Connection Cubes: Sharing

Sharing. It’s the single most important reason why we engage social platforms. It’s the reason we connect to begin with.

Sharing sits squarely in the realm of high dynamism and high intimacy. Where we have high intimacy, we take time to communicate our core values. We exchange everything. Our thoughts, hopes, needs, humor, desires, hatred, frustrations and more are all on display. We do all of this in a way that confronts, challenges, and entices our friends and family.

That’s why we need so many mechanisms and tools. Photos, statuses, “likes,” tweets, email,  blogs, shared links each represent some portion of our core persona.

With all of this comes increased interaction. Dynamism goes off the scale. What’s the reason so many people become addicted to logging into and keeping abreast of Facebook? The fact that they can have controlled, persistent interactions that satisfy the human need to share information with people who will respond in kind.

Sharing is the natural response to connection.

This all said, it is also one of the most difficult connections to create. Offices and companies all over the world talk about how open and sharing their workplaces are. People will have more candid conversations with their grocery store checkout clerk than with their church friends. Why?

Part of the reason is that high intimacy requires both people to share core values openly. How do you know if the person you just ‘friended’ on Facebook is really that person? How do you know if the comments a person makes are their real views or opinions?

This comes from time and shared, common experiences. The more interaction two people have with each other increases both the likelihood and impact of value exchange.

I was watching a debate unfold on Facebook over the past two days. A friend of mine’s iPhone died and he polled his friends to see what he should do: buy an Android-based Motorola Atrix, or go again with another iPhone. Aside from the typical jabs and banter, I found myself thinking about the platforms. Only this time it wasn’t about the technology as it was the costs of switching.

Most of us have the same dilemma. If you use any form of digital music or reader, you’re likely very tied to the device and platform that deliver content. iPad, iPod, iPhone all lock you in to iTunes. Got a Kindle? Try moving your books and magazine subscriptions to Barnes and Noble’s Nook.

So now you’re saying, “so what? This isn’t new or novel.” Where my head was going is the problem we (humans) have with silos and lost potential. The Internet, for all its standardization and commercial appeal, still falls short of its potential to reduce if not remove barriers. The always present argument of “security” or “ownership” is the last remaining hurdle to full and free exchange.

Where the information silos once were mainframe platforms, were replaced by personal computers and desktops. Desktops became laptops, went mobile and are now reduced to smart phones. Throughout all of this, we’ve had applications. Applications for every environment and technology silo imaginable. The problem is: rather than build applications for the web and remove those silos — by figuring out revenue models for secure, profitable communities — we continue to follow the easy path — build applications for hardware platforms and be locked-in to a particular vendor. Instead of being able to get any application’s functionality on any device, people unknowingly are limited to certain applications or companies/developers are tasked to port applications over to a number of selected platforms.

The issues with this are wide and many. The app stores that control the delivery of content tools can select, control and evaluate the who/what/when/why/how of applications deployed via their stores. Apple has already had a slew of stories regarding limiting or removing applications based on apparent political pressures of various groups. Some companies forego development of applications for some platforms in favor of others with little if any input from the user community.

The “Big 3″ (Apple, Google, and RIM) all stand to gain. Now, they’re all very good platforms for what they do. I’m not trying to disparage hardware or software manufacturers and engineers. But the loser in this is the Internet. This isn’t disruptive innovation, it’s sustaining innovation. Innovation that entrenches an incumbent and that existing users will find appealing. This comes at a price of sub-optimizing the Internet. Which ultimately means that we (humans) miss out on what could be.

Who knows…maybe HTML 5 and enhanced richness will collide with multi-core phones and 4G networks to provide a level of hand-held compute power that will stem some of this trend. But chances are, platform providers are going to be loath to relinquish the hold they have over your paid for or self-provided content (or at least the delivery mechanisms).

Connection Cubes: Feedback

In the Feebdback quadrant, we’re dealing with high intimacy and low dynamism. So the frequency, or expected duration of interaction, is low and limited; while the exposure of core competency/value is high. According to the Wikipedia definition — feedback is when “output from (or information about the result of) an event or phenomenon in the past will influence an occurrence or occurrences of the same (i.e. same defined) event / phenomenon (or the continuation / development of the original phenomenon) in the present or future.”

