I’d like to start a Junto. (pronounced hoonto)
Originally, “The Junto was a club established in 1727 by Benjamin Franklin for mutual improvement. Its purpose was to debate questions of morals, politics, and natural philosophy, and to exchange knowledge of business affairs.” [wikipedia]
This seems rather amazing to me, and something that should always exist for knowledge sharing, information exchange, learning, personal growth, and empowerment. Not only does it make logical sense, a recent research study suggests deep, meaningful conversation actually makes us happier. The study, published in the journal Psychological Science, showed that when two people enter into a deep discussion, they create shared meaning of the world, strengthening their connections and bonds and interdependence, making them happy. (It feels good to relate to others!!! Did we need published research to really know that? Just check out the comments section of this blog, it’s living research.)
It may sound counterintuitive, but people who spend more of their day having deep discussions and less time engaging in small talk seem to be happier, said Matthias Mehl, a psychologist at the University of Arizona who published a study on the subject.
But, he proposed, substantive conversation seemed to hold the key to happiness for two main reasons: both because human beings are driven to find and create meaning in their lives, and because we are social animals who want and need to connect with other people.
“By engaging in meaningful conversations, we manage to impose meaning on an otherwise pretty chaotic world,” Dr. Mehl said. “And interpersonally, as you find this meaning, you bond with your interactive partner, and we know that interpersonal connection and integration is a core fundamental foundation of happiness.”
I’ve been wondering how this can be translated into a digital format that might work for the benefit of all.
Here’s the premise: ChatRoulette format + Livestream + Twitter Backchannel
I’m going to lay out the concept. Maybe you can help build it.
1. ChatRoulette
If you haven’t heard of ChatRoulette yet, here’s a funny youtube video of how it works. Essentially, you log in, and it randomly assigns you a partner from around the world and puts you in a video chat together. You can click to move on at any time, which lines you up with a different partner. Like roulette, but with people.
Unfortunately, it’s being mostly used for entertainment or for flashing people their genitals, but it gave me an idea for something much better.
Imagine the very same setup, two video boxes and a text box.
Now what if instead of the “roulette” format, with two random stranger in a conversation for no good reason, what if we do this as purposeful dialogues between intelligent people to discuss big ideas?
There’s been a lot of energy building here, and I think we’re starting to really resonate on the same frequency. Now people have begun to ask what we can do to start taking all this talk to action.
As I’ve been thinking about our “intentional evolution” and this collaborative learning process that’s going on here, I’ve asked myself what the next step is after this.
In the last post, I mentioned a few ways we can kickstart our personal thinking process – through building networks, self-reflection, and rewiring the brain.
I think the next step is through dialogue – bouncing ideas off each other, practicing the act of listening to each other’s perspectives, gaining insights from our different viewpoints, and learning how to communicate.
I know that many great ideas and insights come from those one-on-one interactions that often go late into the night, discussing all those things that really make up the stuff of life.
Now, for the sake of all of us moving forward as people – what if we engaged in these types of chats publicly?
The spoken word has a different impact on consciousness than the written word. When we’re reading text from a book or from a screen, it’s one-way information. We can’t ask it to clarify itself, can’t ask it if it could give us an example, and it won’t let us ask it how its view differs from ours.
Essentially, text only gives us one perspective.
In addition, it boxes in the mind.
In the way that these letters and words lock in your idea of what they mean through the form itself, it locks in your thinking as well. You know just what I mean, if you’re in any of the communities who argue over the TRUE meaning of “design thinking,” “futures thinking,” “social business,” “social crm,” “social learning,” and so on. As soon as you name it, you box it. You contain it. And then the conversation shifts to the arguing over the meaning over the word instead of discussing the deeper concepts that those words represent.
Our attention gets distracted.
The spoken word is different.
You can’t box it in. My nature, sound is already going out of existence even as it is coming into existence. (By the time you say ‘-tence’ the ‘-exis’ is gone. It’s evanescent.
[See Orality and Literacy by Walter Ong – short excerpt here of what the written word does to consciousness and the brain]
But is the spoken word enough?
There is much learning and insight to be had by watching a TED talk, but like a book, the information is still one way.
What if we could engage in mini TED talks with each other? Practice the art of dialogue. Practice listening to another’s viewpoint without interruption. LISTENING. Asking questions when clarification is needed. Asking why that person thinks what they think. Generating new ideas together.
Are we not full of interesting insights and ideas too?
2. Livestream
The web is activity streams. It’s always moving, like a river of information. Most of the streams we look at are text-based (Twitter, RSS), but couldn’t we also have video streams as well?
I love TED videos myself, but I don’t always have 30-60 minutes at a time to invest.
What if these Junto dialogues were streamed in real-time, and you could just “dip in” for as long as you wanted?
No commitments.
Just as we casually glance through the tweetstream to see what’s interesting at the moment, what if this live dialogue could also be glanced at for any length of time we found interesting?
Starting to get excited?
3. Twitter Backchannel
Not everyone is ready to discuss ideas publicly, but they might be interested in watching them.
There’s plenty of learning and insights that can happen for the observer, just as it happens for the ones speaking. And they don’t have to be just an observer. They can also be a participant. By using the hashtag #junto (or whatever is decided), anyone can add in their perspective, and build on the experience itself, amplifying its potential for stimulating curiosity and growth.
Why it Just Might Work: Simplicity
Simplicity helps to reveal understanding within complexity. Many of us are having these conversations already. Over and over. Hitting those “a-ha moments” one on one. Or on our own. What if, instead of all of us having to discover each insight alone or one on one, we can start REALLY pushing forward, and generating ideas IN REAL TIME with MANY OF US TOGETHER.
Those are the components. So simple. Yet so potentially powerful.
The Big Picture
Here’s what I think it could look like.
This is just an idea, an experiment. Sure there are many ways this could fail. But didn’t we learn that to be agile and adaptive, we have to be comfortable with uncertainty, willing to take risk? It occurred to me that we talk about “building agile organizations” as if it’s something that happens “out there” that we “implement.” WE ARE the organization!!! We must learn how to be adaptive ourselves if we want the organization to be adaptive.
This is a collective experiment in what it means to learn and think and adapt and become flexible, resilient, and agile.
It could really take off, and I can see this simple model being effective in so many ways, especially the potential to get young people engaged in critical thinking and gaining appreciation for knowledge and wisdom.
So let’s say we try this thing on a given night and time. Say Monday 8-9pm/EST. We try this a couple of times this way for a few reasons:
1. Model the Behavior – I’m learning from Twitter and this community that we’re learning by doing and by watching each other and seeing what works. When something seems to work, we copy. (We’re monkeys!) We have to show each other what intelligent dialogue “looks like.”
2. Set the Expectation – The idea here is to really engage in some high level dialogue, so it would be nice to set the bar high upfront. I don’t know of anywhere on the web you can go to watch two people hashing out ideas in real-time. It could be VERY interesting.
3. Gauge Interest – This could just be a great idea in my head, but doesn’t work in practice. We’d have to experiment and see if it’s sticky.
The nice thing is, I think the risk here is pretty low. This is not a complex idea, it’s simple. The complexity comes from what happens during the dialogue, from the ideas coming from our minds. The technology is just the tool for us to interact. This is how we use “the social Web” intelligently.
The web is not a destination. It is an interface between people.
So at first, we pick 2 people – there are so many of you who are packed with ideas, I can’t even keep up. I can think of many combinations of you that I’d love to stick in a room together and see what happens. (lol)
And they just talk for an hour. Free form. No rules. No expectations. The goal is the spirit of inquiry itself. The content can be whatever inspires you – how to build online communities, why networks are important, how we can start developing an online reputation system linked to a digital currency model, how to fund projects, or any number of the big problems we face that we discuss in our lives every day. And while those two talk, the rest of us watch and listen and learn. They will also have a chat box where they can type in information during their chat (like links to information that comes up during conversation), so that we can also follow the links. And then us, the observers, also have the backchannel, to be participating with each other while they’re talking.
How Does It Scale?
If people find this interesting and it draws attention, it needs to be able to grow to serve a larger audience without getting weighed down. If we want it to be sustainable, it will have to operate like a complex system. Meaning: self-organizing, non-hierarchical, and organic (just like an agile organization, or like our brains).
Not everyone is available from 8-9pm on Monday nights, including the two people having the chat.
What if it gets opened up to anyone, and the chats could be tagged by theme. You go to the site, and you could click on any number of ongoing real-time conversations to watch, or log in with a colleague/friend/fellow thinker to enter into your own Junto.
