Groundswell- the power of the people

Technologies and and self expression on the Internet are becoming a force to be reckoned with. Personal blogs, user-generated content and podcasts are a few examples of these. A blog is a online journal with posts containing written thoughts, photos, links and videos just like the one you are reading right now. One in four Americans read blogs and more than half of online users in Japan read them as well. These blogs can be powerful manipulative tools and companies and organization should pay close attention to what these bloggers are saying. Companies should participate, read, and even comment on these blogs and take what people are saying to make improvements. Since there is no regulation on what bloggers can say, one hears the true opinions and feeling of the blogger.

Twitter 101

Twitter has become all the rage with real-time communications. This always up to date way of transferring information via computer or cell phone relays millions of messages of ideas, thoughts and knowledge everyday. Twitter lets you read or write messages up to 140 characters long to people that follow you on the site. Businesses can use this information for people tweeting about their company and use these for the betterment of the company. If its a good idea or you just simply like what someone is saying you can re-tweet the message and extend the message to users who may not be following the original author. You can also post pictures known as twit pics of anything you feel like. Businesses may use this to unveil new ideas or offer coupons or give users a sneak peek at a new product.

fiskateers

Like arts and crafts? So do a lot of other people. Fiskateers.com is a site devoted to craft workers and creative people who can share ideas and projects. On the home page there are links for their blog were you can watch videos, see photos and tread about craft projects from other users. Yo can also find and make friends from here, view a calendar of events, view the message board, join fiskateers, and visit the resource center. This is a very helpful site for all you do it your selfers out there.

Ready for the Internet like never before: About.com

About.com is a online community of knowledge based experts available to share their expertise with anyone who acquires it. These online experts offer answers to questions in the form of articles, recipes, tutorials, lectures and videos all found on the Internet. The experts on About.com are known as 'guides' that exist in what they call a neighborhood and just like a real life neighborhood this one is made of of people like you and me helping one another in our online community.

This is a very helpful with 'guides' having expertise in everything from health and pregnancy to poker and gardening. It boasts since 2000 that 20 Guide-sites have been named Forbes “Best of Web,” with 3 Forbes “Favorites.” Many Guides have been recognized for their outstanding contributions to their industries.

so next time you need help with a crying baby, maybe learning how to bluff in a game of poker or even how to get your tomatoes to grow bigger next season, check out About.com and see what they have to say.

Building a Knowledge Community at Hallmark Cards

In terms of people vs. technology at Hallmark cards. The technology is certainly capable of physically making a Hallmark card, but as far as the content of the card, this is solely left up to the people of Hallmark. No machine or form of technology is capable of extracting emotion and displaying them onto a card.

Knowledge Creation, Distribution and Sharing

How do you compile knowledge?
A stone age way of this is writing ideas and thoughts onto a notepad. Not to say that this is a bad way to create knowledge, but in todays day and age we have the internet and other resources of which to compile knowledge.
First to gain knowledge you must get it from experts. For example, scientists, doctors, lawyers and even ground workers who who can contribute knowledge that he or she has experience with in that particular field. To distribute this knowledge is to spread the knowledge to others via word of mouth through lectures or people contact, books, magazines, medical journals and also through the internet with the use of blogs, journals, and articles. Knowledge is of no use if we don't share it with others. To keep knowledge to oursleves almost makes the knowledge useless unless we plan on being the only ones to use it.

"Knowledge creates value to the extent we can move it around like electricty. "
-Thomas W. Brailford

Data

According to Wikipedia the term data means groups of information that represent the qualitative or quantitative attributes of a variable or set of variables. This means that anything taking meaning and being used for purpose can be used as data. As humans we take in millions and millions of peices of data every single day and sometimes without even knowing it. We process this data into information and then turn that information into knowledge which we use for personal gain. Wheither this is for making a good grade on a test or for figuring out which car insurance to purchase. We learn to better things and this all starts with data.