTqyTbWvfkLXSFWxwj4iJ5amELFereYZcVruPGg/s1600-h/McCain+Graffitti01.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6qonlfooX2Tnv7zAPnOgOu8F2COvn_jaCSDlisFXO5c_cNdMgklyrMLUioffqGDDUaHiiNEosDW_wKgaJOE2iqGw3CPrcNhrtTqyTbWvfkLXSFWxwj4iJ5amELFereYZcVruPGg/s400/McCain+Graffitti01.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5210513025067504498" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0mmZJXa0L75S_05HShWMadSAAbmUenFMeHtad2z4zdxR4IGpdVwCM8bS3Sf_-HVGrjd25dwL6VKYigEnd2P3cLIPQyjrkEliJ0ZQ0glojEb_zscIidS1mpbQ576QfevkJUq_RZg/s1600-h/McCain+Graffitti.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0mmZJXa0L75S_05HShWMadSAAbmUenFMeHtad2z4zdxR4IGpdVwCM8bS3Sf_-HVGrjd25dwL6VKYigEnd2P3cLIPQyjrkEliJ0ZQ0glojEb_zscIidS1mpbQ576QfevkJUq_RZg/s400/McCain+Graffitti.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5210513047042187714" border="0" /></a><span class="entry-content"><br /></span><span class="meta entry-meta">Now Amazon eventually got the joke and cleared out the crude stuff, but left the satire up (to the tune of hundreds such reviews for several of the books to this day). I'm not sure what'll happen here. Yanking everything and killing the review system is not the message for a presidential candidate to make: "My staff is clueless in the ways of free association *and* they react by humorlessly clamping down."<br /><br />Of course, there are ways to roll with this, clean it up and still keep the review system. Step one from the brand new <a href="http://developer.yahoo.com/ypatterns/pattern.php?pattern=writingareview">Yahoo Design Pattern Library -- Ratings and Reviews</a>:<br /><br /></span>"Set expectations regarding when the review will be published."<br /><br />Which implies that reviews will be <span style="font-weight: bold;">moderated</span>. Not an unreasonable expectation.<br /><br />UPDATE: I checked the morning after this post and they yanked all reviews and killed the reviewing system. My only comment is that you, dear reader, do not make similar mistakes because while McCain voters likely approve of this kind of authoritarian control, your customers or clients likely will not.<br /><span class="meta entry-meta"><br /></span>Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-38451511924407708702008-05-10T16:19:00.000-07:002009-01-07T11:49:23.897-08:00My 2008 ConferencesIf the list seems heavily weighted toward <a href="http://www.forumone.com/section/events/">Forum One Communications</a>, that because they tend to be local to me and, in the area of community, provide more bang for my conference dollar.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Oct 2007<br /></span><a style="font-weight: bold;" href="http://www.forumone.com/content/calendar/detail/2121/">Online Community Summit</a><br />Sonoma, CA<br />Okay, not 2008, but I lead a group discussion on "Community Growth Strategies".<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">March 20, 2008<br /></span><a style="font-weight: bold;" href="http://www.forumone.com/content/calendar/detail/2679">Mobile Communities Unconference</a><br />Palo Alto, CA<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">April 14-15, 2008<br /></span><a style="font-weight: bold;" href="http://www.forumone.com/content/calendar/detail/2383">Online Community Business Forum 2008</a><br />Santa Fe, NM<br />With <a href="http://www.gailwilliams.com/">Gail Williams</a>, we led a group discussion on "Community Management Best Practices".<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">May 12-15, 2008<br /></span><a style="font-weight: bold;" href="http://www.iirusa.com/community/event-overview.xml">Community 2.0 Conference</a><br />Las Vegas, NV<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">May 27-28, 2008<br /></span><a style="font-weight: bold;" href="http://www.netsquared.org/2008">NetSquared Conference (N2Y3)</a><br />San Jose, CA<br />I will be presenting/leading a session on "Measuring Impact in Online Communities - Lessons from Schwab Learning".<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">June 18, 2008<br /></span><a style="font-weight: bold;" href="http://www.forumonenetworks.com/content/calendar/detail/534">Online Community Unconference</a><br />Computer History Museum, Mountain View, CA<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Jul 30-Aug 2, 2008<br /></span><a style="font-weight: bold;" href="http://www.rwanational.org/cs/conferences_and_events">Romance Writers of America 28th Annual National Conference</a><br />San Francisco, California<br />I will be leading a workshop on early modern surgery. Details TBD.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Oct 9-10, 2008<br /></span><a style="font-weight: bold;" href="http://www.forumonenetworks.com/content/calendar/detail/535/">Online Community Summit</a><br />Sonoma, California<br />This is an invitation only event so my attendance is TBD.