Transcript: IT Conversations | Tech Nation | ‘John Hagel: Small Moves Equal Big Changes’

Posted on May 4, 2010 by Jos Schuurmans

Transcript: IT Conversations | Tech Nation | 'John Hagel: Small Moves Equal Big Changes'

I was intrigued by this interview with John Hagel about his co-authored book, 'The Power of Pull'. A lot of the things he talks about link in with Cluetail's value proposition, including some of his observations about the importance of serendipity, the notion that we don't know what to search for anymore, and some of his ideas about the use of social media.

The other day I was looking for a transcript or a way to generate a transcript. Didn't buy any speech-to-text software, nor used any "Mechanical Turk"-like services. Decided instead to transcribe the podcast show myself.

Should I have posted this on a wiki instead? That way, others could edit and enhance, e.g. adding time codes…

So here comes:

G = Dr. Moira Gunn
H = John Hagel III

[STARTS]

G: Today on Tech Nation, I speak with Deloitte's John Hagel, about 'The Power of Pull – How Small Moves Smartly Made Can Set Big Things In Motion'.

The global economy is in disarray. And it's not just because the banks and financial institutions have made a mess of it. We keep hearing that we all have to go back to how we used to do business. I asked John Hagel, who heads Deloitte's Center for the Edge, how wrong is that?

H: It's very wrong. In fact, that was one of the key motivators for writing this book. The Power of Pull was the notion that so many of these executives we deal with are clearly under great stress right now but they have this still a sense of complacency that somehow, sometime, we're gonna come out of this downturn and things will go back to normal. And we hope this book is a bit of a clarion call to say: Not so fast. There are some longer term trends that have been playing out and we don't see them abading at all, so.

Continue reading →

“What matters is: where are the real relationships?”

Posted on July 29, 2009 by Jos Schuurmans

(From Seth's Blog: 'Four videos about noise, social and decency')

In this short video, Seth Godin explains when social networking does or doesn't matter:

01:22: "(…) networking is always important when it's real, and it's always a useless distraction when it's fake (…)"

01:46: "(…) are there people out there whom I would go out of my way for and who would go out of their way for me? That's what you need to keep track of. And the way you get there is by going out of your way for them; and by earning that privilege of one day having that connection be worthwhile. (…)"

http://www.youtube.com/v/r0h0LlCu8Ks&hl=en&fs=1&

Reading and sharing; the mobile saga continues

Posted on June 7, 2009 by Jos Schuurmans

[NEXT DAY: I need to improve the shared reading feed!]

In my continued struggle to set up a system which would allow me to bookmark, save, tag, annotate, aggregate, integrate and/or share anything I read online (on machines with various degrees of mobility), I am now using Google Reader as my main reading tool.

(I have been complaining before about the lack of social awareness of the mobile environment)

What I read and what I can do with it next is important to me. I like Google Reader's "Note in Reader" browser plug-in, for it allows me to "keep" content on the web which I browse but haven't (yet) subscribed to.

Problem is, when browsing Google Reader on my S60 mobile phone I can only "star" or "share" the items in the feeds I have already subscribed to. Even the outbound links in those Google Reader feeds I cannot mark.

The best workaround I know for this is to bookmark links outside of Google Reader within the Opera Mini browser, then synchronize those bookmarks with Opera Link, view them in a browser on a PC or Mac sometime later at home or at the office, and add them to Google Reader manually, using the "Note in Reader" plug-in.

That's not a very smooth workaround! Please, tell me you know a better way!

While most of the above concerns the capturing of my reading, I would also very much like to share my reading (and annotations), e.g. on my blog, in the most integrated fashion. That means, I would like that reading to be published on my blog, just like any other blog posts.

I am already using a few services which call Typepad's API to post stuff, notably Delicious' daily links and Ping.fm. I wish I could have Google Reader automagically post my shared reading straight onto my blog (not as a sidebar).

Now I just looked at notify.me's relatively new Ping.fm feature. So I added my Google Reader's shared reading feed as a source to notify.me, then selected Ping.fm as a destination for this feed.

I set up Ping.fm to post stuff to my various accounts on social media and social networking sites, including my blog at www.josschuurmans.com.

Curious to see what will happen with this scenario:

Opera Mini -> bookmark -> synchronize -> Opera Link -> "Note in Reader" -> Google Reader shared reading -> notify.me -> Ping.fm -> www.josschuurmans.com / Twitter / Facebook / etc.

