Couple of interesting comments to my last post. Harvey Kirkpatrick from itopik wrote:
"I would argue that all the efforts are complementary and can be automated by some and humanified by others. We are choosing to humanify a bit the process hoping to be a bit more intelligent in our organization as Yahoo was in the beginning. Seeing linkages that perhaps software might miss. Granted slower, but in the end a lower signal to noise ratio we think."
It's a good point - we humans have a marvelous ability to 'think outside the square' and see linkages where computers can't (right now). But I think computers are at their most useful when they automate tasks, which frees up the human brain for more creative things.
I am day-dreaming though. In practical terms itopik is successfully 'doing the business' promoting weblog topics, as are k-collector and Topic Exchange. The developers are out there taking risks and building stuff. All I can do is applaud and support those efforts in my weblog. As Harvey says:
"It is my hope that we can build a village of good efforts and be mutually supportive."
The other interesting comment on my previous post was from Prometheus 6, who linked to me out of blogging courtesy (or charity?). But I'm glad he did because it made me realise I need to clarify one thing. When I said that "Topics can and should be 'exactly the size of one idea'", I meant to make it clear that each weblog post can be associated with more than one topic. Prometheus 6 said it well:
"Really good, really informative writing can draw of diverse conceptual roots, and the "topic" can be "these multiple things correlate in this fashion," but it might not be...Good writing just kind of flows."
Speaking of "flow", I read Rogers Cadenhead's post the other night about the Russian positivity guru Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. He wrote a book called 'Flow'. Rogers quoted this gem, which I'll end my post with ('cause it's so darn positive):
"Problems are solved only when we devote a great deal of attention to them and in a creative way."
My post in response to Clay Shirky's article on Corante generated some interesting discussion. The time is ripe to discuss weblog topics, thanks to innovative new tools such as k-collector, Phillip Pearson's Topic Exchange, and itopik. I want to address a few points about organizing weblog posts by topic.
1) I still believe authorship is important. I have favourite bloggers who I will read no matter what topic they write on. They are authoritative voices and I trust them to inform and/or entertain me. But I also believe the blogosphere should allow for the emergence of new and alternative voices. One way to achieve this is to have a system that organizes information via topics. Otherwise A List bloggers will continue to dominate the blogosphere, like A List actors dominate Hollywood. Do the rest of us really want to be waiting tables the rest of our lives, looking for our big break in the blogosphere? Hmmm maybe the majority of us are better suited to acting in local plays, than on the big screen ;-) But either way, organising weblog posts by topics potentially gives more people a chance to be read in the blogosphere. And the more bloggers that are 'in the mix', the better the chance of finding new and unique ideas.
2) Topic generation should be automated. I've seen a few comments along the lines of: "Oh I wouldn't know what topic to choose, and anyway who's to say my definition of a certain topic will match other peoples definition?" This is a fair point and as I've been using k-collector, I've often wondered if I'm choosing the correct topics for my posts. There have also been instances of duplication or overlap of topics - e.g. there have been two topics about the new Matrix movie on the same k-collector cloud.
The answer (easier said than done) is to automate creation and management of topics, so us humans don't have to worry our pretty little heads about it. k-collector and Topic Exchange are on the right track, as they already automate some functions. For example when you need to choose a topic for your post using k-collector, the software automatically presents you with a list of potential topics to select from. Matt Mower has previously suggested there may be ways to fully automate topic assignation, which in a past entry I likened to an automated Yahoo!.
I'd like to imagine also that topics can someday be managed in a decentralized way, like the World Wide Web itself. Currently k-collector and Topic Exchange both maintain topics on a central server. Perhaps there is a peer-to-peer way to manage topics?
And my final point for now:
3) Topics are different than categories. I use Radio Userland as my weblog authoring tool and I have the option of dividing my posts into 'categories'. However I choose not to, because categories are too broad and they aren't flexible. Anil Dash posted an entry today about posts being the "atomic element" of weblogs:
"When I first wrote up the idea that had been percolating in my mind for the microcontent client, the one element that kept popping up was "meme-sized chunks [are] the natural idiom of the Internet". A post is that memetic chunk, exactly the size of one idea. Not coincidentally, a lot of emails are that size, as are a lot of instant messaging conversations."
Topics can and should be "exactly the size of one idea", whereas categories usually encompass a number of similar ideas. For example if I have a category called ".NET", then I may use it to file links to information about ASP.NET, my thoughts on how .NET can be used to build a Universal Canvas, how Microsoft is using .NET as the base for their next Operating System, etc. Many topics, but just one category.
