While looking at the website for Underexposed Creative a Chester based agency specialising in Branding and Corporate Identity I came across this section:

We Listen:…
We Think:…
We Create:…

I thought this way of approaching any project is fantastic and just could be produce great results.
Listen to the brief, Think about a solution and create the solution.

Poche letture mi hanno colpito come We Think di Charles Leadbeater. Un misto di inattaccabile idealismo e scientifico illuminismo. Guardatevi questo video che in 4 minuti con immaginifiche illustrazioni dice tutto e di più. A prescindere da tutto la mia riflessione è che le immagini e la musica agiscano su centri più nervosi più efficaci di quelli che toccano le parole. E, dico una banalità, è proprio grazie alla diffusione dei contenuti multimediali (ovviamente correlata alla diffusione della banda larga) che il web è davvero cambiato.

I’ve recently written a couple of blog post that are receive a bit of attention, the first was about the changing role of education and the second about Nurphy a new online service for conversations. I’ve decided to see if I can combine then by asking question about one on the other and seeing what happens. It’s a bit of an experiment really.

So, here goes. I’ve posted the following up as a conversation that anyone can join, once registered with Nurphy. Will people be willing to sign up for an untested service at this early stage? I’ll find out. The conversation starts here.

Whatever, I’d still like people’s opinions about the following.

Is the rise of the Professional Amateur Pro-Am, the increase in open educational resources (OER), personal learning environments (PLE), and greater significance of informal learning and research going to lead to a move away from an emphasis on institutional, formal learning?

As people are able to continually express their skills, abilities and achievements via social media, will formalized accreditation, with potentially out-dated assessment systems, be less relevant?

Or are formal learning and research institutions able to adapt quickly enough to the new requirements of society?

BadFormat! Magazine is a pure web 2.0 publication – written by its readership, it’s a true representation of the state of play, without censorship or prejudice.

With the launch of BadFormat! magazine we aimed to enable young creatives to have an opportunity to publish their work, from articles, photos, and illustrations to tweets and status updates. The magazine is built by an online community who submit and edit the content to produce a publication that is built by as well as read by its readership.

BadFormat! Magazine:

www.badformat.ning.com

www.badformat.co.uk

Facebook: Badformat Social Club

Twitter: BadFormat

In May 2009 we opened BadFormat Social Club. Our aim is to provide a multipurpose venue that provides a great cafe/workspace area during the day (free wi-fi, printing and scanning facilities), modular and multipurpose evening event area (cinema, comedy, lectures, performance) and weekend live venue with amazing sound (touring bands and djs).

We want to change things, we’re not trying to educate, we’re not trying to do anything but provide a space where people with creative tendencies can work, rest and play in safety.

BadFormat! Social Club: www.badformatsocialclub.co.uk

A: BadFormat! Social Club, 3-5 Trueman Street, Liverpool, UK, L3 2BA.

T: 0151 227 5388

E: info@badformat.co.uk

BadFormat! is your’s…built for you, by you….so join in, contribute and collaborate.

ISSUE 4: MUSIC CITY – May 2009

Thumbnails

Swindle

The Birth and Death of Copyright

BadFormat’s Penguin Plug-in

Liverpool Music Week Listing Guide

Super Islam Banana

Paul Du Noyer – Future Sound

The Enemy – Interview

Nevermind The Eric’s

Cinematic

The Tune Bomb

*BADFORMAT MAGAZINE OUT NOW!*

PDF: BadFormat! Magazine | MUSIC CITY – Issue 2

I recently wrote a post that touched upon openness of and elitism in education. I just wanted to express a few more quick thoughts on this, though it is something I intend to return to with a more in-depth look at open education and resources.

I feel the elitism of universities doesn’t lie with who is allowed to become a students, it is more related to the fact that resources are securely tied up within universities making those resources inaccessible to the majority. Resources in this context could be books or journals (hard copies or online with paid for institutional subscriptions), the academic discourse, the talents of faculty, the research equipment and facilities, past Ph.D. theses, etc. In addition, it relates to the subjects and specific topics that are deemed to be worthy of teaching or researching, or what the funders deem so.

Universities deal in the currency of degrees, a passport in society. Why in times of recession, such as at present, should it be that otherwise capable individuals are denied their chance of a degree passport because the government puts a squeeze on the number of places available in order to balance the books? A further point is the question of assessment, and is it really a useful measure, or is the ongoing presentation of someone’s work, either within a university or indeed outside it (informal learning), a better reflection of their capabilities and abilities? Indeed, evidence is beginning to accumulate indicating that those who present their work using social media place themselves in a more advantageous position for employment. And shouldn’t publicly funded research be in the public domain anyway? I’ve previously written about Open Notebook Science.

I can envisage how much of this could be opened up to greater access, but I was having a problem with scientific equipment and facilities and how that might be liberated.

There have been some interesting examples where institution based science projects have reached out to the public for assistance. There was SETI were you signed up and your computer were utilized while it was on (and you weren’t using it) to process data to search for extra-terrestrial life. Then I recall a project were public volunteers were called for to look for new astronomical bodies in tens of thousands of photographs of space; these were provided online and after doing a test to see how accurately you could assess the images you could process the live data. It was discovered that humans were much better at seeing differences in the data than if the processing was done electronically with image recognition.

Therefore, in a rather detached way people were participating in scientific research.

However, I then heard the repeat of the Friday 25 September Science in Action programme^* on BBC World Service at 4:32GMT on Sunday morning. (Sometimes I’m awake in the night or wake up early.) Listen to the programme. The significant part where this blog post is concerned is the DIYbio article. The article talked about people who are undertaking scientific research, bio-engineering in this case, in their own homes using inexpensive equipment, some bought secondhand on Ebay(R) for a fraction of its cost new to a research lab. They are able to design and create new biological parts, devices and systems. Integral to this approach is the support from online communities, DIYbio.org for example, sometimes with professionals voluntarily assisting these communities.

Clay Shirky has talked about the increase in mass amateurization, without being amateurish. This is the breaking down of the dichotomy between ‘experts’ and amateurs, with the creation of a new category – the Professional Amateurs or Pro-Ams. Charles Leadbeater in his book We-Think talks about how mass creativity has seen sites including Wikipedia and Youtube, and the Linux operating system rise in prominence and signal a shift in the way we and society can organise ourselves; participation becoming the key element.

All of this, for me raises the question, “Are universities, education systems and society more generally getting ready for the future of learning and research?”

^* This particular programme doesn’t seem to be archived, though you can usually listen to the previous two recent episodes, so I guess you’ve probably got a couple of week to hear it before the link is broken.