No conversation theme is mandated, you decide what you’re talking about. No timeframe is set – you talk for as long as you’re inspired to talk, and then leave when you’re done. The people watching can dip in when they want. The backchannel can dip in when they want. The entire thing is comprised of independent agents who do whatever they want, assemble around ideas for short periods of time, and then disband when they’ve had enough.
So potentially, if this thing would take off, there could be interesting public dialogues discussing important ideas that matter for all of us, all over the world, all of the time. 24/7. It could take the mysticism out of TED talks, by just creating People talks.
It would become like a video-based version of Twitter, where you could tap into the thoughtstream of the planet. And the voicestream.
I think this has the potential to spur on an explosion of intelligence and innovation.
There are so many excellent thinkers out there who could benefit so much from knowing each other and having a chance to share their knowledge. And from what I’ve seen so far, there are enough people out there committed to the notion of the free exchange of ideas and of getting real problems solved, that they would engage in these exchanges publicly. (This is what “open innovation” and “open collaboration” would look like.)
I can see all kinds of Twitter communities embracing this format in order to take their hosted Twitter chats to the next level (#educhat, #innochat, #blogchat, #journchat, #kmers, #socent, etc).
And what happens if parents encouraged it? What if you could get a bright high school kid to start sharing ideas with a senior citizen? And publicly. It might create a transparency that helps us to bridge the generational divide, where we can start to highlight and praise some of the tacit knowledge that is painfully undervalued in our society.
(I recently heard that 7,000 people in the U.S. reach retirement age every day. Imagine if some of those people cared to share some of their life lessons and stories and insights with youth?)
I think we’re already seeing a shift in what “expert” means. We will still value those with deep specialist knowledge or academic backgrounds, of course. But there are other kinds of experts that we don’t acknowledge much – the experts in life – the people with knowledge and wisdom to share. What if we showed them a little appreciation (i.e.”respect” – the acknowledgement of the wisdom of another) and asked them to share their viewpoints?
A little while back I prompted this discussion with What is an expert? There was an overwhelming response, and many great angles to ponder. Here is a response that really resonated with me, left by Jamie Wolf:
I’ve just served on a workgroup charged with establishing the criteria for a Professional Leadership Award in the domain of our interest (Sustainable Energy/Building). I’m pleased with the result and think it informs this discussion.
The people I consider true experts embody an essential quality of humility about their knowledge and experience. As an experienced (and expert) “old world” mason I once worked with explained: “The more I know, the more I know I don’t know.”
In any case, here are the criteria we established for the proposed award – this is good stuff:
The recipient:
- is regarded as a leader in his/her professional field and has made significant contributions. Their concepts and ideas change how we think about and perform our work.
- embodies methods of practice, and models aspects of being, that we aspire to ourselves
- is a whole systems thinker incorporating a multi-disciplinary approach to practice
- demonstrates the highest integrity and honesty
- is immensely generous in sharing his/her knowledge, skill, and experience – a person of great heart
- is a clear thinker and communicator
- has profound curiosity which extends the boundaries of our shared knowledge
- is fully engaged with, and embodies the ideals of the community
Makes sense to me. The leaders and experts of tomorrow (i.e. TODAY) are not people who know all the answers – they are, as Umair Haque put it, The Builders.
And if this could really scale globally, these conversations would start taking place in other languages and spanning nations. It could help take those steps towards understanding each other with fresh eyes.
Many of the problems we face between each other as people is due to misunderstanding. We don’t understand one another’s perspectives, and we don’t know how to listen or empathize well. We’re still caught in being right and defending our views instead of seeing that there are a multitude of views, and each is a representation of a time and place and culture and set of life experiences that is unique to that individual. We have SO much to learn from EACH OTHER!
Everything we need to know is NOT in an operations manual.
I’m not suggesting the world will change overnight. Far from it. But getting a little dialogue started is a good place to start.
#
I can see it, but I don’t have the tools to build it! If you know any programmers/designers who could make this a reality, please pass it on. ChatRoulette was thrown together by a 17 year old kid in Russia. I think we can handle this.
____
Thanks to @nejsnave for pointing me to the article from the NY Times, and to @gabrielshalom for the 4 hour video skype chat that helped generate this idea, and to everyone else here and on Twitter that gave me the experiences that led to all of this.
Onward and Upward!
emergent by design 
I would think if this works it might provide another model for education in some of our High Schools in the States. It will be very interesting to see how it plays out.
Great concept, love it. (And you write so fast and clear.)
Essentially a digital version of a marketplace. Or a party.
While the written word and time-shift encourage equality, the spoken word encourages focus. Ever wondered how come you know much more than you thought if someone asks the right questions? And the public marketplace imposes discipline and enables participation. Need a way to tune out unwanted stalkers, though.
Technically, in my limited experience, skype conference call in parallel with a google wave gets close. Let’s go.
Best way to tune out stalkers would make it invitation only and have it validate with twitter user IDs. Easy peasy 😉
i forgot to mention this in the post, but these are the “rules of engagement” for a junto, that each member had to agree upon before entering. if we are returning to a trust based society, this makes perfect sense to me.
we have an “agreement” that each member makes before they can participate. if they violate it, they’re out.
here’s the list from the Junto wikipedia page:
Any person to be qualified as a member was to stand up, lay his hand upon his breast, and be asked the following questions, viz.
Have you any particular disrespect to any present members? Answer. I have not.
Do you sincerely declare that you love mankind in general, of what profession or religion soever? Answer. I do.
Do you think any person ought to be harmed in his body, name, or goods, for mere speculative opinions, or his external way of worship? Answer. No.
Do you love truth for truth’s sake, and will you endeavor impartially to find and receive it yourself, and communicate it to others? Answer. Yes.
wow great. I love the ability to define the grounds of engagement and for the participants to be able to agree upon a common intention they both bring to the interaction.
I wonder how a reputation model like on StackOverflow could play into the community(ies) that build around this application. At the very least, it would help keep out trolls and flashers. At best, it would encourage participation and reward quality. Unfortunately, it’s only useful when there is a critical mass of users creating the filter.
i think Stack Overflow and also Aardvark are good things to look at as we think about what an expert is and who to trust and how we determine the value of various kinds of information. –> data/info/knowledge/wisdom
i think that will grow by extension though.
i think getting the conversation platform up and running will be the foundation – getting people to visually see and hear each other, and then the twitter backchannel for public participation, so there’s a huge transparency of all of our thinking and ideas and viewpoints.
asking the right questions, that’s it. i’m noticing that that’s one of the biggest ideas to grasp, one that of course i’ve heard many times, but i get it now. it’s how you frame it, and it really is a skill, one that’s learnable.
this is not the realm of “genius,” which to me if very exciting. it means it’s accessible to anyone. ok, the degree will vary person to person, but there is a way to learn how to think in a more critical manner. i don’t even want to use the word “critical” anymore, because it’s so overused it’s meaningless. i’d prefer to think of it as “shifty” – having the ability to really see other points of view, test them against your points of view, and decide how that view fits with yours. if you can’t resolve the difference, you need to create a new framework for understanding. and i think this happens over and over and over. and we just keep adding ways of understanding other views. we don’t have to embrace them or agree with them, but just understand.
Shouldn’t be hard to build, V. And certainly a fine idea. My biggest concern: if it’s video, I will have to shower and shave at last.
hahhhah, noooooo, we just brush off our thinking caps. i think a little stubble builds character. 😉
Hi Venessa,
seems interesting enough. I foresee some problems that might arise as the number of Juntos increases, but maybe it would be simple to fix that by retrieving search results by a number of “listeners” order.
I also am a bit sceptic about the two-people-dialogue model although I understand that it is so for a more easy to follow dialogue, I still think it is too limited this way even with the backchannel output.
All in all I like it and would be as interested and excited to see it in practice as you surely are.
As a curiosity that I did not see referred in your post Junto means Together, which is very appropriate, and when Benjamin Franklin founded the original one it was as a Free-Masons association.
i think dialogue is a very important first step in modeling the behavior of how to have a discussion with someone and exchanging possibly opposing viewpoints in an intelligent manner, without attacking.
once you add in too many voices, it gets distracting. i really think the one on one is a good place to start.
once we know how to talk to 1 person, then we can learn how to talk to 2.
one step at a time.
p.s. – see above the “rules of engagement” for a Junto that i left under Gabriel’s thread.
Very, very cool!!!
Here’s an example of a Mindmap created from Tweets generated in a recent TEDxAmsterdam event – http://www.mindmeister.com/35428817
Perhaps mindmaps also can be built from EBD Junto conversations? That way, anyone who misses the live conversations could later explore the issues.
