Making the Most of the Cognitive Surplus

Source: f3llas.com

In his TEDTalk, Clay Shirky discusses the potentiality of the world's cognitive surplus. He uses the example of people pulling together to use their time and talents to create Ushahidi in the aftermath of the Kenya elections in 2007. He compares this use of time and talent to the use of time and talent it takes to make a lolcat, which though cute and sometimes entertaining only provides value to a specific community whereas the creation of Ushahidi created civic value. 



source (left): technologyreview.com; source (right): wired.com

According to Shirky, there are 1 trillion hours per year of participatory value available, yet what often comes of these participatory hours is not civic but communal value. His example of Ushahidi shows the large civic value that can come from a pooling of resources and talent. 

Shirky's talk was motivating and was something that I find difficult to disagree with. Obviously, we do have the capability to have large positive effects on society. I tend to latch onto ideas such as these rather easily and often idealistically, not looking into exactly how difficult it can be to pull off an effort such as Ushahidi. What seems to be a trend is that a huge disruption must occur first before people begin pooling resources of time and talent towards a greater cause such as Ushahidi. What I think would be great - again, here is the idealist in me speaking - is if we didn't have to wait for such disasters to occur before we started using the means available to us to provide civic value.

In Shirky's TEDTalk, he quotes Dean Kamen as saying, "free cultures get what they celebrate," and Shirky says that "to the degree that we can use cognitive surplus to create civic value, we can influence society." In Here Comes Everybody he shows the ability of free cultures to call attention to their values through social media, specifically weblogs. In one example, he notes that the "group attention" of bloggers brought to light segregationist comments that Trent Lott made at Strom Thurmond's birthday party that the press overlooked because the occasion they were covering was "salutary," not "political" (Shirky 62). By paying close attention and by refusing to allow the media to overlook something that these bloggers saw as important, they were able to bring to light something that could've very well been completely brushed over and not noticed by much of America. Rather, as Shirky notes, these "amateur reporters" transformed the story "from 'not worth covering' to 'breaking news'" (62). 

So, Shirky has clearly laid out examples of how the cognitive surplus has been used in the past to benefit society as a whole. He has demonstrated that it is at least possible and has shown the largeness of benefits that can come from such activity. Taking this idea to the next level requires looking at how it can be done. Howard's Design to Thrive  helps readers understand the "how to" aspect. In the latter section of his book, Howard provides a recapped version of his RIBS strategy and focuses on the idea that as social media become more "successful," they also take on more of a desire to be controlled - thus putting them at risk for later failures. In this section, Howard brings a focused reality into play, highlighting the idea that the more effective social media turn out to be, the more that governments/political forces wish to have control over an item. He mentioned how the US asked Twitter to delay an update to their software that would cause an interruption in service during the Iranian unrest. He then went on to show the top four areas he thought would be future battlefields in terms of controlling social media.

As I was thinking through these readings and the video, I began to think about our current assignment for the RCIT course: to help Clemson University's Cooper Library develop their social media. This task at the moment is a bit overwhelming to me because the library is already so involved in social media and seems to be doing a fairly good job thus far. So, I thought, "what else can be done?" From reading Howard's book, I think the first step is to go through and assess first: are all of the RIBS in place? If so, are they doing what they are intended to do? If the RIBS are doing their job, then the community/network will be healthy and thriving; if not, then they likely need to be amended. Howard mentioned many strategies for providing renumeration, influence, belonging, and significance inside of networks and communities, but they won't all work for all media. And they won't all work forever. So, changing these could be positive - but only if they're not working (or not yet in place).

After checking for the RIBS in the library's social media usage, the next thing I'd like to look for is their level of involvement with society. Are they creating a positive experience for the Clemson community as a whole? or just students? faculty? Are they doing anything that is impacting a larger portion of society, and are they doing anything to help people in the Clemson community pool their resources and cognitive surplus to create civic value? If so, I would like to find a way to highlight this and then to make it more effective. If not, perhaps that is the buy-in that the library needs in their social media to get more people involved in their efforts. I think that the library could really use their social media to help create a deeper social media literacy among students, first teaching them how to interact within the Clemson community. They need to show them how they want them to respond - what kind of responses they are looking for within these communities/networks. As they teach students how to use social media for more communal purposes, perhaps there will then be more civic engagement like that mentioned in Shirky's TEDTalk on cognitive surplus. 