Now, most of us don’t continually evaluate our personal performance regarding a friendship or business interaction. (I shudder to think what some of my ratings may be in those cases.) We do, however, seek confirming advice just prior to or immediately following a purchase of say of a durable good (tv, washer/dryer, blu-ray player). We also seek input from friends regarding status purchases (car, cell phone, consumer electronics – things that culturally show us as belonging), and for one-time, pay-before-consumption items (wedding cakes, party DJs, child safety products – things that are difficult to return or hard to redress upon failure).

For example, my wife solicited quite a good amount of feedback prior to buying a child safety seat for our cars. While the seat looks great, fits comfortably, and more — we’ll really only know its *value* in the unfortunate event of a crash. At that point is when the seat gets a pass/fail grade, and in the event of a fail, it will be far too late to redress.

We all appreciate information from friends and associates and social networks allow us to gather it in a short, trusted manner. It exposes things that we do as a part of our lives, as part of how we fit in, and how we perceive ourselves in relation to others.

Technology companies are continually looking for inventive ways to scour social tools for sentiment analysis and mine that information for new ways to market products to us or predict market trends (what we’ll buy).

The reason I placed a site like LinkedIn here is because the nature of how people use the features. It is specifically designed to facilitate a feedback loop. Not only do people talk about career items, jobs, and findings on LinkedIn, but they are able to recommend people’s past work efforts. This feedback loop reinforces the reputation-based influence that some users have over others. Yes, you can post a comment and get feedback via Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare and many others. Since those are open posts to your entire community of friends, and the interaction may take place over several days, I push that over to a form of “Sharing” (which is the next exploration in this series).

Only in LinkedIn (for this example) are we expressing specific comments about one of our most core values: our careers. You don’t have to visit LinkedIn daily, or even have an app on your smartphone that pings you every hour to stay abreast of what’s going on. It’s not that dynamic. It is very intimate. What we do, how well we do it, and the path of companies/positions that describe our career path is a key piece of our personal make-up.

What are some other sites out there that fit in this quadrant?

Connection Cubes: Sentiment

So let’s move east on the quadrants and talk about “sentiment.”

In this quadrant, the reason people connect is based on some sentimental value. Now, sentiment doesn’t require a person to have a previous connection. It’s not just reminiscing about high school/college or seeking a favorite old toy. In fact, type just the word sentiment into a Google image search and you’ll get more images of perfume and stock performance than you will human faces or expressions.

Merriam-Webster defines sentiment as “an attitude, thought, or judgement prompted by feeling; an idea colored by emotion.” A sentiment-based connection is often short, repeated iterations centered on a specific topic that may have a level of intellectual depth but fails to engage each collaborator at their core. From a technology perspective, sentiment connections often have less regard for the tool or platform used to facilitate the interaction. The emphasis in this quadrant is on the idea of a “topic”: the content being discussed stays at the center.

When engaging in this type of behavior, people don’t care about technology; They want to be right or emotionally validated.

People seek information and data about the topic that reinforce a currently held position in their minds. The position may change over the duration of the connection, or the topic may move into a more specific aspect, but how the information is gathered is not as important as feeding the emotion of the moment. Think about it like the thinking trap of confirmation (confirming evidence). If you’re thinking through this as an information architect, this comprises the exclusive or “known-item” seeking.

There are numerous times when we all fall prey to this line of thinking. Ever had a conversation with someone about the weather and one of you takes out a phone just to say “yeah, but later it’s supposed to rain.” That action was driven by emotion. The source of the weather report didn’t matter. The need to prove a point based on personal attitude drove the interaction.

Here’s another example. Someone sends you an email or posts on Facebook a seemingly scandalous link about  a company or product. They comment around it blithely like “This is why corporate America is evil!!!” For me, the lack of substance combined with hyper-opinionated statement prompts a sentiment of disbelief and a desire to fact-find. So I can quickly and easily turn to other sources through social media like YouTube and Twitter to find related information to the contrary. I know what I’m looking for (the email/post topic) but my search is influenced by an emotional response.

