Matt McAlister

Not saying ‘no’ is far from committing to ‘yes’

Matt McAlister — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 08:54:10 +0000

I had the good fortune of attending the Paley Center’s International Council in Madrid: “News at the Speed of Life: A Global Conversation on the Reinvention of Journalism” #

There were some very interesting themes on where journalism is heading including views from Facebook, Google, BBC, El Pais, Zeit Online, Hearst and some groundbreaking new services like Ushahidi and Newscred. #

While the diversity of approaches seemed very healthy I was struck by an apparent divide between those who view technology as a threat to journalism vs those who see it as integral to its evolution. #

Some, such as the Economist, have taken the view that platforms like the iPad may finally give them the digital positioning they’ve struggled to capture, a concession that nothing else digital has yet worked as well as print has for them in the past. #

While others, such as Brazil’s Abril and Digital First Media, are seeking new ways to embrace all digital platforms and create new opportunities for themselves for the future. #

In other words, technology is happening TO some media companies while others are making it work FOR them. #

The danger in the victimized view is that the market will eventually erode every advantage your brand has achieved over many years. New startups will replace things your core business once benefitted from doing internally, and capabilities in the dominant technology platforms will squeeze out things you’ve always done your way by offering another, perhaps even more relevant version of the same. #

Andrew Rashbass’ refreshingly humble perspective from the Economist is admirable, in many ways. In true British style he sarcastically noted that their failure in the past was not inventing the iPad. That’s not something any news org would’ve had the talent or resources to do. #

Equally, I couldn’t help but think that the failure to try to think big even if it amounts to preposterous ideas is precisely why many traditional journalism outfits are struggling to make digital businesses really sing. #

Success is not about developing a sustainability strategy. Reducing or offsetting the rate of decline is really more of a job protection plan. The best offense may be great defense, but you still have to score. #

Actually being successful is about creating a meaningful business, a relevant business, one that makes money as a natural outcome of its value to people in their lives. #

Given how dramatically technology is affecting the relationship people have with information and how important information is becoming in our lives, you can’t afford to play wait and see. #

It’s not enough to not say ‘no’ to change. #

Fueling new ways of approaching everything about the way journalism works and the business of media itself has to be a core competency at the very least. Otherwise, market forces will continue to happen TO you until you have nothing left but an ageing mission statement that you can’t execute. #

Dedicated to being adaptive

Matt McAlister — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 15:53:59 +0000

The last 9 months we used n0tice to put into practice some of the things that I’ve learned the last decade or so about development and some of the things that I always wanted to try but didn’t have the chance. #

Anyone who has ever worked in a startup will recognize most of what I describe here, but I think the way the n0tice team operates also has some lessons for larger projects happening in larger groups, as well. #

The n0tice team is made up of 1 lead developer (Daniel Levitt) who drives the web site and most of the new concepts, 1 community strategist (Sarah Hartley) who sets the tone and spends time working face-to-face with customers, 1 infrastructure man (Tony McCrae) who not only handles plumbing but also builds services like the API, a mobile development pair (more on them later) who are designing and writing the iOS app, an apprentice (Andre Moses) supporting our social media efforts, and a host of volunteers, occasional contract help, and a cast of supporters who help us out along the way when they can (or when we ask). #

Almost everyone has a hand in at least one other major project in addition to n0tice. #

We chat most mornings at 11am for about 30 minutes, not always. None of us sit together physically. We try to work together in the same space every two weeks for an afternoon, not always. There are no other meetings. #

We decide what to build as individuals, though everyone shares what they’re doing so we can talk about the work and feed ideas to each other. #

I like the principles of agile development, but I’ve never found it great at handling multidisciplinary activity, particularly when you are dependent on the talents of the people around you as opposed to the timeline or milestones. #

So, as a result, we just let everyone work at their own pace, doing what they can do when they can do it, united on a direction of travel. #

We choose release dates based on when something is ready or when it might make sense for co-dependencies to join up. In some cases, a date is a codependency, but generally we care more about what is built rather than when it’s built. #

Everyone uses their favorite tools to build whatever they are building. That means we’re running multiple programming languages, but you don’t have to trade simplicity for creativity if you can loosely join separate systems through a service-like approach…even with a relatively small stack like the n0tice stack. It seems to actually make scalability easier, too. #

I’m as guilty as the next person who cares about their work of micromanaging, but I think I’ve solved that problem for myself and the team and the effort by attracting individuals who are not just talented but also very very creative. We can therefore deflect any tendencies I may have to define solutions to things because we all know that I could never have a better solution to a problem than the person responsible for the problem. #

They force me to stay focused on where we’re going rather than how we’re getting there. #

We pay close attention to what our users say. We setup a Google Group early in the process and invited people to say whatever they want. And they do. We also spent time face-to-face with many of the beta users to ask their opinions of changes before we completed them. We know what we want to do, but we take care to marry our ideas with their desires. #

The whole effort is guided by a few principles that everyone on the team can interpret individually. #

Everything ultimately serves the vision: “what’s happening near you.” Observe constantly and respond quickly. Think in a network native way. Technologies and tools are there to empower people, not the other way around. #

We certainly benefit from being close to the Guardian, too. #

We have internal advisors looking over our shoulders like Guardian platform architect Graham Tackley, and we get bursts of insight from UX specialists like Martin Belam and Alastair Jardine. We can test ideas out on the Guardian editors, mobile teams and ad sales teams. We also get informal advice from some of the Guardian executives and some very insightful external advisors who check that we’re not being stupid. #

