A few days ago I was reading with much interest this article on Robin Good’s blog about an in-depth analysis of the italia.it portal. He mentioned also our little collaborative effort and reading that I smiled childishly.
He connected it with the concept of crowdsourcing (the term was, I think, conied by Jeff Howe) , that is the perfect definition of phenomena like ritalia:
Crowdsourcing can be looked at as an application of the wisdom of crowds concept, in which the knowledge and talents of a group of people is leveraged to create content and solve problems. The official definition from the term’s originator, Jeff Howe, is “the act of a company or institution taking a function once performed by employees and outsourcing it to an undefined (and generally large) network of people in the form of an open call.”
After a few days Robin himself joined the crew giving suggestions on how to structure the initial discussion for the unconference. I must admit that at that time I perceived that advice as not totally in focus with the goal and spirit of the event, and thus took the position of letting the conversation flow freely from the very beginning, to let the event tune itself on the audience. The result was somewhere in between, but I’ll discuss that in the next post.
The fact I want to point out is that Robin was at that point perfectly aware of the expectations of the blogosphere, and I think this is part of his “secret” and genius.
This, and the fact that, meeting him in meatspace was an amazing experience! Always smiling, supportive and unstoppable, he’s been the only reliable point of contact between the event and the internet throughout saturday’s barcamp
A truly inspiring figure. Thanks Robin!
