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Iskander Pols @ SmallRivers 1

A perspective:

Communities of interest & walled gardens

(by Iskander Pols @SmallRivers )

The web represents many things to different people. But it is generallyabout just one thing: connecting people through and with content.Websites and blogs provide easy means to distribute and share ideas,videos, photos, announcements, schedules, services, etc. with like‐mindedpeople, people with the same interests, similar needs or shared passions.These websites can be large or small. That is not to say websites such asYouTube and Flickr represent one single, large, community. They in factrepresent a multitude of smaller ones. This is because they just offer userstools to produce content. And that content, while freely available, is oftennot really meant for everyone. It is there because the tools are there, butit is meant for people that can put the content in context, that have ashared affinity with it. You will undoubtedly have noticed that most of theavailable content is meaningless (to say the least) for you. But it willrepresent something to a select few.How does one find something of interest in the ever‐growing mass of content? While technology, with search engines and tagging, has gone along way in helping us in that direction, filtering the available content isincreasingly becoming an issue. All the more so because it is centralizedon just a few sites. People‐based recommendations are certainlyunderused in this undertaking. You may have noticed yourself thatpertinent content for you, content that matches your interests, passions,humor or style is often pointed out to you (e.g. by a shared email link to aYouTube video) by someone you know, someone you trust and of course,someone who knows you. So much so, that what is important is not somuch the creator of content, it is the person pointing it out to you. Thisbond with the sender will significantly enhance the receiver’s experienceof content.People group around affinities, to share, discover or exchange stuff relevant to them. Never, at least not lastingly, for something that has littleor no relevance! Relevance is probably the single most important factorensuring the success of any web endeavor ‐ if relevance is delivered to

The web…connectingpeople through and withcontentBroadcast media used asa group communicationtoolContent filtering…theimportance of people‐basedrecommendationsRelevance, relevance &relevance !

Iskander Pols @ SmallRivers 2

someone over time, then that person will stay faithful to the offered webexperience. More importantly, that person has a much greater chance inbecoming an actor in improving the experience for all involved.Smaller, tailored, community websites typically provide that relevance.They are the ones that represent an affinity around which people group.They are the ones that have the people providing what they deem isimportant and pertinent for others within their communities. They are theones to provide a natural filter to the available content on the web.The diversity of content found within such sites (announcements, results,photos, videos, schedules…) makes it illusory to expect them to exportthemselves left and right to use tools to create content and communicatewith and around it outside of their own websites. Rather, these tools needto be provided and used within the community websites ‐ ideally in anintegrated fashion. The resulting content is most pertinent within thecontext provided by these websites. It is where the full potential of thecontent’s value is unlocked.Communities are not walled gardens. Some of them ven depend onothers to do what they do. Some are connected through shared affinitiesand exchange ideas and know‐how. Talking of the web, content can thusbe relevant to more than one community. Whether it is a research paperof interest to just a few, or a video on global warming that will be of interest to many ecological groups around the world. Same content,different contexts. The challenge here is twofold. First, enabling thediscovery of synergies with other communities and available content toshare. Second, connecting the distributed discussions around sharedcontent. This last point is extremely important as we have been used to“hijacking” content from all over the web for our own usage, but in sodoing, cutting ourselves off from what others are doing with and aroundthe same content elsewhere. There ideally needs to be a way to haveshared content on a community website, within a given context, but withan easy mean to also discover who else is publishing the same content, ina different context, and share the discussions happening around it.And you guessed it, this is where SmallRivers comes in... :‐)

Community websites ascontent filtersBring content back towhere it matters andmakes sense : thecommunity websiteYou are not alone, or thebridging of communities

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Communities of Interest & Walled Gardens

A brief perspective on the interest but difficulty of bridging communities (and people) sharing the same interest.

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Category:	Research > Internet & Technology
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Upload Date:	05/13/2009
Copyright:	Attribution Non-commercial
Tags:	communities interest web content share communities interest web content share (fewer)