TheSwagGuy Eats RIBS

The meat of Howard's Design to Thrive comes in the form of RIBS. Chapters four through seven focus on his four key elements of designing lasting social networks or online communities: renumeration, influence, belonging, and significance. In these sections, Howard not only defines these terms for his readers, but he also debunks myths of what others have termed them to be. What I like best, though, about the format of these chapters in particular is the practical nature of it and the straightforward "how-to"s he suggests for each principle.

In the "R" section, Howard discusses the principle of renumeration, explaining that users of a social network or online community expect a positive investment on time spent in the network or online community. I absolutely agree with this principle and doubt that many would disagree. What I think most people would disagree on, which Howard mentions in this section, is what type of renumeration people are expecting in the network or community. I think this largely depends on the type of site that is being designed. Howard points out that businesses often continuously think from a business mindset, either denying the user experience, adopting it after the functionality has fully developed (leaving little room for a good user experience to be developed), or look at renumeration from a purely business standpoint. Touching on this last point, Howard explains that all users are not looking for monetary renumeration; most are looking for an experience, and it is up to the creators of that site to determine what experience the users want and need and to do their best to not only help create it but to help facilitate it as well. He provides a checklist of techniques with suggestions as to how to increase the renumeration of the site, all of which I think are helpful. The one that I liked the best, though, was number nine: create a regular event.

One of the online communities that I have been a part of is Swagbucks, a group of users who earn "bucks" for searching the web, taking polls, taking surveys, and completing tasks. The Swagbucks staff do a good job of facilitating discussion on discussion boards and placing "codes" on the web for users to find on other networks like Facebook and Twitter to earn extra bucks as well. What they do best, though, I think, is create regular events. Each Friday, they have Mega Swagbucks Day, a day where Swagbucks users have a higher opportunity to earn bucks on searches. On this day, they send out several tweets and Facebook posts reminding users to search for extra Swagbucks, and they encourage other users to post, too. To encourage more user posts, they occasionally reward users with extra bucks just for posting that they won some Mega Swagbucks. (Click here for details on Mega Swagbucks Day).

Swagbucks' regular event - Mega Swagbucks Day - not only increases renumeration for their users, but it also helps to provide Howard's "I" influence element. As users post on sites such as Twitter and Facebook that they are winning Mega Swagbucks, other non-users become aware of the site and go to visit it for the first time. They will also likely be able to see Swagbucks members interacting directly with  TheSwagGuy or TheSwagGal, who will listen to and respond to feedback that users are giving on Facebook/Twitter/SwagBlog. Having this community extend into these social networks allows visitors the ability to see the influence that users are having on the community itself, something that will likely increase the number of users interested in being a part of the site. And, once they get to the Swagbucks site, users are not overwhelmed with what to do - there is a friendly video on the homepage that explains the gist of the community and explains how getting started works - allowing users to start interacting from the very beginning because they will understand how it works. (Click here for homepage with video).

Swagbucks also creates a sense of belonging among its users. While it uses some elements from Howard's book such as corporate branding and the establishment of symbols, colors, and visual identities, the primary way that they create belonging is through the level of communication that occurs between the individual users as well as the SwagTeam. Swagbucks is trying to increase its branding by encouraging members to use their bucks to purchase items with the SwagLogo on it such as T-shirts, mouse pads, desktop backgrounds, etc., but I have not seen much of that catch on yet.

Swagbucks' significance is shown to users through many of the techniques mentioned in Howard's chapter; however, there is a one additional technique that they would likely benefit from implementing. It needs to work on balancing the paradox of exclusivity. Right now, the site is open to anyone, and other users are practically begging people to sign up under them because of a short-term pyramid reward system. This takes away any element of exclusivity and makes the community less appealing. I'm not sure how Swagbucks can balance this better, though, because if they continue to offer the pyramid rewards for getting new users, then Swagbucks users will continue to invite others to join under their names, and it will continue to feel kind of needy. At the same time, this is a key marketing ploy - they have their users doing their legwork and inviting others while at the same time rewarding them by giving them bucks for it. Perhaps this is something that Swagbucks will have to live with as it is already doing many of the other techniques that Howard suggests in the significance section, primarily mobilizing its members and creating contests, games, and videos.

All in all, I think Howard's book provides excellent, practical strategies for providing a productive and enjoyable user experience within social networks and online communities. Those who are creating these types of sites would benefit from reading these techniques and implementing the ones that would best suit their users' needs. TheSwagGuy, I hope you're listening.

And, finally, if you'd like to sign up for Swagbucks, please do so, and by all means, use the following link: http://www.swagbucks.com/refer/kbellby.