Also, villages in poor regions of the world are moving to attract work-study projects via the net — such as transcribing short audio/video clips, tagging Tweets, or creating Mindmaps and other visuals on topics that relate to their education.
Openworld has experience in giving seed grants to students in Asia and Africa for such projects. We can ask student teams in entrepreneurial schools in Sri Lanka, Somaliland, and South Africa to try their hand at Junto mindmaps and/or transcripts, as soon as the files are ready.
Best,
Mark
@openworld
Simultaneous mapping alongside the exchange in addition to twitter backchannel would be brilliant; could appeal to an entire other group of spectators; those who like mapping connections and visualizing relationships (like our friend @notthisbody ) Would be amazing to incorporate something more sophisticated (like Compendium) to allow multidimensional concept mapping. See: http://compendium.open.ac.uk/institute/
personally, I find mindmeister too hierarchical in nature for mapping out the multidimensionality of conversations. I definitely do find Compendium as the best tool – AND its open source.
I agree with Venessa in that many times I do not have the time to watch all the videos and sound (possibly hours) that it took to get to a given “plateau” (in this use meaning temporary conclusion or resolution).
Concept and dialogue mapping can offer a concise and efficient way to view the “plateaus” of Juntos, as well as mapping across Junto sessions, without huge time involvement on the part of those who’d like to access the information within. You can also start to map the progress of the Junto and interrelations between the different sessions.
Vanessa, I love how you’re pushing on this. Just as card catalogs helped after 1450 to both organize overflowing bookshelves AND re-organize minds and disciplines, we now need new techniques to manage and maximize the Internet & mobile-powered torrent of ideas.
I hope the solution won’t rely on video, though, because it makes scanning content and interlinking ideas so darn hard. 🙂
Tags applied to the individual juntos would let you ‘scan’ the content. Links CAN in fact be applied to video (someone would need to edit in references in post-production for “complete” juntos). Video is the most attention-holding format, as people drift away from long-form reading.
I hope it DOES rely on video, so that video will evolve and become the multidimensional proto-holographic medium it can be, with all the attendant metadata it is presently missing. YouTube’s beta automatic transcription service is a step in the right direction; Adobe’s (and many other independent university’s) research into seam-carving will also help.
See also:
http://quantumcinema.blogspot.com/2009/09/rubric-for-open-source-cinema-beta.html
Further thoughts…
1. Once established, the Junto format could be adopted as a standard by BloggingHeads and any number of issue-oriented think tanks and organizations.
2. Volunteers and work-study teams (mentioned in an earlier comment) could also build Debategraph.org sites for extending issues discussion and consensus building after the Junto events.
Best,
Mark
@openworld
I love this idea. Looking around, BigBlueButton looks like an open-source video conferencing solution that meets the needs. 1VideoConference, another open-source solution might work as well, though at a glance it appears not as fitting.
Venessa – had loved the idea the moment you had mentioned it !! I am passing it on 🙂
If there is any way to increase the number of nodes in the proposed dialogue model, it may help. Not sure if BigBlueButton or similar services are the answer.
Regardless, you can count on me to support this idea, process, and its development, in amy way I can 🙂
Keep forcing us to think, and thank you for expanding horizons.
Cheers,
Prince
Prince,
I’m unclear by what you mean, “If there is any way to increase the number of nodes in the proposed dialogue model, it may help.” Could you expand?
Thanks!
Cole
As I understand it he meant 3,4,5,etc people video-talking instead of just 2.
I wasn’t sure, as that’s explicitly included in the features of BigBlueButton. Thanks!
Cole – Nuno is right. That was my thought. Although, it seems the crowd is moving to a “2” format (at least to start with).
Off to send an email to emergentbydesign.pbworks.com to see if I can become a collaborator.
Cheers,
Prince
I think the critical thing to strive towards (long term, say in 2-3 years) is multiple simultaneous nodal connections with realtime timecoded searchable transcriptions. This way you could search Google and return live video conversation search results, much in the same way that presently you can return tweets in search results. This is ambitious but not impossible or unlikely given Google’s present research into speech-to-text technology.
Venessa,
you may also want to create a mindmap for each of your blogs that can be built upon and used for future reference.
The information you are presenting needs to be captured in real time and stored for reference.
I’d like to see a software that is capable of doing that, capturing blogs and comments with links into a mindmap.
i can’t do all this myself. either something needs to be built, or we need to collaborate with something that exists like compendium and a wiki, so everyone can add links and info.
i can’t assemble it fast enough!
I know! it can’t be assembled fast enough, i tried with the mindmap for the Future of Networks blog to simultaneously take that blog as the focal point and connect from the comments left all the links shared from the people leaving comments.
However i do believe a framework is here for something that could simultaneously create a mindmap out of the comments being left, think of it as a virtual mindmap resource being developed in real time.
The mindmap is alot easier to have as a future reference for anybody seeking knolwedge on the topic at hand.
As an added incentive the idea i was refering to with wibiya was the real time live chat that goes on. if there was a way to add a tab to wibiya and you place that on your blog, then instead of just leaving comments, you can participate in a live chat going on in regards to that blog topic.
five months from now, the conversation will be going on, all the comments and suggestions stored into a mindmap for reference and you can even continue the conversation through the wibiya idea of live video chat.
Spiro,
There’s a way for Tweets to create Mindmaps in realtime.
Mindmeister.com has a Firefox add-on called geistesblitz that lets individuals send Tweets straight into their personal web-based mindmaps, via a direct message to @Mindmeister .
The add-on is downloadable from http://www.mindmeister.com/services/tools/geistesblitz_widgets .
So far, I’ve some hassles getting the DM tweet->mindmap option to work (note – Mindmeister has to follow you back to do this, and they’re pretty slow about doing so).
But the default way to send Tweets to your web mindmap works beautifully. It’s done via a geistesblitz icon in Firefox browser.
I posted a suggestion a about six weeks ago on the Mindmeister site that they might consider supporting batch imports of Tweets (e.g. through BackUpMyTweets) and then let the user click to generate a full-fledged Mindmap. (I also asked if they could have this tool parse hashtags so as to get related Tweets onto the same branches). No response yet.
@GabrielShalom, I think the Mindmeister folks are in Germany – is there a way you might explore possible follow up with them? The Junto tweets (including topic hashtags) would be an ideal beta, I think, to import into Mindmeister and autocreate a web-based Junto mindmap.
Best,
Mark
@openworld
The Mindmeister guys are just east of Munich; I am in Berlin. But certainly there should be a way to connect with them. I am curious about their long term planning and goals and their feelings about open data and the linked data movement. I am also aware of a working group that emerged from Palomar5 called Strata Lab which has issues of mapping hypermedia on their agenda. A friend involved with that initiative is currently in residence at the GAFFTA in San Francisco if any of you are out there in Frisco and want to meet him let me know (twitter: @gabrielshalom )
I’d like to see this whole continuum spawn a global wiki for semantic objects. So that whether you had a conversation about Nietzsche or Hong Kong, the people watching and mapping that conversation would map THE Nietzsche or THE Hong Kong and those would be the same globally defined semantic variables in an open system.
The notion of the semantic web as a “global graph” will mean opening up definitions of semantic objects in the same way Wikipedia opened up definitions of encyclopedic content. And Wikipedia would be a great platform on which to build out some of this structure. Imagine a website called “everything.org” that would be a global database of semantic objects! (PS: everything.org is presently just being occupied by domain squatters!)
this is something like DotsSpots is trying to do, again. DOT being Distributed Object of Thought. Its a firefox addon that allows you to mark a paragraph of text, comment on it, and then DotSpots indexes the internet and attaches your comment to everywhere else on the internet where that paragraph on text exists. Very powerful concept. http://dotspots.com
Hello Mark,
I’ve experimented with the default tool you suggested and it does work well but that is your own personal knowledge manager.
What i’m suggesting is point of contact based on topic at hand mindmaps.
for example, this blog post is a focal point of our contact, the discussion surrounds the topic at hand, and we are communicating via a comments stream.
What if every time i type in a link in this comments box, it automatically goes under my name which is categorized in a mindmap called “participants” and that link i provide is an extension to the blog topic.
thus it would be an embedded system where no matter what the topic and who comments that information goes into a mindmap on it’s own. and you can have a criteria for that mindmap based on the #hashtag idea.
Now five months down he road, and after five hundred comments people don’t have to go through all that, instead they can go to the mindmap for reference and see the “big picture”
Finally, not only will it be captured, but the blog topic will also be the point of conact in regards to real time chat.