Another key to this exchange is that my friend and I can debate by having frequent exchanges on the topic, but the level of intimacy is confined to a more superficial level because we’re not engaging or sharing core values. Even though the debate can be heated, we’re not engaging each other — nor the social media we’re using — in a manner that builds new layers of openness or connection. We’re merely throwing facts, data and conjecture in an effort to sway the other’s perspective.

Keys to this area are:

1. The frequency of interaction between the people is high [frequent], and
2. The degree to which they exchange core values is limited [nonexistent].

Another aspect of the dynamism is the length of time the collaboration is expected to last. In the email/post scenario above, the debate isn’t going to rage on for weeks or days. It may have a carry over or resurface at some point, but unless the two of you are really going at it, the fervor is going to die down shortly. From a social media tool usage perspective, it is important to note that the sentiment cube tends to drive people to access a variety of different tools. Since the item is known (topic) and the collaboration is fixed (people engaged on email/post), it allows you to explore a variety of information sources and media.

When I do a search for the topic I’m not looking for certain links. I’m trolling for a variety of sources that support my emotional position. I’m no longer emotionally tied to the tool, as I may be if I’m sharing a photo of my family and only do that through Flickr or Picasa. When my emotion or sentiment is fixed because of the social tool, I’ve moved into the quadrant above and am doing more sharing than I am sentiment.

So how does this impact business or technology? Well, for starters, if you know how the content in your application, tool, or website will be used, you can better structure both it and how its accessed (mode of use) to suit your consumers. Your information may be better suited as a mobile app or optimized for viewing on a mobile phone versus a full, Flash-enabled website. Understanding how users need information (for consumption or distribution) better positions you to be effective in delivering that content.

Connection Cubes : Curiosity

In my previous post, I introduced my concept of “connection cubes.” I want to break each one out for a bit more investigation and start by exploring the concept in the “Low-Low” quad.



In this quadrant, the reason people connect is based on general curiosity. That curiosity can be based on general interest, “nosiness,” or some kind of exploratory searching. Keys to this area are:

1. The frequency of interaction between the people is low [infrequent], and
2. The degree to which they exchange core values is limited [nonexistent].

I guess a little exposition on “core value” is warranted. Ralph Welborn and Vince Kasten describe core value from a business perspective, but it’s a valid starting point. Businesses create core value through the processes and information that allow them to develop a particular product or service as theirs. For example, a car is a car in many respects. Toyota has certain processes and ways of making their cars unique to Toyota. So much so, that they branded and market the process as “The Toyota Way.” The finding Welborn and Kasten write about shows that intimacy of an exchange is based on how much each firm is willing to expose those key processes that drive adoption, culture and ultimately value.

The principles can be applied to other firms. Companies can hire Toyota executives and employees away from the company. In the end, there is still a set of underlying core values that culture has to embody.

If we apply this to everyday personal interaction, how does it work? Core value, on a personal level, can’t be “I like ___” and its not like a personal ad (“SWF, seeking SSM for drinks and friendship”).

Core value, on the Internet, is more about how much of your real person is required to be revealed in order to have an authentic, meaningful interaction.

To get value from a tool like StumbleUpon or even a blog (WordPress, Blogger, TypePad), as a consumer, I don’t have to share a lot of myself. I can read blogs until my eyelids collapse and never let an author know I was there. I can take an insight shared on a website I stumble upon and use it in another form or fashion. That is low intimacy. Low intimacy sites and tools are a byproduct of the growing comfort people have with sharing more information about who they are, where they are, what they’re doing, and why things matter.

Social media launched most of its users into the era of an onymous Internet. People like and want to know who’s posting information. Facebook, Flick, LinkedIn and more shed the practice of acting anonymously in favor of self-promotion. To this end, there is a clear division of web sites. Those who favor identifying users and those which don’t. Now, one is not better than another. They each serve a purpose (there’s no argument for one over another).

The other key to this area — frequency – is a matter of how often people engage in that behavior; or use that mode. Again, for example, I’ll use StumbleUpon when I feel I’ve searched to the end of my known web and back and want to ‘refresh’ things a bit. I don’t use it every day as part of my work or life. Think of the performance review tool/app at your job. That’s likely a very good example of low dynamism — something that is used infrequently which limits its effectiveness for driving growth. You use it as a tool when you have a need and move on.