(a stream of consciousness
apologies for disjointed thought)

I am currently reading a fascinating book by Charles Leadbeater called “We-Think”

It deals with the now commonplace phenomenon of people sharing information and effort online, on a wholly voluntary basis. Sites like Wikipedia work on this premise – that there is now a NEW “compensation” system. As opposed to money, some people now have a genuine desire to make a difference, or get recognition in their field.

Software is even being developed in this way … with operating systems like Linux offering original coding to the public, so it can be tinkered with and developed for the good of everybody.

This idea has made the press today … thanks to a speech by Internet lawyer, (Harvard Uni) Jonathan Zittrain.  

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8163190.stm

In his speech, Zittrain, compares this online collaborative effort to reaching for the buckets when your neighbours home catches fire, its pressumed that everyone will help out with no thought for themselves.

Yes, there is a human spirit that kicks in, but I do not believe it is wholly altruistic. For one, if your neighbours house burns down, there is a good chance YOUR house may catch light too. There is the guilt of not doing anything – especially if the fire ends in tragedy – could anyone stand that? The social stigma of being the one person who didn’t step up to the plate.

Yes, people will help out for a fire – because it could directly affect them. Why is that people being attacked in the street or rape victims are advised to shout “FIRE”? It’s because it stirs up a basic human emotion in our souls – one that goes back to our days in the caves – one of fear and threat.

We cannot compare online collaboration with helping your neighbour during a fire, as they are inspired by totally different motivations.

Instead people are attracted to helping develop websites like Wikipedia and operating systems like Linux for a range of reasons:

• to make a difference
• to gain recognition
• to have an online presence / to occupy a plot of cyberspace
• any more?

What happens if Wikipedia is sold off to Google for a huge profit – will people STOP participating? The site is currently run by a “not for profit” foundation – but if a megabucks corporation comes along and a huge bag of money - could that change?

I am not questioning Wikipedia (or any collaborative websites) morals right now (or resistance to takeover) – I am wonder what would happen IF they went corporate. Are people turned on by the idea of helping out a collective, as long as it stays that way?

Is the system of “we-think” (that Charles Leadbeater spoke of) self regulating … so if a company started to take liberties, then people would “vote” by switching allegiance to another site, or simply setting one up of their own.

There is another issue – one of intellectual property. If your favourite collaborate website is sold off  – and the founders are suddenly millionaires – what about the contributors? I am pressuming there small print to prevent any claims should this happen – but there would almost be a right to do that. If YOUR work has helped someone else make a fortune, would you mind?

Is this “we-think” collaborative, and voluntary spirit, on the proviso that NO-ONE makes money out of the efforts? If Bill Gates suddenly released a new open-source version of windows – would people help out?

I have asked a lot of questions – they are ones I am currently pondering – your thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

The first blog was created in 1993 when the web browser company ‘Mosaic’ set up a page on its website called ‘What’s New’ and included links to other sites. The writer Jorn Berger was the first to use the term ‘weblog’, in 1997; this turned into blogging in 1999 when Peter Merholz used the term ‘wee blog’ on his site, which quickly got shortened to blog. There was 23 weblogs in 1999, and the first do-it-yourself blogging tool - pitas.com -was created by Andrew Smales in July of that year to make it easier to create a blog. blogger.com launch a month later, became the most popular blogging software available and was subsequently bought by Google for an undisclosed sum.

Well Pitas doesn’t exactly look like WordPress but things like this are amazing to look at and to see how far the internet and publishing content has come. It’s nice to see where something so common and mainstream originated from and to appreciate how much of a luxury blogging used to be. It’s not something to be taking for granted people!

Moving on, this quote is sandwiched in between hundred of other nice facts about the internet and more specifically how we as people share things with one another in the book ‘We Think’ by Chris Leadbeater. The book studies the idea of mass inovation, not mass production by exposing how sharing and crating schemes such as open source is helping our society to develop faster and better than before.

Oder we think on Amazon.

Some will remember the past decade as the decade the people started to claw back power from business and government. What with the rapid growth of online consumer activism, whistleblower sites and consumer driven watchdog organisations that has proliferated on the Internet, I have started to wonder if we aren’t nearing a future in which the current shape of government itself is outdated.

This year will undoubtedly be remembered as the year that MPs in Britain were exposed as people who see working in government as the proverbial gravy train. Second homes paid for, when most people in Britain don’t even have a first home. Three months summer holidays, when most people in Britain are lucky to get three weeks. Short working hours, when most people in Britain are working the equivalent of 1.5 full-time jobs. And golden pensions worth millions, when most people retiring in Britain will be retiring in poverty.

Times have changed. We no longer live in the agrarian world that defined the early days of “government by representation”. People no longer have to travel to London from the countryside on horse and buggy in order to have their voice heard in government. We no longer need to rely on “people who know better” about  problems inflicting our society, nor should we. For time has proved over and over again, they simply don’t know any better than we do. We no longer need problems “managed” by people who in truth, only know how to pass laws to “manage” problems under the carpet rather than actually solve them.

This is the 21st century. It is not only the Information Age, but also the Age of Empowerment. It is the time when we the people, should have the direct power to influence change in our world. In which we the people, should be able to find solutions to problems rather than new and clever ways to sweep them under the carpet.

If we are to even think about replacing the current system, we need another model to consider. One model presented itself in Charles Leadbeater’s book, “We-Think.” Now, the last time I talked about “We-Think,” I was kind of doing it a bit of disservice by not talking about the fundamental societal change the author refers to.  The step-change behind the notion of We-Think, is that collective humanity is better placed to actually solve problems than individuals. The core idea works like this.

You take a problem, break it down into its constituent components, and disseminate each part to different groups of people. Each group is composed of a mix of skill and knowledge sets. So you might have one group let’s say, composed of sociologist, scientists, artists, planners, researchers, writers, or even construction workers. According to Charles Leadbeater,  these mixed groups are actually better at solving problems than for instance, a group of specialists who all study in the same or closely related fields. Because we disseminated the problem into smaller chunks to different groups, each problem doesn’t seem all that overwhelming. So when you bring all the different groups together, you can actually solve some very complex problems. This is one reason, for instance, why Nasa has opened up their research problems to the people. And why even die-hard organisations like Proctor and Gamble now allow anybody to invent new products, and earn royalties from their inventions.

We-Think in essence, allows companies to cast a much wider net for its innovations, for far less money than it would cost for them to do it all inhouse using a team of dedicated researchers. Plus you are far more likely to get some truly surprising ideas, which could really never come out of your own organisation. Politicians on the other hand, like to debate problems amongst themselves. Because the majority of them are either lawyers or ex-businessmen, their debates often are very repetitive, typically resulting in a small handful of available solutions: to either pass a new law or privatise, nationalise or re-privatise something.