Now, all of this is less of a method and more like a state of play. #

We can be sure that the next 12 months will change around us and that users will change what n0tice means. But we’ve taken great care to make adaptation a core competency so that the core factors that got us to where we are now continue to help us do well. #

That’s a principle inherent in the medium itself. The Internet is a messy, ever-changing, human-powered, technically and creatively diverse platform that means different things to different people. In my view, succeeding online means aligning what you’re doing with how the Internet works and the characteristics that make it meaningful and interesting and important in the world. #

It feels like we’re on that journey with n0tice, so far. #

Of course, all of this is a recipe for building stuff. What we haven’t yet proven is whether or not what we’re building fully captures people’s imaginations and becomes important in their communities. #

Hopefully, I’ll have a blog post like this in about 6 or 9 months time describing an approach for successfully empowering healthy community activity, too. #

Start noticing everything again

Matt McAlister — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 11:31:33 +0000

Today we are removing the invite-only door on n0tice.com and opening up for the world to join us. The announcement details are posted on the n0tice blog here. But I’ll use this space to share some of the thinking behind what we’re doing. #

There’s a really interesting film from the mid-90’s called Smoke. Harvey Keitel plays a shopkeeper who takes a picture of the street from his shop every day for several years. #

Looking at his pictures it seems that nothing changes in some ways, but the little details that do change begin to surface. It turns out that the characters that pass through his shop are loosely connected and that their personal stories actually impact each other profoundly. #

It’s a great reminder to look around and to be part of what’s happening right in front of us, something that is increasingly difficult when the network follows us everywhere we go – it’s always with us right in our pockets. #

While the temptation to escape reality and spend more time in digital land is increasingly challenging, the network can unify and amplify things in meaningful ways when the digital and physical worlds come together for a purpose. #

The catalysts for this symbiotic effect include things like festivals, protests, art, sports, debates, gatherings, etc. All of these things can be planned, promoted and chronicled digitally while the real experiences are shared with real people in real places physically. #

The digital and physical experiences reinforce each other and make a stronger experience possible together than either the digital or physical experience operating without the other. #

Can you imagine a protest without twitter or youtube today? #

Photo By sierragoddess #

With headphones on and eyes locked to a screen we are missing both the beauty and the danger that coexist around us. But perhaps by unifying the things happening around us with the power of the network our lives will be more meaningful, not less. #

And maybe as a result we will become more interested in participating in what’s happening around us with more commitment and enthusiasm, too. #

It’s this idea and many other inspirations that set the stage for us to build n0tice: #

We applied some ideas from a fun little game developed by Tom Taylor and Tom Armitage called noticings – a game about learning to look at the world around you. It was also inspired by aspects of the street art movement – an attempt to wake people up, and an attempt to have conversations in, about and because of public spaces. #

Of course, we’ve learned a lot from Twitter, Foursquare and many other successful platforms, too. We’ve witnessed incredible innovation over the last 3 years or so, and n0tice is benefitting from those advances. We are standing on the shoulders of giants. #

But we’re also hopeful that n0tice can play an important new role in your world, helping you to become part of your surroundings. #

Take a moment every day to notice what’s happening near you. Look closer. Listen carefully. Get to know the stories that you didn’t notice before. #

Help others notice what’s happening nearby, too. Post photos. Report what you notice. #

If there’s one thing we hope n0tice can do it’s that it may encourage us to be better participants and keen observers in the world. By using the power of the digital network to amplify what’s important and interesting in the world around us perhaps the concept of a community will be more meaningful to everyone. #

Why we’re supporting the SOPA protest

Matt McAlister — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 16:06:30 +0000

The n0tice team decided that we should join the SOPA protest. We’ll be self-censoring the web site on January 18 and blocking our own users from participating. #

The full explanation of why we are participating is on the n0tice blog, but here are a few of the excerpts: #

We believe the role of law and politics in an open environment like the Internet should not be to create weapons for fighting bad behavior but rather to set boundaries and to mediate acceptable behavior. #
Capitalism is an adaptive system, and the TV and music industries will find other ways, perhaps better ways to make money and fund creative works. There are many models and success stories appearing everywhere including within their own businesses that will help them transition to more network-friendly, digitally sophisticated business models. #
They don’t need and shouldn’t have the power to take down an entire web site because of a copyright claim. #
Inasmuch as the initial concept for these bills questioned the state of protections for people and businesses on open networks, we are in agreement. We want laws that protect people from harm. We want politicians to raise awareness of threats to civility. #
The solution to those problems, as we see it, is about supporting open spaces, protecting open spaces and collectively reinforcing positive behaviors. #

I don’t consider myself a very political person. I take a lot of time to decide what I think about stuff, and I find it difficult seeing any issue through totally black and white lenses. #

But I’m conscious that the Internet is going through some difficult growing pains right now, and this issue may reinforce a way of thinking that threatens the founding principles that have made the Internet such a positive force in the world. #

Of course, there’s no doubt that the team agreed to support this protest out of self-interest. The bills are a direct threat to what n0tice and the many services like us are all about. #

Plus, sometimes taking sides has other effects. It’s character-building for a startup like n0tice. It helps us and our users to understand what our brand means, what really matters to us, who we want to associate with, and why we’re here. #

We all felt that this is one of those moments when we could do something very small to help with something very big. I can’t imagine a better way to frame the n0tice culture. #

