At the Supernova DC mixer I interviewed Dr. Jon Peha, a Carnegie Mellon professor in the Department of Engineering & Public Policy and the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering. Jon’s describes his role at the FCC in this interview, and discusses a bit about the the national broadband plan. He predicts a future with more possible tech solutions than we have today to access the net, as well as different service configurations.
He also briefly discusses Mesh Networks with me, and the pros and cons of making us all nodes in a network.
Thanks again to Dr. Peha for spending time with Supernova Hub.
Tim O’Reilly is the founder and CEO of O’Reilly Media, a computer book publisher and conference creator. O’Reilly is widely credited with coining the term “Web 2.0.” In this interview from the 140 Characters Conference in NY, I ask him how he thinks Web 2.0 has evolved four years later. He talks about the effects of Web 2.0 technologies on both consumer and enterprise spaces. He also discusses Google’s role in the ecosystem of Web 2.0, using the example of how Google’s mobile apps have helped create databases of speech recognition, and location based information.
Tim also speaks of the roles of curators and editors in the real-time stream. We finally discuss how FOO camp gave birth to the Bar Camp movement, and some of the future of the web community.
UPDATE: Tim has just published his “Web Squared – Web 2.0 Five Years On” report, and you can find some of the germs of that report in the video above.
Note: The lighting for this interview was not optimal, but the information is quite relevant, so apologies to the community and to Tim for some of the lighting artifacts.
Wendy Seltzer, a Fellow at the Harvard Berkman Center, joined me at the Supernova DC Mixer to discuss a number of subjects relevant to how law impacts the Network Age. She notes how technology innovation has brought control out to the user at the edges of the networks, and how intellectual property rules sometimes can stifle it. Wendy discusses patents and how they affect innovation and progress.
She also discusses the Chilling Effects Project, a clearinghouse for cease and diciest orders people receive that the project posts to help people understand their rights online. We discuss how such takedown notices can get sent, and what a user might do about it.
We look forward to hearing more from Wendy here at the Supernova Hub and at the conference in December.
kathrynshantz: #supernova SUPER thanks to Kevin and team – no booze but the talk and report was a rare and generous present about 10 hours ago from web · Reply · View Tweet
kathrynshantz: #supernova anyone who’s ever been in a small co that grew into a big co knows the drastic impact on knowledge flow about 10 hours ago from web · Reply · View Tweet
kathrynshantz: #supernova any good case studies out there of big companies that figured out how to opp like a small company? about 10 hours ago from web · Reply · View Tweet
kathrynshantz: #supernova -still think it comes down to scale enabling creative execution – small co’s have more creative edge about 10 hours ago from web · Reply · View Tweet
Persistance: RT @gbolles: “John Hagel & John Seely Brown @supernovahub mixer, talking about the big shift toward a networked economy” great convo & crowd about 10 hours ago from web · Reply · View Tweet
iPolicy: #supernova Chart said middle 6 yrs of Bush 43 was grt time for US bidness. Hard to see that, ROA not all that. about 11 hours ago from TwitterBerry · Reply · View Tweet
thekenyeung: Good times at the Supernova Mixer tonight. Very thought provoking & I even got @cathybrooks to almost laugh. oh, and got a cool takeaway. about 11 hours ago from TwitterBerry · Reply · View Tweet
DivShare: John Hagel & John Seely Brown @ Supernova mixer, talking about the big shift toward what I’d call the networked economy. (via @gbolles) about 11 hours ago from Tweetie · Reply · View Tweet
supernovahub: RT @gbolles: John Hagel & John Seely Brown @ Supernova mixer, talking about the big shift toward what I’d call the networked economy. about 12 hours ago from cotweet · Reply · View Tweet
chiah: Can look at knowledge flows or talent metrics by proxy, panel hopes to not go back to transactional measures. New paradigm time? #supernovaabout 12 hours ago from Snaptu · Reply · View Tweet
ahesse: Hagel (Shift Index): every public policy question should be reframed as a talent development issue (!) #supernovaabout 12 hours ago from TweetDeck · Reply · View Tweet
gbolles: John Hagel & John Seely Brown @ Supernova mixer, talking about the big shift toward what I’d call the networked economy. about 12 hours ago from txt · Reply · View Tweet
ahesse: #supernova – all work could be set as creative, problem solving. Use of right tools for knowledge flows and creation is key about 12 hours ago from TweetDeck · Reply · View Tweet