Nobody stops to think whether these essentially limited basic solution sets are in fact, going to solve the real problem. At best, they are akin to bandaids. They mask the real problems with a skin-colored covering, so you don’t notice the gaping wound that lies underneath, At worst, they make the problem worse, which is what essentially happened with the majority of the PPI (Public Private Initiatives) that the government offered up to outsource the problems to somebody else. The only problem with approach is of course, most of these companies simply Inflated the real problem in order to inflate their profits to solve the artificially inflated problem they were contracted to fix, but which of course, they never did, simply because if they fixed the problem, they wouldn’t be able to milk it for more profit.

At no time, will any of the solutions debated in Parlaiment every involve getting rid of the MPs altogether and letter the people join together online to find the real solution to the problem, We-Think style. More importantly, as citizens would create the laws in this We-Think run society, we would likely have a corporate world that actually works for the people rather than for themselves. After all, when you’re own consumers can pass laws that control how much profit you can make for instance, or even which makes your business illegal altogether, you are likely to make sure they accept what you do and how you go about it. Without the protection of government flunkies, it’s hard to imagine guns and other weapon’s manufacturers existing at all. Likewise, it’s equally hard to imagine any heavy polluting industry lasting long in a We-Think world. It’s easy to corrupt a handful of people to do your bidding or to turn a blind eye, but try corrupting an entire nation of people. May not be impossible, after all, Ceasar was fairly effective at keeping the masses distracted, but in the long run. But in an internet powered We-Think run society where whistleblower sites are common, it’s easy to create a groundswell moment around an eye-opening truth.

Naturally, a We-Think run nation would mean the end of the professional politician. But so what? Reading the headlines nowadays, does anybody really want them? Most consumer research shows that what people really want is to be able to have a say in how things are run, or even to be able to make direct impacts to solve problems. A Vox Pox I did for a Levi’s campaign of young Londoners actually revealed that at the young actually want to solve problems in their local communities, some even in the wider world. But most felt unempowered to do so.

By switching to a model of “direct participatory democracy”, ever citizen could be empowered to make a difference and be part of a collective hunt for solutons to society’s problems. Each problem could be debated online, researched by different groups of mixed specialists and compared and studied with input from other teams. The various solutions could all be analysed by indiviuals actually living those problems and voted on by the public at large. In a true democracy, the people’s vote is supposed to be what decides the direction of government. In  a We-Think government, this literally is what happens, every day. People decide thier own futures, together, collectively. If something doesn’t work out. if a solution is proved to be the wrong one, the people can instantly gather, re-analyse and change it to a new solution, creating what is essence, a truly dynamic, flexible way of government that is fully capable of dealing with our quickly changing world.

% of UK households with Internet Access

All of the underlying technologies now exists for this new, fairer and more open type of democracy exists already today. Broadband penetration in the UK is now at 52%, while basic internet penetration is at 68%, and it’s increasing by about 1 million people a year. Mobile penetration is at 78% of the population.

Population by age, UK

Given that 20% of the UK population is under 16 years, this means that pretty much everybody who could own a mobile phone, does. We all have the tools in our hands and at our fingertips every day to participate in a We-Think government. So the burning question is simply, why don’t we?

Statistics: http://www.statistics.gov.uk

Der Film “Us Now: The Power of Mass Collaboration” zeigt, wie das Netz grosse Communities voller informellem Wissen schaffen kann, was diese Communities alles anstellen können und wohin dies noch alles führen könnte:

Video: Us Now: The Power of Mass Collaboration

Wir präsentieren euch unten einige Zitate aus dem Film. Und sind daran interessiert, was ihr von diesen Aussagen haltet. Ist das alles Utopie oder ist da wirklich was dran am Knochen? Wir glauben an Letzteres …

(Zitat Nr.)/(min. Video) – Thema

1 / 0:53 – Politik 2.0
Don Tapscott (Autor und Business Stratege):

Es entsteht gerade ein ganz neues Modell, in dem wir Teil der Regierung werden.

2 /         – Web 2.0
Mikey Weinkove (The People Speak):

Ich denke, wir haben die Technologie mit der jede Abstimmung vor dem Parlament dem ganzen Land angeboten werden könnte.

3 / 1:21 – Neue Werkzeuge, neue Verhaltensweisen: eine Revolution?!

Eine Revolution geschieht nicht, wenn die Gesellschaft neue Werkzeuge übernimmt, sie geschieht, wenn die Gesellschaft neue Verhaltensweisen annimmt.

4 / 1:37 – Die neuen Werkzeuge (Web 2.0)

Diese Werkzeuge haben die Kosten, Dinge zu tun, so weit verringert, dass unser Wille, uns miteinander zu beschäftigen, ausreicht, um die Dinge geschehen zu lassen. Und zwar auf grossem, gesellschaftlichen Niveau anstatt gewissermassen nur auf dem Niveau von Familie und Freunden.

5 / 2:18 – Unser Drang nach Anerkennung

Unser Drang nach sozialen Kontakten, nach Verbindung, nach Anerkennung … nach sozialem Status kommt mithilfe dieser Technologie viel einfacher zur Geltung als es in der Welt der Rundfunkmedien könnte oder in Zeitungen oder Massenkommunikation im Sinne des 20. Jahrhunderts.

=================================

6 / 15:09 – Wie wir uns heute regieren lassen … und wie wir zusammenarbeiten können

Diese sehr zentralisierten Ansätze (d.h. die heutigen Regierungsformen) bergen eine grosse Gefahr und ich denke sie übersehen die Tatsache, dass Menschen von Natur aus gemeinschaftlich und kooperativ sind und dass verschiedenste Versionen der selben Technologie heute für jeden verfügbar sind. So können Menschen zusammenarbeiten auf eine Art und Weise, die tiefgreifend die Rolle der Regierung hinterfragt.

7 / 15:37 – Die alten Institutionen … und wir sie, indem wir zusammenarbeiten, konkurrenzieren können

In der Vergangenheit waren wir auf Institutionen angewiesen. Heutzutage stehen uns allen (technische) Mechanismen zur Verfügung, die eine Menge von Individuen zusammenbringen können, basierend auf ihren eigenen Interessen, die nun konkurrenzfähig mit den staatlichen Organen sind.

8 /            Charles Leadbeater (Autor, We-Think):

Hierarchien sind sehr ineffizient. Sie reagieren meist sehr langsam, sie konzentrieren Leistung und Information an der Spitze und hindern Leute oft daran, ihre Chance zu nutzen, die Initiative zu ergreifen, Ideen zu teilen und selbst nach Lösungen zu suchen. Und oft nehmen sie den Menschen da Gefühl der Zuständigkeit.

