E L S U A ~ A KM Blog Thinking Outside The Inbox by Luis Suarez

Weblogs as Conversations – What Is the Deal ?

Over at Knowledge Jolt Jack Vinson created yesterday a very interesting weblog post coming from a trackback from Amy Graham‘s weblog post on 10 Reasons Why Blogs Are an Awkward Conversation Tool. His weblog post is titled Blogs as conversation and I have certainly enjoyed the conversations so far from both weblog articles. I must say that there are a couple of comments that I just couldn’t help but agreeing a great deal with Jack on how I view myself weblogging out there in the Blogosphere. In a previous weblog post I mentioned how in most cases I view weblogging as a conversation with others pretty much like you would normally have conversations while hanging out at the water cooler or with your friends, but in this case it will be a virtual water cooler. That is why his comments on “my blogging serves to add my voice to a larger conversation around topics of interest to me” and “blogging has been a source of a growing personal network of people who are similarly interested in the topics I follow” are spot on for me, too ! That is exactly how I view weblogging; as a powerful method to channel through my voice on topics for which I have got a passion and also as a way to try to help nurture my virtual network of connections from all over the place. Trying to do that with regular conversations would be a no go. At least, for my case.

That is why when I went through both articles from Amy (10 Reasons Why Blogs Are an Awkward Conversation Tool and Missing the Conversation for the Blogs) I just couldn’t help but diving into them and add some additional feedback into her already existing thoughts. So what I would want to do now is to basically list the heading from the 10 reasons and then add my two cents worth of comments on them. Hopefully, as a way for me to engage further in the virtual conversation(s) and also showing why weblogs may not be that awkward for conversation after all. Thus here we go:

1. They are not intuitive: Maybe, yes, they aren’t, but, then again, entering the 21st century we have to acknowledge that there are lots of smart web users who know how to get around the basics of weblogs. In fact, there are plenty of services out there where you can create a weblog in just a few minutes and without hardly any technical knowledge. I could use myself as a good example. Now try to think about that same thing for someone who may want to create a standard web site. I am sure it would not be that easy. In fact, I would have given up altogether within the first few minutes. I am certain.
2. They are too busy: May be there are some of them which are rather busy, but then again that is the whole purpose of using something so useful as RSS / Atom Newsfeeds with which you can just get rid of all of the noise and focus on the topic of discussion, i.e. the conversation. I must admit that I hardly ever go to a weblog site to read a weblog post from the feeds I subscribe to. I may eventually check them out every now and then to see what things have changed but not on a constant basis. So I guess that it will be up to yourself to tailor the level of interruptions and noise you may want to go through.
3. Who’s is responding to whom: This is certainly something that I have noticed myself quite a few times and what distinguishes a good weblogger from one who may rather not be that good or not interested. Or just going with the hype of a popular weblog. If someone is genuinely interested in a conversation held at a weblog post, they will always try to make sure their message gets across; by rather using the number of the comment field or some quoted text (My main preference in most cases) people are able to carry on with those discussions for certain. I guess with all that said what I am trying to indicate is that it would all depend on how much motivated you may be to engage in the conversation or not.
4. Comments don’t necessarily = conversation: Perhaps this may be the case, but they could well be the sparks that trigger the conversations. It all depends as well on how willing you would want to be to engage further. And if you have got several weblog posts without comments I would think that is fine, too. You shouldn’t expect to have comments the very right minute you publish a post. The key message from all this is that these weblog posts are published and available forever so if you have not started the conversation just then there is a good chance that it will happen at some point in the future and you will have to be ready for them and engage with them. And see if you would want to turn them into interesting conversations or not.
5. Comments don’t always get a reply: Yes, this is very true and that is something that happens quite often. Take my weblog, as an example. But picking the comments mentioned above I know that although my weblog posts may not trigger a number of comments right away they are still valid posts. They are dealing with thoughts that I have decided to share on a more or less permanent platform and which I may be coming to at a later time or some other people may bump into them and comment further if they inspired them to do so. The fact that I am opening the door to make those ideas available to others forever might certainly provide a conversation at some point. I am sure. It would just be a matter of time and, perhaps, a specific context.
6. (Usually) No notification for follow-up comments: Yes, indeed ! This may be something that is currently happening with most of the weblogging engines and for this I have seen a number of different solutions adopted by many webloggers. I particularly like the one to bookmark those weblog posts where I have placed some comments in and that I may want to check on them at a later time using my favourite social bookmarking service(s), whether that would be BlinkList or del.icio.us.
7. You can turn off comments and trackbacks: Certainly, and thank goodness for that ! Pretty much the same way you would do at the water cooler; there are times where you would be willing to converse with other people and exchange ideas and knowledge and there would be other times where you would rather prefer not to engage in those conversations because you may be busy with something else. Or you just don’t feel like it. And the fact that you can do so as well in this virtual water cooler that weblogging is will give webloggers the opportunity to identify the best timing for engaging in those conversations where they could dedicate the specific time and energy they would deserve. I would remember the day when elsua.net, for instance, was restricted for sharing comments as they would need to be moderated (I didn’t think I was ready to get comments back then just like that while I was setting things up but when I felt that the time was right for me to open them up I have already done so and now all those potential issues with spam that I thought would hammer down the conversations are taken care of by the corresponding plugins). And so far I haven’t encountered major problems.At the end of the day it would just depend on people’s choices whether they want to open comments and trackbacks or not and the fact that we have got that choice is probably one of the best parts of weblogging. To give webloggers the possiblity to decide when to be ready or not for taking those conversations. Always a personal choice.
8. Perceived inequality: Although I could certainly agree with both comments shared over at Amy’s weblog I think that is also the same kind of perception in real life, and I doubt there would be much more we could do about it. In fact, I think it may well be a good thing as it would allow webloggers build their virtual network of contacts with whom they would be able to host different conversations and although at the beginning it may well be something related to weblogger and their audience in the end, and if things work out in the right way, that could well be turned into peers at the same level participating from the same experience: sharing their own thoughts on those common topics of interest. And I feel that this is one of the strongest selling points from weblogging: build your own virtual community of people around the topics you are passionate about using your weblog as the medium to carry on with the conversations.
9. Lots of people don’t like blogs, and they never will: Hummm, I am not sure about this one. Certainly there may be lots of people who may not like weblogs but with Technorati tracking over 26 million weblogs, and who knows how many more million there are out there still to be tracked, I doubt we would be able to say that people do not like weblogs. I would rather prefer to think that what people do not like, or, at least, do not seem to be rather comfortable with, is the hype around weblogs. Certainly, that may well be the case, but one thing we would need to consider is that every hype has got its time and that would come as well for weblogs. However, weblogging will still be there after the hype is gone and it will be then, and only then, when we would start seeing the true power of what weblogging is all about. We would start seeing how more and more meaningful and relevant weblogs would come afloat and they would allow us to get access to much more relevant information to meet our intellectual needs and, of course, have an exposure with those people who decide to stick around with their weblogs despite that hype. Time will tell but it all may not be that long in the distant future.
10. It’s much faster just to talk: You bet ! Of course, it is. We all know the speed of our thoughts, how they slow down when coming out through words and how they would even slow down further when writing down those same words. That is a fact that we cannot deny. However, in a world where more and more people are having virtual or distributed contacts, whether they are colleagues, peers, friends, family, etc, etc, talking to one another may not be that easy and accessible any longer. Instead, people may want to take the approach of writing down what they would want to communicate to others regardless of what timezone or geography they may be. Face to face contact, talking to one another, etc. is certainly probably the preferred method (Perhaps that is the main reason why VoIP is so popular these days); however, I am sure there would be people out there who would want to use different means of reaching out. Reaching out to their virtual networks of contacts and continue nurturing them in the best possible way: through a conversation.