The mindmap builds on it’s own so to speak.
love the idea of automated mindmap generation based on point of contact gathering around a #hashtag idea.
still think there’s the need for pruning, planting, grafting, fertilizing, stimulating the dialogue, and it is precisely the concept of immediation or conduction which gives the most value to mindmapping, not just the automation of the creation of the map.
one tool that’s going the right direction with treating a certain block of text as a point of contact is Dotspots, Dot standing for Distributed Object of Thought. Check out http://dotspots.com. A step in the right direction.
You may not be able to “do it all” yourself at once, but you can do it all in time, a little at a time. Obviously, some of these people want to help you and involve themselves in the idea – a little like a “barn-raising” ! !
Let’s try out using “BigBlueButton.org” because it seems the most redi-made of what you seem to be envisioning and discussing. Any interface needs some time and effort in a learning curve.
Also, it seems that you are using the forms of a World Cafe to conduct a Junto, correct? Are you familiar with David Bohm Dialogue too?
This idea just came to mind, if you visit, http://www.wibiya.com you will see the interface panel they have on the bottom of their page, perhaps there is something there that can be orchestrated where a page like this and the topic at hand in real time hae participants chat about it, as you have proposed.
Instead of just leaving comments on a blog, you can participate in the discussion going on first hand, which can be something that wibiya could offer that implements some of the ideas Venessa’ is proposing.
i would definitely point discussions to this platform we’re talking about. i don’t want this blog to be tied to it though. i want to stay focused on the understanding of this stuff, about how to help more people understand how to use these tools in order to talk to one another and share their knowledge and wisdom. it would be easy for me to gallop off into the sunset after all these amazing ideas, but i want to just focus on communicating the big picture of how these tools can be useful for people. beyond that, i’d like to help all of us just better connected, become more aware of our strengths/gifts we have to offer each other, and let the people with the inspiration around these particular ideas to go manifest them. i will stay on the sidelines cheering!!!!
I like the idea .. and I too would prefer that it not be limited to two-person one-on-one dialogue (I think).
I find myself wondering how much of this could be done with http://www.zorap.com (or future versions of it and / or similar capabilities). Zorap is video chat, but more than two people at a time are possible, in a “room” (on the screen) and you can drag n’ drop into the room files, presentations, (maybe) video clips … I don’t know about it hosting a Twitter stream or twitterclone stream, but that might be all that’s additionally necessary.
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Venessa,
Nice idea. I think you could get most of what you’re looking for from another free, easy-to-use video chat service that I happened to be checking out today – http://www.tinychat.com
It sounds similar to Zorap.com, except tinychat.com requires no download or registration. Supports multiple videos streams from 2 or more participants, as well as text chat. No twitter connection though.
–Dean
We (members of Washington State University’s Office of Assessment and Innovation, a few ex-members and a few friends) do a version of this with more or less dedication, called Morning Reading Group.
We combine Ning with Zorap
http://morningreadinggroup.ning.com/
http://www.zorap.com/jaymejacobson
Next meeting should be Wed March 24. We’d welcome lurkers or coaches who might help the process get better.
Responses like neurons firing in all directions. Amazingly useful contributions from all. They exhibit the fundamental problems with networks, that the numbers of paths through them increases exponentially as the number of nodes increases. The number of paths is not useful. It is like dealing with the number of possible chess games there are. The secret of a chess playing algoritms is to reuce the number of possibilities considered. I think Venessa is right to want to limit the number of interactions taking place at any one time. I also believe that limiting the amount of effort on each interaction will be productive, despite intuitively being wrong. I just retweeted a Tom Peters qot (almost a quote) that to get things done you have to drop optimum from the vocabulary.
Limiting discussion will mean there are people getting quite frustrated that important considerations are being missed. I believe that in time any missed items will get their time. Just like in a game of chess there are several routes to the same position. For all the billions of games possible there are shelves full of books on the endgame. All that creative effort ends up in the same place a seen before.
Limiting the number of characters that can be tweeted has not prevented us all from arriving here.
We have been treated to a Cornucopia of tools by the contributors. One possible way ahead is to have groups championing there own favourites and using them to debate the issue Venessa has put before us, which is which tools are best and how to use them? When each faction has decided what tools are best and how the others fall short we will all be in a position to judge by the record left behind. For example 100 hours of video will not be an impressive way of proving text based methods inferior.
David,
Beautifully said!
>>Limiting discussion will mean there are people getting quite frustrated that important considerations are being missed… One possible way ahead is to have groups championing there own favourites and using them to debate the issue Venessa has put before us, which is which tools are best and how to use them? When each faction has decided what tools are best and how the others fall short we will all be in a position to judge by the record left behind.
I agree. As an example of convergence, I’ve offered to help Venessa on a possible EBD “sandbox” for these purposes. Among many things it could help springboard may be –
– “builder challenges” along Innocentive-like lines to encourage individuals and teams to work on new ways to enrich the EBD commons (creating mindmaps, transcripts, etc);
– pilots of social currencies, especially ones that can align reputation-building opportunities with enrichment of the commons/social capital formation;
– development of systems to encourage “soft forks” rather than the zero-sum battles that often plague fast-growing communities. One approach may be to use prediction markets as a way for factions to build reputation via wagers on the results of their preferred paths in demonstration projects.
To make this work well, it would be great to have ideas on the high-level topics/opportunities posted here or on the interim EBD wiki (please DM @venessamiemis or @openworld to join in). Once there is a list of specific topics that can engage energies of the kind you have described, the new “sandbox” can provide a more accessible venue for co-creation. If Venessa is willing to set (or vet) the aims and metarules for such a springboard, it will be wonderful to see where the cocreativity of our aligned energies can go.
Best,
Mark
@openworld
All,
Please post, Tweet, or DM your ideas on issues/project opportunities that can be explored in the EBD commons wiki – the aim is to have it emerge as a workspace and springboard for self-organizing projects.
Best,
Mark
@openworld
This morning I woke up with a inspired feeling of taking some dots and connecting them.
I think the first dot is the most important one. It was a post written by Venessa in December titled “How to use Twitter to build Intelligence’
https://emergentbydesign.com/2009/12/21/how-to-use-twitter-to-build-intelligence/
Brief Summary:
Twitter is a massive Idea & Information Exchange.
How do you use it strategically?
Who am I and what information am I trying to get?
What information am I bringing to the table?
2. The next dot is a post written by Venessa titled “What is an Expert”
https://emergentbydesign.com/2010/02/25/what-is-an-expert/
Brief Summary:
What would allow us to tag ourselves and each other, and how that could be helpful for locating talent and sparking innovation?
An expert is identified based on the criteria of building trust networks?
Thus what an expert is in regards to twitter or “social media” is someone who has been identified by their daily activities.
3. The importance of Managing Your Online Reputation
https://emergentbydesign.com/2010/02/06/the-importance-of-managing-your-online-reputation/
Brief Summary: Your daily activities as suggested in #2 emphasizes the importance of giving or feeding into the system your strengths, gifts, talents, thoughts…etc.
4. Tapping the Network to Faciliate Innovation
https://emergentbydesign.com/2010/02/21/tapping-the-network-to-facilitate-innovation/
Brief Summary:
How can the power and scope of social networks, combined with a human capital inventory, be used to facilitate shared creation and innovation?
Power and scope of networks: Idea and information exchange which is tagged and stored based on human capital inventory to build trust networks based on the ongoing building of one’s online reputation to facilitate innovation.
Here’s where it gets interesting…
Now that we understand why we’ve been using twitter, why the tools that compliment twitter are used to tag and store human information because Trust networks are only built when we don’t think we have to build them, they build themselves.
The point of contact is this blog, in this realm we have many people leaving comments which shows us the point of interest, thus the point of contact is the question, the point of interest holds the answers and the point of interest are the people.
The question (point of contact) then asks for answers (point of interest) based on the trust network which has not been picked and chosen by anybody but has been filtered out by the tagging system that places you in direct proportion to your participation in that network that has been built to gain added value.
There has to be a root question and in that root question twitter and the tagging system expands out into that realm and then filters back the right alignment of people/networks to attain value.
Innovation process then begins.
Studies have shown there is a right way to conduct idea generation.
http://www.business-strategy-innovation.com/2010/03/distributed-idea-generation-outperforms.html
But is there a tipping point to all of this.
http://forwardfound.org/blog/?q=why-you-never-see-people-complaining-about-knowledge-overload
For the past several months I’ve been doing a lot of observing and watching the patterns unfold without thinking too much about it and not interfering with the system that is taking place.
In my opinion, twitter is the only tool at the present moment that has third party tools that are doing a great job tagging and placing us into an eco system that identifies eventually on it’s own which trust networks will come together based on the question that needs to be answered.