Rolling out n0tice

Matt McAlister — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 15:32:19 +0000

It wasn’t until we stumbled onto the name n0tice.com that I started paying closer attention to noticeboards. #

You probably see them around you, too, now and again, and you probably read 1 or 2 things that catch your eye. But you probably don’t think much about them. #

It’s because you don’t have to. They just work. Like magic. Everyone just knows what they’re for and how to use them. #

In the 1980’s and 90’s the dial-up online bulletin board systems or BBS’s made the noticeboard concept come alive in the digital space based on what technology was available at the time. Email enabled mailing lists that acted like noticeboards. And, of course, the web and Netscape made browsable noticeboards possible in digital space, such as Craigslist.
But few models for community noticeboards have taken off in a social-local-mobile world, so far. #

Now, I don’t count Facebook because I don’t think most people in a local community know each other well enough personally to connect on Facebook, nor do they intend to. Location can be a great starting point for social activity in ways that your known contacts can’t provide. #

We may or may not have the answer to the new digital noticeboard with n0tice, but I think we’ve made something pretty fun in that space. #

The past month we’ve been inviting people to join us on the platform, as we release new features and experiment with this theme. #

The release today is a big one for us. We’ve added the ability to create your own n0ticeboard. #

You can customize branding, look and feel, and subdomain. We’ll also give you options to customize the content using some filters like following people, tags and locations, though that feature is still being developed. The read API (RSS/JSON) will be exposed soon, too. #

What started as a hack day project became a prototype which was rebuilt as a real community platform that you can see today. #

We’re keeping it somewhat limited to invite-only access still or ‘Private Beta’ status. #

Two people have been intimately involved in launching n0tice – Daniel Levitt and Sarah Hartley. Daniel has worked with the Guardian’s Open Platform in the past developing both the Recipe Search and the WordPress Plugin. Sarah is an experienced community strategist having launched the Guardian Local project and several other hyperlocal initiatives over the years. #

We’ve also benefitted from the contributions of several others such as Tony McCrae who setup the backend systems, Andrew Travers who tightened the user experience, the prototype testers notably Nigel Barlow and Will Perrin, and the members of the n0tice Google Group who share their ideas with us. #

These people have all shaped it into something very powerful. In many ways they’ve created a new kind of social platform, or a really really old one reinvented for the new world. #

If we can make citizen journalism possible in more contexts for more communities then I think we will have done a good thing. If we can also make citizen journalism a financially sustainable activity then we will have done a great thing. #

As we go along we are increasingly unsure of what happens next. Participants are starting to determine what we do more and more. So, if you want this platform to do something, please get in early and share your thoughts with us. #

Becoming network native

Matt McAlister — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 22:58:58 +0000

I think one of the most challenging conceptual blocks facing anyone whose business or interest touches the Internet in some way is the notion that the network itself is the playing field that matters, not any single node within it. #

People used to obsess over making the perfect web site. Many are doing the same now with mobile apps. #

Crafting the perfect product is an interesting and worthwhile pursuit, but the Internet typically rewards platforms over point solutions. #

This might be the line that defines one generation vs the next. #

The network natives are busy igniting activity, connecting and collecting things. They see plumbing and grid solutions to grow cities where most people are still building houses. #

The really good developers have the ability to generate network activity, to fuel new data by manipulating the way people move around the Internet. They build services for the Internet and expand on data from other platforms. #

Simon Willison has demonstrated this in the past with things like Wildlifenearyou, and he’s doing it again with lanyrd.com. Aaron Straup Cope uses Flickr data and maps platforms to generate new lens through which to see our world: #

“We should start to think about how we interpret data the same way that people design patterns for textiles and work with it the way they might approach a bolt of fabric to fashion any number of different objects – from a bag to a dress to a wall-hanging – out of it.” #

Daniel Levitt and Tony McCrae are both looking at the world in similar ways as we build the n0tice platform for local community activity. #

I’m not just talking about getting hyperdistribution to explode virally across the network. An interesting network-native startup called Path is demonstrating how to exchange private experiences only amongst people who know eachother via the Internet. #

If you’re interested in this stuff, you have to read Steve Yegge’s internal memo about Google’s challenges in the face of platform plays at Amazon and Facebook. A clearer window into what makes the big dotcoms tick has perhaps never been published before. #

“A product is useless without a platform, or more precisely and accurately, a platform-less product will always be replaced by an equivalent platform-ized product.” #

I don’t know when John Gage or whoever it was at Sun came up with the slogan “the network is the computer”, but it’s probably about 25 years since that statement catalyzed a group of people who were on a shared journey to turn the Internet into a mainstream thing. #

Yet there are still too many people focused on creating, producing, delivering, and shipping things meant to be purchased and consumed. The production-consumption model still dominates the way people think. #

That wouldn’t be a problem except for the fact that so many traditional institutions and companies and organizations repeatedly get blindsided by new ways of working that undermine everything they stand for. #

We’re witnessing a recurring disruption in a very basic anthropological tendency to harness power by controlling information. The scale at which the network is able to break down towers of information power can be comprehensive, swift and seemingly violent. #

It really shouldn’t surprise people anymore when this happens. Yet it does. #

The network is a market that doesn’t respect secrecy, supply and demand, or many of the other traditional value levers that people have depended on for centuries. #

The network respects a connected, service-like approach to the world. How can you tell if network-native thinking has changed the way you see things? #