9 /            Clay Shirky (New York University):

Die grosse Veränderung im Moment ist die Vorstellung, dass jeder zum Handeln in der Gruppe verfügbar ist. Das bedeutet nicht, dass jeder sich an der Gruppenaktivität beteiligen wird; es bedeutet nicht, dass alle gleichviel beitragen werden – aber es bedeutet, dass jeder sich einbringen kann.

=================================

10 / 16:26 – Bsp: Ebbsfleet United, ein englisches Fussballteam, das von einer Online-Community von 30′000 Mitgliedern geleitet wird

11 / 17:18   Paul Miller (School of Everything):

Man kann Institutionen auf den Kopf stellen mithilfe des Internets. MAn kann Systeme und Institutionen von der Basis aus gestalten und sie sich selbst organisieren lassen.

12 / 18:17   Clay Shirky (New York University):

Auf gewisse Weise ist es weniger persönlich, sich von 30′000 Leuten beraten zu lassen anstatt von einer arroganten Person. Und, wenn du es richtig machst, dann erhöhst du durch den guten Rat von 30′000 Leuten die Chance, dass nicht ein Einzelner irgendeinen katastrophalen Fehler macht. Ich bin sicher, dass es sich für die Manager sehr anders anfühlt.

13 / 22:53   Charles Leadbeater (Autor, We-Think):

Meg Whitman, dem mal Ebay gehörte, sagte, es sei, als führte man eine Gemeindeversammlung. Das heisst gewissermassen, dass wenn man die Führung übernimmt, ein politischer Job daraus wird. Denn womit man es hier zu tun hat, das sind keine keine Menschen, denen man Anweisungen geben kann. Man muss sie überzeugen und ihre Unterstützung gewinnen.

14 / 26:01   William Heath (Ideal Government):

Falls Ebbsfleet ein echter Erfolg würde, dann wäre das der Beweis, dass der partizipative Entscheidungsprozess gute Ergebnisse bringen kann.

15 / 26:27    Charles Leadbeater (Autor, We-Think):

Letztlich funktionieren Communities nicht, wenn keine Entscheidungen getroffen werden So wie die Kommunen der 60er und 70erin Amerika; tausende Kommunen gingen unter; vor allem, weil sie keine Entscheidungen treffen konnten.

=================================

16 / 19:40 – Bsp: Open Source Software (Linux) vs. Microsoft
Charles Leadbeater (Autor, We-Think):

In diesem selbstorganisierten System kann es sehr bilig und sehr effizient sein verglichen mit “oben-unten” bürokratischer Hierarchie. Vergleichen Sie nur Open Source Software mit Microsoft.

=================================

17 / 29:07 – eine partizipative Regierung(sform)?
William Heath (Ideal Government):

Die Vertreter von partizipativer Regierung könnten sagen: Hier ist der Beweis, dass die Weisheit der Massen (d.h. “Wisdom of the crowds”) recht hat und es eine gute Idee ist, auf alle zu hören. Und  STATT GESTELLTER UMFRAGEN sollte es wohl echte Umfragen geben über Dinge, die die Menschen wirklich beschäftigen.

18 /          Lee Bryant (Headshift):

Die grösste Veränderung ist, dass Institutionen jetzt in Ihren Machtstellungen gefährdet werden von Individuen und Gruppen, die sich für Veränderung wirklich organisieren können.

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WIRTSCHAFT

19 / 38:16 – die Kraft der Transparenz zwingt Unternehmen und Wirtschaft, ihr Verhalten zu ändern
Don Tapscott (Autor und Business-Stratege)

Es gibt seit langer Zeit eine Redensart, dass “es gut läuft, wenn man Gutes tut”, und ich glaube, das war früher nicht wahr. Bei vielen Firmen liefs gut, obwohl sie sehr Schlechtes taten. Indem Sie Monopole errichteten und furchtbar mit Beschäftigten umgingen oder lausige Produkte hatten, die sie für viel Geld bewarben und vertrieben. Und die Unternehmen müssen saubermachen – nicht wegen der Regulierung. Sie müssen aufräumen wegen der Marktkräfte und der Macht der Transparenz. (…)
So wird jedes Unternehmen nackt. Und wenn du nackt sein wirst, dann ist Fitness keine Alternative mehr. Wenn du nackt sein wirst, dann solltest du besser durchtrainiert sein!

20 / 40:48   Don Tapscott (Autor und Business-Stratege):

Es geht nicht mehr darum, sich online zu treffen oder eine Garten-Community zu erstellen. Hier entsteht eine neue Art von Produktion die fundamentale Änderungen an unseren bisherigen Mitwirkungsmöglichkeiten in der Gesellschaft hervorbringt: Die Art und Weise, wie wir neue Dinge und Dienste erschaffen. Und die Gesellschaft ist meiner Meinung nach dabei, den grössten Wandel eines Jahrhunderts zu erleben. (…)

=================================

DEMOKRATIE & POLITIK

21 / 41:36 – Die Beziehung zwischen Bürger und Regierung
Don Tapscott (Autor und Business-Stratege):

Der Wandel in der Beziehung von Kunden und Unternehmen SPIEGELT SICH IN DER BEZIEHUNG ZWISCHEN BÜRGERN UND IHRER REGIERUNG.

22 / 41:47 – Wisdom of the crowds = “fantastic policies”?

Wenn es möglich wäre, diese eigene Intelligenz zu vereinigen – die Millionen der verschiedenen Meinungen von Menschen mit unterschiedlichen Perspektiven – würde dabei eine fantastische Politik entstehen.

23 / 42:09 – Politik, wie sie bis anhin funktionierte, und wie sie ab heute funktioniert …
Don Tapscott (Autor und Business Stratege):

Wir kennen das Modell, wie Politik entwickelt wird. Es ist eine zweifelhafte Demokratie, ein “Broadcast”-Modell, das folgendermassen funktioniert: Ich bin ein Politiker. Hört meiner Werbung und Debatten zu, dann geht und wählt für mich, und dann texte (d.h. eben das “Broadcast”-Modell) ich euch während vier Jahren zu, und dann tun wir das gleiche ein neues Mal. Ihr wählt, ich bestimme.
Dieses Modell ist ungeeignet – für das 21. Jahrhundert! Ich spreche nicht von Lobbies oder Gruppen, die versuchen von aussen die Regierung zu beeinflussen. Ich spreche davon, in gewisser Art und Weise aufzuschlüsseln und neu zu definieren, was eine Regierung ist.

24 / 43:19   Saul Albert (The People Speak):

Ich denke, es existiert ein grossartiges Potential dafür, Entscheidungsfindung zu starten auf einer Basisebene, auf einer viel weniger grossen Bühne als wenn das Parlament einen Entscheid fällt über Einwanderungsgesetze. So etwa der Ansatz des partizipativen Budgets (“participative budgeting”).