Top-down Lighting Bias

Bringing Sexy Back to MySpace

Justin Timberlake is now a large shareholder in the MySpace corporation.


Skeptic comments have abounded regarding this recent stock acquisition. Twitter user @donovanwoods tweeted: "This just in: Justin Timberlake also buys Blockbuster Media and a rotary phone factory. What does he see that we don't!?! #myspace" (source cnn.com). And when I first heard about the acquisition, I was equally as skeptical and actually still am. There is, however, the possibility for making MySpace once again a useful space, but it would have to go through a significant FaceLift and would need to be repurposed as an online community rather than a social network.


Currently, one side of the MySpace community (MySpace Music) already seems to be semi-operating under the online community model. It is this side that Timberlake also seems to be most interested in, according to his comment in the news release regarding his purchase of stock in the company: "There's a need for a place where fans can go to interact with their favorite entertainers, listen to music, watch videos, share and discover cool stuff and just connect" (source: cnn.com). I think Timberlake is certainly on the right track - taking his musical skills and experience and letting that be the aspect of MySpace that he decides to build. I think he needs to go the furthest, though, with the sharing aspect of it, turning the network into more of a community wherein artists can collaborate with one another online - having online concerts together, opening for one another in virtual spaces, even remixing one another's works (through secured servers on a case by case allowed access, of course). In this same forum, fans will also be able to comment on artists' work, suggest new song or video ideas, and even request feedback on their own music. The details would, of course, be dependent on Timberlake and other online community experts, but I think that collaboration and increased connections are key to making MySpace a new success - or at least somewhat profitable from its multi-mullion dollar loss that it currently is.


Clay Shirky, in his book Here Comes Everybody, discusses levels of sharing/collaboration, and he explains three different "rungs" up which communities can climb in order to achieve higher levels of interaction. MySpace will be moving from the initial sharing rung to the next, cooperating, rung if it decides to go the online community route. As Clay Shirky points out, this step can be complex because it requires dual synchronization,  and it creates group identity (sub-genres could be created on MySpace, and current genres could be transformed - all with input from fans, collaboration among artists, and the public could witness much of it taking place). This step, though, could backfire on MySpace because collaborative production, according to Shirky, "increases the tension between individual and group goals" (50). MySpace could also potentially move to the third and most difficult of Shirky's rungs - that of collective action, which requires commitment to "undertaking a particular effort together" (51). This action would likely only occur occassionally on certain projects such as intentionally creating a sub-genre, holding a virtual concert, or collaborating on a specific musical piece. 


So, why do I think Timberlake needs to reboot MySpace as an online community rather than a social network? In Howard's book Design to Thrive, he discusses the differences in online communities and social networks. One distinction he shows between them are that social networks are centered and organized an individual user's "one-to-one relationships" while an online community centers its structure around "a shared purpose" (11). Timberlake clearly wants users to have a shared purpose: connecting with music. He wants to turn MySpace into a musical community, giving it a focus rather than letting it be just a poor man's Facebook. Another distinction is that social networks are good for sharing activities in a simple manner that does not require much collaboration. Facebook and other social networks are great for inviting people to parties, sharing photos, posting status, etc.; however, they are not the forum for collaboration. However, Timberlake could try to build some connections with Facebook so that users could invite friends on Facebook to online collaborative concerts in MySpace. Another strength of online communities according to Howard is that they have "tighter secondary connections" (19). Aspiring musicians need these secondary connections to be tight because they need to make connections with people in the industry so that they can get discovered. MySpace can become more of a place for this if Timberlake and his partners organize it well enough. 


MySpace certainly has a long way to go, and they have fewer funds to do it with than they had before. They have a new face, who is connected with both movies and The Social Network. The company has the opportunity to rebrand itself as an online community that can interact with musicians around the world, allowing for increased collaboration among artists and fans as well as serving as a launching pad for aspiring musicians and fans looking for mentoring and feedback from more "known" or experienced musicians. If MySpace chooses to go the online community route rather than the social network route, the company will not only have less of a competition with Facebook (still significant but less), but they will also be able to cut their own company's cost by organizing their company through a similar online community, thus cutting travel costs and flattening organizational hierarchies whilst learning how to operate within and manage online communities. 


Print Sources: 
Howard, Tharon W. Design to Thrive: Creating Social Networks and Online Communities that Last. Burlington, MA: Morgan Kaufmann, 2010. Print.
Shirky, Clay. Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing without Organizations. New York: Penguin, 2008. Print. 