My question here is, what other social media tools/apps fit into this quadrant?

Why Do We “Connect?”

It’s hard to turn on a tv, read a paper or magazine, or traverse the web without some mention of social networking or connecting. Businesses learned from the site squatters of the mid- to late 1990′s and real estate alike, that online is all about location, location, location. Business, and some individuals, have colonized social media sites like Facebook and Twitter to ensure that their brand is retained. Do Proctor & Gamble, Kimberly Clark, Coca-Cola or other large corporations *really* want to connect with me as a consumer? Or are they just capturing their slice of the social universe and, what the heck, throwing in some posts, “likes” and whatever else the “kids” are doing today?

On one level, there’s always a purpose for doing something. Regardless of whether that purpose stems from corporate strategy, marketing, grass roots or the fringe, a reason exists for action. The first problem is that these actions get fixated on “social technology” or “social media” when they really are comparing the same thing. Often the conversation about “technology” or “media” is more about the platform than the tool. For example, weblogs (blogs) are a form of media. However, there are many blogging platforms. Blogger, WordPress, TypePad each are weblog platforms. They have different capabilities, attributes and underlying or compositional technologies that enable them. To say that one is better than another is often more a function of preference versus capability. (Yes, based on specific tasks or desired functions, one platform may be better than another, but without stating the tasks it’s a moot debate.)

So when it comes to whether or not companies want to “connect” with consumers, it’s not about the tech/ social media question or hype. The more interesting question is why do we connect in the first place? If you look at both the mechanisms (web applications) for doing so or the data (posts) they contain, a somewhat simple paradigm emerges. In 2003, authors Ralph Welborn and Vince Kasten wrote a book entitled, “The Jericho Principle: How Companies Use Strategic Collaboration to Find New Sources of Value.” in the early chapters, they lay out a fairly simple, but valuable way to look at interaction. They quad chart intimacy and dynamism. In this case, intimacy refers to the degree to which an organization’s core values are exposed or shared. Dynamism is the frequency of interaction or exchange.

When applied to normal, everyday personal interaction, you get similar, simple but meaningful charting. Most important, I labeled these as four (4) basic categories of interaction: Sharing, Sentiment, Feedback, and Curiosity.

Sharing is the high dynamism, high intimacy quadrant. Sentiment occupies the high dynamism, low intimacy. Curiosity I assigned the low, low quadrant. And Feedback is the low dynamism, high intimacy. I also started to map existing, popular social media to the quadrants I thought best facilitated  that niche. The result is the chart  below.  I call it the “Connection Cubes.”

I’m looking for feedback and thoughts on these concepts, as I’m going to continue to hone them based on further research. I’ll be publishing my thoughts here, specifically, I’ll be following up with details about each quadrant.

So, more to come!!

Future of Web Applications?

The IEEE has a call for papers for topics on the future of web applications. Sounds like an interesting area. The big problem is that the publication (“IT Professional”) won’t hit the streets until June/July 2011. That’s quite a lag time for a topic that can change in the same amount of time.

It dawned on me that when you’re writing about a topic of research that can shift in focus like the evening news, you’re reached a tipping point. Now the question becomes, what is the significance? The old adage: “all things are possible, but not all things are beneficial” comes to mind.

I mean, just because technology can, and will, change doesn’t mean that if I’m not applying the latest and greatest web app tools to my job, business or personal life, that I’m failing. You’re not a Luddite just because you’re not using social media for your small, local fastener company.

Technology is a tool.  Just like things change in human resources — there are new ways to recruit and retain staff; things change in accounting — tax code changes anyone (??); and things change in your personal life — career, family, housing; computer technology will change. The attribute we have to master is making the right decisions to position ourselves, companies, careers, etc. for growth. We need to know the how, when and why of applying technology to a problem; not to be told “its a problem if you’re not solving this.”

I think Nicholas Carr got it right in “Does IT Matter?” when he stated that “those executives with the steadiest, least distorted view of IT’s changing role will be able to make smarter, sounder choices that their less cold-eyed and clear-headed rivals.”

So where does that leave the future role of web applications? still growing, always relevant, but definitely in need of a temperate hand.