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Last Wednesday of every month<br /></span>I'll be bouncing between two local meetings of community-minded people:<br /><a href="http://ocr.meetup.com/135/">The San Francisco Online Community Report Meetup</a> and<br /><a href="http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=11294065222">Online Community roundtable</a> (links to facebook group).Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-17096487253864817582008-05-10T13:37:00.000-07:002008-05-10T15:52:13.116-07:00Meanwhile, back on the ranchA quick post to update what I have been up to.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Getting laid off</span> - In Sept 2007, the <a href="http://www.schwabfoundation.org/">Charles and Helen Schwab Foundation</a> announces they will close their operating websites <a href="http://www.schwabfoundation.org/About-CHSF/Schwab-Learning/SchwabLearning.aspx">SchwabLearning.org</a> and <a href="http://www.schwabfoundation.org/About-CHSF/Schwab-Learning/SparkTop.aspx">SparkTop.org</a>. New homes for both sites are found and transition work begins. I learned important lessons about coordination, strategy, resources. Considering the parent community ultimately fragmented between the official host, GreatSchools.net, and at least 3 other community<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhC60Mk0MTsOu7JF6RTqRcglvppXpyGG7R0NcYKVtN4yXskE1fmmS_WH39Va0ShBJN3Im_fnmARrfR1EOJbi_aIYfRKvPJdcH3SxNsxs5mH9oKmFjeKmXAPWST4t2UifMf3qnN6wQ/s1600-h/schwablearning.png"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhC60Mk0MTsOu7JF6RTqRcglvppXpyGG7R0NcYKVtN4yXskE1fmmS_WH39Va0ShBJN3Im_fnmARrfR1EOJbi_aIYfRKvPJdcH3SxNsxs5mH9oKmFjeKmXAPWST4t2UifMf3qnN6wQ/s320/schwablearning.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5198881223488099874" border="0" /></a> spaces, I can say I also learned difficult lessons about working within overly structured organizations and sudden losses of decision-making.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Reinventing myself as a consultant</span> - I been keeping an eye out for jobs in online community and there are a lot of them out there. Unfortunately, most of them are for managing communities under the direction of a product manager or VP. These are too limiting given my experience in handling all aspects of communities including control over UI and feature design and mining the data for information directly. I've had a few people express interest in hiring me and I have been offering contracts for more foundational help rather than accept permanent work in a limited role.<br /><br />I've had good luck so far and will be doing some work for a couple of non-profits and a health-oriented for-profit. None of it is long-term, but it involves helping the organization get the most out of a community strategy and plan for features, staff or skill sets they will need.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Attending conferences</span> - To keep myself connected and relevant, I've been attending online community round tables, meet-ups and conferences. I'm even getting a chance to lead small group sessions at some. I'll turn that into a separate post of both past and upcoming 2008 conferences.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2306/2433037674_c0f8611f7d_m.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px;" src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2306/2433037674_c0f8611f7d_m.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">Enjoying myself</span> - I got a pretty sweet layoff package and I've been taking advantage of that to sleep in, clean my house (I have half of my back office reclaimed as an actual office - go me!), spend more time with friends, and a <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/scottm/sets/72157604618006527/">road trip through Arizona and New Mexico</a> (with an important stop in Bakersfield, CA, pictured right). I've been listening to <a href="http://www.jeffersonhour.org/">The Thomas Jefferson Hour</a> via <a href="http://www.jeffersonhour.org/?id=16&page=Download+the+Show">downloads</a>, <a href="http://twitter.com/scottmoore">twittering</a>, walking and reading in preparation for a presentation on early modern surgery for a group of historical romance writers. Somewhere in there, is also losing weight (35 lbs since last Nov), roasting coffee and playing games on the computer and Nintendo DS.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-8436178977143367812007-05-09T15:50:00.000-07:002007-05-09T16:02:46.171-07:00Online Community Meetup in SF, May 23<a href="http://ocr.meetup.com/135/members/2558157/">Susan Tenby</a>, the Online Community Manager for <a href="http://www.techsoup.org">TechSoup.org</a> has been reviving the Online Community Report Meetup. When I have gone it's been a nice mix of new and experienced folks talking about their online communities.