Tag Archive - Amazon

The “groundswell” is about relationships, not just technology

June 24, 2008 in Technology-Social Media with 0 Comments

I just posted this at Leadership Network’s book blog, so please take a look.

Li
So as you may or may not have noticed I have been on a reading spree with books that discuss new web 2.0 technologies and how they are influencing leadership, especially in the church (sidenote, this is the first book that I have read with my new Amazon Kindle; talk about new technologies are changing things).  The most recent book is Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies.  The book is co-authored by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff of Forrester Research.  Charlene has a very popular blog and is considered one of the leading experts in social media and technologies, so I was very interested in reading what all the buzz has been about.

This is book is focused around the idea of the "groundswell":

Simply put, the groundswell is a social trend in which people use
technologies to get the things they need from each other instead of
from companies. If you’re in a company, this is a challenge.

This is not only an interesting challenge if you are a company, but an interesting challenge if you are a church, since people within the church no longer need to go through the leadership or hierarchy of the community to get things done. With new technologies such as Facebook, Twitter, wikis, blogs, etc, more and more people within churches are taking action and doing things on their own or with a group of people.  The days where the flow of information, content and decision making travel through the pastor and the leadership are coming to an end if they haven’t already.  With this in mind, Charlene and Josh use this book to teach companies three important things:

  • Part One: Understanding the Groundswell
  • Part Two: Tapping the Groundswell
  • Part Three: The Groundswell Transforms

As a leader in the church I think this book is a must read.  And even though they are talking more about companies, churches can easily be inserted.

There is a lot of great research and application in this book such as the categories that make up the people online which is important to know when you are determining what type of technological tool you are going to use to reach your audience.

  • Creators
  • Critics
  • Collectors
  • Joiners
  • Spectators
  • Inactives

Throughout this whole book one thing kept sticking in my mind and it was this statement by them throughout the book:

It’s important to understand these technologies, but the technologies are the detail, and it’s tempting to get sucked into the detail.  So many words have been written about blogs and blogging, social networks, and user-generated content that you might think that understanding those technologies will equip you for the new world.

Wrong.

First, the technologies change rapidly. And second, the technologies are not the point. The forces at work are.  Like the jujitsu master, you must understand how bodies move, not just learn a single block or throw.  You must develop a feel for the groundswell.

With that in mind, here’s the principle for mastering the groundswell: concentrate on relationships, not the technologies.

In the groundswell, relationships are everything.  The way people connect with each other–the community that is created–determines how the power shifts.

That last quote is brilliant.  Technology is great, but it’s not about the technology, but about the relationships.  How leadership is carried out in the church is embedded in relationships, and now with the use of new technologies many relationships are changing.  So do your church a favor and read up on how you can best capitalize on the shifting relationships and technologies that those around us are using.

Kindle and the Continued Emergence of Online Collaboration

January 9, 2008 in Uncategorized with 1 Comment

In the previous post, What Buying, Collecting and Amassing Large Libraries of Books May Say About Us, I reflected a little on Amazon’s new wireless reading device, Kindle. A couple of the questions that I raised were:

  • Will a movement towards electronic reading promote more collaborative writing efforts? How will this effect new theological thinking and publication? And what will this do in terms of authorship and ownership?
  • What will be the future of publishing as we know it now?

Concerning these questions, I was most intrigued by this following passage in the article:

In a connected book, the rabbit hole is no longer a one-way transmission from author to reader. For better or for worse, there’s company coming.

Talk to people who have thought about the future of books and there’s a phrase you hear again and again. Readers will read in public. Writers will write in public. Readers, of course, are already enjoying a more prominent role in the literary community, taking star turns in blogs, online forums and Amazon reviews. This will only increase in the era of connected reading devices. “Book clubs could meet inside of a book,” says Bob Stein, a pioneer of digital media who now heads the Institute for the Future of the Book, a foundation-funded organization based in his Brooklyn, N.Y., town house. Eventually, the idea goes, the community becomes part of the process itself.

Stein sees larger implications for authors—some of them sobering for traditionalists. “Here’s what I don’t know,” he says. “What happens to the idea of a writer going off to a quiet place, ingesting information and synthesizing that into 300 pages of content that’s uniquely his?” His implication is that that intricate process may go the way of the leather bookmark, as the notion of author as authoritarian figure gives way to a Web 2.0 wisdom-of-the-crowds process. “The idea of authorship will change and become more of a process than a product,” says Ben Vershbow, associate director of the institute.

This is already happening on the Web. Instead of retreating to a cork-lined room to do their work, authors like Chris Anderson, John Battelle (“The Search”) and NYU professor Mitchell Stephens (a book about religious belief, in progress) have written their books with the benefit of feedback and contributions from a community centered on their blogs.

“The possibility of interaction will redefine authorship,” says Peter Brantley, executive director of the Digital Library Federation, an association of libraries and institutions. Unlike some writing-in-public advocates, he doesn’t spare the novelists. “Michael Chabon will have to rethink how he writes for this medium,” he says. Brantley envisions wiki-style collaborations where the author, instead of being the sole authority, is a “superuser,” the lead wolf of a creative pack. (Though it’s hard to believe that lone storytellers won’t always be toiling away in some Starbucks with the Wi-Fi turned off, emerging afterward with a narrative masterpiece.)

Fascinating stuff…..

I have been blogging for about four and half years and during that time I have had the opportunity to collaborate more online with others than was previously possible. Now I’m only a click away from collaborating on articles and some book ideas with those around me, and with Facebook, blogs, wikis and more the possibilities are endless.

I still enjoy going away alone to a quiet place or sitting in a coffee shop as I write, but the possibilities of collaborating with others (reading, writing, commenting, bookmarking) through some wireless reading device such as Kindle is so exciting.

This is an area that I have just recently begun to seriously think about, so I’m going to point you in the direction of some others who have been doing this already, and who have some more astute thoughts on some of these issues than I.

Check out Open Source Theology which is a site that encourages a collaborative effort in the development of an emerging theology for the emerging church. Not to be confused with emergent village.

Read Neal Locke’s Challenge to Emergent Authors

As for me. I’m currently exploring a collaborative writing project with four others through the use of a wiki. If anyone has any wikis they love using, let me know.