A Perfect Storm: Microsoft, Toshiba and Apple

In April/May 2010, Apple sold over a million iPads effectively ushering in the era of tablet computing.

In November 2010, Microsoft announced that it sold 1 million units of the Kinect sensor in just 10 days.

In December 2010, consumer electronics manufacturer Toshiba announced that it will bring glasses-free 3D TV to market. And now in January 2011, Toshiba is following that product with the 2011 International Consumer Electonics Show (CES) launch of glasses-free 3D laptop prototype.

Why are these developments important? Because they signal the arrival of technology that’s been in the works for most of my lifetime. Many of us have seen movies like Minority Report where people interact with computers using gestures, images, holographics, images projected on surfaces seemingly out of the air, and more. That promise is now coming closer.

Just as Star Trek has given us cell phones (communicators) and tablet computers, we’re starting to see movement into more modern sci-fi dream technology (holograms, voice-activated cloud computing, context-aware computing, and gesture user interaction). Granted, we’re still a long ways away from teleporters, hologram training rooms, and phasers, but some of the compute paradigms are at the brink of reality rather than pure fiction.

Combined with the (what I’ll call) *slow but deliberate growth* of formal cloud platforms (Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services & Elastic Cloud Compute, Force.com), the perfect storm is brooding. On the consumer side, there is more ‘rapid’ adoption of informal cloud platforms (cloud-based email [Google, Yahoo, Hotmail], cloud productivity suites [Google Apps, Live Office], cloud-hosted applications [ Basecamp] and cloud-based social platforms [Xbox Live, Playstation Network, Facebook, Ning, Twitter]).

Microsoft, Toshiba and Apple are building products that will lead the first major transformation of human-computer input devices in two generations. I grew up with the keyboard and mouse. My daughter will grow up with touch, 3D and motion. That’s a major shift. Simultaneously, more and more user-generated content is being pushed straight to the web without having to reside on a personal computer first. This consumer move to the cloud enables information to be everywhere. My daughter will grow up with the expectation that she can access any piece of information from any where via any device. She’ll be able to use motion and gesture to control applications and search for information. All of which is grounded in the competition we’re seeing play out in the marketplace today.

Pretty exciting if you like watching the rain.

Facebook Showing Signs of Bureaucracy

Facebook is prepping for a slew of announcements. Facebook Innovations is gradually releasing info to the press “about something.” One anticipated announcement is a site redesign. Just recently reported by Alexa Tsotsis on TechCrunch is the ability for users to “Download Your Information.” People will analyze this a number of ways, but my first take is that this move begins to show that Facebook is starting to show signs of bureaucracy.

I’m not going to state that Facebook is acting like an old, stodgy company steeped in a hundred years of tradition and culture; to the contrary, bureaucracy begins when the features of an organization are at odds with its policies.

A simple example of this is the computer darling now consumer product company of Apple. To keep the story short, the tenure of Apple without Steve Jobs at the helm was when the features of the company were at odds with policies. The primary difference between Apple in the 1990′s and Facebook 2010? We have a more public view of Facebook’s policies and features than insight into Apple’s internal politics.

Policies are tangible claims and promises of a firm to its stakeholders (both consumers and staff alike). People can take action against them in the marketplace and court system. Features are evidence in the products and services of a firm. They result from thinking and conditions created by culture and climate inside the company. Now, while climate can be influenced by rivalry, market forces, and external factors, culture is a bit more steadfast.

So what does this have to do with Facebook giving users the ability to download their information? Glad you asked. Take a look at Facebook’s “Terms“, in particular, look at #2: “Sharing Your Content and Information.” While it sounds great that a user can download all of their content and depart from Facebook, they’ve inadvertently created a gap in policy. You see, now users can leave Facebook without deleting content. Removal of content is *not* deletion of content. And users need to know that there is a distinction between the two.

Specifically, if you look at 2.2, it states:

“When you delete IP content, it is deleted in a manner similar to emptying the recycle bin on a computer. However, you understand that removed content may persist in backup copies for a reasonable period of time  (but will not be available to others).” [emphasis added]

Facebook has just created the veil that will guide more users to ‘extract’ their information rather than delete it. It’s a sign that the features of the platform are showing the ability to lean away from policy, a leading indicator of the climate of an organization.

