DIYfrastructure

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Kevin Werbach writes on the worth-watching Supernova blog about “the next communications network”:

“WiFi is taking off as a grassroots phenomenon. More users leads to more access points, which leads to WiFi being built into more devices, which pushes down costs, etc. With enough density, WiFi could be the basis for the phone and broadband network of the future.”

This reinforces what Nicholas Negroponte was saying in his WiReD piece “Lilypads and Frogs” that got me thinking back in September. I clumsily married some of these things together, along with some carfreeLondon in a talk I gave on the “hypermobility” track of the “beyond the Backlash” thinktankathon, entitled “DIYfrastructure” [1.8mb powerpoint in need of annotation]

Also – Danny’s writing about the idea that was at the core of our carfreeLondon proposal:

“I think [the] largest hurdle public transport has to overcome, I think, is the feeling of powerlessness and unpredictability it induces in most people. I think you can go a long way to reducing that – without requiring any heavy initial investments in public transport itself, by harnassing this new tech.”

I made a very brief talk about at this the social software summit in NYC: DevelopingBlurryspace/Blurrytime: giving people control over their time and space through technology. More on this later. There was a somewhat similar presentation which was a little higher on style than substance by someone from Ivrea entitled “Fluidtime” at Doors7.

Dialogue on Doors7

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Been meaning to write up something a little more considered than my raw notes on Doors7 [here, here, here and here] – and haven’t managed it what with all my comings and goings, laziness and, erm, work.

As a result I’ve been getting some feedback about the notes, and my use of the phrase “usefully-annoying” to sum up my experience there.

So, it was with a certain trepidation I clicked on the email I received from event head-honcho, John Thackara; but in the resulting email-tennis, I think we got to an understanding: I certainly came to refine my reaction to the event through doing so.

John has kindly allowed me to publish his email here, and I’ve published my reply – which comes as close as I think I’m going to get to a reflection on Doors7 in the time I’ve got right now. It’s kinda long, but I hope y’all enjoy it as much as I did briefly corresponding with John.
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HiptopPlanet

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Once or twice in a week, I go and visit hiptop nation.

I love it. I still love it.

It’s so full of little slices of realness.

Low, low, cross-cultural barrier to entry (cf. previous post about this) No need to be a great writer, thinker, proselytizer to blog there… Just see something that catches your eye and post it…

It’s got so much – no other word than the very cheesy, disneyfied – ‘heart’.

I love it like almost no other place on the web – it’s being let in on
millions of little personal places all at once. I can’t wait until it’s
HiptopPlanet. I want to see tacos in Texas next to street violinists in
Vienna next to schoollife in Kabul next to crazy bleachhair Ginza action in
Tokyo.

It’s going to be like those cheesy ads that tech companies used to run full
of images of grinning gap-toothed farmers in paddy field next to wall-st
brokers or something, except it’s been handknitted, ground-up by a bloke
called mike who just happened to love his hiptop.

Some lovely things this morning:

I’m not really thinking too critically about this at the moment, just preferring to enjoy the web getting “more real”, more open and react until I can participate: but there’s been lots of people are, with much comment about ‘this’ lately, mostly hubbed-on Justin Hall’s ‘Moblog’ writings:

» Justin’s original piece in “The Feature”
» Adam Greenfield on HipTop Nation
» Smartmobs Category: The Mobile Many

Possidifficulty

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At Doors, one of the participants mixed up his words while presenting, and said instead of ‘possibility’ the wonderful, fantastic:

“Possidifficulty”

This word has already found much usage, in my work-life particularly, for example:

“that phase of the project is an area of possidifficulty”

Or, with elbow-patches on my blazer and attempting my best, most-pompous Carl-Sagan-type voice:

“Social software is an area that presents boundless possidifficulties”

Try it yourself! The possidifficulties are endless!

Groups online, and the Turing test.

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I thought, somewhat flippantly, a while back:

Could a group of full of non-human, artificial participants be distinguished from a group of humans participating in a mailing list or group message board.

If you joined a mailing list full of sufficiently-advanced bots, how long would it take you to tell the difference, if you could at all?

In social situations, are we more easily fooled?

Pretty, difficult.

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Stewart’s diagrams showing overlaps of social networks in the GNE are beautifully reminiscent of Buckminster Fuller’s “Tensegrity” structures.

They also bring home the messy, nuanced and subtle nature of human social relations, and the attendent difficulty of recreating/augmenting them in a media where the ‘experience design[ed]’ is sometimes little more than “one page of paper after another slapping you in the face on a windy street” [© Jessica Helfand]

A hunch of mine is that successful social-software will seem messy like a meatball to plan, resource, design and build, but will have the beauty and poise of Bucky’s tensegrity structures when it happens…

Social Saffo-ware

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The mass-amateurisation of futurology commences, with this BBC site that uses the DNA engine to create a collaborative speculation on things-to-come, with the somewhat-perverse goal of turning it all into a book.

It’s going to be interesting to see how it develops, and how the mix of ‘celebrity writers’, ages, newbies and H2G2 regulars works out: already there is a certain extropian/hitchhiker’s guide flavour to the contributions that might raise the barriers to others?

Also, it will be fascinating to see how the influence of a ‘deadline’ and editorial process for the physical publishing of the book create feedback for the community’s efforts.

Some selections of what’s there so far:

Another thought about collaborative authorship projects such as this: does a reliance on text that most of the existing tools/platforms/environments mean a bias toward those who are literate in the first language of the website in question; with a corresponding bias towards the age, education and nation-of-origin of those able to participate?

Perhaps Josh and the other Futurefarmers’ new project “Co|Mix” points a complementary path forward.

» www.bbc.co.uk: BBCi book of the future