Never mind the 140 chars limitations. Or actually: mind!

[In the meantime:] WOW! I just had a look and something did happen while I was writing this post. Interesting; to be continued..

P.S.: In an attempt to edit RSS feeds before subscribing to them in Google Reader, I was using Yahoo! Pipes earlier today. My goal was to follow (only) Marshall Kirkpatrick's produce on ReadWriteWeb, so I fetched the RSS feed from RWW into Yahoo! Pipes, then filtered its contents by author, to output a modified RSS feed.

Here is the pipe:
http://pipes.yahoo.com/josschuurmans/rww_marshall_kirkpatrick

and this is the feed: http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/pipe.run?_id=3MwoDOBS3hGSVPSx8cv2rw&_render=rss

I was able to add this new feed to my "myYahoo!" page but, to my surprise, I couldn't get Google Reader to subscribe to it. So, what's that about?

P.P.S: Do I hear you saying that all this can be fixed with an iPhone or a Nokia N97? How?

Does your online work flow support your needs?

Posted on November 25, 2008 by Jos Schuurmans

If blogging is a "hungry beast" as Dan Gillmor already remarked in 2001, today's micro-blogging and social networking sites are, if anything, even more addictive and distracting, devouring our precious time.

In order to get something of a grip on my own online behavior, to impose a bit of self-discipline and subject my social media mingling to my real business needs, I thought I'd try to write up what might be a workable work flow for routine online participation.

This just comes off the top of my head; I have no idea if it would work for anyone else out there. It would please me to receive a few pointers to other examples. Do you recognize yourself in this structure? What would you change? Please, share your thoughts in the comments below.

I – Respond:

1. Answer phone calls, return missed calls, reply to SMS.
2. Answer/return IM calls as relevant.
3. Check email. This is where a lot of stuff you should be aware of, comes to you. In fact, according to Steve Rubel, if you use Gmail it could be your nerve center.

3.1     Report and delete email spam. (Maybe this is not always to most urgent if you are the only person who is bothered – still it's important, it's about hygiene, removing clutter, which will help you focus)
3.2     Check comments and track backs on your blog(s). Delete spam or inappropriate content. This is defensive and urgent, as it reflects most immediately and visibly on your (brand's) online public presence. Respond to relevant comments, and/or plan when and how to respond later.
3.3     Check out Google Alerts on your (or your brand or product) name. Bookmark sources if relevant. Save source content if relevant. Respond immediately if necessary, and/or plan when and how to respond later.
3.4     Check out replies or comments to you on social media and networking services. Bookmark sources if relevant. Save source content if relevant. Respond immediately if necessary and/or if time allows, and/or plan when and how to respond later.
3.5     Respond to relevant email, and/or plan when to respond later. (I feel that sending me relevant email is about the most personal approach people can take and therefore deserves my full attention)

4. Get some fresh air, pick up snail mail. Respond and/or plan when to respond later. File snail mail.

II – Manage your time:

5. Once a week, on the last work day: look at the big picture, then establish priorities for next week. (see my blog post on '16 steps to effective time management')
6. If necessary, adjust this week's and today's priorities and time schedule.
7. Arrange or change appointments if necessary.

III – Administer:

8. Pay bills, send bills, arrange travel, etc.

IV – Execute:

9. Scheduled or unscheduled, just get some of those prioritized tasks out of the way! (This was supposed to be the "real" work)

V – Read up, capture & amplify:

10. (On mobile device during "spare cycles":) Read RSS feeds (blogs, publications). Bookmark and sync with Opera Mini. (See also my frustrated blog post about the lack of participation tools on the mobile handset)
11. (On mobile device during "spare cycles":) Read micro-blog content feed(s). Bookmark and sync with Opera Mini.
12. Save relevant content for later reference. (I have to find a good way to do this)
13. Bookmark, tag, rate, (re)tweet, comment on relevant content.
14. Subscribe to new RSS feeds and micro-blog feeds. Start following relevant new people.
15. Capture own ideas for later execution.