Instead of caring about how much value you will get from your customers in exchange for your goods, you care about how much value you create for your customers with your services
You want to help other people succeed knowing that you will benefit from their success
You simultaneously seek ways to embed what you do into other things and to embed strengths of what others do into your things
You view those who do the same thing as you as partners rather than competition
You view those who take more than they give as threats
Nothing you do is ever done

Being network-native means that the network is where conception and design happens, where manufacturing and production happens, where delivery happens, where feedback and research happens. It means that everything that you can do is done openly on the network with and amongst customers, suppliers, partners and competition. #

Of course, even if you want to change the way you operate to be more network-native it’s certainly no easy task. Even the most innovative companies in the world struggle to change their core processes…look no further than the dotcom king – Google. #

Amazon is a shining light in this respect. Again, as Steve Yegge notes: #

“Amazon was a product company too, so it took an out-of-band force to make Bezos understand the need for a platform. That force was their evaporating margins; he was cornered and had to think of a way out. But all he had was a bunch of engineers and all these computers… if only they could be monetized somehow… you can see how he arrived at AWS, in hindsight.” #

What kind of people do you have? What is your greatest asset? Ok, now turn all that into a platform. Simple, right? #

Complex storytelling: can journalism fuel game development?

Matt McAlister — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 13:06:38 +0000

There have been some incredible innovations in journalism over the past few years, particularly around fast-paced, microchunked news creation and distribution. Some might even argue the native format for news in a networked world has been discovered in the form of the Live Blog. #

However, increasing the speed and reducing the size of the information bits that hit us does not inherently make us smarter. #

The big, heavy, complicated issues that shape our world and our place in it can surely be discussed in native formats for the networked world, too. #

What’s the best way to make stories with longer arcs that run parallel to the fast-paced news agenda more accessible to people? Issues like education reform, globalisation, ethics in biotechnology, energy security, poverty, pandemics, etc. #

In the coming weeks and months we’re going to see journalist/anthropologist Joris Luyendijk openly exploring the world of finance via the Guardian. He’ll publish interviews and insights online and in print in an attempt to make this otherwise opaque industry more accessible and maybe even entertaining to everyone who is not inside the finance industry. #

The tools at his disposal initially will include the many reporting capabilities available via the Guardian digital platform. The output will initially be text, data and multimedia, but he’s also interested in seeing how we could use all of his work to serve people in an ongoing way. #

In the past people have turned long form journalism into books for posterity. But maybe there’s another way. #

I’m guessing most people would answer ‘Wikipedia’ if asked where to find an accessible view into a complex issue. That would be an excellent answer. Most big topic pages in Wikipedia include a lot of depth including historical background, philosophical positions and good footnotes. #

But the Wikipedia page is at best just one entry point on the journey toward understanding more complicated issues. #

Many others now including innovative media organisations are exploring new approaches to breaking open long topics for the rest of us and showing some real success with it. #

ProPublica’s analysis of educational accessibility in the United States, The Opportunity Gap, is a wonderful approach to bridging the gap between huge volumes of data and real human issues in the education system. The Economist hosts interactive debates with experts, and the New York Times is making some wonderful interactive news projects come to life. The new poll format employed after Osama bin Laden’s death to help people identify what that event meant to them was brilliant. #

What these examples point to is a format that fuels better conversation rather than better packaging. #

I think we can go much further still. #

Dutch philosopher Johan Huizinga argued in the 1930’s that play is more important to culture than we typically recognize. He was famous for saying, “Let my playing be my learning, and my learning be my playing.” #

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor founded a program called iCivics after she retired in 2006 designed to raise understanding and engagement in democracy. The organisation partnered with a game developer Filament Games to create several web-based games and teaching materials. #

While some may argue that edutainment fails on both accounts – you don’t learn, and you don’t have fun – the ability to communicate complex issues through some form of play can be very powerful. #

There are many applicable lessons about how the world really works to be learned from spending time with the Sims, Civilization, World of Warcraft and newer games like Eve online. #

The world’s most successful board game ever made was an attempt to explain the economic theories of Henry George – Monopoly. In fact, an early variant of the game was actually called “The Fascinating Game of Finance.” #

After listening to Joris and what he’s trying to do it’s easy to see that the player roles, game mechanics and environments for an imaginative new game are right at his fingertips. He will be talking to asset managers, brokers, lobbyists, analysts, CEOs, investors, academics and many others. They will tell him how the real game of finance works today. #

Now, we don’t know how to make a good game, and we don’t even have a conception of whether we should try to create a single game or a collection of games. For example, might it make some sense to develop simple card games like Crunch – “the game for utter bankers”? #

How do you keep score? What kinds of achievements will work? What’s the relationship with real world data? How does distribution work? #

Also, what kinds of costs are we talking about? There are some fascinating approaches to funding and licensing games via Kickstarter, such as the NASA-backed multi-player online game. Should we use a similar model? #

The first step is to initiate the discussion, set the stage for the right things to happen. #

Joris will lead the way on his blog and start explaining what the real game of finance looks like and how it works. #

Our hope is that we can create the environment for a real game to develop backed off what Joris finds in his research. #

If you’re interested in coming along on this journey with us, please follow Joris on twitter @JLbankingblog and check in on his banking blog on the Guardian. #

The binding effect of digital and physical worlds

Matt McAlister — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 21:07:58 +0000