The Missing Party

Having been involved in theater since age nine, I especially enjoyed the theater analogies that he used when referencing computer interfaces. While many of these metaphors had elements of truth to them, they didn't seem to go far enough for me. His comparison of a graphic designer to a stage designer certainly worked, but the comparison of a computer user to a theater audience seemed vastly different. True - a theater audience does shape a performance and can be involved but only to a certain extent. The true involvement comes through the actors on the stage and their interaction with the backstage design, set, lighting, and sound. At most, an audience member can get more involved through his/her imagination during/after the performance. For traditional performances, though, the plot and message(s) of the play are not going to change due to anything that an audience member does.

While reading Jenkins' introduction, though, I started to think more about how the computer interface could be similar to an interactive, improvisational theater. My favorite improv theater is Theater 99 in Charleston, SC. In fact, that is one of the things I miss most about Charleston. For my birthday last year, I went to see a show at Theater 99. Their show involved a group of actors who did "improv." (As a former improv-er, I know that the situations had been rehearsed at some level - characters/situations had been created, and they could all be meshed together to create what appeared to be unrehearsed drama. To a level, of course, it is new, but to say that the actors got up there without some sort of "script" would be inaccurate).

To enhance the "participatory culture" of the experience, there were two "emcees" for lack of a better term. One spoke directly to the audience regarding participation and the other chimed in with snide remarks here and there regarding both the audience and the actors. These third party emcees helped to shape the participation so that it flowed more naturally and also flowed in a way that would achieve the best theatrical effects. As I thought through both the Jenkins and Laurel readings, I kept returning to this third party who, to me, seems to be missing from the interface model. Wouldn't a third party help to enhance the conversation between user and computer?

When I think about  user experience, the first user I think of is myself. And I was having a less-than-ideal user experience when trying to read and take notes on both Laurel's and Jenkins's text. I am trying to keep all of my documents electronic and read/annotate them electronically. It helps me keep them all in one place and not have to lug around as much. However, the steps it took for me to read these texts and then to be able to annotate them were many more than if I had been using a hard copy of a book, and they were certainly more difficult to annotate. In an effort to find an easier interface for annotating these texts, I turned to Google and looked for better .PDF annotation softwares. I am now using two different ones - Mendley and NookStudy. Mendley is better for .PDFs, and NookStudy is better for eBooks.

Just as I think Laurel left out a key component of theater that can increase audience experience - an emcee, especially in an improv environment, which is what much of a computer interface is like since the audience is more active than passive, much of the computer experience that I am involved with is leaving out this third party. There needs to be someONE else to talk to about certain aspects of an interface. For example, I would love to talk with someone at NookStudy about improving their annotation software - letting them hear from me and how I could better use it if I could highlight a PDF and not just an eBook that I purchase from them. I'd like to talk to Mendeley and tell them that I'd like to be able to add and sort tags to documents that I annotate using their software. In theory, this is possible. I could submit an email or call customer service, but the time involved with talking to a service rep and improvements actually being made is too long.

Jenkins' Convergence Culture referenced the New Orleans Media Experience in which "the general public [could] learn firsthand about the coming changes in news and entertainment" (7). Jenkins notes, though, that the few "outsiders" who did show up were ill-informed on the convergence of media that was occurring or on the culture of media as a whole. His goal, he claims, is to "document conflicting perspectives on media change to [...] critique them [...because...] if the public doesn't get some insights into the discussions that are taking place, they will have little to no input into decisions that will dramatically change their relationship to media" (22). At first glance, I like Jenkins' statement. I would like to have input regarding how media is created and delivered. In reality, though, I do not know that his book or similar books from others will have much effect as to whether or not the voices of consumers are heard accurately or timely. I'm not sure how to increase this conversational interface of a computer, and I'm certain Jenkins, with his background, has a much better idea than I. I am open to hearing more of what he has to say and also to looking into others' ideas and possibilities for improving the interface(s) available.

Staged Interactions

When I was in the fifth grade, my best friend's grandparents moved into the house across the street from me. The day they moved in, it rained. No cable had been set up yet, and there were no toys in the house either. So, to keep us from constantly unpacking boxes into the wrong places, her grandmother, Mrs. JoAnne, told us to watch a movie. The only movie in the house was Gone with the Wind, which surprisingly the two of us Southern girls had yet to see. So, we popped the tape into the VCR and sat back to watch Miss Scarlett O'Hara in action for the first time. But as the Title Card began to roll across the screen, we realized something was wrong: there was no sound. We shook the TV, banged on the volume controls, but to no avail. Rather than going back to digging through boxes, we decided to watch the movie anyway and make up the words ourselves. So, we did. For 224 minutes - stopping only to change tapes midway through.

