This confirms our telecon this evening. I called to get a sense of progress on
OHS/DKR and other KM efforts based on discussion with John Deneen who indicated
that IBIS methods have been used in recent months on another mailing list. I
was wondering if IBIS has helped develop an architecture and design for KM
technology? For example, on May 18,2000 you suggested a
3-layer architecture. Can IBIS help design this? You
confirmed this evening that there was a recent discussion among the OHS/DKR
group that applied IBIS methods, but it did not relate to technology
development. You also indicated that Eugene Kim has applied IBIS
with good results by following guidance from Jeff Conklin, and
that Jeff helped Southern Cal Edison adopt IBIS methods
following an assignment where he used this technique.
..
Seems like IBIS should be able to improve progress in KM, based
on experience you related this evening. Would be helpful to see
work product on this?
..
During our call, you asked when IBIS first came into the record
for the Colloquium Doug Engelbart led at Stanford during the first
quarter of 2000? While we talked, the record on February 18, 2000
was located that shows
Eric Armstrong
wrote a letter to the group
proposing consideration of IBIS. Review further showed that Eric
raised IBIS a few weeks earlier on January 30. You asked if Dick
Karpinski had discussed IBIS, and a link to another record showed that
Dick discussed IBIS
during a meeting to on SDS, also, on
February 18, 2000.
..
You cited a big increase in using weblogs associated in some way
or another with the impending conflict in Iraq. My feeling is
that more people writing up the record helps grow a culture of
knowledge.
..
During our call this evening you asked for a definition of
Knowledge Management?
..
We reviewed the explanation in POIMS on
converting information into knowledge.
You feel the SDS process of adding
"intelligence" to information for creating Knowledge Space fits
the model you are using of "information management,"
and went on to say that "knowledge
management" can only occur in the human mind. I agreed that KM
occurs in the mind, and further propose that the process
in the mind can be meaningfully aided with technology,
roughly described as "augmenting intelligence," by using an
external rendering much like
alphabet technology models
"information." This idea is summarized in POIMS as
Knowledge Space. ..
While we did not discuss it during our call, my sense is
that literacy augments human mental metrics for creating and managing
information, as noted by Doug
Lenant saying that alphabet technology makes people
superhuman, reported on June 22, 2001
..
Since SDS
strengthens literacy
for handling information
by an order of magnitude (see again POIMS)
this seems like a useful, work-a-day explanation of knowledge
management. Moreover, since construction of knowledge
in the mind is almost entirely
subconscious, occurring involuntarily
on automatic pilot, as it were (see POIMS), I am not sure how
much mileage we get by limiting discussion of Knowledge Management
to solely a mental exercise, as you propose this evening,
particularly, since that experience relies on
remembering only the gist
of information, which, according to
research submitted by Henry van Eykan on September 27, 2000,
is only about 10%
accurate. My feeling is that improving on 10% memory (some
authorities say only 5%, for example Morris mentioned on 020110 that
people only use about 5% of the features in Microsoft
programs,
because they cannot remember all of the menus to open)
is a reasonable objective for technology to support Knowledge
Management.
..
In discussion this evening, I asked for examples of work
product that illustrate your perspective on information
management. You explained that reliance on work product is
incorrect for understanding what is being produced and how it
helps daily work, and further indicated that such request
demonstrates a narrow perspective, noting that Morris Jones
agrees with your analysis of my credentials and work in knowledge
management.
Morris' letter
on September 23, 2002, and
another letter
the next day on September 24 seem to
line up pretty well with your analysis.
..
I asked about current
attitudes
on linking, and on organization that adds "meta
data," following correspondence last year in August and subsequent articles
that said people have voted against both of these practices, reported on
October 31, 2001, and, further, that
John Maloney
argues against analysis.
Since, as you can see in POIMS, analysis, organization and alignment are three
(3) of the five (5) elements that SDS supports for
converting information into
knowledge,
it seemed striking, in light of
tragic events
on September 11, 2001, more
recently on February 1, 2003 with
loss of the Columbia Space Shuttle and her
crew, and
collapse of the economy
reported continuously since December 7, 2000,
that features for working
intelligently have been abandoned by people working on knowledge management,
evidenced by the history in the record on October 3, 2001.
..
You cited Nexist, Eugene's work and one other person as making
progress in KM. I asked about seeing some work product, and you
objected again to this line of inquiry.
..
You asked how Gary is doing with SDS? I explained that Gary has
made good progress, and I am hopeful this continues. John Deneen
is taking longer to work through the learning curve because I
have had less time to support him due to other projects John has
underway. I asked if you are familiar with the MyLifeBits
project that John commended for research. You were aware of the
project but not familiar with any details.
..
This evening, you suggested I look at Eugene's website at....
http://collab.blueoxen.net/forums/yak/ .. ...under the title Collaboration Collaboratory discussion list
(date)
..
Generally, it appears that Eugene is shares some of your
goals for Nexist to support collaboration by encouraging and
helping people tell stories.
Dave Snowden at IBM mentions this idea in his paper on
Complex Acts of Knowing,
reviewed last year on June 8, 2002. I could
be wrong, but, if memory serves, Dave shares your view about KM
only occurring in the mind, and is not anything that can be
augmented by tools; at least that is an impression from the
conclusion of Dave's paper
that does not mention a role for technology, and further argues that
knowledge cannot be stored.
In our discussion this evening, you noted
that SDS helps people write stories, and I agreed that
understanding the story is important, often leading to the
question "What's the story? -- and, "Then what happened?" When
people don't get the word and so have the story wrong, they often
ask "Why is this always happening to me?"
..
A lot of the discussion in the email archives on Eugene's website
is outside my expertise, but the quality of the discourse and the
design Eugene has developed seem very advanced. Suggest
consideration be given to some approach or another that expands
span of attention and mitigates meaning drift. On July 26, 2002
Tom Munnecke submitted information about an initiative he has
underway that urged people to ask
Can what counts be counted.
Expanding span of attention and more accurate memory count a lot
in human
mental metrics,
as related on February 4, 1995.
..
I am pleased to see Tom Munnecke and Gary Johnson participating
(Gary seems to be the only person who has told a "story" so far),
and I am further pleased to see people using links with anchors
to support the work. You mentioned this evening that a new
method has been adopted of using traditional footnotes and
bibliography formats. You explained how this helps avoid the
problem of opening a reference directly, and instead people can
notice the footnote number, store that in memory, or write it
down, then scroll to the bottom where the bibliography is listed,
find the footnote number and then open the original source, if
people want to investigate context and verify accuracy. This
sounds like it implements a suggestion Morris submitted on
September 23, 2002.
..
While I did not see examples of work product using this new
footnote method in the 10 or so letters I had time to review on
Eugene's website, seeing people use links with anchors to
specific context is an important step for transformation from
information to a culture of knowledge.
..
So, congratulations to you and Eugene for sticking with the KM
stuff and making real progress.
..
Thanks also for bringing me up to date this evening on what's happening in the
KM field since, I am too lazy to do the hard work of research, noted by Ed
Swanstrom on August 12, 2002 who objected to investing so much time
writing up the story in SDS. Thanks to
you, I have another story to write.
..
Sincerely,