<br /><br />If you are in the San Francisco area and can make it, it's a nice way for a small group to meet and talk in a relaxing environment. It's a very welcoming group.<br /><br />RSVP through the <a href="http://ocr.meetup.com/135/calendar/5710809/?a=cv1_ve">official link</a> or just show up!<br /><br /><b>When:</b><br />Wednesday, May 23, 2007, 7:00 PM<br /><br /><b>Where:</b><br /><a href="http://www.hotelbiron.com">Hotel Biron</a><br />45 Rose Street<br />San Francisco , CA 94102<br />415.703.0403<br /><a href="http://ocr.meetup.com/135/venue/?venueId=142166">Map</a>Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-62257946854907375472007-05-08T16:59:00.000-07:002007-05-08T17:23:44.345-07:00My interview on the Online Community ReportNot that you would guess from recent posts, but I have spent some time starting and fostering communities through computers for some time. With "Online Community" being all the rage this year (three conferences to date and two more on my calendar before the year is out), I've been able to act like a grizzled Veteran of the Bubble.<br /><br />Do I stand up to today's views of community? Judge for yourself as I answer questions for Forum One's <a href="http://www.onlinecommunityreport.com/">Online Community Report</a>:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.onlinecommunityreport.com/archives/202-OC-Expert-Interview-Scott-Moore,-Schwab-Foundation.html">OC Expert Interview: Scott Moore, Schwab Foundation</a><br /><br />Unless you *want* to dig through odd posts about trips to Germany and, uhm, delicate medical conditions, you can skip right to the good stuff tagged as <a href="http://phoom.blogspot.com/search/label/Community">Community</a>Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-91180862683691524202007-04-17T15:17:00.000-07:002007-05-08T17:11:52.017-07:00Web 2.0 Expo -- midwayOkay, so the post a day thing went down the tubes. Right now, I am at the Web 2.0 Expo where the wifi is overloaded, especially when sessions are on. It seems there is no limit to the underestimating of traffic at these things.<br /><br />Because I can't jump on, I can't check out <a href="http://digg.com/spy">digg spy</a> at the moment. I also don't have a chance to check out <a href="http://www.truthscape.com/">TruthScape.com</a> which is a site set up to help people from getting scammed in the popular free online game RuneScape. It also has some <a href="http://www.truthscape.com/html/ts_TheTruthAboutRuneScapesCommunityandItsImpactonChil.htm">parental advice</a>. However, that last one comes as a recommendation from a parent in the forum I support and not from Web 2.0 people.<br /><br />I know this will sound overly negative, but I'm really tired of hearing misapplications of the <a href="http://www.randomhouse.com/features/wisdomofcrowds/index.html">"wisdom of crowds"</a> (the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Net-Gain-Expanding-Markets-Communities/dp/0875847595">Net Gain</a> of this post-bubble bubble) which most often comes out as a confusion between crowds (people who may be aware of each other, but are not influencing each others actions) and communities (where people are influencing each other through trusted relationships). Crowds are *not* inherently communities.<br /><br />So far the best session wasn't even on the schedule. Tara Hunt of <a href="http://citizenagency.com/">Citizen Agency</a> and <a href="http://horsepigcow.com/">HorsePigCow</a> organized a community roundtable in one of the unused alcoves on the third floor. It was scheduled from 10am to 5pm and I missed the first half, but poked my head in and saw <a href="http://gailwilliams.wordpress.com/">Gail Williams</a> and <a href="http://cervisa.com/">John Coate</a> who gave it a thumbs up and said they would return after lunch. There's a <a href="http://www.socialtext.net/web2open/index.cgi?community_roundtable_notes">set of notes</a> and soon to be audio and video (where you can witness just how big my mouth can be).Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-89853957573326067372007-04-04T09:34:00.000-07:002007-04-04T09:48:08.827-07:00Growing up with Charles AddamsNot literally. But I'll get to that.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYXczjwWMiSk77Qnic-aqsCpZb_fkaZrmA_R0nI8m1a1Rns7qb873LYBbncYNhHfwWU6voAq6d43AqVAUvrX8R0SLeHLXNKVOdt7yw0bOwSnDthzX9Y1lPmTy3u17GDjQfhxBMdg/s1600-h/masseter.gif"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 152px; height: 180px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYXczjwWMiSk77Qnic-aqsCpZb_fkaZrmA_R0nI8m1a1Rns7qb873LYBbncYNhHfwWU6voAq6d43AqVAUvrX8R0SLeHLXNKVOdt7yw0bOwSnDthzX9Y1lPmTy3u17GDjQfhxBMdg/s320/masseter.gif" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5049614007065024882" border="0" /></a>Last night, I woke up and couldn't fall asleep. I woke up because for the past week a muscle in my left jaw has been acting up. Any attempts to chew or otherwise close my jaw resulted in excruciating pain. It's not <a href="http://www2.blogger.com/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temporomandibular_joint_disorder">TMJ</a>, but more likely just a stress knot in my Masseter muscle. It's getting better, though.