One of the things that fascinates me about the whole mobile and social media landscape is the increasing importance the physical world plays in our digital experience and vice versa. #

The devices are binding the physical and networked worlds and changing the shape of markets and social institutions. #

I’ve become more interested in this because of n0tice.com, a new twist on a very old idea – the public noticeboard. #

Many have considered technological convergence long before now. Marshall MacLuhan was one of the more articulate voices of this particular concept way back in the 1960’s. #

More recently Google’s founders wanted their company to be the force that united the digital network with the physical world…this is a quote from Larry Page in 2004: #

“Ultimately I view Google as a way to augment your brain with the knowledge of the world. Right now you go into your computer and type a phrase, but you can imagine that it could be easier in the future, that you can have just devices you talk into, or you can have computers that pay attention to what’s going on around them” #

On the surface this binding effect may appear to be a simple and obvious evolution of technology we know and understand already, but the broader impact of the change feels bigger than the sum of its parts: #

First, there are, of course, the devices themselves, the point of contact. This is what we use to physically engage. The change we’re going through right now may not feel as different as the step we took from TV to PC, but you can imagine the step from PC to mobile device may feel even more dramatic in a few years…particularly as tiny sensors become like dust around us everywhere all the time.
Then we can see innovations in the interfaces sitting on top of those devices. New OSes, browsers and apps – a whole software movement is accelerating via the unique capabilities of the devices and our relationships with them. The ones we see and use are the human to machine experiences, but there are also many automated machine-to-machine interfaces that we don’t even know are happening.
The information flow as it extends into this new space has a different feel to it, a different utility, a different role in our lives. Much like TV started as radio programs on camera, many early mobile experiences are web sites on small browsers. That is changing fast as the mobile pure plays catch their stride. The digital incumbents have a long journey ahead of them still, but they are no longer sleepwalking into it and will surely get there soon.
Lastly, the shape of the information itself is becoming increasingly atomized. It seems obvious how information is changing when you consider the more recent proliferation of microblogging and data journalism, but most people don’t realize the depth of knowledge forming beneath the surface. We’re probably not as conscious as we should be about the way different platforms extract knowledge about each of us from looking at the data exhaust we leave when we move around the network.

So, the ‘stack’, if you want to call it that, doesn’t feel totally foreign if you were paying attention during the first wave or two of network activity, but that’s only because it’s so early still. #

Another way to look at the change is through Kevin Kelly’s eyes, which is always a smart thing to do. He describes the large-scale trends using the verbs: Screening, Interacting, Sharing, Flowing, Accessing, Generating #

I’m particularly interested in the generative ideas he mentions here. I wrote a long form paper about that titled ‘Generative Media Networks.’ #

Many others have been talking about the movement toward the Internet of things: #

“Fridges, buses and buildings will be able to share data and adapt to suit our needs. In fact, Cisco estimates that the number of “things” connected to the internet has already surpassed the number of people on earth.” #

And one more approach to defining the broader trend comes from Tom Coates. He developed a really nice visual way to describe some what’s happening in his presentation Everything the Network Touches: #

Now, where things start to get interesting and make me think about the size of the opportunity ahead is when you realize how explicit and direct the network’s role is becoming in our lives. This is very different from Web 1.0 and 2.0. #

The network is no longer a thing you spend time on. It doesn’t compete with other media sources for your attention, because it’s always there. Your attention to it is a matter of focus and intent, less of an on/off switch. #

The network is no longer something you can only use when you’re sitting at a desk. You don’t have to go somewhere to get on it. It’s on you instead. #

The network is increasingly becoming an extension of what we are thinking and doing, when and wherever we are thinking and doing it. #

But perhaps most importantly, and this is where things really feel different from the PC-and-browser era, there’s a two-way bi-directional relationship with the network. #

Sure, we had a person-to-person bi-directional network before the mobile era. But email, IM and social networking had to be triggered and engaged before it started working. #

In the new physical-digital network era, the network can do things for us just by taking some context from the devices and software that are connected to us. #

Gary Wolf explains one outcome of this binding effect in his TED talk on “The Quantified Self”. He is referring to the many ways in which people are tracking their daily behaviors to understand more about themselves. #

There was a word used a lot to characterize the way people and organizations need to behave in a connected world – ‘transparency’. #

That was once just a thing people said, mostly frivolously, but now the scale of that truth is almost overwhelming. #

It seems to me that we’ve barely scratched the surface, that the word ‘transparency‘ as we apply it today is going to feel like a toddler when this megatrend matures and we all fully embrace the externalization of our personal behaviors and social institutions. #

For example, David Weinberger recently demontrated how the externalisation of the journalistic process is playing out on Reddit, in particular around their IAMA and TIL threads: #

“it’s not exactly 60 Minutes. So what? This is one way citizen journalism looks. At its best, it asks questions we all want asked, unearths questions we didn’t know we wanted asked, asks them more forthrightly than most American journalists dare, and gets better — more honest — answers than we hear from the mainstream media.” #

In a much more extreme case, the government of Iceland is being externalized through a collaborative rewrite of their constitution: #

“A group of 25 citizens presented a draft of the constitution to Iceland’s parliament. The group, which is made up of ordinary residents, compiled the document online with the help of hundreds of others. The constitution council posted the first draft in April on its website and then let citizens comment via a Facebook Page. The council members are also active on Twitter, post videos of themselves on YouTube and put pictures on Flickr.” #