The answers are an alignment of people who then are filtered into a trust network based on the criteria of the initiative.
However once the team is assembled, they are given the question and asked to generate ideas on their own then coming together and filtering those ideas with the team that was created to give us a deeper contextual meaning.
For example, in this post @openworld has laid out some criteria:
1. – “builder challenges” along Innocentive-like lines to encourage individuals and teams to work on new ways to enrich the EBD commons (creating mindmaps, transcripts, etc);
– pilots of social currencies, especially ones that can align reputation-building opportunities with enrichment of the commons/social capital formation;
– development of systems to encourage “soft forks” rather than the zero-sum battles that often plague fast-growing communities. One approach may be to use prediction markets as a way for factions to build reputation via wagers on the results of their preferred paths in demonstration projects.
To make this work well, it would be great to have ideas on the high-level topics/opportunities posted here or on the interim EBD wiki (please DM @venessamiemis or @openworld to join in). Once there is a list of specific topics that can engage energies of the kind you have described, the new “sandbox” can provide a more accessible venue for co-creation. If Venessa is willing to set (or vet) the aims and metarules for such a springboard, it will be wonderful to see where the cocreativity of our aligned energies can go.
Now imagine these are the criteria’s that will develop the questions that need to be answered, the realm we find ourselves in now is this post, participants commenting have an already established “online reputation”
The trust network then begins to come together to answer the questions posed based on the criteria.
No longer are we searching for people, but the system filters you out and places you in harmonic alignment with others.
To be continued……
Hi Mark, i think what you’ve laid out here with the points to further discussions needs a mindmap instead of a wiki, because there are questions that stem from each point you bring up, my thoughts are who are the perfect alignment of people to bring together to get this initiative off the ground.
Just in this blog post there are many participants each which have built a reputation online through twitter and now it’s aligning that team to meet those initiatives.
This is where trust networks come into play not on who we choose but what their tagging system says about them…
Spiro,
Perhaps then we can start web-based, wiki-style mindmaps now on two tracks –
1) a “metamap” of what all might go into the EBD commons (with links to maps of now-forming projects, as well as placeholders for planned or pending initiatives)
2) project maps in followup to ideas that gain traction in EBD blog comments (Junto, user profiles/badges, learning, games4change, social currencies, etc)
Are there any shareable mindmaps you can sketch out w/ Mindmeister for this? Hoping that Michael and others here will leap in too…
Best,
Mark
@openworld
For me right now is what is the criteria of the mind map.
What is the point of contact.
I think by answering that questin first, then we will attract the right people who will bring the highest return on ideas and allow that to go into an innovation process.
I’m using your points outlined as the criteria for point of contact. Also i believe the first point you outline for builders challenge is the key to the other two success.
It’s actually quite funny because the Junto idea Venessa is talking about i believe is what is happening between you and I right now in regards to this initiative. 🙂
I will contact you via dm to discuss this further.
Glad to be in this pre-Junto junto w/you… look forward to connecting via @openworld on Twitter and Skype, or email with mfrazier @ openworld dot com).
Let’s also launch a convo on mindmapping on the EBD commons wiki.
Anyone else interested in mindmapping of EBD-related issues and project ideas? Please give a look at http://Mindmeister.com, and jump in!
Best,
Mark
i’m just on the sidelines watching here, my ‘thing’ is writing this stuff, your thing is whatever your thing is.
the way you describe this commons is that it would be a map that could synapse to any project underway.
am i reading that incorrectly?
what kind of scale are you talking here, because i’m reading it as something that could grow into a global initiative.
For me Venessa my thing right now is trying to make sense of it, and referencing it at the same time.
You’ve triggered alot of us with your vision and insight to at least try and take this to a next level of learning.
Great stuff in this post and like the best collaborations some of the best nuggets are from the “audience” comments.
I have two side projects that are related
1. twebevent merges the livestreaming and the twitter chat. It does not currently allow for chatroulette type capability, but if there is enough groundswell or if anyone would like to help collaborate, I could be convinced to move in that direction.
2. http://KMers.org is a new type of community site that is driven by a regular Twitter Chat. One can use Ning, Blogs, or wikis as the tool, but they are such generalized tools that they are very sub-optimal.
Thx for the links. I will be checking out some of the ones I haven’t seen yet.
Swan
so twebevent only streams one video location, correct? any plan to integrate 2 so it could be a conversation? basically skype chat + twitter.
Venessa,
I think this is a great idea. While there are existing platforms that allows people to discuss topics of interests and create their own networks (Ning being one example), what is missing is the transparency to the rest of the world and the inability for folks to just ‘jump in’ and contribute. In terms of tools and technologies that can probably be used, I think the other contributors have thrown in quite a few choices and currently I don’t have anything to add to it. So I am going to direct my viewpoints on some other aspects of this initiative.
1. What I really like about this is that it allows us to let loose our real thinking & imagination without constraints or boxes. Like you said, we often box ourselves in by putting a box around what we can and should talk about. Part of this is the nature of our mind. Or as the Spanish observer Miguel de Unamuno put it, “The mind seeks what is dead, for what is living escapes it; it seeks to congeal the flowing stream in blocks of ice; it seeks to arrest it. In order to analyze a body it is necessary to extenuate or destroy it. In order to understand anything it is necessary to kill it, to lay it out rigid in the mind…”. In other words, we put boxes around things to dilute and simplify the complexity. The other reason we put a box around things is purely a cognitive need — folks find it difficult to respond to unnamed categories or situations. However, really understanding what we are capable of as human beings and truly understanding the power of social networks requires us to shed those boxes and grapple complexity not by dilution but by attacking it in miniscule chunks. And that to me is the beauty of this new paradigm. We can solve even the most complex of issues by [eventually] engaging a million minds, each attacking and providing alternatives on the part they are most comfortable with. In my mind, I call this an ‘open source reverse emergence’ — open source because everyone has access to the source materials and ‘reverse emergence’ because emergence refers to the creation of complex patterns out of a multiplicity of relatively simple interactions and in this case we are breaking down complex patterns with a multiplicity of simple interactions.
2. Beware of Scope-creep. It is easy for us to get excited and wanting our Junto to have all sorts of bells and whistles, but my recommendation is that we start simple. I would rather launch a relative simple system that embodies our concept and then scale rapidly as it gains acceptance than have the “biggest and greatest” idea not take off because of technical, social, and other bottlenecks. In this respect, we should have a clear mission that drives this initial launch — maybe a modification of the original junto goals — wanting to improve oneself and in the process helping others and the community.
3. Tools are critical to serve as the bridges between our concepts and execution, but they should not at anytime be the focus of this excercise. Like in any other endeavour, if this takes off then you are going to find many people peddle their favorite tool and sometimes the pride in the tool adversely affects the results coming out of the system (from lack of focus).
At the end of the day, I believe getting this up and running will definitely provide benefits. As Carlzon of Scandinavian Air once said-“You cannot improve one thing by 1000% but you can improve 1000 little things by 1%”. In other words, we can make small marginal impacts in a lot of cases and in aggregate that should build the momentum for us to push forward.
Very nicely said.
Despite several other comments I’ve made which lean towards vision for increased complexity, we should all keep in mind that going from a format like TED (one talking head) to a format like the one Venessa’s suggesting (two talking heads) is still an exponential growth in the amount of dialogue! (Remember: 1 … 2 … 4 … 8 … 16 … 32 … 64 … 128 … etc)
Optimal, no. Exponential, yes!
agree. my vision is just a way to have dialogue that other people can learn from and participate in.
those dialogues may inspire particular people or groups to make mindmaps of their particular conversations, but let that be up to them.
keep the platform lightweight and simple, like twitter.
people will develop the add ons that work for their needs.
and besides, we don’t even know what kind of needs we’d have until we experiment with it.
Venessa,
As the note I sent you on Twitter stated, I love this idea, and I’m willing to lend my skill set to it if you would ever need some help.
And even if you don’t need me, I’d like to participate if it gets off the ground.
Thanks!
Andrew
thanks andrew, i’ll keep you posted as we figure things out 🙂
I am fascinated! This is an extraordinary concept and one that I think is deeply needed in our current split second, ADD/OCD online communication state!
When you all get it organized, please do count me in! 😀
Lori,
Check out http://emergentbydesign.pbworks.com/ Set up a convo and off we go. It would be great to be able to discuss this at greater length.
This is what I was eagerly looking forward to — an engaging dialogue.