And that is exactly why I think that weblogging is good for knowledge sharing and collaboration, specially remote collaboration; for establishing conversations with others and, more importantly, for keeping active and alive those virtual networks / communities that are floating around different people. Creating those connections, nurturing them to make them better in such a distributed world as today is something that we just can’t afford any longer not doing. It is becoming an integral part of who we are and the fact that weblogging is there is just a big help. As long as you keep the conversations flowing? So are you ready to engage in them ? You better be or you will miss out.

[tags]Metablogging, Blog+Conversation[/tags]

Launching the New actKM Web Site

Over at Anecdote Mark (Hi Sean!) has been sharing a worrying and troublesome post dealing with how some Knowledge Management Yahoo Groups have been disappearing lately and for no good reason. And how one of them, one of my favourites dealing with the world of KM and from which I have learnt a great deal, has been wiped out altogether: actKM (That is a new group created afterwards, but most of the information has been lost !). Indeed, in Disappearing Yahoo! Groups Mark details what has actually happened and, since the already existing discussions cannot longer be recovered, he actually mentions what will happen next with such a thriving and energetic KM virtual community with members from all over the world.

They have gone ahead and right away launched the new actKM web site, which, in my opinion, is way better than the actual Yahoo! group that was in place before. The web site is actually a weblog with a whole bunch of different sections that will help get this virtual community up and running in no time. There is even a discussion list which is available at this URL which will bring things back to the initial stages when everything was working fine. Since they have lost part of the membership list details they have asked members from the former Yahoo! group to actually spread around the message about what is happening with the new actKM new site in order to get the full membership back to what it used to be. And this is the main reason for this weblog post, folks. If you were a member from the now gone Yahoo! group actKM you may want to check out the new web site and engage further in the discussions from there.

Or if you already knew about this but you think that others may not have been aware of it by all means go ahead and continue spreading the message. We just cannot let this virtual KM community disappear or get damaged just like that because of whatever the technical issue and for no apparent reason.

At least, the good thing about this unpleasant episode happening over at that KM community is the fact that whenever it is possible if you are planning to make use of Internet resources make sure you are able to look after them yourself, instead of having to depend on others, no matter how big their name(s) may be. At least, you would be in control and if any problem arises you would be able to get back things in place and restore them at your own leisure and without loosing any of the conversations and knowledge shared over a specific amount of time. I have had similar experiences in the past myself and although I could recover completely it was one of the main reasons why elsua.net is now live and kicking.