<br /><br />I couldn't fall asleep because I had a dozen ideas kicking around in my head again. Stuff ranging from ways to improve how we foster community at the parent's website I work on to coming to the conclusion that arguing about which is better for fostering community, blogs or message board is moot because the design of both has been rooted in one form of narcissism or another and neither are purposefully designed to foster actual <i>conversations</i>.<br /><br />I typed all of these ideas up just to get them out of my head. Then I looked for something to read. I grabbed a biography my mother had given to me for Christmas, <i>Charles Addams: A Cartoonist's Life</i> by Linda H. Davis.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3Afp4K4iZpMR4waorXxUyrpfMAwDFF1HtozU35L11-8DdWD0b4khUjNQxMeP4pbTeOxa8WiO50BAJ5AgmSiJULKnxHidDnaDvMHYzhErZ3wqSDddHWugD3XqaMUraIvOAwz0mMQ/s1600-h/AddamsandEvil.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3Afp4K4iZpMR4waorXxUyrpfMAwDFF1HtozU35L11-8DdWD0b4khUjNQxMeP4pbTeOxa8WiO50BAJ5AgmSiJULKnxHidDnaDvMHYzhErZ3wqSDddHWugD3XqaMUraIvOAwz0mMQ/s320/AddamsandEvil.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5049613392884701538" border="0" /></a>As I said, I grew up with Charles Addams. Since before I was born, my father had a copy of <i>Addams and Evil</i> on the family bookshelf. I must have been in 2nd or 3rd grade when I first pulled it off the shelf and started flipping through the pages, reading, though not always understanding the captions.<br /><br />It didn't matter though because some of my favorite cartoons were of the boy and the trouble he made: speeding a wind-up school bus across toy tracks just so the locomotive would hit, building a town in the bath tub and turning on the spigot, mixing chemicals in a Jr Scientist kit and turning into a Jr. Hyde and back before his mother arrived. Though my mother may have worried about my desire to find and hang stolen "danger: bridge out" signs on my bedroom wall, she used these moments to point out why that would be wrong.<br /><br />It may have stopped me from doing it, but it didn't stop me from thinking it was still funny. These were the moments when I grew up --knowing the difference between right and wrong, but still being able to imagine the possibilities of wrong were funnier than the possibilities of right.<br /><br />Today, I have only a small collection of his cartoons on my bookshelf. Whenever I read these, especially the macabre ones, I get a sense of nostalgia. They comfort me and I love to revel in his art and their twisted takes on the twisted world around us. It's Charles Addams' cartoons that warped my sense of humor -- and my sense of tragedy.<br /><br />I can't see myself any other way.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-12305294658146928282007-04-03T08:55:00.000-07:002007-04-03T08:59:25.621-07:00I hate blogging and why I'm doing it anywayI swore to myself many years a go that I would not ever write a post about the fact that I haven't been updating my blog.<br /><br /><i>"It is the beginning of all true criticism of our time to realize that it has really nothing to say, at the very moment when it has invented so tremendous a trumpet for saying it."</i> - G.K. Chesterton (1923)<br /><br />Well, there we go. Chesterton was most likely talking about broadcast radio when he said this but it seems to apply nicely to myself at this moment. The fact that I am not the first to use this quote in reference to blogging is, to me, proof of the validity of the criticism.<br /><br />For a long time, I've viewed creating personal spaces on the internet (since the days of Geocities) and now blogging with an unhealthy grain of salt. Part of this comes from a few paragraphs from Milan Kundera's <i>The Book of Laughter and Forgetting</i>:<br /><blockquote>Graphomania (a mania for writing books) inevitably take on epidemic proportions when a society develops to the point of creating three basic conditions:<br /><br /> (1) an elevated level of general well-being, which allows people to devote themselves to useless activities;<br /><br /> (2) a high degree of social atomization and, as a consequence, a general isolation of individuals.<br /><br /> (3) the absence of dramatic social changes in the nation's internal life. (From this point of view; it seems to me symptomatic that in France, where practically nothing happens, the percentage of writers is twenty-one times higher than in Israel. Bibi is, moreover, right to say that looked at from the outside, she hasn't experienced anything. The mainspring that drives her to write is just that absence of vital content, that void.)