But if it is freeform discussions leading to better and higher ideas than where we start from — then why do we need mindmaps? We seem to be very hung up about technology. As Venessa keeps repeating, ‘technology is not important’ it is a place where ‘great’ and ‘intelligent’ minds meet and discuss over a period of time — need not be a technology marvel (I have had held such outstanding discussions over the ‘simple old fashioned’ phone).
However, I think we must make a long list of topics to discuss about. And these topics might as well come from the participants. With this list displayed somewhere a pair is immediately formed as soon someone from the group opts to discuss about the topic with the originator of the topic. This I think might lead to a meaningful dialogue from which viable solutions or understandings would evolve.
Then there might be a feedback as to what actions, if any, has been taken on the outcome of the discussions and what are the results? Slowly, over time many actionable ideas are not only developed but implemented for the common good of many. The good work is then listed for all to take inspiration and ideas from and built upon further for better ideas and actions.
After a while a personalized network would evolve where people are free to choose ‘mentors’ for a particular area of expertise and discuss with them anything on that area as the need arises.
It then makes the Junto very unique and useful unlike other things that we have on the net today, like discussion groups in LinkedIn (wonderful discussions take place here too). It would then also become a exemplary cornerstone of free ‘gift economy’.
i don’t know if we’d need to make topics. i think the topics will emerge on their own. people will decide.
i think of http://listorious.com/, a service that was built within a day or a few days after Twitter Lists was launched as a way to search people and the lists they created.
those details will emerge on their own.
if this takes off, and the participants of the junto tag it, i have no doubt someone will come around and create a service that indexes.
it’s all layers.
the focus now is just setting up the foundation.
i think you are right. It must creatively evolve on their own.
The tagging that has been going on by various tools out there that compliment twitter have i believe already placed on in it’s own way into an “expert” position based on the daily activities we participate in.
These tools are in itself working to formulate connections.
What if once a question is posed, that this filtering system works it’s way to gather the human networks for added valule purposes.
A perfect alignment of people to gain higher level insights.
In essence we are a huge mathematical formula.
All,
Just came across a likely goldmine (especially items 4-10) of resources for developers interested in helping create Junto project (thx @fdomon) —
>>Incorporating the backchannel on Twitter: http://dlvr.it/LSCL
Best,
Mark
@openworld
Love it.
I can see a ton of applications. You’re right, there does need to be strict rules of engagement.
The brilliant network Venessa has already attracted will be a great test bed of adopters.
I’m not a developer, but happy to help with any planning or biz related or other.
Leonard
if interested in framing suggestions for planning/biz related (Builder, Initiatior, Propagator skills) email a request to be a collaborator on wiki emergentbydesign.pbworks.com
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I like the concept, although I’m not sure if the #junto hashtag would be enough – wouldn’t that pull all comments about the system in? Rather than just the comments about your particular junto? Perhaps it is needed to automatically generating a unique junto identifier to correspond to a particular conversation? Or are the participants in the conversation self-identify and add more hashtags? And if so, is 140 characters enough?
On top of that, what about the persistance of such a system – wouldn’t it be good to have a record of the conversation – publicly available? Or an opt-in system, where participants can choose to have their conversation archived? Just thinking out loud…. maybe that’s not a great idea.
excellent insights, i agree. we are hashing this out on the wiki. if you’d like to be a collaborator, email a request at emergentbydesign.pbworks.com
thanks!
I love how Junto could and hopefully will evolve into being nodes of conversations. Traceable nodes and threads of all manner of communication to their relative past and pushing modulised and extended predictions of our future understanding on topics we choose to care about, linking to one another, offering insights into our ability to project thought into something which is bigger than what we comprise our individuality on.
A holographic concept of our thoughts being projected as a system of reference to states either inactive or hyperactive allows more connections to form, bringing us closer to core issues and comforts of our own need to bring about change and happiness. Sharing our ideas, while being either a mentor, someone in reception of a mentor or just balanced dialogue aids personal and collective growth on all sides.
Embracing a holistic approach to communication in this new digital platform, reaching out to those who have the mind to care for what makes us much more than the meandering is a powerful statement for Junto.
Our taking action in inducing and creating mindful thoughtstreams brings culture one step closer to waking up that little bit more. It lets us have a mechanism for a conscious project management of our own evolution, that of humanity with a focus on strong, harmonised and creative delivery into our self projected future.
Hi Venessa
I think this is an excellent idea, which could make a real difference. I am reminded of Jane McGonigal’s TED talk on how we should use games to make a better world. What you’ve done here is essentially take a game (ChatRoulette) and come up with a way it could be used for good. Well done!
However I do think that there is one key element missing from your design. And that is that these conversations need to be anchored to a key idea, and more importantly, a problem to be solved or goal to be reached. Without that, I am not sure it would be much more than an interesting way to chat to people.
I’ve done a lot of research into social business software, and one of the things I learned is that the most effective communications happen when the communication is allowed to happen in the context of the content.. for example Vyew is a product that is much more effective than a wiki or an e-meeting, because it allows a voice chat to happen anchored to and while updating a wiki page. Another example is the conversations that evolve around a status update in Facebook. I think we need to apply some of this thinking to the Junto idea.
I think we need to integrate your idea with something like the call-to-action page for Jamie Oliver’s TED wish (Teach every child about food). This would make a powerful combination. People chatting live in pursuit of a defined goal.
Also, consider how useful this could be if it was something you could embed into a blog like you can with Disqus.. or use as metadata around any webpage like you can with Google Sidewiki. Then anything posted online could be harnessed by anyone else as the talking point for making a real difference.
I’m very excited about this idea and I’d love to take part in the discussion. I’ll email your wiki address for access.
thanks alex, looking forward to collaborating.
one thing about “these conversations need to be anchored to a key idea” – i totally agree, but i think that will be up to the people who organize a specific junto chat. what i’d like to do is create the platform first – general – where different groups could use them for their purposes. maybe on the site could be a ‘Suggested Junto Guidelines Handbook’ or something, teaching people how to create a chat around a topic and establish some rules, but before we get caught in those details, i’d like to just see the platform. for example – no one ever told us how to use twitter… it was super basic, and people decided how to use it. i want to follow those same principles and let the growth be organic… if we impose too many restrictions at the start, i think it might stifle some interesting/innovative ideas of how it could evolve.
You’re right of course – I’m getting ahead of myself – once the platform is there the uses will evolve. Reminds me of an excellent Social Experience Design talk I attended
BTW, I’ve requested wiki access but not heard anything.
i just checked, i don’t see any pending requests.. not sure what happened, maybe just try again?
Great to see another in pursuit of a Junto. I’ve been attempting one myself for three years. I participated in a Google group called, “House of Junto” for nearly two years.
The Do Good Gauge website describes the motivation to develop a new media for a public sphere. Franklin’s Junto is built into the foundation of the idea. Recently, I’ve been attempting to gather less than a dozen individuals from my subdivision to participate in a process which replicates Franklin’s description of the Junto in his autobiography. Here is a letter I sent out to potential candidates.
Ample research and thought has went into a round table discussion group formed by Benjamin Franklin. This group was called the Junto. Each Friday the group gathered together over dinner and ale to discuss topics of technology, politics, religion, and community. There was a formula of respect built into the group for maintaining civil discourse. Deliverables were owned and managed by an individual, not the group. Each week one individual presented a topic of research pondered for 12 weeks. The 12 member group rotate turns presenting ideas. The purpose of the meeting was to provide supportive and critical review of the described problem and solution.
Venessa, I would be interested in participating in your effort. The concepts developed with the Do Good Gauge are a work in progress. In your thoughts you describe gauge processes. I would suggest a portion of your thoughts are a work in progress at my sight.
The foundation of Franklin’s idea comes from his autobiography and is posted at the following link:
http://www.dogoodgauge.com/site/DoGoodGauge/page_contents/display/67
great, let’s collaborate. i am just trying to get everyone who’s expressed interest on the same page and see where it goes from there. i’d love to see this exist as a free platform that anyone could use for the purposes of their particular initiatives. i will keep you in the loop as we move forward!
V,
A couple resources… :was comparing your evolving and open / transparent vision with supercoolschool :
Worth watching the video at link below to get a visual on their model if you are not familiar…
http://socialentrepreneurship.change.org/blog/view/why_solve_anything_other_than_a_great_big_problem
was thinking how … 1)their model is closed but can be monetized easily, whereas 2)yours will most likely be more viral and disruptive but subsequently more difficult to initially monetize ??
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/viral_marketing_startup_magic_quadrant.php
They have some momentum and engineers and structure obviously, it might be interesting to see what they think of your ideas and if there was a way to meet half way etc.