25 / 48:26   Don Tapscott (Autor und Business Stratege):

Demokratie ist weit mehr, als dass die Mehrheit auf einer (…???) Basis entscheidet. Die Technologie wird für Millionen von Menschen zugänglich werden, um eine Unterhaltung miteinander zu führen.

26 /               Clay Shirky (New York University):

Die Vorstellung, dass die Leute einbezogen werden, verbreitet sich so weit und so nachhaltig. Das wird ein grosser Antrieb für Regierungswandel werden. Das wird nicht nur passieren, indem es für die Leute in gewählten Regierungspositionen zu einer Option wird, die sie mitbedenken müssen, sondern es wird zu einer Erwartung der Bürger, die sich durch die Politiker vertreten lassen.

27 /               Lee Bryant (Headshift):

Heute haben wir eine massive Konsumenten-Technologie, die das unterstützt. Und wir sind erst gerade dabei zu entdecken, was wir damit alles tun können.

28 / 49:09   Tom Steinberg (They Work For You / MySociety):

In einem Land, in dem die Wahlbeteiligung ziemlich tief ist, wo viele Leute denken, dass Politiker nicht für die Bürger arbeiten, wo viele Leute denken, dass was sie tun, keine Rolle spiele, in keiner Art und Weise etwas bewirken kann, würde es den Bürgern viel Macht verleihen, wenn sie Sachen wüssten, die versteckt, geheim gehalten werden. Aber es würde auch die Politiker befähigen, viel besser zu regieren. Und das ist eine Sache, die Politiker meist nicht glauben – dass Transparenz besser ist. Geheimniskrämerei mag im Moment nützlicher erscheinen, aber sie kreiert nur den Stoff für massive Skandale in der Zukunft.

=================================

REVOLUTION

29 / 52:05 – eine neue Form von Demokratie, Entscheidungsfindung durch die Bürger?
Paul Miller (School of Everything):

Ich denke, die repräsentative Demokratie wurde auf der Idee aufgebaut, dass die Leute (…???) sind. Aber das stimmt nicht! Ich denke, dass noch viel radikalere Dinge passieren werden, grundsätzlich einmal werden die Leute an der repräsentativen Demokratie vorbei gehen und weniger Aufwand dazu verwenden, Einfluss zu nehmen auf die Politiker und ihre Entscheidungen im Parlament, als vielmehr die Entscheidungen selbst zu treffen.

30 /            Lee Bryant (Headshift):

Was wir erleben werden, ist, dass die Aufgaben und die Durchsetzungsmacht der Regierung in den öffentlichen Raum wandern und dass sie dort besser erledigt und angewendet werden, als sie es durch die Regierung wurden.

31 /             Paul Miller (School of Everything):

Stellen Sie sich vor, Sie wollten eine neue, schnellere Eisenbahnlinie zwischen Birmingham und London bauen. Wie viel würde das kosten? Im Moment ist der einzige Weg, das zu tun, Steuern zu erheben und sie dafür einzusetzen. Nun, wenn sie www.thepoint.com benützen würden, um dies zu tun, dann könnten sie es tun – und zwar komplett ausserhalb der politischen Ebene.

32 / 53:18 – die neuen Möglichkeiten und die Parteien?
Don Tapscott (Autor und Business Stratege):

Breitere Schichten von Menschen können mit einbezogen werden in die Ausarbeitung von politischen Programmen und Massnahmen. Die Grüne Partei Kanadas zum Beispiel hat ihr Parteiprogramm über ein Wiki aufgestellt, in dem alle Mitglieder der Grünen wie auf Wikipedia zusammenkamen und gemeinsam das Programm schrieben. Und das hat ziemlich gut geklappt.

33 / 54:42 – die neuen Möglichkeiten und die Regierung, der Staat?
Don Tapscott (Autor und Business Stratege):

Anstatt dass Regierungen alles selbst tun würden, könnten sie vielmehr eine Plattform aufbauen, auf der sich Bürger und andere selbst organisieren könnten, um besseren Wert zu schaffen, als gegenwärtig existiert.

Yesterday I attended the  ‘Breaking the barriers‘ conference, organised by PTFS Europe and Ken Chad. It was an excellent conference, so many thanks to the organisers. It covered all aspects of Open Source within libraries, from full-scale LMS to catalogue enhancements, from a wide range of perspectives including conventional suppliers, developers and customers. The mark of a good conference is when the attendees go away excited and inspired by what they’ve seen, and from the people I spoke to yesterday that was certainly the case. I understand the Powerpoint slides should be available soon on Slideshare for those who couldn’t make it.

It demonstrated how Open Source is emerging within libraries, with or without encouragement from conventional suppliers and institutional management. There was a paper from Bob Molyneaux of Equinox which showed how OS LMS have become an accepted part of the LMS market in the US, and are now customarily considered during the initial market survey during the procurement procedure. I think we’re lagging behind slightly in the UK on this, as demonstrated by the supplier presence at the conference. Ex Libris and Talis both gave presentations – very different ones reflecting their different approaches – but both demonstrating committment to this new way of doing things. The old supplier-customer relationship is already dying, with some suppliers cutting back their support desk facilities at a time when customers need more support than ever.  Other LMS suppliers were conspicuously absent – I won’t name anybody, you know who you are…..

The keynote was given by Charles Leadbeater, of ‘We-think’. He gave his usual inspirational talk, pointing out how Web 2.0 is going to change most businesses (read libraries) over the next 5 years, but we don’t really know how. He pointed out that his 9 year old son, ie an emerging user, wants 3 things: to enjoy, to communicate, and to do, and all of them at times of his own choosing. We need to meet these needs, and to my mind Open Source is a way of doing so while avoiding the stagnancy which has crept into some corners of the library market. Things are already changing, witness the sudden appearance of link resolvers, federated searching and catalogue interactivity in the last seven or eight years, and the pace of this change is only going to accelerate. Conventional proprietary software looks like it may not always be the best way to solve the challenges facing us.

Οι σκέψεις σαν εικόνες. Το σπουδαίο στο βίντεο δεν είναι μόνο το θέμα. Βρίσκω εξαιρετική την φρεσκάδα του, την αμεσότητα και την απλότητα του. Δε χρειάζονται πολλά.. Σπάνια βρίσκει κανείς κάτι τόσο ευθύβολο. Το μέτρο όσον αφορά στις εικονες επιτρέπει στις φράσεις να λειτουργούν σαν στοιχεία πλαστικά και το παιχνίδι με τον χώρο αντί να κουράζει ανανεώνει διαρκώς την προσοχή.