silverton: #supernova you. yes YOU won’t “let” me be “real” simply because my body isn’t there right now. personhood revoked. about 12 hours ago from web · Reply · View Tweet
kevinmarks: John Hagel: looking for proxies for knowledge flows – cant yet take it down to an individual company #sn09about 12 hours ago from mobile web · Reply · View Tweet
silverton: #supernova the only *why* of geo-aggregation is anachronistic & vestigial meatbot bias & behavioral inertia. about 12 hours ago from web · Reply · View Tweet
daveambrose: Shift Index: what type of Return should we track? What generates value add? Capital assets? Knowledge? Creativity?#supernova (via @ahesse) about 12 hours ago from Tweetie · Reply · View Tweet
supernovahub: IT focused too much on ‘Scalable efficiency’ and not on creating creativity for workers – John Hagel ^HG about 12 hours ago from cotweet · Reply · View Tweet
supernovahub: RT @chiah: Talking about passion in employees, most engaged workers find new knowldge flows- but these are often not the satisfied ones. about 12 hours ago from cotweet · Reply · View Tweet
kevinmarks: John Hagel: in a high growth environment you get inequality; question is how fluid it is – continual disruption of winners #sn09about 12 hours ago from mobile web · Reply · View Tweet
ahesse: Shift Index: what type of Return should we track? What generates value add? Capital assets? Knowledge? Creativity?#supernovaabout 12 hours ago from TweetDeck · Reply · View Tweet
ahesse: Hagel: “passion” is part of the Shift Index. Passionate people engage stronger in knowledge flows. #supernovaabout 12 hours ago from TweetDeck · Reply · View Tweet
chiah: Talking about passion in employees, most engaged workers find new knowldge flows- but these are often not the satisfied ones. #supernovaabout 12 hours ago from Snaptu · Reply · View Tweet
alevin: Is there evidence that the trend is global or is this us declining relative to rest of world? #sn09about 12 hours ago from Tweetie · Reply · View Tweet
kevinmarks: John Hagel: measuring worker passion is important – passionate workers join knowledge flows. Passionate people arent the most satisfied #sn09 about 13 hours ago from mobile web · Reply · View Tweet
ahesse: Hagel, Shift Index: ROA is declining. So, is that a problem? Return on knowledge and creativity is up. #supernovaabout 13 hours ago from TweetDeck · Reply · View Tweet
kevinmarks: John Hagel: companies failing to capture knowledge flows; Next report will look at company sectors and outside US #sn09about 13 hours ago from mobile web · Reply · View Tweet
ConcepcionBoldA: 1) Barriers down. 2) Competitive forces HIGHER #supernova Creative Talent: knowledge workers cash comp rising. about 13 hours ago from API · Reply · View Tweet
chiah: Listening to how speed of knowledge flows out is often bad for institutions and corporations but good for the rest of us. #supernovaabout 13 hours ago from Snaptu · Reply · View Tweet
kevinmarks: John Hagel: 3rd element is flow index – knowledge flows. Knowledge flows faster; innovation spreads, learns faster. Big co’s suffer #sn09about 13 hours ago from mobile web · Reply · View Tweet
larrychiang: 1) Barriers down. 2) Competitive forces HIGHER #supernova Creative Talent: knowledge workers cash comp rising. about 13 hours ago from txt · Reply · View Tweet
kevinmarks: John Hagel: companies caught between customers and creative talent both extracting the value, not going to return on assets #sn09about 13 hours ago from mobile web · Reply · View Tweet
larrychiang: Fixated on ROA (return on assets). Its collapsed 75%. Asset profitability has dropped. Labor productivity UP #supernovaabout 13 hours ago from txt · Reply · View Tweet
MagicSauceMedia: Am at Supernova mixer in SF at Wharton School, John Seeley Brown and John Hagel talk about The Shift Index Report about 13 hours ago from TwitterBerry · Reply · View Tweet
ggdm: At Wharton for the #Supernova event talking about The Big Shift. Can someone give Internets to the WIFi router beaconing the event? about 13 hours ago from txt · Reply · View Tweet
rycaut: I have migrated to the back room of a Starbucks on Howard across from the Rincon center. OJ, wifi & power before Supernova mixer about 15 hours ago from web · Reply · View Tweet
One of the key challenges in the Network Age is how to absorb all the information flowing through what’s being called the “Real Time Web.” Howard Greenstein spoke with Andrew Keen (self-proclaimed “Anti-Christ of Silicon Valley,” Author of “The Cult of the Amateur”), TechCrunch Co-Editor and moderator of the Real Time Stream Crunchup event Erick Schonfeld, John Borthwick, Kevin Marks, David Talley and others on the topic. Click the player above to hear the conversation. The conversation continues in the comments below.