I wonder though if Yahoo! will ever reply back indicating what actually happened and if they could recover all that fountain of knowledge and resources that has now been lost for good. Or, perhaps they may be busy with something else. Who knows. Either way, spread the message. actKM has got a new home !

Technorati Tags: Knowledge+Management, KM, actKM, Yahoo+Groups, Anecdote

Upgrading Performancing For FireFox 1.1: Roller Integration and a Few Other Things

Earlier on today I got the headsup from Jed (Thanks a lot for the feedback comments, by the way ! Good stuff !) indicating that the upgraded version of Performancing for FireFox is readily available for those folks who may be brave enough to give it a try. Of course, I had to give it a try, specially since I have been commenting a few times on a number of different items that I thought would be worth while having at the same time that I wanted to confirm if it would eventually be working with Roller Weblogger. And WOW! Let me tell you how my experience has been so far ! Yes, indeed, WOW!

Ok, let me say up front that Jed was right. I can certainly get Performancing for FireFox to work with Roller. Finally ! Everything seems to be working fine. I can set up the weblog manually since it is sitting on the IBM Intranet and it works all right because I can grab the list of previously posted weblog entries (One of the features I really like, by the way) and have been able to post a weblog entry successfully in my Intranet weblog. However, and like he said, there is one thing that does not work just yet, and that is the fact that the list of categories is missing from the right side panel and when posting the weblog post it will not grab any category, not even the default one I may have set up. Jed indicated that this may have been a problem with the Roller engine itself and I think that this may be the case because I know we are not running the most up to date version so I am keeping my fingers crossed that it will work just fine with version 2.1.

However, for the rest let me just state up front that I am totally delighted ! Yes, you heard it right. I was a bit skeptic at the beginning but the place from where I am weblogging right now is just getting rid of all that. Indeed, folks, I am weblogging directly from Performancing for FireFox 1.1 in Flock ! In where? Yes, using one of the latest builds from Flock I am testing out something that I have been meaning to try out for some time now and PFF 1.1 just gave me the perfect opportunity for it. You may be wondering why I am trying out this meant-to-be FireFox extension in this other web browser when it already has got a very powerful weblogging component which I, myself, have been using already to share content in my weblogs. Well, the main reason is choice !

Indeed, it is all about choice and since it looks like more and more I am tending to make use of Flock as my default web browser I refused to stop making use from such a superb weblogging extension just because I might no longer be using FireFox. At the same time there are cases where I would want to share content in my weblogs in a particular form and may switch between one extension and the weblogging component of this browser from where I am writing now. Yes, to me, and despite what other people may say, it is a win-win situation where I get to decide in which form and shape and how much content I would want to share in my weblogs. That to me, is one of the main principles from Personal Knowledge Management in its purest form: give the power to the knowledge worker to decide how and what content should be shared where and for which audience. And having the choice of both options integrated in a single web browsing experience makes it all worth while the most.

But apart from all of the above here you have got five other reasons why I have been enjoying posting this post from PFF 1.1 and why I am planning to make extensive and continued use for two of the three weblogs that I currently maintain:

• All of the different features mentioned in another weblog post I shared not so long ago: Weblogging Directly from FireFox – Performancing for FireFox – Part Deux.
• Ability to easily configure the Publishing options from the Settings tab in order to bring some more advanced features, like pings, trackbacks, and Technorati tags. We will just have to see if it will pick up all those settings when publishing but so far it looks like this time is just about right.
• Ability to easily check who else has blogged about whatever the topic with Page Tools. Indeed, if you are in a particular web site or weblog post and click on Page Tools you will be able to see how many links are going into that particular web site and also, and something much more interesting, you would be able to see in a split second which other weblog posts from Technorati are linking to it. This, on its own, is one of my favourite features since it would allow you to expand your weblogging horizon and make you connect with other webloggers on the fly and through trackbacks build up on those conversations further and get yourself more involved with those with similar interest to yours. Does it ring a bell ?
• And talking about another great feature from this particular release, is the much tighter integration with del.icio.us bookmarks through the Bookmarks option, so that you can add to your del.icio.us bookmarks all those weblog posts that you think would be worth while remembering and, most importantly, worth while sharing with others (Like I am about to try now). I know that some folks would think why I would be using this particular social bookmarking service when elsewhere I have mentioned that I am now currently using BlinkList. Well, did you know that you actually can import bookmarks into it from del.icio.us? So now it will make it all much more interesting I would think since both tools will get populated and expanded further.
• And, finally, something not new since it has been support since the end of last year, but I think that the fact that PFF 1.1 continues to work just wonderfully well with Flock is a big plus ! Specially for those of us who want to have choices when sharing what we would want to share using whatever method we may think is more suitable at the time.

As you can see, overall, I am quite delighted with the work that has gone through into PFF 1.1 and I just can’t wait for the new upgrade and see what they will do (Perhaps a lovely integration with Flickr? Hint. Hint). For now, just want to take an opportunity to thank Jed and the development team for an outstanding release of Performancing for FireFox.

Well done!

Technorati Tags: Metablogging, Performancing, Flock, FireFox, Roller,