<br /><br /> But by a backlash, the effect affects the cause. General isolation breeds graphomania, and generalized graphomania in turn intensifies and worsens isolation. The invention of printing formerly enabled people to understand one another. In the era of universal graphomania, the writing of books has an opposite meaning: everyone surrounded by his own words as by a wall of mirrors, which allows no voice to filter through from the outside.</blockquote>[Later in the text]<blockquote>One morning (and it will be soon), when everyone wakes up as a writer, the age of universal deafness and incomprehension will have arrived.</blockquote>I always come to the end of reading this and have the overwhelming sense that anything I might write afterwards simply contributes to the universal deafness and incomprehension that surrounds us today.<br /><br />This is why I don't blog.<br /><br />However, conventional wisdom claims that in order to connect via blogging, one must produce. If one cannot produce quality, then produce quantity. <br /><br />Aside from my moral misgivings about excessive blogging, I suffer from a form of mental constipation where I will read something that will trigger an idea for writing a blog post, but I have a need to look deeper before I say anything publicly. What happens is hours of reading other people's commentary, often months after I have had the original urge and often better though through or written than what I might wish to say. Then comes a day or more of thinking about all of what I have read and forming some half-baked new tangents off of that. After that, the desire to regurgitate any of it and put form to it in a way that it is even remotely comprehensible to anyone outside my skull is gone.<br /><br />In the mean time, pent-up ideas needing feedback, or ill-formed opinions needing correction lie festering only to explode through my synapses at the worst possible moments.<br /><br />So, I will give conventional wisdom a try and commit to writing a post a day, regardless how trite, how ill-formed, until either I form a habit or I completely solidify my view against inane writing altogether.<br /><br />Fantastic. I'm clearly off to a good start on the ill-formed part.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-31160206335388914112007-03-03T17:29:00.000-08:002007-03-03T18:13:15.984-08:00I'm off to the GDC!So 2007 is shaping up to be the year of Online Community Conference revivals. I managed to sneak in to Community Next in February, thanks to a friend who was unable to go. Coming up in a few weeks is the <a href="http://www.community2-0con.com/">Community 2.0 Conference</a>, then there is <a href="http://www.virtualworlds2007.com/">Virtual Worlds 2007</a> at the end of March (it's community related and <a href="http://phoom.blogspot.com/2005/11/virtual-world-celebrates-10-year.html">I have a past history</a> of working in a virtual world). June Brings us the <a href="http://www.forumone.com/section/services/strategy/occ">Online Community Camp</a> and October will see the return of the <a href="http://www.forumone.com/section/services/strategy/ocs">Online Community Summit</a>.<br /><br />I will be bailing on the first two since I am using up a week's vacation once again to <a href="http://www.gdconf.com/register/caregistration.php">volunteer to work at the Game Developers Conference</a>. Since 1999, I spend one week a year in a fast, intense customer service job that pays no money. Why would I do such a thing when I am not in the game industry and I'm not bucking for a job in the game industry?<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv7wkYgGLD6utujqsMiAXxkwSX2Qbb5_uIlVQ0SqpQkFjpPxX6rcahIAQ_1QEe9uV4TysXe-cN-ZhyphenhyphenZll2VQjv9eun435MI7veiyuep4wkVYrlC8wiV0aq9WZQbA7Bn5zINkvCCg/s1600-h/IMG_3284.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv7wkYgGLD6utujqsMiAXxkwSX2Qbb5_uIlVQ0SqpQkFjpPxX6rcahIAQ_1QEe9uV4TysXe-cN-ZhyphenhyphenZll2VQjv9eun435MI7veiyuep4wkVYrlC8wiV0aq9WZQbA7Bn5zINkvCCg/s320/IMG_3284.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5037886454170060178" border="0" /></a>I started because I was tangentially in the game industry when I was working on virtual worlds. In fact, by volunteering my first year, I got in to their job fair for free and scored a contract working with <a href="http://www.there.com/">There.com</a> before they lifted the veil to the public. I return every year because the program is a fantastic example of a service-oriented structure that really lives up to all the old theories about <a href="http://www.kpcinc.com/philosophy/inverted_pyramid.htm">inverted pyramids</a>. Add to the fact that this organization functions with 250-300 stranger (about 30% are veterans of previous years) suddenly coming together and working like a dream for a week and it's worth being in the mix and learning how it all comes together. And then there is the chance to spend a week seriously getting my geek on with several hundred folks.