Now, is this the end of all things Facebook? Hardly. Is it a crisis? Not even close. It is the sign of a firm trying to react to protect marketshare ahead of a competitor. The fact that the article’s second paragraph highlights Diaspora is a sign that the industry is watching both rivals closely.

I mention this contradiction only to highlight that what seems to be an advancement has unintended drawbacks that must be dealt with either by changing policies or redressing functionality. Doing either is an inward process that doesn’t focus on stakeholder value. And both of which are signs of growing bureaucracy.

Is Knowledge Management a Misnomer?

Is there something I’m missing?

When it comes to “knowledge management,” the more I research, the more I find KM to be a misnomer. Perhaps, I’m too much of a pragmatist, or per chance too legalistic in my approach to word definitions. In my estimation, there is no realistic way to say that the more KM tools an organization provides or implements, that performance of the organization will improve. I don’t think it’s a technology nor process problem; rather, it’s a people problem. Specifically, it’s a culture and climate problem.

It’s a problem for most organizations to create a culture that values other people’s experiences. People have to be willing to share (openly, honestly) about success and failure. They have to be good communicators who are willing to take time to listen to what others in the organization need to ask about. They have to be willing to answer those questions openly without regard for ego.

All of which is also a problem for company climates. The day-to-day operations of a firm have to engender feelings among employees that their opinions and experiences matter. Corporate leaders have to take customer and staff experiences alike and show how those experiences matter to organizational performance.

This is no simple task.

So, let’s get the word smithing out of the way. Knowledge is inextricably linked to experience. In fact, many times people use the terms interchangeably. If I look to the dictionary for guidance, this is what you’re likely to get:

2a (1) : the fact or condition of knowing something with familiarity gained through experience or association (2) : acquaintance with or understanding of a science, art, or technique b (1) : the fact or condition of being aware of something (2) : the range of one’s information or understanding

All of these subtleties rely on human experience. Acquaintance, understanding, familiarity, and awareness are all states of human cognition. Now, I’m going to avoid a lengthy expository or chasing too many rabbits here. Sufficient for now is the position that knowledge is a person’s unique view of a situation brought out through experience.

Second, and more succinct, is the notion of “management.” If knowledge is related to experience, there is paradoxically little a process or technology can do to “manage” experience. Now, we can control a user’s experience of a system or interaction. That’s do-able. But to collectively capture, translate, and distribute to others the same or even similar experience with the goal of collective improvement is doubtful.

Any time someone tries to teach a lesson learned, the audience receives that not as “experience” transfer, but as “teaching.” And depending on numerous external factors (person’s mood, attention, apprehension, etc.), the lesson is more likely to be stored as text book type learning. This does not yet include the factors influencing the teacher’s ability to convey the lesson. The ability to effectively capture and redistribute human experience requires much more than written information or even classroom-style teaching can convey.

To sum this up, in any situation there’s what is learned and what is experienced. People are likely to believe what they experience far more than what they’ve been taught. Now, the ability to apply what was taught to what one is experiencing is the true objective. And yet KM initiatives continue to tout the goals of “search and find” across huge data stores up to and including the entire Internet. Why?

Even the process of searching is inherently flawed. As soon as I begin to type words into a search box, I am automatically excluding a multitude of various words and data points that would yield more accurate findings and interests if included. If I’m interested in energy savings for my home, I may start searching by looking for doors, windows and insulation. If my current situation has me concerned about drafty openings, this makes sense. But I’m automatically leaving out information about garage doors, walls, ceilings, attics, R-factors, materials and a wealth of other data points. So the likelihood of me reaching a well educated and “experential” answer — a knowledge-based piece of information — is not high.

The reason I’m interested in clarifying KM (as a whole) is because I do believe that process and technology can move human kind toward the goal of capturing and spreading good information. I also believe that the hype surrounding concepts like KM sub-optimizes the efficacy it can have.

Should KM be broken up into another, more precise concept? Should KM adopt the position of “lessons learned?” Or should I just realize that KM is going to be another fad that is used by consultancies to sell wares and engagements with little tangible value related to organizational performance improvement?

It vexes me. I am terribly vexed.