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Here are some trackbacks from my original post...manually tracked mind you. Bring on the Radio trackback Matt :-)
http://www.corante.com/many/20030701.shtml
http://blogdex.media.mit.edu/track.asp?id=6045980
http://home.earthlink.net/~prometheus_6/
http://blogs.it/0100198/2003/07/02.html
Clay Shirky (via Ross Mayfield):
"The weblog world has taken the 4 elements of organization from mailing lists and usenet -- overall topic, time of post, post title, author -- and rearranged them in order of importance as author, time, and title, dispensing with topics altogether."
This is something that makes me a little queezy about weblogs. If I had my way, I'd rank the importance of topics as number 1. I would like my RSS Aggregator to deliver RSS feeds to me based on topics that I subscribe to, rather than by author. Don't get me wrong, an author's 'voice' is what makes a weblog unique and interesting. But I don't believe the blogosphere should rank the importance of a weblog post based on who the author is. Google ranks on topic relevance, why shouldn't the blogosphere?
For example, I am very interested in reading weblog posts about Longhorn. But I actually don't care who writes them. I'm curious about everyone's opinion - and I will make up my own mind about how relevant the information is. Right now I rely on Robert Scoble's weblog to deliver me new posts about Longhorn. Robert Scoble has a fantastic policy of giving everyone "one free link" and I enjoy the wide variety of weblogs he links to. It gives his weblog a feeling of openness and freedom. Everybody - A, B and C List bloggers alike - feels welcome to respond in writing via his Comments. It's no coincidence that Scoble's comments system is one of the liveliest and interesting on the Web (even though it is a bit funky - ie the software deletes stuff every now and then!).
Clay Shirky goes on to say:
"This "author-first" organization gives the weblog world a huge boost, as the "Who said what" reputation system we all carry around in our head is a fantastic tool for organizing what we read, as well as acting as a kind of latent bozo filter."
I couldn't disagree more with that statement - organizing what we read according to who wrote it is plain elitist. I'd much rather organize what I read based on topics - then decide for myself if it has any value. This is the beauty of a system such as k-collector, which Paulo and Matt have developed as a means to track and connect peoples weblog posts by topic. It's still in development, but so far I like what I see. I can browse topic pages and read through what various bloggers have to say on the same topic. It's a good way of discovering new voices - rather than simply reading the A List Bloggers.
To be fair, Clay does point out the one major downside of the "author-first" model of weblogs - the blogosphere becomes riven with personality clashes. This is particularly so amongst the A List Bloggers, who because of their high profile in the blogosphere have reputations to uphold and so frequently challenge each other. They engage in epic pissing contests and unfortunately the rest of us get sprayed too. It's not particularly fun to read and, as Rogers can testify, it's no fun to be on the receiving end.
Watching the Echo project unfold in the blogosphere is like watching the WWF's Royal Rumble - we see each A List Blogger climb into the ring, until about 30 of them are in there slugging it out. Who will be left in the ring at the end? Who knows, and I don't care. I'd rather just read and write about topics that are of interest to me, thanks. Leave the Web-wrestling to the pros (it's all fake anyway).
How can we improve the weblog world, so that it does take into account topics? Well I'd like to see new versions of RSS Aggregators give us some more options to filter weblog posts by topic. And Paulo and Matt, I look forward to the next version of k-collector. Keep up the good work!
Some quotes on the theme of content management (CM)...
Gerry McGovern: "The Web may have been the almost exclusive domain of techies. Today, it is increasingly the domain of communicators."
Bill Gates: "Whether it's handling a classified ad or handling editorials, the authoring tools for these things no longer require an IT department to be involved. The actual tools that the reporters, the managers are working with can understand XML."
Matthew Berk: "In five years, content management functionality will move in two directions: out to the desktop in the form of software like Office 11, and down to the infrastructure in the form of file systems that implement the essentials now seen in content management packages."
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The quote below from Dan Gillmor doesn't obviously seem to fit under the topic of "content management". But think about why Google bought Blogger:
Google = Read; Blogger = Write.
Read + Write (seamlessly) = the future of Content Management
Dan Gillmor, writing about Blogger and Google: "The first order of business for Evan Williams and his team was to upgrade the blog-posting software, and to put the Blogger-hosted weblogs on Google's more reliable server computers. But Williams said the team is also looking hard at the element of the read-write Web that Google does so well -- finding stuff."