Οι ιδέες που παρουσιάζει είναι, νομίζω, γνώριμες.. Η Αισιοδοξία του υπό συζήτηση. Ο Leadbeater ήταν μεταξύ άλλων σύμβουλος του.. Tony Blair!
Εντούτοις εκτιμώ πως πρόκειται για ένα από τα πιο ωραία και εύστοχα ‘δοκίμια” που κυκλοφορούν στο δίκτυο!

Ας θεωρήσουμε κι αυτό το βίντεο σαν ένα ακόμα παράδειγμα των δυνατοτήτων που δίνει το δίκτυο για Λόγο (πολιτικό και άλλο).
Καλές οι αφίσες και τα συνθήματα αλλά..

το site του Charles Leadbeater εδώ

το σχετικό μ’ αυτόν άρθρο στην Βικιπαίδια εδώ

In a new twist, the complete lack of social prIvacy potentially could be a good thing. At least according to the author of We-Think, Charles Leadbeater. In his book, he proposes that  we apply social participation strategies to government  to foster communities that govern and police themselves, without the need of interfering politicians or police. In a kind of “neighbourhood watch on steroids” if you will, whole cities/populations would essentially be activated to watch over each other in a mutual peer support fashion. 

A famous example of this community policing was seen back in 2005 in what is now known as “the Dog Poop Girl case.” In South Korea, where everybody and their toddler have a mobile phone, a girl and her dog boarded a local subway train.

Naturally, the dog must have mistook the bland floor for dirt – or then he was just making a statement against bad design – and decided to defecate on the floor of the train car, apparently by accident. Nearby passengers were naturally appalled and asked her to clean it up. Surprisingly, she replied something akin to “mind your own business.” 

As all phones today are also spy cameras, a fellow passenger fotographed the girl and posted it on a Korean Website. The  photograph was picked up by the hyper-active asian social networks, retouched, mashed up, commented upon and generally spread around like the pandemic flu. It was in effect, a national user generated “name and shaming” policing exercise.

Naturally, the girl in question became famous for all of the wrong reasons, and probably a social pariah among her friends as well, causing her to drop out of university. Most likely today she is dog-less (and forever so), living in a new city with a new haircut and maybe even a new name. 

Now let’s apply this social policing strategy to our local British burglar. Let’s say a burglar (who we all call Yobs over here) breaks into a property. The house however, is wired to the local community owned and monitored CCTV network (no government or police oversight here) so our Yob is caught in the act by a nearby neighbour, an old lady living on her own and battling an ongoing insomnia problem. Either that or she’s catching up on back episodes of “Eastenders” on the Beeb’s iPlayer. She hurriedly sends text alerts to all the residents in the area. They rush around to the house just as the robber/yob exits. He turns (it is always a he isn’t it) only to face a horde of angry residents, all armed with mobile phone cameras and busily filming the unfolding drama.

Now, assuming our angry horde doesn’t turn into a vigilante mob, they instead run a mobile Internet search on Google’s new Face recognition service, which matches images to those on the social networks to quickly get the yob’s personal details and those of all of his friends and family. His surprised and angry mother is contacted, as is his grandmother, his father, brothers, sisters, cousins, uncles, etc, who all are suddenly calling the Yob’s mobile phone to berate him in what J. K. Rowling would describe as a “Howler Mail”.

To make matters worse, the entire drama, complete with the yob’s very public shame, is posted on the Internet site, www.Gotcha.com, a newfound wikipedia-style public database of social shame and now his very public police record. If he was a repeat offender, then he might even be placed in a prison. But not the usual countryside retreat with drugs, Sky Movies and a free gym membership, but rather a very public room in the town square with glass walls so that everybody can watch him. No curtains. No privacy.

Naturally, the gaping whole in this approach is that we currently live in a fame-obsessed society where criminal activity is glorified as being a “cool profession” with few real downsides, well, except for that potential death thing of course. But as fame has become more important than achievement, we are seeing gangs of youth challenging each other to commit crimes. So when our group of concerned and involved residents show up with their mobile phone cameras buzzing away, a burglar is now more likely to mistake them for paparazzi, break out into a big smile, and perform a little jig for the cameras.

Once on Internet, he would become famous on both sides of the Atlantic. Hollywood or Fox TV would then offer him a lucrative Film/TV deal, only to find themselves outbid by the BBC, using millions from the public purse of course. Books titled, “Why I Burgle” would become runaway best-sellers, making it to the top of the RIchard and Judy list, who would praise it “for its moving hardcore realism” and “as a telling indictment of modern society”.  Even our PM, fading in popularity as he ever is, would invite the famous crook over to No. 10, whereupon our now famous Yob would nick the silverware, which everybody would find hilarious.

Sources: 
On Internet Vigilantism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_vigilantism

On the Dog Poop Girl case

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2005/07/06/AR2005070601953.html

http://blog.japundit.com/archives/2005/06/30/808/

On Google and Facial Recognition

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13580_3-10026577-39.html

BadFormat! Magazine is a pure web 2.0 publication – written by its readership, it’s a true representation of the state of play, without censorship or prejudice.

With the launch of BadFormat! magazine we aimed to enable young creatives to have an opportunity to publish their work, from articles, photos, and illustrations to tweets and status updates. The magazine is built by an online community who submit and edit the content to produce a publication that is built by as well as read by its readership.

BadFormat! Magazine:

www.badformat.ning.com

www.badformat.co.uk

Facebook: Badformat Social Club

Twitter: BadFormat

In May 2009 we opened BadFormat Social Club for the first event held as part of Liverpool Soundcity. Our aim is to provide a multipurpose venue that provides a great cafe/workspace area during the day (free wi-fi, printing and scanning facilities), modular and multipurpose evening event area (cinema, comedy, lectures, performance) and weekend live venue with amazing sound (touring bands and djs).

We want to change things, we’re not trying to educate, we’re not trying to do anything but provide a space where people with creative tendencies can work, rest and play in safety.

BadFormat! Social Club: www.badformatsocialclub.co.uk

A: BadFormat! Social Club, 3-5 Trueman Street, Liverpool, UK, L3 2BA.

T: 0151 227 5388

E: info@badformat.co.uk

BadFormat! is your’s…built for you, by you….so join in, contribute and collaborate.