<br /><br />And then like many group gatherings such as sports leagues, Renaissance Faire/Burning Man, message boards or multiplayer games, relationships form and people return because they know friends will be there. And if there are ways to keep the connections going outside the event through newsletters, mailing lists, gatherings or converging on social networking sites then communities form. If course I have to bring it back to communities.<br /><br />This week, Erin Hoffman wrote a piece <a href="http://www.escapistmagazine.com/print/86/8">describing the GDC volunteer program</a>. It does a much better job of describing the program and reasons why it's valuable to the game industry and to the people who attend.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-65747489615373027462007-02-08T07:01:00.000-08:002007-02-08T07:04:36.765-08:00Woke up at 3AM for the second night in a row<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSmAduJ0M2frC0sZ6W0Fn34Yf5L2ZK5TaeK3MvdQS19Jnmt3BZ2Dqzt_RebWUenLLpPIrF4A4-rHGOhZcVGFKPyUPgSnblFzR0pOV7xUv98bTXZngUynkzvZ8v6LYR3wtPxvUanw/s1600-h/200702-+5AM+Scream_Ver2.gif"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSmAduJ0M2frC0sZ6W0Fn34Yf5L2ZK5TaeK3MvdQS19Jnmt3BZ2Dqzt_RebWUenLLpPIrF4A4-rHGOhZcVGFKPyUPgSnblFzR0pOV7xUv98bTXZngUynkzvZ8v6LYR3wtPxvUanw/s400/200702-+5AM+Scream_Ver2.gif" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5029179408511243074" border="0" /></a>I finally decided to just get up and caught a look at myself in the mirror. I felt like hell, but figured I may as well make fun of myself and have a laugh. Sure beats laying in bed grinding my teeth.<br /><br />I've never had my own animated GIF. I figured it was about time.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-1167227937438298042006-12-27T05:55:00.000-08:002007-02-08T07:11:17.844-08:00Trauer um Soul-König James Brown<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/x/blogger/6899/232/1600/662962/theman.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/x/blogger/6899/232/320/741899/theman.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>This is how I found out that James Brown has died. On the front page of the Münchner Merkur that I saw on the free newspaper stand in the airport. I'm actually broken up.<br /><br />This is probably because I saw the news (without sound) and figured out that Gerald Ford died. That was expected, but honestly, I hadn't been paying attention to the health of James Brown. Literally, I didn't even know he was sick.<br /><br />It is less that I really loved the music or the man, but more that my best friend from high school really loved him. Part of me being all teary is that I can't call him right away and go get blind drunk on Hennessy with him.<br /><br />For the moment a shot of whiskey will have to suffice (and boy did that surprise the kid behind the bar - a beer *and* a whiskey. Sweet Gibralter, y'd think I asked for the blood of a virgin.<br /><br />So here's a toast to James Brown and here's a toast to Dirk, my friend. I missed meeting up with him in my hometown over Thanksgiving and coupled with a month away from familiar things and friend to shoot the shit with, I miss him.<br /><span style="font-size:78%;"> <span style="font-style: italic;">(Oh, and the Munich Airport has free wireless that's better than my dorms' anyday.)</span></span>Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-1167129135720601232006-12-26T02:22:00.000-08:002006-12-26T02:32:15.730-08:00Christmas MemoriesNot mine, mind you. But here's a gallery of children who are scared of Santa.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.southflorida.com/events/sfl-scaredsanta,0,2245506.photogallery?index=1"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/x/blogger/6899/232/320/797889/10670865.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br />Praise be to <a href="http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/">Respectful Insolance</a> for posting this originally. It was a lot funnier than the series of "I insist on saying Merry Christmas and I don't care who is offended" emails from folks I know who are one of the following: a non-practicing Christian, a non-practising Bhuddist and an Atheist.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-1166488981755233182006-12-18T16:34:00.000-08:002007-01-13T04:25:40.900-08:00My name is SkawtThe other night some of the young folks (early 20's every one of them) were having a little party in the common room on our floor. Since the dormitory where we live is all concrete walls and ceilings and the floors are tiled, it's like living in an experimental speaker system at the Bose factory. Knowing I would not be able to sleep, I dropped in. Over the salsa music the Argentinean students were, one girl asks me my name.