Background: In recent video interviews on the Supernova Hub, Keen and author Clay Shirky, perhaps surprisingly, agree that the information flowing across our news, email, Facebook, Twitter and other networks needs to be curated and filtered. But will the curators be “experts,” acting as the gatekeepers of All The News That’s Fit To Share? Will we simply filter our information based on the concept of “greylisting,” where we simply see the items that were interesting to our closest contacts and colleagues? What can we learn from the TechCrunch event where experts gave their opinions recently?
Chat Transcript:
*** (18:04:37):Welcome to the Supernova Chat Room.
Supernova says (18:05:37):
welcome all
Kevin Werbach says to (18:06:19):
Ironic that we’re talking about the real time web today when Twitter was down for hours from a denial of service attack
Supernova says (18:06:28):
agreed
ccarfi says to (18:07:23):
Hi, all
Kevin Werbach says to (18:08:54):
Andrew sees real-time replacing email. Another reason that is happenign is the continuing growth of spam.
ccarfi says to (18:10:20):
if anyone has a question for the callers, either put them here, or if you would like to ask live on the call, please let me know.
Jonathan Trumper says to (18:11:39):
go bitly!
Kevin Werbach says to (18:11:47):
Who woulda thunk there was a biz in link shorteners?
Jonathan Trumper says to (18:11:58):
John did.
Kevin Werbach says to (18:12:03):
(I know)
Jonathan Trumper says to (18:12:12):
of course.
Kevin Werbach says to (18:12:12):
Johnborthwick says to (18:12:34):
thank.ly
Jonathan Trumper says to (18:12:39):
well said.
Supernova says (18:13:11):
welcome John . we’ll include you if you ahve a comment or question
Johnborthwick says to (18:14:05):
ok
Kevin Werbach says to (18:15:47):
Memory vs. consciousness? Yes, this is getting deep.
Supernova says (18:17:43):
maybe we should take it up a level
ccarfi says to (18:20:38):
“recency effect?”
Supernova says (18:21:21):
i want it now
Supernova says (18:21:34):
shiny object syndrome?
Kevin Werbach says to (18:21:54):
Is Facebook really about realtime? Even with the news feed, I mostly use it for connections, rather than stream updates.
Jonathan Trumper says to (18:24:39):
A new way of experiencing the world?
Jonathan Trumper says to (18:25:14):
Are we experiencing it with our minds or our hearts?
Johnborthwick says to (18:25:32):
here howard
Johnborthwick says to (18:25:50):
tell me what to do to talk
Supernova says (18:26:02):
we will addyou
Supernova says (18:26:04):
in 1 min
Johnborthwick says to (18:26:54):
ok
Jonathan Trumper says to (18:28:20):
All these streams…what Joseph Campbell spoke of -we’re “standing on a whale, fishing for minnows”
blephen says to (18:28:45):
fb is hardly realtime and i doubt it will ever be as “realtime” as twitter. i don’t see that as their core competency or their offering.
geoffabrown says to (18:29:26):
Perfect timing for this debate. I just finished reading “Cult of the Amateur” as research for a recent panel on Citizen Journalism and found Keen’s points to be quite relevant.
Supernova says (18:29:49):
is FB making pages the public component
blephen says to (18:30:22):
hi andrew, hi eric, it’sjeff, “the schwartz” here…interesting stuff both of you, thx.
Supernova says (18:30:36):
geoff if you have a quest. pls dial in and press 1 to ask it
blephen says to (18:34:42):
good point andrew
blephen says to (18:35:37):
this is a very old discussion that began back before web 1.0 dotbombed. glad to see/hear it recapitulated and mapped onto today.
Supernova says (18:36:21):
we’re open to your questions
Supernova says (18:36:27):
you can call in and press 1` or ask them here
blephen says to (18:39:23):
suggest folks take a look at this video rant by alan kay and andy van dam from last year’sprogramforthefuture.org conference. https://admin.adobe.acrobat.com/_a295153/p99875217/
blephen says to (18:39:51):
the stream from twitter contains 20+ percent bots…that’s well more than enuff to game the system
RandyGiusto says to (18:42:56):
regular people have to take the next step and look at Twitter apps to “get it” as Twitter.com is limited in functionality- great chat!
blephen says to (18:43:15):
it’s simple, you don’t follow your friends, you search subjects and look at people who are tweeting on the subject you are interested in. if they’re tweets are 20% useful, i follow them. in one hour i was able to uncover most of the backchannel on iran.
blephen says to (18:44:39):
it’s not about nowness it’s about relevence and context.
geoffabrown says to (18:46:30):
At our Social Media Club Los Angeles panel, Chris Tolles (Topix CEO) said, “assume all news from unconfirmed sources” as untrustworthy” and “you have to triangulate reports” to get at the truth. I prefer to wait for a trusted news source…
Supernova says (18:46:48):
excellent geoff but who do you trust?