This is my earliest and most obvious remembrance of truly interacting with the screen and negotiating a meaning with images. Of course, I had been doing so for as long as I can remember, but as I read the first few chapters in Sturken and Cartwright's Practices of Looking, I kept reminiscing of this experience. For, though we certainly were not able to discuss the elements of the war or the social and cultural strife occurring, certain elements of the film's cultural significance couldn't help but spill over. The producers had effectively created the film so that even in black and white and without sound it was able to be understood on some level.

As Sturken and Cartwright point out in the book, much of the message/interpretation that is gleaned from a signifier comes from the cultural conventions to which the viewer is accustomed and from the elements against which an image/film/signifier is juxtaposed.  As children of the south, we certainly were already aware of Southern conventions that marked racial distinctions and a "love of the land" (both of our grandfathers were farmers). These elements resonated with us through the faces and landscapes on the screen. In addition, many of the themes that were appearing in the film were practically being physically represented in the house while we were watching it or had been throughout much of our lives. That day while we were watching, my friend's grandmother's African-American housekeeper, Mrs. Stella, was cooking lunch and ironing the linens. And we'd heard our relatives time and time again deliver many of the well-remembered lines. We were certainly standing ready to deliver Rhett Butler's all-too-famous last-line. So, even without sound and with never seeing the movie before, we gathered some of what the producer had intended (as much as could be gathered by a 10 and 11 year old under the circumstances). Yet, we were still able to make the film our own by creating a new dialogue among the characters and many new story lines.

Sturken and Cartwright, in Chapters One and Two, repeatedly refer to the importance of personalization within images and to the levels of interaction that occur between individual viewers and producers (whether they be artists, lead designers, directors, corporations, etc.). A "central tenet of [the] book," as they claim in the introduction is that "meaning does not reside within images but is produced at the moment that they are consumed by and circulate among viewers" (6). In order for an image to connect with a person, an interaction must take place, an interaction that elicits some sort of emotional response - whether anger, happiness, distrust, excitement. And the more elements - that are executed well -  (historical/cultural relevance, personal experience, context when receiving the image) that are reaching from the image that can pull the viewer in, the stronger the connection. Sturken and Cartwright explain that image interpretation involves not just how the image is created or framed or even how the viewer understands it but also by against what it is juxtaposed - physically, socially, culturally, and historically. They explain that we naturally decode/interpret images, often without even realizing it. And, one of their primary ideas seems to be that the more natural the interpretation/interaction, the more powerful the image or message. For interpretation to be organic, the elements within the image must work together well so that images will interpellate viewers, who can them - together - create meaning.

In reading through their examples of "successful/powerful" art/images/film, I kept Dr. Howard's question from our first class in the back of my mind (loose quotation): how will this book shape my understanding of usability and interaction design, and how will it teach me how to create a better user experience when I create images/art/film? Relevancy to the culture is, of course, going to be of key importance. Using techniques such as framing, bricolage, isolation, and countless others can help producers achieve the desired effects. And executing the final incorporation of images, techniques, and text will assist in the image's interpretation feeling more organic to the viewer. But most importantly, I think creating additional ways for viewers to interact with an image will allow for a better user experience. Much of this can be done by placing the image within the context of a social media outlet with commenting features enabled (such as the one in this blog - feel free to use them). It could also be done through modes such as The New Yorker's caption contest. Just as a caption or other symbols on an image can help a viewer better understand its intended interpretation, purposefully creating interactions for viewers can help them to see that they are interacting with the image and can likely create a stronger connection between the image and the viewer.

When my friend and I as children "poached" Gone With the Wind, we created a stronger connection with the film than we likely would have had we sat down and watched it with all of the sound and with our parents/grandparents informing us of the meaning as we went through. Rather, we were able to create a meaning for ourselves because we had been given an avenue of interaction. Certeau would've said that we were "making do" with the text, and it's true: we were merely trying to make the best of our rainy moving day. It was natural, organic, and not forced. I'm not sure that we came away with a renewed understanding of Southern history or racial relations or anything for that matter. But, we enjoyed the film and will forever remember the experience we had that day. It wasn't until years later that I realized Gone With the Wind wasn't intended to be a comedy.