September 2007 Archives

Again if you don't want to know, don't read on...

Over at Entrepreneur.com they've explored a list of businesses that risk implosion over the next decade. It's not the greatest list; I think there are several things on this list that will survive, if perhaps in a moderated fashion. However, any list that says telemarketers are going to expire has my vote.

There's an excellent article in The Guardian's Comment Is Free from Aung Zaw on the situation in Burma.

What worries me about reporting on this horror in Australian news broadcasts is that while Burma has finally got to the front of news reports, there is still a great deal of misunderstanding out there in the Australian community about what's going on over there. What Zaw's article does is explain in simple terms, the events that have led to the current conflict. Much like Idi Amin's persecution and repression of opposers and the Chinese Government's brutal treatment of protestors in 1989, the current events in Burma will go down in history as an horrendous abuse of human rights. But as new evidence arises of the razing of villages by the Burmese military, as global citizens we need to respond - and urgently.

Sadly it's already too late to save some of the innocent protestors in Burma. But that doesn't mean we should just turn away from this violence. It's time we all band together, to force the Burmese Generals to listen to global condemnation of their actions.

For those who don't want to know the result of the match, don't click through to my extended entry. But for those who already know or who don't care....

If you're watching any TV in Australia at the moment, you've probably come across the Australian Government's Climate Change advertisement. Reportedly part of a A$23 million campaign, the ads are one heck of a joke considering John Howard won't even endorse the Kyoto Treaty and Howard has even expressed doubt at the moral importance of climate change as an issue.

Frankly the more entertaining advertisement is the one being played during the AFL Grand Final today from grassroots organisation, GetUp!. In case you missed it, here it is:

Go the Cats!
(I'm actually a North Melbourne supporter, but I'm barracking for Geelong today.)

Live scores here: http://afl.com.au/

Dan Walsh's new product kwoff.com.au is a new social filtering technique for Australian 'quality' content. This seems to be a growing area of interest in a field which is overrun by information production. There's a potential there for blog filtering mechanisms and social bookmarking to influence idea development and traffic channelling.

But Peter Black asked my co-editor Axel Bruns to outline what he sees as the future of the field of blogging research. Axel noted that understanding the changes to the way we communicate and our information rights/requirements and what social implications are arising from the act of blogging.

Others noted that understanding the opportunities to connect people from disparate backgrounds as a value of blogging.

There was some debate on the quality of blogging outputs and the issues associated with dumbing down important and complex issues, but there was an overwhelming feeling that the values outrank the problems and it is problematic in an environment which is already vilified in some mainstream media.

There was a general consensus that the community tools of Facebook (including the ubiquitous POKE!) is a great way of motivating people to participate in a way that didn't necessarily involve much time investment. (IMHO all those tools drive me up the wall... unless it's a means of connecting with people who are interesting and providing a context for debate/discussion then I don't want to know about it.)

Mark Bahnisch noted that the social techniques of increasing cross-fertilisation of blogs and varying social networking tools are interesting in terms of driving orthogonal links between speakers.

There was a point raised that tools like Twitter and Tumblelogs are tools which may reduce individual posts, but increase the thoughtfulness and aggregation of ideas/referencing when blog posts are created.

The point was raised that you can eventually have things that aren't human twittering, and this is its own information channel. I pointed out that the experience of training my CyberTwin (btw - feel free to converse with my cybertwin at http://www.mycybertwin.com/logintochat.jsp?useridnum=25523), in that I can imagine a period down the track when I could deploy a cybertwin in a commercial context where a zeitgeist of current issues could in fact be quite profitable.

We closed with a plan for drinks and for staying in contact.

I was a panellist in the Business and Corporate Blogging session this afternoon so I wasn't able to make too many notes during this session, but I think we had a valuable session where Nick Hodge, Des Walsh and myself introduced ourselves, posed a few questions and then allowed the audience to lead the debate and tell their own stories, ask their own questions and consider new ways of communicating the value of blogging.