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/x/blogger/6899/232/1600/942565/myNameIsScott-small.gif"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/x/blogger/6899/232/320/885683/myNameIsScott-small.png" alt="" border="0" /></a>"Scott Moore", I reply. She gave me a puzzled look and I thought perhaps the music was too loud or I was being too quiet. "SCOTT MOORE", I repeat. Again a puzzled look, but with a head shake meaning, "I am sorry traveler of the stars, but these vocal sounds you are making don't even sound like language to me". Exasperated, I simply say, "Ich heisse Scott". Here eyes light up and she says, "Oh! Skoht!", but with a very, very short "oh" like everyone else in Germany pronounces my name.<br /><br />This reminded me of being in Germany last year when I met an old follow in a pub and upon hearing my name pronounced very distinctly, "Scott. Moore. I. haff. never. heard. this. name. before!" Sigh. My name is so common in English, you can't actually google me unless you add "phoom" or "online community" and there's still another Scott Moore who blogs about online community.<br /><br />So, on a sleepless night, I mulled this over. Is my accent *that* bad? I repeated my name to myself over and over. Then I thanked the fates that I didn't have a roommate who would surely be cowering in a corner wondering why the hairy mad-man was whispering his own name. Then I realized that I pronounce my name with a longer "ah"ish kind of "o" as in dog. Not dohg, but dawg. How very American of me.<br /><br />Sometimes it's easier to accept what is around you than struggle against it. So from now until I leave, I will be "Skoht", but my friends can call me Skawt.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-1166109578120655372006-12-14T07:12:00.000-08:002006-12-15T15:14:57.916-08:00How to surf in a landlocked German city in the WinterLast weekend, as I left the Bavarian National Museum and headed toward the Englisher Garten to eventually get somem Gluhwein to warm me up, I spotted a crowd watching local surfers. In Germany. In December. In the cold (about 40 degrees F) . In the middle of a city in the middle of a land-locked state.<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://static.flickr.com/134/322165509_5536e2d523_b.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px;" src="http://static.flickr.com/134/322165509_5536e2d523_b.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-size:78%;"><span style="font-style: italic;">(Click the image to see the video)</span></span><br /></div><br />If you do a google search on <a href="http://www.google.com/search?hl=de&safe=off&q=surfing+the+isar+river&btnG=Suche&meta=">surfing the isar</a> you will find longer videos and better pictures.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-1166107814211017432006-12-14T06:45:00.000-08:002006-12-14T06:50:14.213-08:00Class Picture<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://static.flickr.com/138/322208429_90b0722cc8_o.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px;" src="http://static.flickr.com/138/322208429_90b0722cc8_o.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>Back Row: Don from Chicago (now living in Germany), Me, Joseph from Canada<br />Middle Row: Suhail from the United Arab Emirates, Aies (sp?) from Greece, Frau Schwalb our teacher, Dan from Rumania<br />Sitting: Sarena from Italy, Ines from Spain, Roberta from Italy, Sarah fromm the UEA.<br />Not pictured are Thomas from Spain and Stephano from Switzerland.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5788854.post-1166018850608694902006-12-13T05:52:00.000-08:002006-12-14T06:45:18.006-08:00Lots of pictures, not many descriptionsAlthough haven't been typing much, I have been uploading the pictures I take to my <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/scottm/">flicker account</a>. I haven't been typing descriptions because I haven't found a tool that will allow me to create titles, descriptions and tags for each picture offline and then just batch upload them to flicker. For now, I pull them from the camera onto my laptop and then fromm the laptop, I can upload them (only when I have a fast stable connection) and then I have to go through them while online to change titles, add descriptions.<br /><br />So, if anyone knows of a tool that let's me add metadata to my photos before I upload them to flicker (and will do it as a batch, not individually through their email service), let me know. In the mean time, enjoy this night shot of the back side of the city hall.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://static.flickr.com/109/315627085_252adc7c52_b.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px;" src="http://static.flickr.com/109/315627085_252adc7c52_b.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01008184599324923996noreply@blogger.com0