It’s wonderful to see how important people’s voices have become to the fabric of the network. #

In the Web 2.0 world we had a name for participation: ‘user generated content‘ or ‘UGC‘. While many recognized UGC was a terrible thing to call this new activity, people had no choice but to articulate the new thing in a way that those who didn’t participate online could understand. #

In this new world, there’s no name for the stuff people contribute. It’s a redundant concept. #

That is part of the inspiration for n0tice.com. I want to externalize all the constructs that shape a fact. What would an information network look like if Richard Rogers were to architect it using the materials who, what, where and when? #

It’s also the basis for another project we are working on around creative collaboration. Can creativity be flattened further so that it’s more accessible to a broader public? Can the commissioner be the commissioned? #

I consistently find myself wanting to flip every problem around and to expose the systems and processes behind it. Everything gets filtered through the same lens: “What would happen if you turned it all upside down and inside out? Why can’t the seller be the buyer or the consumer be the producer? Is there a way to flatten the control structure and make the solution to the problem more accessible to more participants? Can the solution generate new activities that form something better?” #

While it doesn’t always help to reduce many important changes to a single concept, the world looks very different to me when viewed this way. #

Humanity is becoming externalized, shaped by a binding effect between the digital and physical worlds, fuelled by the growth of generative media platforms. #

Hopefully, I’ll be able to demonstrate what this actually means in reality and show how it can work soon. #

There are many approaches to playing in this space. The important thing is to be in it and to actually do something about it. #

Stay tuned… #

An open community news platform: n0tice.com

Matt McAlister — Mon, 16 May 2011 12:09:17 +0000

The last several weeks I’ve been working on a new project, a SoLoMo initiative, as John Doerr or Mary Meeker would call it. #

Noticeboard photo by Jer*ry

It’s a mobile publishing platform that resembles a community notice board. It’s called n0tice*: # #

http://n0tice.com. #

After seeing Google’s “News near you” service announced on Friday I thought it was a good time to jump into the conversation and share what I’m up to. Clearly, there are a lot of people chasing the same or similar issues. #

First, here’s some background. Then I’ll detail what it does, how it works, and what I hope it will become. #

What is n0tice?

It began as a simple hack day project over a year ago. I was initially just curious about how location worked on the phone. At first I thought that was going to be beyond me, and then Simon Willison enlightened me to the location capabilites inherent in modern web browsers. There are many solutions published out there. Here’s one. #

It took half a second from working out how to identify a user’s location to realizing that this feature could be handy for citizen reporters. #

Around the same time there was a really interesting little game called noticin.gs going around which was built by Tom Taylor and Tom Armitage, two incredibly talented UK developers. The game rewarded people for being good at spotting interesting things in the world and capturing a photo of them. #

Ushahidi was tackling emergency response reporting. And, of course, Foursquare was hitting its stride then, too. #

These things were all capturing my imagination, and so I thought I would try something similar in the context of sharing news, events and listings in your community. #

Photo by Roo Reynolds

However, I was quite busy with the Guardian’s Open Platform, as the team was moving everything out of beta, introducing some big new services and infusing it into the way we operate. I learned a lot doing that which has informed n0tice, too, but it was another 12 months before I could turn my attention back to this project. It doesn’t feel any less relevant today than it did then. It’s just a much more crowded market now. # #

What does n0tice do?

The service operates in two modes – reading and posting. #

When you go to n0tice.com it will first detect whether or not you’re coming from a mobile device. It was designed for the iPhone first, but the desktop version is making it possible to integrate a lot of useful features, too. #

(Lesson: jQuery Mobile is amazing. It makes your mobile projects better faster. I wish I had used it from day one.) #

It will then ask your permission to read your location. If you agree, it grabs your latitude and longitude, and it shows you what has been published to n0tice within a close radius. #

(Lesson: It uses Google Maps and their geocoder to get the location out of the browser, but then it uses Yahoo!’s geo services to do some of the other lookups since I wanted to work with different types of location objects. This combination is clunky and probably a bad idea, but those tools are very robust.) #

You can then zoom out or zoom in to see broader or more precise coverage. #

Since it knows where you are already, it’s easy to post something you’ve seen near you, too. You can actually post without being logged in, but there are some social incentives to encourage logged in behavior. #

Like Foursquare’s Mayor analogy, n0tice has the ‘Editor’ badge. #

The first person to post in a particular city becomes the Editor of that city. The Editor can then be ousted if someone completes more actions in the same city or region. #

It was definitely a challenge working out how to make sensible game mechanics work, but it was even harder finding the right mix of neighborhood, city, country, lat/long coordinates so that the idea of an ‘Editor’ was consistent from place to place. #

London and New York, for example, are much more complicated given the importance of the neighborhoods yet poorly defined boundaries for them. #

(Lesson: Login is handled via Facebook. Their platform has improved a lot in the last 12 months and feels much more ‘give-and-take’ than just ‘take’ as it used to. Now, I’m not convinced that the activities in a person’s local community are going to join up naturally via the Facebook paradigm, so it needs to be used more as a quickstart for a new service like this one.) #

The ‘Editor’ mechanics are going to need a lot more work. But what I like about the ‘Editor’ concept is that we can now start to endow more rights and priveleges upon each Editor when an area matures. #

Perhaps Editors are the only ones who can delete posts. Perhaps they can promote important posts. Maybe they can even delegate authority to other participants or groups. #

Of course, quality is always an issue with open communities. Having learned a few things about crowdsourcing activities at the Guardian now, there are some simple triggers in place that should make it easier to surface quality should the platform scale to a larger audience. #

For example, rather than comments, n0tice accepts ‘Evidence’. #

You can add a link to a story, post a photo, embed a video or even a storify feed that improve the post. #

Also, the ratings aren’t merely positive/negative. They ask if something matters, if people will care, and if it’s accurate. That type of engagement may be expecting too much of the community, but I’m hopeful it will work. #

Of course, all this additional level of interactivity is only available on the desktop version, as the mobile version is intended to serve just two very specific use cases: #

getting a snapshot of what’s happening near you now
posting something you’ve seen quickly and easily

How will n0tice make money?