VI – Research & contribute:

16. Prioritize online conversation topics.
17. Online research. Save new relevant content. Bookmark, tag, rate, (re)tweet. (Here is a great primer on retweeting for Twitter novices such as myself – via Jeremiah Owyang)
18. Original research. Ask questions. Interview people. Collect facts. Lay bare connections.
19. Create. Write, shoot, record, edit.
20. Share. Upload, publish.
21. Promote. Micro-blog, email, recommend.

VII – Network:

22. Talk with people. On the street and in the corridor.
23. Pick up the phone and call a friend (or enemy).
24. Call someone new

25. Leave a comment on one or more blogs.
26. Drop a personal line to one or more people in your online social networks.
27. Connect to one or more new people on your social networking services (e.g. on Facebook).
28. Recommend one or more person (e.g. on LinkedIn).

Does your online routine look similar? What do/would you do differently? Does this serve any purpose at all? Or have I just been reading too many PR blogs lately? Please, share your thoughts in the comments below.

The Live Web Will Be Federated

Posted on August 8, 2008 by Jos Schuurmans

Under the headline 'Blogging 2.0: Moving Toward Conversational "Flows"', Bill French wrote a piece on MyST Blogsite, in which he observes that conversations on the Internet are increasingly moving away from being contained within blogs, towards being distributed among lifestreaming or micro-blogging services (Bill calls them "flow applications") such as Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter.

He quotes me by saying:

"(…) Ironically, in this comment, Jos Schuurmans equate sthe emergence of social networks with the end of “channels”. (…)"

I subscribe to the view that online conversations will be less and less contained within channels, while more and more federated among and across different platforms and services. To the extent that channels can be seen as walled gardens, the emergence of the blogosphere itself was the disruption that started taking down those walls.

The point I was trying to make earlier, under 'The End of Channels?' and ''Channels' does not sufficiently describe the dynamics of distributed online conversations', is that conversations take place across and between channels, not just within, and that it is therefore less useful to think of the Web in terms of channels. As David Weinberger and Doc Searls have pointed out: the Internet is a place, not a medium.

Indeed, enablers like Jaiku, Twitter, FriendFeed, Identi.ca, Ping.fm, and Facebook are speeding up the trend of conversations being more distributed. But what these services represent most of all is the shift from a more static Web to the "live Web".

Another application worth mentioning in this context is Disqus, an enabler of blog comments federation. If Dave Winer will have his way, something similar is going to happen to micro-blogging as well… And why wouldn't he?

Tags: Bill French, David Weinberger, Doc Searls, Dave Winer, lifestreaming, micro-blogging, federation, channels, conversation

Dugg: Geek Army Knife #4 – chatting to Charlie about livestreams

Posted on June 16, 2008 by Jos Schuurmans

My friendly and knowledgeable colleague Charlie Schick in a podcast interview by Geek Army Knife.

Charlie "(…) spoke about lifestreaming and how it led [him] to thinking about semantics. [He] mentioned a bunch of folks along the way, including Friendfeed, Socialthing, Socialbrain [or Second|Brain?], Lovely Systems, and TagCrowd. (…)"

(Via Charlie Schick)

Dugg: Who is Who: Interview with David Weinberger | Ulrike Reinhard

Posted on June 2, 2008 by Jos Schuurmans

Via David Weinberger:

"(…) Ulrike
Reinhard, of WhoIsWho, video-interviewed me on our back porch last
week. She asked me about the need for serendipity, what an “open”
Internet means, the costs of social networks, the new sense of privacy,
user-controlled identity systems, Web 3.0, market conversations,
categorization and control, Twitter, Obama… (…)"

http://blip.tv/scripts/flash/showplayer.swf?enablejs=true&feedurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwhoistv%2Eblip%2Etv%2Frss&file=http%3A%2F%2Fblip%2Etv%2Frss%2Fflash%2F954559%3Freferrer%3Dblip%2Etv%26source%3D1&showplayerpath=http%3A%2F%2Fblip%2Etv%2Fscripts%2Fflash%2Fshowplayer%2Eswf

Serendipity is a fascinating concept. I strongly believe that the way we learn new things and expand our horizons is through serendipity. In order to discover and, if you will, accept something new, this "news" needs to be presented to us in a familiar, trusted, i.e. "old" context.

We hardly ever buy into something entirely unfamiliar. For example, if we don't know the source, we are less prone to trust the news. In conversations, I am more likely to learn something new from people with whom I have, say, 80 percent in common, than from people with whom I have, say, 10 percent in common. If you get my drift…