ISSUE 2: U41! - May 2009

Thumbnails

Swindle

A Cross To Bear

Myths of Reality TV

Liverpool Sound City Listing Guide

Breaking Down

A Recent Taste of Cut and Paste

Flash

YouTube Orchestra

Online Dating

Hollow Earth

Pop Turd

*BADFORMAT MAGAZINE OUT NOW!*

PDF: BadFormat! Magazine | U41! – Issue 2

Cornerhouse in Manchester have commissioned a new provocative essay from Charles Leadbeater called The Art of With. The essay addresses questions grappled with by many arts organisations, such as:
– What do the advent of the web, collaborative practice and open source ways of working mean for the arts and art organisations?
- How do artists, audiences and other stakeholders really get involved with programming and evaluating arts venues? – What does it mean for curators, programmers and traditional structures of arts organisations?

In true WeThink [read] / [watch] style, the essay is created so that readers can think, comment and contribute around every paragraph! This exciting interaction with the content will lead up to the discussions held at the live Art of With Seminar.

In his latest book, We-Think, Charles Leadbetter argues that if the 20th Century was one of mass production and mass consumption, the 21st Century will be one of mass innovation and collaboration, the sharing of ideas being the currency on which our future prosperity depends:-

“In the economy of things you are identified by what you own – your land, house, car. In the economy of ideas that the web is creating, you are what you share – who you are linked to, who you network with and which ideas, pictures, videos, links or comments you share. The biggest change the web will bring about is in allowing us to share with one another in new ways and particularly to share ideas.”

At least two questions immediately come to mind. If the new economy is about sharing, what is it that is going to encourage people to share and to give away, rather than trying to cash in on their ideas and maximise their profit, according to the natural laws of self-preservation, natural human tendencies to self-interest etc etc. And in a world where it is rapidly becoming easier to organise on a global scale, what is going to prevent individuals and organisations from using the power of the internet for destructive rather than constructive purposes?

On the first issue Leadbetter is optimistic. It’s not that he believes we-think will entirely replace the market-driven economy but rather that there will be a balance between  market and non-market ways of organising the networked economy. In other words, individuals and organisations will survive according to their ability to sell and to share freely their ideas in the right proportions, a mix of collaboration and commerce, community and corporation. He believes that what motivates people above all else is not wealth but the quality of the relationships they are able to develop, alongside a sense of worth and a recognition of their talents, especially by their peers. This is threatening to traditional corporations with hierarchical structures, which operate on the basis of status and authority within the organisation rather than the creativity of individuals, and in the next few years we will see an increasing struggle between this dysfunctional world where decisions are made for us rather than with us and an alternative world in which we are, in the words of Pat Kane, “players”, where we are engaged and participating fully in the process of our own lives.

The challenge, according to the author, is to create a sense of order and security without undermining our capacity for sharing, for sharing can also spread diseases, infections and viruses, ideas and identities can be stolen. Furthermore, those who have top-down control, whether private corporations or governments, will fight to retain it. However, he believes that within organisations managers and professionals will struggle to retain power based on privileged access to information as those they govern  become less deferential, acquiring their own voices and finding their own information.  Secondly, more forms of peer-to-peer control, including surveillance, will provide the transparency needed to provide the security we all seek. We will get used to rating one another and being rated by our peers – something which is currently an accepted form of self-regulation in the scientific community but which will spread to many other walks of life. Finally, Leadbetter argues, we will have to encourage and develop in people more self-control so that they use their increasing technological power more responsibly. Enter the role of education and educators. He puts it succinctly like this:-

“That means, at the very least, children learning the skills and norms of media literacy and responsibility; learning to question and challenge information as well as copy and paste it.”  Reassuringly, this has echoes of the following statement from the new Literacy and English framework in Curriculum for Excellence:-

To help me develop an informed view, I am exploring the techniques used to influence my opinion. I can recognise persuasion and assess the reliability of information and credibility and value of my sources.

Never has the role of the teacher been more important in guiding and supporting young people as they develop that “informed view” for themselves as independent learners and thinkers.

Comparto la visión que Charles Leadbeater tiene sobre cómo la red está cambiando nuestro mundo. La ha plasmado en su libro “We-think”, del que puedes descargarte los tres primeros capítulos y el primer borrador completo en su página web. Como resumen, en este vídeo puedes ver sus principales ideas de una forma gráfica y divertida:

The lights dim in the screening room. Suddenly, the doomed Titanic fills the screen–but not the way I remember in the movie. The luxury liner is nearly vertical, starting its slide into the black Atlantic, and Leonardo DiCaprio is hanging on for life, just like always. But this time, I am too. The camera pans to the icy water far below, pulling me into the scene–the sensation reminds me of jerking awake from a dream–and I grip the sides of my seat to keep from falling into the drink.

Most of us have seen the top-grossing film of all time. But not like this. The new version, still in production, was remade in digital 3-D, a technology that’s finally bringing a true third dimension to movies. Without giving you a headache. (See the 100 best movies of all time.)

Had digital 3-D been available a dozen or so years ago when he shot Titanic, he’d have used it, director James Cameron tells me later. “But I didn’t have it at the time,” he says ruefully. “Certainly every film I’m planning to do will be in 3-D.”

Digital 3-D, which has slowly been gaining steam over the past few years, is finally ready for its closeup. Just about every top director and major studio is doing it–a dozen movies are slated to arrive this year, with dozens more in the works for 2010 and beyond. These are not just animations but live-action films, comedies, dramas and documentaries. Cameron is currently shooting a live-action drama, Avatar, for Fox in 3-D. Disney and its Pixar studio are releasing five 3-D movies this year alone, including a 3-D-ified version of Toy Story. George Lucas hopes to rerelease his Star Wars movies in 3-D. And Steven Spielberg is currently shooting Tintin in it, with Peter Jackson doing the 3-D sequel next year. Live sports and rock concerts in 3-D have been showing up at digital theaters around the U.S. nearly every week.

With the release on March 27 of Monsters vs. Aliens, Jeffrey Katzenberg, the head of DreamWorks Animation SKG, is betting the future of his studio on digital 3-D. While he’s not the first to embrace the technology, he has become its most vocal evangelist, asserting that digital 3-D is now good enough to make it–after sound and color–the third sea change to affect movies. “This really is a revolution,” he says.

Over the past few years, Katzenberg has repositioned DreamWorks as a 3-D-animation company. From Monsters on, all its movies will be made, natively, in 3-D. (Many animation studios create the 3-D effect in postproduction.) That’s a pretty big commitment since 3-D involves even more computer power than usual. The DreamWorks crew invokes “Shrek’s law,” which holds that every sequel takes about twice as long to render–create a final image from models–as the movie that preceded it. Authoring the movie in 3-D effectively doubles the time called for by Shrek’s law.

That requires an extreme amount of horsepower–the computational power of DreamWorks’ render farm puts it roughly among the 15 fastest supercomputers on the planet. The studio partnered with Hewlett-Packard and Intel and built an enormous test bed on more than 17,500 sq. ft. in California. The Silicon Valley companies are hot on 3-D because they believe it’s how people will navigate the Web and the desktops of their PCs and that it will be standard on computers and HDTVs.