Since the service is a community notice board, it makes sense to use an advertising model that people already understand in that context: classifieds. #

Anyone can list something on n0tice for free that they are trying to sell. Then they can buy featured promotional positions based on how large the area is in which they want their item to appear and for how long they want it to be seen there. #

(Lesson: Integrating PayPal for payments took no time at all. Their APIs and documentation feel a little dated in some ways, but just as Facebook is fantastic as a quickstart tool for identity, PayPal is a brilliant quickstart for payments.) #

Promotion on n0tice costs $1 per 1 mile radius per day. That’s in US dollars. #

While still getting the word out and growing the community $1 will buy you a featured spot that lasts until more people come along and start buying up availability. #

But there’s a lot we can do with this framework. #

For example, I think it would make sense that a ‘Publisher’ role could be defined much like the ‘Editor’ for a region. #

Perhaps a ‘Publisher’ could earn a percentage of every sale in a region. The ‘Publisher’ could either earn that privelege or license it from us. #

I’m also hopeful that we can make some standard affiliate services possible for people who want to use the ad platform in other apps and web sites across the Internet. That will only really work if the platform is open. #

How will it work for developers and partners?

The platform is open in every way. #

There are both read and write APIs for it. The mobile and desktop versions are both using those APIs, in fact. #

The read API can be used without a key at the moment, and the write API is not very complicated to use. #

So, for example, here are the 10 most recent news reports with the ‘crime’ tag in machine-readable form: #

http://n0tice.com/api/readapi-reports.php?output=xml&tags=crime&count=10 #

The client code for the mobile version is posted on Github with an open license (we haven’t committed to which license, yet), though it is a few versions behind what is running on the live site. That will change at some point. #

And the content published on n0tice is all Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike so people can use it elsewhere commercially. #

The idea in this approach to openness is that the value is in the network itself, the connections between things, the reputation people develop, the impact they have in their communities. #

The data and the software are enablers that create and sustain the value. So the more widely used the data and software become the more valuable the network is for all the participants. #

How scalable is the platform?

The user experience can scale globally given it is based on knowing latitude and longitude, something treated equally everywhere in the world. There are limitations with the lat/long model, but we have a lot of headroom before hitting those problems. #

The architecture is pretty simple at the moment, really. There’s not much to speak of in terms of directed graphs and that kind of thing, yet. So the software, regardless of how badly written it is, which it most definitely is, could be rewritten rather quickly. I suspect that’s inevitable, actually. #

The software environment is a standard LAMP stack hosted on Dreamhost which should be good enough for now. I’ve started hooking in things like Amazon’s CloudFront, but it’s not yet on EC2. That seems like a must at some point, too. #

The APIs should also help with performance if we make them more cacheable. #

The biggest performance/scalability problem I foresee will happen when the gaming mechanics start to matter more and the location and social graphs get bigger. It will certainly creak when lots of people are spending time doing things to build their reputation and acquire badges and socialize with other users. #

If we do it right, we will learn from projects like WordPress and turn the platform into something that many people care about and contribute to. It would surely fail if we took the view that we can be the only source of creative ideas for this platform. #

To be honest, though, I’m more worried about the dumb things like choking on curly quotes in users’ posts and accidentally losing users’ badges than I’m worried about scaling. #

It also seems likely that the security model for n0tice is currently worse than the performance and scalability model. The platform is going to need some help from real professionals on that front, for sure. #

What’s the philosophy driving it?

There’s most definitely an ideology fueling n0tice, but it would be an overstatement to say that the vision is leading what we’re doing at the moment. #

In its current state, I’m just trying to see if we can create a new kind of mobile publishing environment that appeals to lots of people. #

There’s enough meat to it already, though, that the features are very easy to line up against the mission of being an open community notice board. #

Local UK community champion Will Perrin said it felt like a “floating cloud of data that follows you around without having to cleave to distribution or boundary.” #

I really like that idea. #

Taking a wider view, the larger strategic context that frames projects like this one and things like the Open Platform is about being Open and Connected. Recently, I’ve written about Generative Media Platforms and spoken about Collaborative Media. Those ideas are all informing the decisions behind n0tice. #

What does the future look like for n0tice?

