Some times ago i have posted something about microcontent and wikis…

Now there are two innovations: a sort of blog wiki…
and an intellligent use of wiki + Tiddlywiki as a comfortable way of publishing content as an aggregation of microcontent…
From MicroWiki:

The MicroWiki is meant as a collaborative project. If you want do contribute or discuss the wiki’s content, please leave a comment on the MicroBlog or mail to conferenceATmicrolearning.org. Contributions will be included in the next updated version of the MicroWiki (at least every two weeks).

A Wiki is a special piece of software that makes creating and updating hypertext extremely easy and intuitive. If you have visited Wikipedia, as you should, you know that ‘classical’ wikis can be updated online on-the-fly, in principle by anyone.

The TiddlyWiki-technology this MicroWiki is using is different, because it is not a server-side wiki.
There is no database behind it: just Javascript and CSS packed into oine single HTML file. You can change and expand your own MicroWiki (or begin a TiddlyWiki of your own on any subject), but to do this you have to download the file to your computer first (see SaveChanges).

Thanks to an extraordinary Danny Ayers bookmark, i’ve found two important things:

  • an important example of bringing up Semantic technologies and Social software to make an interesting piece of innovation in usability from the end user point of view, and not only: System one activities…

    For a start there’s seamless integration of enterprise info and authoring with real-time analysis of what you write. Although there are some familiar technologies involved as well (Wiki/blogging, syndication etc), the tech is presented in a way that from a user’s point of view, it gets out of the way and just works.
    There are capabilities like custom (semantic) form building available, but even those look designed to be maximally user-friendly.
    Probably the most notable thing about the system is that though there broad facets (context) and views (perspectives), most of the navigation is mostly relevance-based and changes in real time as you interact. Compared to some of the other knowledge management tools out there, I reckon this does deserve the epithet “groundbreaking”.

  • a link about Microlearning.org, where i’ve found some good points of interests…

I’m very impressed…

We have the data itself more semantically and in a indipendent vendor format…

The freedom and the power on my own data is something that i cannot explain… It’s a wonderful step to an innovative way of thinking software, programs and data…

It’s something that let us to aggregate information in a bottom-top way…
That’s the point…

The core principle of the Semantic Web is the extension of documents by so-called metadata that categorize and link the content they refer to. Frequently, this categorization process is carried out by experts rather than by the users themselves, as the structuring tools available are usually very complex. This reductionist, top-down approach to a problem that basically occurs from the bottom up often fails.

In contrast, System One generates semantic structure (ontologies) in three different ways that consistently and meaningfully extend the shared pool of structured data:

* Automatic processing of information, content, context, and usage in time.
* Provision of basic, universally available definitions.
* Integration of easy-to-use tools for optional personalized and collaborative structuring.

System One makes it a lot easier for individual employees to work with structures by allowing to extend free associations of resources and by making folder hierarchies obsolete. At the same time, machine processing of information rertieval results greatly increase in quality and practical usability.

This is a key problem: it’s difficult also to experts decide the correct property to apply in a context, or the ontology…
That’s why the tags and folksonomies are a success, in the beginning…

Capturing the freshness of social software with the formality of ontologies in a user-friendly way IS the fight of the future…
And of the present…

Some ideas about Microcontent and context

From this post, i’ve found this idea:

Jeff Jarvis raises the interesting question whether content can live without context. This is not only relevant for content, such as books, but also for MicroContent. My definition of MicroContent is that is does not need context. I should add to this sentence “to be understood”. The idea of MicroContent is that it can be read, used, created and exchanged without any context needed.

But naturally as soon as you link to a MicroContent Item, add an Item to your playlist, find an Item, etc, you already have created or used context. But that is not part of the MicroContent Item itself. It seems that people need this context. That is what the web and thus also the MicroWeb is about. So I guess I agree with him, without context no (Micro-)Content. The pointer in your head to the book on your shelf is already context.

The idea is that context is WHEN we take a content, when we use it and so on…
And thinking of RDF model, the resource and property relationship…
I’m not sure of the implications…

I’m thinking on it…

There is also something in the System One blog, that needs another reading…
-> Catjects
I must tell you: all the blog entries are VERY interesting and fun to read…
There is a lot of potential…

I’ll read it all in the next days, i hope that i’ll find the time…
This company is very cool, reading its creation:

The omnipresence of a graph perspective changed a lot: Not only media contents became hypertextual and non-linear, but also the basic storage technologies behind them. And most important: Society as well.
2003 the Web 2.0 gained momentum, breathtakingly fast. Suddenly dozens of great small services appeared like vernal flowers, allowing people to articulate, organize and communicate themselves better and easier than ever before, and in a digitally adressable way. People started talking to, sharing, reflecting and remixing each other. If the fragmention of global society wasn’t fast enough, this was adding even more speed to process. Especially the economic change was crucial to us: If companies need to adapt but don’t have the tools, there is a market.
But we also knew from some projetcs that Social Software works well for individuals with shared mindset, but mostly fails within organizations. Comparably few people form the backbone of the Blogosphere or Wikipedia, which by the way isn’t a point on the web. A percentage certainly not high enough to grant those concepts success within the closed community of an organization. For 99% of the employees, the clear benefits where missing. It wasn’t our mission to evangelize people within companies, but to provide them with a set of tools that we knew will work and also enough personal benefits to use them. The Semantic Web backend paved the way: Hey, everybody gets too many emails, has to take care of too many files and knows that there is more than comprehension (even Google supported) allows out there on the web.
So why don’t we stop trying to convice everbody to switch to Social Software but rather use our Wikilog ideas as collaboratively written navigation layer on top of the ubiquitous information overload?
So now everything was making sense.

work in progress