Today I went to a workshop on ‘Innovative Media for the Digital Economy’, part of the Digital Economy programme run by the UK Research Councils, in which various social media academics presented the first fruits of research which had received seed funding through this scheme.

Charles Leadbeater shares some thoughts

The day kicked off with a keynote speech by Charles Leadbeater, author of We Think, the very good book which I had previously referenced in my inaugural lecture and elsewhere.

In a slightly longwinded question to him, I was pleased to be able to thank him for reminding me of the power of Ivan Illich (mentioned in We Think as one of the precursors to the spirit of Web 2.0), who had fired my sociological imagination back in the day. You don’t necessarily expect to be reading about Illich’s radical and brilliant Tools for Conviviality in a book by a ‘leading business thinker’.

He said many interesting things, which I won’t try to type out here (see his website for a range of useful resources), but here’s just one. When asked about Wikipedia, he noted that it’s a useful starting point when looking into a topic, and added: “If you’re a teacher and the answer to your question can be copied from Wikipedia, you’re asking the wrong questions”. What a brilliant point. I will be using that next time one of my colleagues wants to ban Wikipedia, as someone usually wants to, soon.

After this, the academics made a string of presentations about their research studies. These were mostly interesting projects focused on particular online products or services and the ways that people did, or could potentially, use them.

There were, for instance, excellent presentations from Jen Southern (and colleagues), and Andy Miah, on finding new ways that artists can collaborate and rethink their social role; interesting stuff on how mobile technology could help us make much better use of public transport by identifying spare capacity in the system, on the spot; and some thoughtful comments on Facebook and identity from Udi Butler.

As my contribution to the panel discussion at the end of the day, I suggested to the roomful of academics — somewhat bravely, I thought — that it was interesting that it was the ‘corporate’ speaker, Charles Leadbeater, who is an ‘industry’ person, a business consultant and journalist, not an academic, who had been prepared to discuss big broad social issues in his book and his speech — doing the job of an Emile Durkheim or Max Weber in looking at these new technological social phenomena and their role in public life – whereas the academics were mostly presenting narrower stuff, evaluating products and services, or particular case studies, and not really dealing with ‘big’ questions. I noted politely that as academics we all have to work on particular projects, of course, and that probably they aspired to deal with big questions too. I added that maybe the fault lies with the way academics have to align themselves with funding councils.

Nevertheless you’d think that the role of academics would be mostly raising big questions. I have no problem, of course, with Charles Leadbeater’s intelligent and well-referenced mass-market paperback, and don’t really care whether it’s officially an ‘academic’ book or not. But it’s a bit odd if academics are not really covering those big issues on the grand scale, isn’t it?

Is this what happens when funding councils emphasise academic links with ‘industry’ all the time — academia just gets a bit smaller-minded, whilst ‘industry’ responds by producing the superior grand thinkers?!

As mentioned in a previous post whilst at Stockport College I studied along side Scott Jones who went on to form Juno in Liverpool, and has more recently founded BadFormat! specialising in Artist Branding for the music industry with a portfolio that contains some of the most recognisable music campaigns of recent years from Arctic Monkeys, The Zutons and The Coral to name but a few. Producing amazing work from record sleeves, pop promos, photography, events, web design, tv adverts, films, point of sale, branding, magazines, promotion, marketing, illustration, animation and merchandising, there films have also been awarded on the international film festival circuit.

BadFormat! Creative Consultancy: www.badformat.com

I recently met Scott in Liverpool when he was in the process of launching BadFormat! Magazine and he kindly asked me to get involved with the project, so I jumped at the chance. I have since been working with BadFormat! Magazine on Art Direction, Illustration and Writing.

So I will be posting up any future Issues along with any work I have done for BadFormat!

BadFormat! Magazine is a pure web 2.0 publication – written by its readership, it’s a true representation of the state of play, without censorship or prejudice.

With the launch of BadFormat! magazine we aimed to enable young creatives to have an opportunity to publish their work, from articles, photos, and illustrations to tweets and status updates. The magazine is built by an online community who submit and edit the content to produce a publication that is built by as well as read by its readership.

BadFormat! Magazine:

www.badformat.ning.com

www.badformat.co.uk

Facebook: Badformat Social Club

Twitter: BadFormat

In May 2009 we opened BadFormat Social Club for the first event held as part of Liverpool Soundcity. Our aim is to provide a multipurpose venue that provides a great cafe/workspace area during the day (free wi-fi, printing and scanning facilities), modular and multipurpose evening event area (cinema, comedy, lectures, performance) and weekend live venue with amazing sound (touring bands and djs).

We want to change things, we’re not trying to educate, we’re not trying to do anything but provide a space where people with creative tendencies can work, rest and play in safety.

BadFormat! Social Club: www.badformatsocialclub.co.uk

A: BadFormat! Social Club, 3-5 Trueman Street, Liverpool, UK, L3 2BA.

T: 0151 227 5388

E: info@badformat.co.uk

BadFormat! is your’s…built for you, by you….so join in, contribute and collaborate.

ISSUE 1: BIG FAT BRITANNIA – March 2009

Swindle

The Dark Side of Fame & Fantasy

Political Apathy and the Rise of the BNP

Charts Versus Choice

Sunday Bloody Sunday

Signed by 4Music

Pop Turd

*BADFORMAT MAGAZINE OUT NOW!*

PDF: BadFormat! Magazine | Big Fat Britannia – Issue 1

The last week I am reading two books concerning the social media. The first one is “we-think” by Charles Leadbeater and the second is “groundswell” by Charlene Li and josh Bernoff.
Both books give you an insight for social media, how it works and why it became so essential in our everyday life. The books give you many impressing examples on how social media are used by the world and the business to evolve their communication.
The reason that attracted my attention at the first place to read these books is that both are actually written “in the web”.
What do I mean by that? The authors of both books were publishing these books chapter by chapter to their individual sites, and used the comments of the e-readers as part of the book.
Actually Charles Leadbeater in the first page of his book writes that the author of the book is himself and other 257 people. He explains later on his book that he uploaded the first draft on October 2006 and till the late 2007 he was mentioned in 250 blogs, he had received 200 e-mails from people pointing in useful information and every draft was downloaded at average 53 times a day. At the end the book title and his name in the Google search came back with 65.600 hits! What a wonderful way to write a book!
I couldn’t believe it so I just visit both Charles Leadbeater site and groundswell site ,in which you can actually see all the procedure they followed.
It is amazing how interaction and collaboration of the people create one of the biggest forms of power I have ever experienced.