Virtual communities can learn from evolution
Stumble It!Evolutionary science has many lessons for our online communities
David Bollier offers a very interesting overview perspective of a workshop co-sponsored by the Berkman Centre and The Gruter Institute.The workshop, involving lawyers, biologists, social scientists, technologists and policy experts, focussed on what evolutionary science and "commons scholarship" can teach us about the social architecture of co-operative on-line communities ('on-line commons').
Topics such as:
- How people share real life "common resources"
- The importance and practicalities of "reputation systems" in reducing the risk of dealing we people we don't physically meet
- How we can learn from natural immune systems in the ways we can protect the online community against 'rogue outsiders'
- The experience of Open Source Software (OSS) as a victory of ST ("Social Technology") over IT and the innovative energy released through common ownership approaches
These are important topics for those of us trying to develop a more biological and evolutionary view of organisations, teams and networks
Digg | 
del.icio.us | 
Reddit | 
Yahoo! | 
Add to my favourites
Bioteams Books Reviews
BIOTEAMS book just published
You followed the blog; you listened to the podcasts; you watched the movies; now read the book! “Bioteams: High Performance Teams Based on Nature's Most Successful Designs” is now available from Amazon.
Buy it now from:
Amazon.Com
Amazon.Co.UK
Related Collaboration Research & Science Articles
Teams of self-managed collaborative robots could be employed as security guards
A swarm or a team can collaborate to overcome what a single robot might not be able to do.
Swarm behavior and organizational teams
Frank Lacombe of the Evolutionary and Swarm Design Group at the University of Calgary offers a good introduction to the concept of Swarm Behavior. Using examples of ants, bees, birds, fish, and termites he identifies the two main advantages of such decentralized systems: robustness and flexibility. The objective of bioteaming is to realise these same two swarm behavior advantages in organisational teams and inter-organisational business networks.
IBM readies workforce for an "On Demand" world
Cross-training, identifying needed skills and boosting interdepartmental cooperation are key to IBM's responsive business strategy.
Leave a comment