blephen says to (18:46:59):
bingo
blephen says to (18:47:10):
trust is the key
blephen says to (18:47:56):
what is a trusted news source?
blephen says to (18:48:43):
in an echo-chamber of spin, there are few “genuine” voices
geoffabrown says to (18:48:44):
Each source leans one way or another…I suppose you can have a better triangulation by taking a few different major media outlets
RandyGiusto says to (18:48:51):
Yes, I’ve created a “sages” group in TweetDeck that is growing, but it’s from following various streams and other industry people I know. Over time, I trust these people the most
blephen says to (18:49:41):
yes, editing is still an essential function
blephen says to (18:49:52):
but who is going to do it?
Jonathan Trumper says to (18:50:22):
public versus private sources
blephen says to (18:51:04):
that’s not true
blephen says to (18:51:11):
all the source data is hardly public
blephen says to (18:51:44):
much of the “source data” is just referencing hearsay
blephen says to (18:52:16):
there’s less and less real research and more and more obfuscation
David Talley says to (18:52:31):
One excellent source of credible filtering might be a professional association in the space (says the guy who works for a professional association).
David Talley says to (18:53:09):
Few associations are all that agile but they can catch up.
ccarfi says to (18:53:17):
yup.
Supernova says (18:53:51):
david – which association?
David Talley says to (18:54:09):
American Water Works Association (awwa.org)
RandyGiusto says to (18:54:22):
more data does not equal more insight, just more noise!
Kevin Werbach says to (18:54:33):
“slicing and dicing the stream”
blephen says to (18:54:50):
@randy, tru dat s/n ratio is the problem
geoffabrown says to (18:56:09):
News aggregators can add value by having various “trust” levels associated with each article they publish I suppose.
ccarfi says to (18:56:09):
David…you are totally on to something. Didn’t associations used to do “research” and publish it, but perhaps that raw-data info comes from the web now. But it’s too much, not credible, etc. So, assoc. can (re-)become the authoritative source?
blephen says to (18:56:44):
remember that associations often have a bias of their own…
David Talley says to (18:56:51):
We do that now in old-web terms — online pubs, mainly.
blephen says to (18:57:48):
what is needed i think is a spin indicator…hey there’s an idea for a biz…mebbe i’ll get to work on that.
geoffabrown says to (18:57:50):
Great call everybody. Thank you very much Supernova.
David Talley says to (18:58:12):
Those researched original stories & papers take time, though. We may be ignoring an opporunity to pick up bits from our community and retweet or post the best, according to our informed judgment.
blephen says to (18:58:13):
yes, great call. thx
JulianG says to (18:59:58):
Thanks
blephen says to (19:00:09):
just remember as billy wilder said: taken individually, the audience are all idiots, but together they are genius
When you think about Clay Shirky, author of Here Comes Everybody, and Andrew Keen, author of Cult of the Amateur, you don’t usually look for places they agree. However, in the two video interviews posted today (Clay, Andrew) on the SupernovaHub, it is clear both of them are noticing similar problems keeping up with the real-time web.
The real-time web should be familiar to those who try to parse their Twitter feeds for critical information, or attempt keep up with the flow of information from their friends on the Facebook newsfeed. Much of the information is raw, unfiltered, out of context, or just random. Google’s Udi Manber notes in this piece from ReadWriteWeb that “Search has to be lightening fast, relevant comprehensive fresh, but the main point is that even that is not enough.” So, even Google is having trouble returning real-time, relevant and contextual information.
About 4:45 into Clay’s video, he talks about what’s new and next, including the concept of Greylisting (origninally a term describing technology that would dissuade email spammers) now being used to describe a way to limit information flow from the real time web. “Only show me stuff that x number of my friends, and their friends also thought of as important.”
About 4:45 into Andrew’s video he talks about real time web, and notes that Twitter and other services are unmediated and potentially overwhelming. He mentions the example of Middle-Eastern news network Al Jazeera , who reported at Jeff Pulver’s 140 Characters Conference that they actually have a team that monitors Twitter during certain events, curates the tweets, and presents an edited and logical flow to their viewers and readers.
Keen, who famously railed against the flow of consumer generated media in Cult of the Amateur calls for more editorial and filtering in his interview, and this isn’t surprising. Shirky, who’s much more positive in Here Comes Everybody about the power of “Everybody” to create, publish and organize, is also calling for filtering. They both approach the problem different ways, with Clay looking for programmatic solutions to use our friend’s actions as a filtering mechanism, while Andrew is looking for the human filtering of editors.