The Guardian Media Group exists to deliver financial security for Guardian News and Media. #

My hope is that we can move n0tice from being a hack to becoming a new GMG business that supports the Guardian more broadly. #

The support n0tice provides should come in two forms: 1) new approaches to open and collaborative journalism and 2) new revenue streams. #

It’s also very useful to have living projects that demonstrate the most extreme examples of ‘Open and Connected‘ models. We need to be exploring things outside our core business that may point to the future in addition to moving our core efforts where we want to go. #

We spend a lot of time thinking about openness and collaboration and the live web at the Guardian. If n0tice does nothing more than illustrate what the future might look like then it will be very helpful indeed. #

However, the more I work on this the more I think it’s less a demo of the future and more a product of the present. #

Like most of the innovations in social media, the hard work isn’t the technology or even the business model. #

The most challenging aspect of any social media or SoLoMo platform is making it matter to real people who are going to make it come alive. #

If that’s also true for n0tice, then the hard part is just about to begin. #

* The hack was originally called ‘News Signals’. But after trying and failing to convince a few people that this was a good idea, including both technical people and potential users, such as my wife, I realized the name really mattered. #

I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about generative media platforms, and the name needed to reflect that goal, something that spoke to the community’s behaviors through the network. It was supposed to be about people, not machines. #

Now, of course, it’s hard to find a short domain name these days, but digits and dots and subdomains can make things more interesting and fun anyhow. Luckily, n0tice.com was available…that’s a zero for an ‘o’. #

Where to find value in open strategies

Matt McAlister — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 17:25:37 +0000

I’ve been exploring some of the implications of openness at large scale and identifying how value is created. One way to think about that is by positioning openness and empowerment against control and ownership. #

When does control create value? What characteristics do the opposite extremes have in common? What does success mean in a world that is constantly changing at seemingly increasing speed? #

By ‘control’ I mean owning and defining product design, materials, rules, behaviors, processes, marketplace, pricing, etc. as opposed to ‘empowerment’ which is all about fueling strength in others. #

When you then compare that spectrum against a related tension in the world, change vs the status quo, some interesting things start to appear. #

Here is a very generalized view of where certain industry sectors sit on this scale, in my mind. None of this is based on real data or research. It’s still just a working hypothesis. #

I’m saying here that sectors like Finance and Manufacturing represent the status quo, industries where its customers want incremental change, if any at all. By this measure, maintaining known outcomes through tumultuous times requires control of resources, distribution, etc. #

Utility services similarly want to keep things in a sustainable state and reject transformative change. The Utilities marketplace differs from Finance in that its success is dependent on how well it serves people’s needs as opposed to predetermining outcomes for people. #

On the other side is Science where its core purpose is defined by the constant pressure to discover new, transformative ways of understanding the world. Achieving success requires a great deal of control over details that only individuals and small teams can manipulate, often with great secrecy. #

On the other hand, social software enables similarly transformative capabilities in the world, but its customers are empowered to make those changes happen, albeit very chaotic. These organizations are defined by their own customers. #

The argument then goes that success in each of these categories has slightly different characteristics but signficantly different core purposes. #

What do people, business, industries want? #

Some aim to sit safely and last as long as possible, while others want to do things and to be busy. Some want to achieve or accomplish something new and important, and others want to grow toward something meaningful and to progress. #

In the industrialized world, the reward for succeeding has traditionally meant cash money. Historically, bigger financial rewards find their way to those who are able to sustain behaviors as opposed to those that intend to transform our world. #

But not everyone does what they do primarily for cash reward. Some do it for the recognition. Others do it to be useful. #

While fame and utility are strong incentives for many, money has very powerful gravitational pull, particularly at larger scales. #

The power of money pulls many oganizations out of the worlds from which they were born into a place that ultimately values the status quo over change. #

Now, this in and of itself is certainly not a bad thing. Too often, though, the financial motive drowns good intentions and changes the essence of an organization. #

From the outside this is what seems to be happening to companies like Yahoo!, Microsoft and even Google. It’s becoming the expected outcome for Facebook, but certainly not its destiny. #

Interestingly, Apple has come back from that dangerous death spiral to irrelevance of the ‘sans Jobs’ years, but they’ve done it by focusing on transformation as a core value, a cultural flag in a sense. As change is the interminable force driving technological advancement, it makes sense to have an intentional approach to it if you are a technology company…and even if you’re not. #

This argument doesn’t suggest that more closed organizations like Apple, Microsoft, News International, Disney, etc. are unsuccessful. By most commercial measures they are all very successful, indeed. #

Rather, this argument suggests that the characteristics of a closed approach to operating mean that change and growth are dependent on the organization’s achievements, it’s discoveries, it’s own capabilities against everyone else’s. #

It means closed organizations operate on their own and compete for points of control. Winning comes at the expense of others. #

The open approach means that change and growth happen by giving, by strengthening others, by creating spaces for opportunity. #

The rewards for being successful as an open agent of change are profound. By valuing utility, service, relationships, tangible impact and effect over precision, being right, process and method you become part of a larger, deeper, more meaningful change in people’s lives. #

This is not to say that operating on the edge of change doesn’t also have commercial value. Being first to market has huge financial advantages if they are played correctly. #

I might argue, actually, that being an open organization focused on change is no different than a closed organization in terms of how to approach building commercial value. #

If you are not on the edge of change then you are more susceptible to the intense pull of the change-resistant markets sucking you back the other direction. In that case, you risk losing focus on your intentions and instead become focused exclusively on cash rewards to survive. #

Then without a Mr. Jobs to recenter your target on the future your options close down in front of you very quickly. #

Value in open organizations operating at large scale, therefore, is created through healthy relationships with others, by giving value to them, by creating value for new partnerships, opening opportunties on the edge of change. #

In return, if it is in fact uniquely useful, the open organization becomes a dependency for its customers and partners. And that is a position of strength with many positive commercial outcomes. #