— JT
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You can never solve a problem on the level on which it was created. Einstein.
Perhaps a nicer way of sayingg it, is you can’t find the new in the old. Easy enough.
What I feel Junto requires of us is new of looking at things.
IN itself Junto wants to be created around that new way of looking at things.
A few things come to mind..
– Frequencies
– Intuitive thinking
– Dimensions
My participation thus far has been to capture everything that is going on through this discussion, mapping it out and allowing the information itself to surface on it’s own.
I’ve observed as closely as possible intuitions effort to “make sense of it all”
What i’ve discovered is that we all work on frequencies and those frequencies are creating simultaneous dimensions, these dimensions and frequencies are intuitive.
The point of contact is created when there is an intent, the point of interest are frequencies that are being attracted by the point of contact.
What social media platforms have shown us is that everything is happening all at once, but frequencies are what connects the dots.
The dots represent point of contact/people and the intent is the thoughts that carry the frequencies, the lines that extend from the point of contact are bridges for information exchange between dots.
We all stay in our present moments, and with each present moment intuition asks to be observed.
YOu stand still and expand your thoughts and by standing still or grounded your intuition maps out simultaneously your thoughts to others that carry the same frequency.
The next level is when perfectly aligned, consciosuness elevates into a new realm of discovery.
What i envision Junto doing is creating point of contact with intention, and aligning frequencies of people who exist through the realm and simultaneously connect us.
to be continued…..
Based on the rich dialogue here in the comments, you’re clearly on to something. I love the idea of bringing chatroulette to the next level, and scaling up the universal aha moments. These rich moments of learning and connection are always where I find the greatest hope- and am absolutely convinced if we increased the # of these moments the world could tip a different direction (ah the wonders of idealism!)
It seems to me you’ve thought through the main thrusts of the idea, and have the right balance of constraint, simplicity and flexibility to allow for true creativity. I would encourage you to be more open than less, and let natural social capital get rid of the crap and abuse. We’re playing with this conundrum (on a much smaller scale) at Myoo Create (an emerging innovation platform) and have sketched up some lose community guidelines to start: http://www.myoocreate.com/blog/about-us/community-guidelines/. Way to specific and small for Junto.. but I agree oaths, trust, social capital are the way to go. We just have to avoid the whole ‘cult’ feeling that freaks people out around social capital enforcement policies and currencies.
Finally, It seems this idea is thought through enough to move forward. I would suggest a facebook style launch (they started with one university network, then all U.S. university network, then the world) and find your niche network to release and test this in, then scale up from there. Two test networks come to mind
1. the most obvious is a large university. Academics are always complaining they don’t have the opportunities to throw ideas around with their colleagues from other departments, students… some of our great research institutions are networks of 80,000 thinkers craving a chance to connect.
2. the more interesting is the global Hub network. There are 20 Hubs across the globe, all of which create a physical platform for social change by supporting social and environmental entrepreneurs, primarily through coworking, professional support, networking support, and events. However they are hungry for an on-line network to take the Hub platform to the next level. They would be the perfect breeding ground/test for Junto.
Would love to stay connected as your thoughts evolve!
Cheers,
Rebecca
both networks are great ideas. i’m imagining the platform would burst into “Junto Channels” – where different communities could operate a communication network around the discussion platform, so no matter who you are, you can use “dialogue and collaboration” for your purposes.
Collecting bits that may lead us towards #Junto tools.
“The Seven Needs of Real-Time Curators” And with @Scobleizer’s definition of ‘curation’. http://is.gd/b37YG via @jangles << I so agree
Collecting #Junto prototypes: “Seth Godin talks about consistent generosity and genuine voices” Wetoku Blog http://bit.ly/7DfqpW
Wetoku has a great tool, but as yet has no back channel immediation / curation to take out what they call “Ramble, ramble, yidi-yada.” A sorry tagline for enlightening talks happening there.
Youtube removed the Chatroulette video Venessa linked in her post. Here is another one, embedded in a CNET article. I watched about half of it and realized what this may mean. It brought up some emotions, unusual for me, possibly just not used to watching an improv artist serenade.
Creativity explodes on Chatroulette | Geek Gestalt – CNET News http://bit.ly/al5wdb Prototype for #Junto. It’s too much #moved #tears #joy
Hey, three time’s a charm…
I think Rebecca makes some great points. Since our host Venessa mentioned in her last blog post she will be unplugging for a week, and the conversation here shouldn’t stop, i also believe in the past ten days there have been some great next level thinking and ideas being shared.
What we are emerging is a way to filter out this next level thinking to those who are in frequency with the “idea at large”
I think thus far, it’s been about the technology, and now we understand that it’s about the human networks and the capital that they bring.
The next level seems to unfold it’self when groups of people emerge with the same frequency to not only make sense of the true benefits of human networks but establish a technology around people that ultimately captures the essence of building filtered next level value adding information and insight.
I look forward to the next level….
Great work, nice design!
this is super. would love to see it get off the ground. even in a crude beta stage.. which is what you’d get if i offered a format/platform. 🙂
i love watching people listen. and hearing them think.
a great model for kids – since we rarely model learning.
bravo Venessa – you’re doing amazing work here.
thanks for your support! and YES! i love your point “we rarely model learning”!!! that was a big a-ha moment for me here on the blog, that as you read thru the comments, and see the level of respect everyone has for each other as they offer their (sometimes opposing) views, what’s actually happening is that we are modeling the type of behavior we expect of a community focusing on growing. i’m sure that influenced the idea of taking it to the next level to real-time viewable conversations via junto.
some of the bif stories that are conversation – http://tinyurl.com/ycp42gb – that last link had a mix…
Example for an awesome interview that would benefit from being marked up Junto-style.
http://www.quitbit.com/the-being-awesome-series-episode-1
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This has is similar to what I am trying to create at http://ideaforecasting.com/ (which is in prototype) although I like your layout better.
hey, i tried to access the site a few times but the page fails to load. let me know when the site is back up, i’d love to check it out.
Sorry, it’s on a slow link and sometimes the graphics are an issue. It does have it’s own twitter account, and when someone posts or comments it announces it. @ideaforecasting
I wanted to put some data points on the table regarding twitter. Sometime last week, @Hastac got in touch with me after following tweets. The progression was I saw she RT’ed. Then I started following her. That went on a couple of iterations, at which point she got in touch through DM. We went back and forth a couple of times.
Turns out she is on deadline for a book with a April 19 th deadline for copy submission. One of her chapters is about retirees and how they are using social media. In that context she wanted to interview me for the book.
She suggested a phone interview. I suggested “twitter tennis”. As in a # with “volleys hit over the net.’
You can take a look at #twitTen to see how it’s playing out.
Since then I started playing twitter tennis with @francisotolo who is working on an education startup in Lagos, Nigeria. That convo is at #twitTenLagos. After a couple of @ me exchanges I tweeted with @Openworld. It seems to me that entanglement of possible mutual interest has begun.
I don’t know how this works with junto. But I have a feeling it might be a proof of concept of some of the ideas that are being played out in this comment thread.
Michael (and all),
As it happens, there’s a new, possibly converging “entanglement” – a new Q&A template that might help participants gear up online for TwitterTennis bouts, as well as Junto conversations. (I’ve also reconnected with @supercoolschool founders on how it may be useful for instructors and students in new learning ventures – perhaps a pilot with @francisotolo? ).
It has just been uploaded on the EBD Wiki at http://j.mp/9DR8WO .
Look forward to comments and ideas on next steps.
Best,
Mark
@openworld
Thanks, Mark, for sharing the interview template.
Here is a use case worth spreading, or a potential audience for workable tools. Let me introduce them with this quote.
…very few corporate strategists making important decisions consciously take into account the cognitive biases—systematic tendencies to deviate from rational calculations—revealed by behavioral economics. It’s easy to see why: unlike in fields such as finance and marketing, where executives can use psychology to make the most of the biases residing in others, in strategic decision making leaders need to recognize their own biases. So despite growing awareness of behavioral economics and numerous efforts by management writers, including ourselves, to make the case for its application, most executives have a justifiably difficult time knowing how to harness its power.
Do you think a honed #Junto discipline might help executives with some of their most difficult decision-making?
If yes, here is more. Follow the first link “The case for behavioral strategy” at http://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/newsletters/strategy/2010Q1.htm
Hi
Venessa I admire your ability to see things from other people’s perspectives, and willingness to model it for us to see. I think one of Junto’s promises is to help many people develop their ability to see from different perspectives and worldviews, to be compassionate to other worldviews, and also to also how to collaboratively figure out what the real truth is. Junto can help move the collective conversation to another level.