The questions we posed were:
* Can businesses afford not to blog?
* How do you measure Return on Investment?
* Should the CEO blog?
* Should PR and/or Legal vet all blogs?
* How do you find enough to write about?
* How do you handle negative comments?
* Blogging Codes of Conduct

I welcome any comments on the session we had this afternoon, and I would like to thank both Des and Nick for what I believe was an interesting session. I have so much respect for what both Nick and Des do, but I'm also bowled over by the talent we had in the audience. Thanks one and all!

Chair: Mark Bahnisch
Panel: Senator Andrew Bartlett, Brett Soloman (GetUP!), Graham Young On Line Opinion).

Mark began the session with an overview of the political blogging landscape and the comparisons between blogging and critical analysis in mainstream media.

Mark noted there was "no business model" for blogging and that blogging is more about taking advantage of the gift economy in online communities.

Brett spoke about GetUP! and the fact that people have experienced a need to have their voices heard. Alternative analysis has been seriously lacking in mainstream media. This is an opportunity to do an expose on political actions which are otherwise unreported. In the case of the NT landrights legislation, GetUP! had a chance to provide a context for a consultative approach - it failed in changing the law, but it was a forum which was not being accommodated by mainstream media.

GetUP! also ran a fund raising exercise to inform the public about climate change issues by running ads in the Grand Final coverage. Raised over $189,000 in 5 days with the average donation being $50 per donator.

Senator Bartlett reinforced that the value of blogging is in comments. My view is that the Australian political environemnt is all about following. Blogs have the chance to lead political decision makers.

[[AB responded to my question that most politicians and corporate reps would love to blog if there were no comments - how do you respond to that - was to say that you can manage it. You need to give people time to adapt to the process of participating in comments based systems]]

Quite an interesting discursive environment emerged on grassroots debate. Unfortunately, I was interrupted by my client requests and couldn't blog much for 20 minutes!!!!

MY INTEREST IN POLITICAL BLOGGING:
Grassroots lobbying and developing a deliberately provocative blog which can change opinions and aggregate distributed knowledge.

Participants: Senator Andrew Bartlett (AB), Prof John Quiggin (JQ) and Duncan Riley (DR).

Peter Black asked the panellists to reflect on the blogging revolution over the past five years.

JQ - Always wanted a website and feel the technology was "waiting to happen". Desire of people to diarise is a fundamental urge of humanity. The growth of LiveJournal as a diary online, read by a vast collecftion of unknowns was something that many wanted without knowing they wanted it. All sorts of issues that have motivated peope to blog. Politics - the likelihood of mass change - is something that people want to reflect upon. We have so few newspapers here in Australia that blogs provide an avenue for an alternative perspective, and more critical debate. What's interesting about political blogging is that the quality of some political blogging is as good as any critical analysis available in mainstream press.

Technically it hasn't got easier to blog and with spamming on blogs, it is even harder to run a single author blog. Seems to be that multi-user blogs is the way of the future.

AB: Obviously I've followed the political blogs rather than knitting or food blogs (which are more popular) but what has been fascinating has been the social networking aspects of blogging. The viral aspect of blogs that feed the generation of ideas and corss-pollination of ideas is interesting and powerful - perhaps not as revolutionary as it is often portrayed but generally quite interesting in terms of peer influence over public issues and concerns. The other aspect with comments in the political arena is quite interesting.

To have people outside the sphere of mainstream media commenting and providing feedback on the manner in which politics and public policy is developed is a useful means of gauging genuine feedback on issues. Cross fertilisation of comments is useful in providing a forum for civil discourse and sustaining interest in public policy issues.

The less filtered mechanism of access to public opinion (ie: outside mainstream media) is the most interesting aspect of blogging - though a lot of it is dull and boring.

DR: Disagree that future of blogs is multi-user. Single author blogs will always remain strong. Interested that the best news stories coming out of Burma at the moment are bloggers.

In Australia, the media characterisation of blogging is vilifying. In the US, blogs are more respected than here. 250,000 MySpace users, 200,000 Facebook users in Australia. All have access to a blogging platform. Talking potentially to 3-4million Australians either blogging or having access to a blogging platform. In terms of political blogging, we have missed the tipping point in blogging in Australia in having a stand out blog which has captured the imagination of the population. We need to do more collectively to generate the excitement of blogs in Australia.

