Twitter, the first ten days.

I tried to stay away. Really, I swear I simply am not that keen on sharing 140 character thoughts, notions and witticisms...but frankly, for better or worse, it appears that one is increasingly considered out of touch technologically if one is not tweeting, blogging and doing whatever the hell it is you do on Facebook. Particularly if you are in marketing, which certainly is part of what I do. So I got a Twitter account recently, and have been gently dipping my toes in the swirling chaos of millions of little thoughts.

A few observations:

At first I was puzzled why so many tweets were in initial caps. What was it about writing a tweet that inspired tweet authors to write like journalists of old with screaming headlines? Um, nothing, it turns out. The truth came to me when I decided to comment on an article from the New York Times -- most sites "prompt" you to tweet by offering the headline as tweet.  How thoughtful -- should I not care to craft a witty insight of my own I can just use what they provide. Easy!

Second, I was fascinated by the number of folks who always appeared to looking off the side (generally the viewer's right, so as to look as tho they are gazing lovingly at their tweet). This particularly seemed to be the case for what appeared to be professional, or business folk. This in fact inspired one of my early tweets, which I will repeat here (which is the point, isn't it?):

"New study shows 3 out of 4 twitter users unable to stare directly at camera."

Still makes me giggle.

Now, here's the thing I still don't really get -- most tweeting is simply retransmitting what smarter, more informed people have already written elsewhere. And generally, as noted above, with little added insight, other than reinforcing whatever beliefs that person already has.  Which is fine, I guess, but certainly makes much noise to filter thru, especially if you follow people with similar interests, as they are all tweeting and retweeting the same damn thing. 

What Twitter has motivated me to do is seek out people who are amply capable of making witty and clever statements worth reading. So far I have found Sarah Silverman to be worth reading, as well as The Onion (whose use of initial caps is perfectly acceptable).  Admittedly, I have not sought out too many others yet, but I am saddened (but respect them even more) by those who have chosen not to tweet, like John Waters (just the film maker from Baltimore, please) -- but I bet if he did they'd be particularly clever.

On a final note, it appears the dead are prolific tweeters.  Kurt Vonnegut has been active lately (and kudos to him, he only chooses to "follow" one single person -- Mark Twain), and you know what, when his writing is broken down into snippets and doled out one at a time -- it really works, but only because he was such a damn good writer in the first place.

Mediocrity of the crowds

Everyone may have a fundamental right to an opinion, but that doesn't mean they know what the heck they are talking about. And put enough of these people together, and well, welcome to the internet, 2010. Loud, anonymous and opinionated with little substance. Credibility and expertise be damned.

While the touted benefits of the hive mind help rationalize this embracing of mediocrity, it in fact makes it even harder to discover information of substance and value as the outliers, both superior and inferior, get clumped together as they are not of the "norm."

Practically speaking, this makes it harder to know what new books to read, what new music may be of interest, or if a movie or play is worth seeing. Not to mention the utter lack of meaningful serendipity. It is not for lack of opinions, but for lack of quality, substantive opinions. While the internet has made it exceptionally easy to solicit and contribute feedback or post one's grandest or most heart-felt insights to a blog (ouch), there is absolutely no guarantee the thoughts shared are of any value whatsoever. And even if there are postings of substance you may simply never find them, having to first wade thru dozens or hundreds of rants and ramblings.

A real problem with this clumping together of outliers is that it also makes it much more challenging to discover things that may be loosely but not directly of interest. Sure Amazon and Google can tell you what has occurred in the past (people who liked this bought that...), but they are lousy at predicting the future because it's, well, unpredictable.

The answer? Well, for as long as they are around, the best resources are still the traditional media, where people are directly compensated to articulate critical thoughts. Skilled writers and reviewers with years of expertise in specific domains. While one may not always agree with their opinions, there is at least respect for the wisdom applied. And by being trusted sources, they enable readers to make discoveries and connections that software simply cannot know to make.

NYTimes: Text without context

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/21/books/21mash.html

Really good article on the challenges facing online content and media, as well as the impact of those challenges on, well, all of us. The handful of books referenced seem worthwhile as well, I have already read Jaron Lanier's "You Are Not a Gadget" and I highly recommend it.

Free the desktop!