In the Spiral Dynamics system of cultural and individual development, the ability to see things from other perspectives really begins to take off at the second-tier yellow level. Most of the population is at a few levels lower than yellow. And even many conscious, environmentally aware, social justice aware people are still at green, the level below yellow. Many activists have a hard time of listening with compassion to a view they really disagree with. But that compassion is what might help us collaboratively ALL evolve to deeper understanding of the world.
Here are dialogue systems that Junto could perhaps take some of the better parts of and add to its mix : Bohm Dialogue (the willingness to be question your assumptions) , Insight dialogue (the ability to use intuitive knowingness to guide conversation) , Appreciative Inquiry(the ability to focus on and magnify the good ideas), Theory U (the ability to listen to the group field), Non-violent Communication (honoring feelings of all involved), and the Council of All Beings (Joanna Macy’s process of bringing other beings into the dialogue)
Alpha
“Open Collaboration Encyclopedia” http://bit.ly/bISi84
http://www.opencollaboration.wordpress.com
congrats for being the 100th response!
i love these suggestions. i’ve just begun pulling together resources of different generative dialogue/group communication models, and you’ve just made my life easier.
thank you!
Heres a compilation of facilitation/dialogue techniques I made with links to where you can read more on the web about them http://bit.ly/cfPrMT
You can also read about these facilitation/dialogue techniques in my book “Open Collaboration Encyclopedia” online here at http://www.pioneerimprints.com or at http://bit.ly/bISi84
In my quest to understand the what can create large scale societal change I’ve really felt facilitation and dialogue were key. You can have all these amazing people, but if they cannot communicate and work with each other then its difficult to create great change. And amazingly the right facilitation/dialogue system can help people who are usually only interested in their own ideas or needs to really open up to others and their perspectives.
Hi Venessa,
I am very much looking forward to the progress junto will make. I have not managed to read all 100 responses… 😉 Is there anything I can do to support you?
What about something like Scribblar? It’s unlimited in how many people can attend, it’s configured for integrating Skype video, it’s got a chat box… You can draw mind-maps to your heart’s content if you have a way to draw… I think that’s everything, isn’t it?
Scribblar was originally designed to be a medium for teachers doing online classes… I think. Signup is free, but you would need to be invited to a “room” so this is what you could just start advertising the ongoing existence of… Anyway, check it out and get back to me.
Sounds fun.
Franis
Thanks Franis, for sharing this easy-going tool. Within 5 minutes or so I was in and running, created a room “Junto prototyping” and tried the whiteboard.
Observations – solo test:
shared whiteboard, graphic-based, collaborative.
No hyperlinks, no embedding of rich media in the finished work.
Easier to use than Google Wave, but too limited for more than sketching of ideas on a single 2D layer.
Need to try with partner to appreciate strengths.
Bernd (Cocreatr)
Then I tried to save a snapshot and it froze. Firefox 3.6.3 on OSX 10.6
Public room http://www.scribblar.com/rooms/index.cfm?r=s3ytvnb
I wish I had read this post before I ‘wandered in’ to the first #junto session yesterday. I could immediately grasp the Chatroulette-like nature of the experience but the goals for it were not clear at that time — and now I get it. I think this was an interesting idea and definitely worth developing further. And while the idea of a free-for-all conversation is interesting, I think designing the system to support seamless splits and merges of ‘clusters’ of users would bring this to a totally new level.
If you think of this as the equivalent of a physical conference event (i.e., potential strangers meeting in a forum to learn and share their interest in some common cause) then the analogy is that of meeting multiple people during a session — then going off to a breakout room with a select few to have a side conversation before returning to the main session. Others could still see the video but the idea is to isolate out the audio channels so that folks can hear and be heard clearly within a smaller discussion.
Another reason I loved the idea is that I can see its value in a completely different environment — e.g., senior centers — as a means of getting users engaged with others specifically for the reason you originally mentioned i.e., socializing improves the level of happiness and quality of life of an individual. What struck me particularly is that with the Internet, the world is flat — so there is ALWAYS someone to strike up a conversation with at any time. I can see this as a really compelling way to help folks who are otherwise alone, to re-engage with life.
In any case — loved the idea! Do keep us posted (via Twitter) on how this evolves!
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Wow! What an irresistible vision! I have been seeing the #junto on Twitter for a while, I’m very pleased to discover the great project it is! I have been following @openworld @gabrielshalom @sebpaquet @gavingeek and a few others, discovering many wonderful links. This is helping me seeing the big picture. Looking forward to explore, listen and participate! THANKS!
I have a practical suggestion about how to make the interface for Junto REAL.
Check out http://www.kickstarter.com.
All you need is to convince some programmers to work on it, come up with a budget projecting how long and for what sort of money it would take to build such a thing…and people would donate to make it happen! In fact, similar visions have raised TWICE and THREE TIMES the projected dollars!! It seems technological things like this are really, really popular on kickstarter.
definitely, i’ve thought about kickstarter. the thing with this project, is the idea of junto is about building collective intelligence and effectively sharing information/knowledge/wisdom and creating new meaning together. so, it’s more about changing behavior, perception, and ways of thinking. the tool itself is just an interface. the thing that changes is the people. so, in a sense… we are already practicing. there are tons of video conferencing tools out there already.. anyone can hop into a video conversation on skype, tinychat, tokbox, supercoolschool, etc etc etc and begin modeling the behavior of open collaboration. then record the session with jing or some other screencasting software, and now you have a shareable knowledge product.
we’re hoping to streamline that by having a tool that brings those components together, but the process can begin as soon as the choice is made to do so by the community members. 🙂
Yes, I think that people been practicing these ideas by doing David Bohm Dialogue for decades already. Of course, the history of “Junto” indicates this has probably been happening in person since people could talk to each other.
Of course the tool you are proposing is just an interface. It’s the people who are attracted to using the tool toward creating shared goals that make the experience meaningful.
However, a tool is a tool is a tool – which is why this is such an appropriate project for Kickstarter. This is idea waiting to be born! If you do not do it, it is such a great idea that someone else will do it soon.
I cannot tell you how many times throughout my life how often I thought up some amazing inventions, (actually doing some of them.) At the time I did not imagine what they would or could mean to other people…so I did not take them for the ride they deserved and do whatever it would take to allow them to be born.
For instance, my girlfriends and I invented co-counseling in 1967 as a means to get along with each other. Many of us are still friends today, because it was so effective. By myself I invented mind-mapping, (it is now called graphic recording) to document the results of my independent study class on communication in my second year in college in 1974. In both cases, I wasn’t able to imagine that since I found these things useful, it could be useful to others. Also I had no clue then how to properly develop those sorts of ideas. So many decades went by before someone else “discovered” the same thing and decided to popularize it – and possibly make money off of their efforts.
More people would want to use a tool like you are imagining. This tool could answer multiple goals. Other people will have different motives for using a tool of this kind, but that’s OK. It’s usefulness has already been recognized by the many people here who see it’s potential. Your idea is an invention of combination; the reason you want it is your motive – the two are not necessarily joined at the hip.
You’re also making the assumption that people who post here already know what these tools are named and how to use them, as well as having the ability to use them on the OS they happen to be using, etc. etc. Once someone knows what a tool is called and what tools of that sort are named, you can’t combine them. After you do, then you can use them, search for others like them and compare them.
It would be helpful to know a list of more screencasting software, and to read reviews to compare how appropriate they are for our purposes.
well, the prototype is up at junto.cc, we’ll see how it evolves
Hi,
Is the project still up please ?
What’s the economic model to go further ?
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From a KM POV conversation is essential:
“…the most we can do is help others embed inputs as we have done so that they may approach the world as we do based on our experience.”
Keeping in mind The curse of knowlege, which gets in the way when trying to explain or converse with someone. ie. getting to a shared context so a good exchange can happen, telling stories and metaphors are the bridge that helps quite often
http://www.commoncraft.com/explainer-tip-remember-curse-knowledge
Dave Snowden talks about this curse of knowledge as shared context and abstraction…Narrative as mediator and The origins of Cynefin (part 1)
http://www.cognitive-edge.com/blogs/dave/2010/02/narrative_as_mediator.php
http://www.cognitive-edge.com/blogs/dave/2010/03/the_origins_of_cynefin_part_1.php
Stephen Billing talks about meaning as a dance in conversation…Gesture and response of communication
http://www.changingorganisations.com/2008/08/a-useful-way-of-thinking-about-communication/
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Glad to determine that this site is effective on my iPhone , everything I wish to do is functional.
Machen Sie weiter so work.I ‘ll Rückkehr oft.
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