Listen Project How to Build a Collective Intelligence Platform to Crowdsource Almost Anything Introduction The MIT Center for Collective Intelligence recently published an important overview of the theory and mechanisms behind successful crowdsourcing efforts. Their report, called “Harnessing Crowds: Mapping the Genome of Collective Intelligence“, can be found here. Their research reveals similarities behind many high-profile collective intelligence (CI) systems, including Threadless, Wikipedia and InnoCentive. It then describes how these lesson can be applied to the design of other successful CI platforms. I call this work the MIT Approach to Collective Intelligence, which is a generic approach applicable to a wide range of problems and circumstances. The MIT approach to collective intelligence According to the Center for Collective Intelligence, a good collective intelligence platform (CI) must address the following themes: These four themes then translate into the following four questions: What is to be accomplished? Figure 1, the basic building blocks of a CI system Conclusion
We Are Power Shift The Center for Nonviolent Communication | Center for Nonviolent Communication Michael Meade, D.H.L.: The Two Great Stories of the World Recently, I have been on panels where people lament how the troubles of the world seem increasingly intractable. I've heard environmentalists suggest that evolution may have reached a dead end with regard to the human species. I've heard pained audiences decry political parties as well as social movements. I have found myself responding with ancient proverbs such as: "The great person allows universal imagination to work through them." It's as if something quite old and truly resilient is required to face the dire array of modern problems, for most of modern life is arranged to take us away from ourselves. Amidst radical environmental problems and massive changes throughout culture, it becomes easy to forget that there are two great and enduring stories found on Earth. We are not accidental citizens of a world gone wrong, not merely faceless members of an age group or statistical, biological blips without inherent meaning.
Columns / B S Raghavan : Ringing in the era of people's power Without any exaggeration, 2011 has indeed been a turning point, a cathartic experience, giving a foretaste of the invincible power people have for bringing about whatever change they want. I have never in all my life known a turn of the year that has not been marked by a gloom-and-doom syndrome in the outpourings in the media. If you want evidence, go to the section in the Madras University Library keeping old dailies and pick up at random issues of 1948, 1949 or 1950 — whatever comes to hand. If you remove the allusions to contemporary names and read on, you will have the illusion that you are reading today's newspapers: The same alarm being sounded about things falling apart, the centre not being able to hold and mere anarchy and blood-dimmed tide being loosed upon the world — in the ready-to-order words from the poem The Second Coming, of William Butler Yeats. It has been no different at the passing of 2011. Calm down, everybody. That's the future that is beckoning to us. It was M.
Social entrepreneurs go Hollywood: The promise of change in 25 words or less (It’s pretty hard to change the world, if no one wants to follow your thinking…) Curtis Faith has been asking us all about stories. What is your story? Who is the hero? Good questions, because stories provide a powerful framework for spreading ideas. Randy Olson, the scientist-turned-filmmaker, regularly lambastes the academic/science community for getting so caught up in the pointy-headed details that they completely forget how real communication happens. Also take a look at the work by Alex (Sandy) Petland, the author of Honest Signals. Yet most scientists (and other big idea people) don’t get it. The thing is, if you want to move your idea from the edge into the mainstream, from the future to the present, you have to package it. This is not the same thing as dumbing it down. That’s why, especially for the “issue entrepreneurs”, stories are the key to changing the world… And no one is better at telling stories (that move a big audiences) than Hollywood. Hollywood Story: Too formulaic?
Earth Hour » Best Procrastination Tip Ever :zen habits Post written by Leo Babauta. Your first thought as you look at this article will be, “I’ll read this later.” But don’t. Let the urge to switch to a new task pass. Read this now. It’ll take you two minutes. I’ve written the book on ending procrastination, but I’ve since come up with a very simple technique for beating everyone’s favorite nemesis. Try it now: Identify the most important thing you have to do today. Clear away distractions. Sit there, and focus on getting started. Pay attention to your mind, as it starts to have urges to switch to another task. But don’t move. Notice also your mind trying to justify not doing the task. Now just take one small action to get started. Get started, and the rest will flow.