AB: Never quite understood Facebook<> but it is clearly a great way of getting people to connect with one another. What they should know and what they shouldn't is somethng that probably teaches us all about how to communicate more effectively and more thoughtfully.

JQ: Net drain of time in blogging is significant, but the act of blogging has led to the development of a research profile in areas covered in blogs. Invitations to develop a research expertise in the blogosphere can act as a catalyst for academic research. Investment in getting involved in a debate through blogs is a way of maximising payoffs from the act of thinking critically about ideas.

[[Peter black asked DR if there is anything unique about Australians]]

DR: Australians have a unique voice. But as Australians we tend to be a little bit shy with personal thoughts on an open access blog - this isn't a defining feature but it has held us back. On the good side of things, Australians tend to be more interested in writing about world issues in a way US citizens simple *don't*. I've always been conscious of writing for a global audience. Australians tend to have an outward look on the world.

Question: Mainstream media influenced by comercial interests... To what extent is there a danger in the blogging world that commercial interests will have an effect on editorial opinion.

DR: Obviously some people can be influenced by commercial interests. Not many.

[[JJ added that QUT has questioned me in my critique of the university when I was employed by the institution]]

Question: Is there any value in using blogging as a mechanism for democratic practice?

AB: Possibly no votes in it. Surprised that more people don't use blogging at local council level. Putting up authentic genuine Australian blogs is possibly too difficult. Advertising in YouTube is often done just to get media coverage. It is the networking aspect of Facebook that could be powerful for grassroots politics.

Here I am at the Australian Blogging Conference and Michael Lavarch is openingthe day, proclaiming this to be the first blogging conference of its kind here in Australia. I'm not sure about that but certainly the more discursive nature of this conference is probably unique.

I'll be doing a summary of each session I attend via this blog and welcome any comments anyone would have to say on the contents of the day.

I'll be presenting tomorrow at the Australian Blogging Conference along with pretty much everyone else in the Australian blogging community. I'm one of the leaders of the Business and Corporate Blogging section. I'm joined in this task by Microsoft geek, Nick Hodge, and Web 2.0 business coach Des Walsh. I look forward to the discursive nature of this conference and to the opportunities to further articulate the value of this great activity.

I've been in the papers and on radio again regarding the Daylight Savings issue. New Queensland Premier, Anna Bligh is a supporter of DLS, but she's against the split time zones. I'm still convinced that multiple time zones can work intra-state, but I'd be just as happy if the whole state adopted DLS en masse.

For those of you just visiting this blog because you're interested in the debate, can I draw your attention to these resources on the issue:
- My SEQ DLS petition (now closed)
- The older, state-wide e-petition
- An older essay I wrote, 'Saving more than just daylight'
- A series of resources I collated some time ago on the issue
- A flyer and an information sheet that Nick Lloyd developed this year (email DaylightSaveSEQ@Hotmail.com for further information)
- Allan Clarke's brochure on the DLS research set up by our former Premier Beattie.

A very big thanks also to the wonderful Charles Wooley for having me on his program on this issue again today. It's always fabulous to speak with you Charlie and so fantastic to have your support!

Let's bring Brisbane back into the light!

This time Bush has attributed Mandela's "death" to sectarian violence in Iraq. Nelson Mandela was surprised to learn of his own death and felt it was perhaps a tad precipitant a report, not to mention, wildly inaccurate.

Even if Bush can't expire from his own sense of shame - clearly he doesn't have any sense at all - how is it that our own collective embarrassment and mortification is having no impact at all on his leadership?

It wasn't a scheduled disconnection. And now there are legal proceedings in place arising from the period of disconnection I can't say much about it other that my phone line was severed, and a series of service visits couldn't fix the problem.

But finally when a Telstra technician attended the query the problem was solved. So all of you who dislike Telstra, let me tell you, they are the *only* ones who know what they are doing.

In any case I'm back. Most of you probably didn't even miss me.