Sociocorpus

As we prepare to launch our own Web 2.0 offering OnlineGroups.Net, I am constantly looking around to get a feel for the space that we are entering. I won’t try to define Web 2.0, but I can point to a couple of the lists that I look at, and imagine being on.

The one I have most fun with is the The Museum of Modern Betas because it keeps changing, blog-style and has such a cool name. Dion Hinchcliffe’s list is a classic (and has logos) and he has now added more. The eConsultant Web 2.0 directory is huge. I’d like to see some Aotearoa (NZ) links pop up on Innovation Map. The listible list (where you can add and rate items) is Web 2.0 itself. And the Web 2.0 Awards illustrate some of the criteria for success. And LOGO2.0 provides a retinally overloading graphical representation.

There is no shortage of lists of Web 2.0 sites. There are even lists of lists.

Now, to see if we can get ourselves added to some of these.

After nearly four years developing the underlying open source technology GroupServer, we decided that it’s too good to keep it to ourselves. Sure, there are variouls successful GroupServer sites but we figure that lots of people don’t want a whole installation, they just want some groups or a site. So we decided to build a site where they can have that. After many months of polishing the interface and building the ’shop’, OnlineGroups.Net is open for business.

OnlineGroups.Net allows you to create your own site and then add online groups. Sites and trial groups are free. Our online groups work equally via email and the web. There are other tools that provide this but we believe that OnlineGroups.Net has the most usable interface. What other tools don’t do is allow you to have your online groups on your own site. With a little help from us, OnlineGroups.Net sites can be completely customised.

We want to have tens of thousands of sites running on this service so that we can make GroupServer better faster, and build our specialised services business. So please, start a site and try out our online groups, tell us what you think of them and, if you like them, spread the good word (web feed).

Collaborative technologies provide the opportunity to collaborate. People use them when they have the motivation to collaborate. If the motivation is high enough, and the existing opportunity is low enough, the technology doesn’t have to be that great (eg SMS). If the technology we are offering, however, is worse than what people are used to, then they won’t adopt it.

In the adult world, the default is email. If nine out of ten people adopt the new technology and one keeps using email, everyone has to keep using email. That’s why we built GroupServer and OnlineGroups.Net to use email.

In the youth world, there is no default. It’s a highly dynamic mix of SMS, IM, social networking and MMORGs.

So what do you do if people won’t adopt your technology? I think do as the Halcum folks do and adopt theirs.

I am working with Ron Kjestrup of Plains FM to launch an online public issues forum in Canterbury.

We’re going to use the approach taken by E-Democracy.Org and in the public issues forums in Minneapolis, St Paul and Roseville, Minnesota and in Newham and Brighton & Hove in the UK. OnlineGroups.Net has worked closely with Steven Clift and Tim Erickson from E-Democracy.Org as they have used GroupServer for all their online groups over the last few years.

The next step is to set up an independent and non-partisan steering team to support the forum. We are holding a public meeting for people who are interested in participative edemocracy, to introduce them to the public issues forum concept and to form a steering team.

If you are local, please support this initiative by publicising the meeting to people who are advocates for public participation in the democratic process. You can print and display this notice about the meeting (PDF, 37kb). And if you are interested in eDemocracy, please come along.

Although this project will help to build the profile of OnlineGroups.Net, it’s not commercially driven. I am doing it because I think it’s a good idea and I’d like to see it succeed.

The Sept. 19 issue of the NZ Herald quotes me as saying “Email has won”. It’s not actually my quote, or anything to do with lottery scams. It’s the reason that we’re doing OnlineGroups.Net and GroupServer. Email is the tool that is most used in people’s attempt to collaborate online, but it sucks for many to many messaging and file-sharing. The main problem is that email has no shared entitity for a group, and that’s what we provide. With GroupServer and OnlineGroups.Net, the group has a name, a url and an email address. Its messages, files, membership information are all visible online, to authorised users. People can participate in group conversations and file-sharing using both email and the Web. And all this can take place on a website that has regular pages and custom presentation. Sounds simple, yes? Well it’s taken us nearly four years but we’re nearly ready for prime time. Rebuilding registration is our last nasty task before we’ll be ready for tens of thousands of users. We’re also rebuilding the way groups are displayed, and adding a CMS/wiki-equivalent module. With plans for a release before Christmas, and to attract new site administrators to OnlineGroups.Net, you should be hearing a bit more from us online.

After blogging here for three and half years, I have joined the OnlineGroups.Net team, Alice, Michael and Richard, to blog in the new OnlineGroups.Net blog.

We’re using that to share our thoughts and conversations, so that the people and ideas behind OnlineGroups.Net are more visible on our site.