Politics and the Power of the Web According to research by Hanover Communications, the Labour backbench MP Tom Watson had a higher media profile in 2011 than every shadow minister, except for Ed Miliband and Ed Balls. Even a few years ago, the idea that a mere backbencher would have a higher profile than, say, the shadow Foreign Secretary or Home Secretary, would have seemed bizarre. Today it is a fact. Why? Many will put it down to the phone hacking scandal, in which Watson had a starring role exposing wrong-doing, and think no more of it. But I suspect something more is happening. One clue lies in the fact that Watson is an ex-blogger, and a prolific tweeter. On the Tory side, too, many backbenchers have a far higher media profile than many ministers. And what do many of the most high profile backbenchers have in common? Several years ago, after reading Chris Anderson's The Long Tail, I realised that I'd have to start blogging. The internet is democratising communication. Today MPs can get their views out there directly.
What A Detroit Supper Club Teaches Us About Co-Creativity A social movement is underway in downtown Detroit. Each month, 100 or so individuals pay $5 for admission to a loft, where they eat a dinner of organic soup (and other foods) prepared by volunteers. Diners share ideas and connections, hear presentations from artists who are working on projects aimed at improving the city, and then vote on which project will receive proceeds from the evening's dinner. Detroit SOUP organizers call the gathering "a democratic experiment in micro-funding," but it’s much more than that: It’s an example of the power of co-creativity, and it represents the way forward for organizations that want to remain relevant and reach consumers in an authentic way. In recent years, crowdsourcing has become a trendy tactic for soliciting input and engaging consumers, but in reality this approach is nothing more than an open call for submissions. Yesterday, businesses succeeded through industrial or technological expertise, with little need to converse with consumers.
Some Real Issues for 2012 The presidential election may be grabbing headlines, but the true rallying cry for 2012 is to struggle and organize around those issues that a president might take seriously, to stake out positions that would benefit what used to be called the working class (and now goes by “the 99 percent”) and to garner enough political will and power to pressure the president and Congress to move resolutely on the issues that matter. Tall order, and one that’s of more than passing interest to those who think of themselves as part of the food movement. Or the environmental movement. Or the Occupy movement, or the foreclosed homeowners movement, or the indebted students movement, or the unemployment movement, or pretty much any movement you can name that implicitly or explicitly acknowledges that there is a class war in this country, one that the wrong side is winning. It doesn’t matter what you call the movements, or the people behind them. Whatever. Why?
And here's to the year of people power Cartoon: Cathy Wilcox. THE death on January 4 from self-immolation of Tunisian street vendor Mohamed Bouazizi triggered a tumultuous year of revolution in North Africa and the Middle East. The 26-year-old Bouazizi's suicide, a protest against corruption and despotism, was a tragic start to a year that will be remembered for a resurfacing of people power. The awful regimes of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen were swept from power and Syria's leader is under siege from his own people, his Arab allies and major powers, including the US. There have been protests in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia; Jordan's king has acknowledged a need for democratic change, appeasing protesters; and there are high hopes a victory for moderates in Morocco's recent election will pave the way for a fairer future. The campaign for democracy has been bloody and well short of universally successful. Advertisement Time magazine has called ''the protester'' the person of the year and it's a fitting plaudit.
People power comes to Russia Opposition protest rallies across Russia Dozens arrested across Russia as opposition party calls for mass rallies around the country. P 11, 2011 VLADIMIR PUTIN'S return to the Kremlin as president next year may not be the smooth limousine ride he expects, judging from growing protests across Russia against the way his ruling party hijacked recent parliamentary elections. Significantly, the people coming onto the streets are not opposition regulars but ordinary citizens who have never demonstrated before. ''I didn't vote for United Russia [the pro-Putin party], neither did any of my friends or relatives or anyone I know, so I don't see how they can say the party won 50 per cent.'' When Kiev became a sea of orange flags after vote-rigging in Ukraine in 2004, Mr Putin vowed there would be no ''colour revolutions'' in Russia. Advertisement One woman said she did not mind whether or not Mr Putin came back.