NextD Journal I ReReThinking Design Conversation 29
The Sky Room
game the now well-known system. For these folks what matters is what matters in the context of the search engine universe, not what matters in terms of broader community considerations. Some of the worst list and blog behavior can be seen coming from those bloggers who claim mastery of the system. In high contrast to our friend Grover working over on Sesame Street this tends to look behaviorally more like Freddy working the Nightmare on Elm Street [G9]. In such communities technology awareness is king and human behavior is considered a throw away. Some communities of practice that consider themselves to be movers and shakers are well on their way to embedding such behaviors and tonalities into their community cultures. Regardless of whatever technologies might be in the mix it is ancient thinking to assume that behaviors are not an important part of any innovation equation in teams, in organizations and in the broader community. Cross-disciplinary innovation 101 includes the very real notion that behavior matters. Without such awareness, without such skill what you see in action most often is unenlightened industrial era behavior that really has nothing to do with the technologies being used. To some degree the technologies are masking and enabling these behaviors. I am quite sure that Marshall McLuhan would be more interested in the behavioral impact of these technology tools/games then on the mechanics of search and feeds. It is no secret that presently most blogs and lists have built-in behavioral dynamics not too dissimilar from first person shooter games. For some, part of the game is to draw the dialogue into the game system where it can undergo the first shooter dynamics. Non-participation in the game is particularly not appreciated by the gamers. Lots of energy is being expended out there in this regard with virtually no acknowledgement and probably often no knowledge regarding such dynamics. Clearly some see the blog/list gaming mastery as among the highest form of knowledge today while some of us see that focus as part of the dumbing down of community dialogue. Many thought leaders that we interact with would agree with Peter, that in spite of all of the hoopla around blogs it is in print form and in face to face dialogue form that you are more likely to find deeply useful knowledge. To assume that blogs and lists are just on line versions of off-line dialogues would be naive. Some of this likely connects back to what we talked about at the beginning of this conversation regarding the transformational directions of various communities. Suffice it to say that those of us who headed in the direction of SIA early on are very interested in the behavioral aspects of dialogue and innovation today. Rather then being out in the community acting out as worst offenders we think it is more constructive to strive towards helping others understand the impact of these technologies, and these behaviors on organizational innovation. Often what is being passed off as leading discourse in the blogosphere typically reflects a high awareness of technology and little awareness of human dynamics. From our perspective the more encouraging news in the big picture sense is that the community discourse picture is changing but not exactly at lightning pace. We do see the wave of design related graduate and post-graduate programs coming on stream as an emerging force that is already changing the level of community discourse. In five Page 21 of 29