Keen’s approach is less scalable, though proven through years of traditional media workings (by result if not by business model.) Shirky’s desire seems possible, but difficult, with the same issues of search-vs-find we have with search engines now coming to mind. UPDATE: The topic calls to mind the concept of a curator, whether digital or analog, to help us along.
How will we parse the real time web? We hope to bring you more from both these authors and from others on this topic here on the Supernova Hub and at the Supernova 2009 conference.
In this video interview from the Personal Democracy Forum 2009, Clay Shirky, author of Here Comes Everybody, discusses the Iran Twitter situation (but doesn’t want to call it a “Twitter revolution”). He tells Howard Greenstein how the immediacy of this kind of media reporting affects us differently than standard news programming. Clay also discusses the overload many people experience when trying to parse the real-time web, a topic of interest to many who are interested in the Change Networks theme of Supernova 2009.
Of addition interest is how Clay’s opinions about filtering the real-time web coincide with those of Andrew Keen, who has a very different take on the “everybody” Shirky discusses in his book. This was worthy of a post about the real-time web and filtering.
In this video, Andrew Keen, author of Cult of the Amateur and talks with Howard Greenstein about his views on the value of real time, in person interaction in the age of online social networking. Additionally, Andrew has some very insightful comments regarding our need for filtering and editorial oversight in the age of the real-time web, which is a very important part of the Change Network theme for Supernova 2009.
UPDATE: Even more interesting (and worthy of its own blog post) is the way Keen’s views and those of Clay Shirky intersect.
At Personal Democracy Forum 2009, I caught up with David Isenberg. He’s famous for telling the Bell companies what they didn’t want to hear – that a “Stupid Network” would eventually replace their smart, centralized one as the main place people communicate. David is never shy with his discussions on policy, and runs an excellent Freedom To Connect conference each year for future thinkers and policy makers.
In this interview, David talks about his take on Change Networks, and notes how, without the stupid network of packets, we’d be missing all sorts of innovation.
We hope to hear more from David at Supernova 2009.
Yesterday, about 600 Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, VCs, and social media geeks piled into the historic Fox Theatre in Redwood City for the 4th annual TechCrunch CrunchUp. Instead of turning off our cellphones and keeping it dark and quiet, we filled the room with the blue glow of laptop screens and the rainstorm sound of typing. And instead of sitting back for a summer blockbuster movie, we watched Robert Scoble on the big screen, video streaming live from England. (Well, okay, there were other panels and presentations, too.)
The topic of the day was Real-Time Streams, and it focused on the usual suspects: Twitter, Facebook, Twitter, Friendfeed, Seesmic, Google, and Twitter. A few curveballs were thrown in by way of the product demos, which tended to represent the smaller, more focused startups happening today: apps that aim to be a better Twitter, and apps that aim to make Twitter better. In the realm of real-time content streams, everyone seems pretty clear on which company is the winning horse to back.
At one point an audience member (someone from the People Browsr team) asked a pointed question to Chris Cox, VP of Product at Facebook:
When I create content, I select that I want it to go to everybody, but you don’t make it public and searchable. I want it to be public and searchable. Why won’t you let me have a public stream?
Cox reiterated that they’re examining a number of things, and tactfully dodged the question. (At which point Kevin Marks leaned over to me and whispered, “It’s public to ‘everyone except Google.’ No really. They’ve said this to me.”) The questioner jumped back in:
I don’t think that’s an answer! And I think that if you don’t get this sorted out in the next year or so, we’re going to meet again at another little conference like this in the future, and we’ll find that Little Twitter will have taken over.
The audience applauded.
Meanwhile, back out in the commotion of the lobby (where a platter of pastries stood in place of the traditional popcorn machine), Twitter for Dummies author Laura Fitton was quietly unveiling her super-secret angel-funded startup project, OneForty.com. “It’s a Twitter app store,” she announced, and proceeded to show off the cross-referenced catalog of 1100 twitter applications. “It’s going to be a marketplace.” When someone in the crowd asked why the apps didn’t have user-generated ratings or reviews on them yet, she responded, “That’s because you’re the third person to see this.”
The busy lobby was also the home to a makeshift gallery of large works of art by cartoonist, Hugh McLeod. Hugh designed the poster for the event, and spent the after-party sitting at a table by the entrance turning each poster into a custom signed cartoon. He announced in his conference recap at gapingvoid.com that every single piece of art displayed at the conference sold that day, and then some. (Congratulations, Hugh!)
The after-party was held at the August Capital offices on Sand Hill Road — a shoulder-to-shoulder outdoor gathering of cocktails, decadent sorbets, and a brilliant sunset.
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