While virtualization is all the rage, making your word processor, spreadsheet and other day-to-day tools “virtual” still ain't solving your big problem. While your TCO can certainly be brought down, you aren't going to get a corresponding or greater return on productivity.

A brief history:

In the beginning, the application or program was the primary point of entry for the user. Then, as users installed more and more applications on their desktops (which begat more and more files), the file became the primary means for entry – click the file and the OS generally knew which program to launch. Today, we are in a hybrid environment of desktop apps, network client/server apps, files and URLs/URIs that connect to networked or remote hosted applications. And lets not forget "the cloud."

The problem with the desktop is simply that it is the wrong metaphor for the distributed enterprise. And, as illustrated by the floppy disk that represents “save,” software companies are loath to change “learned” metaphors. Great leaps are only made by taking risks (or at the very least stepping outside your comfort zone).

So how do you build a better desktop? By reinventing how you interact with business content and business process. Business process can provide a crystal clear lens into the enterprise that reflects and communicates exactly what an employee could, should or must do.

Imagine:

No matter where you are, or what device you are using (laptop, smart phone, kiosk, toaster), you log into your “workspace,” where you see the processes and tasks that define your job. As each task is selected, the relevant content, regulations and policies, subject matter experts and yes, the software systems, are exposed. Clicking on any one of them links to, contacts, or logs you into that thing. You in turn print, download or upload work files, enter data and collaborate with peers.

Bottom line – while virtualization is not solving the productivity puzzle, it certainly does provide some critical, enabling pieces. But the rest, well, is yet to come.

The imperative to reinvent business process

Why am I so keen on the idea of reinventing business process?

Because an amazing thing happens when an enterprise's business processes leverage the distributed nature of the Web.

Productivity...increases.

Unfortunately, this is not what traditional business process methods, tools and techniques were created to enable. Originally, they were developed to do essentially two things – one, to analyze how an organization operates and determine areas for improvement (which might or might not have resulted in a technology implementation); and two, identify resource types and definitions so that database schemas could be designed. Thus the tools created to do this are generally expensive and complicated, with steep learning curves. And the result, or output of these tools are diagrams either too large and complex to comprehend, or so granular and precise that they fail to communicate any understanding of, or relationship to, the enterprise as a whole.

For an enterprise to see dramatic productivity gains, the tools to do so must be in the hands of, and usable by, the business user – the person actually doing the work.

So what about business process needs reinventing? Four things:

1. Anyone should be able to document, or model, a business process with little or no training.
   
2. Anyone should be able to use the result, or representation, of a documented process to navigate the tasks and activities that define their role within the organization.
   
3. The documented process should directly connect process activities to all relevant content.
   
4. Human interactions with a process should act as feedback into the process, either validating it or indicating areas for improvement.

Determining the value of your content

A key challenge to connecting content is determining exactly what is useful and what is not.

The truth is this – the vast majority of information produced by the enterprise has little residual value to the enterprise.

The highest value content, or intellectual assets, are those that format, drive, guide or inspire the majority of information produced by employees. This "core asset set" may evolve and change over time, but it still sets the standards that define business value. The core set is the foundation for most content that is produced. Due to the critical nature of this set, and because it's generally small (relative to all content produced) the best way to manage these assets is manually as it must be continually refined and validated. However, once an inventory is complete, updating and evolving consumes little resources as it becomes self perpetuating if managed in the right kind of system.

The fresher the asset, the greater the value

New content produced from the core set is at its zenith in value the moment it is completed. Bottom line: the best work is always the most recent. As newer and newer content is produced, the value of the predecessor continually diminishes until it is reduced to archival status.

The real challenge at this stage is the location of the content, as the fresher it is, the closer it resides to the authoring mechanism. Thus, the very best content often lives in the least accessible places, the desktops and laptops of the creators. Making the freshest content widely and painlessly accessible is the real challenge, for both the system and the culture.

Archived content provides infrequent value

This is where search engines and content/KM management systems can be useful (though questionable in proportion to their cost), by automatically indexing and cataloging information stored throughout the infrastructure. Sure you'll have to sift through a lot of junk, but eventually you will find what you think you need. Odds are, however, if you didn't find it in the first two tiers, it's probably not all that valuable anyway – certainly not in proportion to the cost of the time wasted finding it.