beyond blogs and social networks dec. 1, 2005 © 2005 ibm corporation collaborative innovation:...

Beyond Blogs and Social Networks

Dec. 1, 2005 © 2005 IBM Corporation

Collaborative Innovation:Blogs, Jams and Social Networkingat IBM

Mike WingVP, Strategic Communications, IBM

2 Beyond Blogs & Social Networking | Dec 2005 © 2005 IBM Corporation

The “blogosphere” is doubling in size every 5-6 months (3x Moore’s Law)

27 percent of all U.S. Internet users say they read blogs – more than 32 million people

– Blog readership grew 58 percent in 2004

– Technorati tracks more than 17 million blogs

Déjà vu from 1995

Jul-02 Mar-03 Feb-04 Nov-04

30%

25%

20%

15%

10%

5%

0%

Blog creators

Blog readers

Percent of Internet Users

Source: Pew Internet and American Life Project, January 2005

“A huge change in how people do things is once again bursting out all around us. Some call it ‘social computing.’… Where the first stage of the Internet Age largely consisted of people consuming what the Web made available, now they are creating it.” – Irving Wladawsky-Berger


Blogs are part of a broader convergence

% US Market Penetration

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Internet Internet Projected Broadband Blogs Blogs projected

Sources: Internet – www.Internetworldstats.com Internet Projections – Jupiter Research 2004Broadband: Websiteroptimization.com Bandwidth report Aug. 2005Blogs: Pew Internet and American Life Project 2005


Web 2.0: The Age of Collaborative Innovation


Syndication + XML = A new global information commons

Blogs, podcasts, wikis or other Web pages can “feed” content directly to users’ aggregators

– Condensed version, then users can click for more information

– Formats include RSS, Atom, etc.

Blog content is automatically contextualized via XML – and categorization is democratized via “folksonomies”

Any data can be syndicated – whether or not created by a human.

Typical desktop aggregator

IBM AlphaWorks site with feed

"At some point (probably one we've already passed), weblog technology will be seen as a platform for so many forms of publishing, filtering, aggregation, and syndication that blogging will stop referring to any particularly coherent activity." - Clay Shirky, "Power Laws, Weblogs and Inequality" - Feb. 8, 2003


Collaborative Innovation: blogs, syndication and social networking go far beyond “buzz”

A new arena for public discussion and influence– A radically democratized “bully pulpit”

– Instant fact-checking: “nobody knows nothing”

– Expertise and authenticity are the coin of the realm A new information and social space for learning & collaboration

– Interlinked, holistic and emergent -- via syndication, trackbacks, links and tagging

– Lightweight, low-cost, easy-to-use -- “KM” done right

– “Finding people through content and content through people” Requires new thinking, skills and methods to engage

– From passive audience to active co-creator

– From control to interdependency

– From “intellectual property” to intellectual capital – cf. open source

And just as in 1995, no one yet understands its true meaning or dimensions.


IBM blog strategy

Engage and Learn

– Educate IBMers and encourage them to engage

– Identify select IBM industry, thought leaders in key industries & issues

– Engage with external bloggers

– Experiment and investigate new areas such as podcasting

Build a Management System

– Create channels and content to communicate continually with bloggers

– Develop system to sense what’s happening in the blogosphere – and to respond

– Align blog strategy with internal and external technology strategy

– Explore opportunities to help clients blog-enable their companies


Blogging Inside IBM

“Blog Central” emerged as a new collaboration space

– 13,800 registered users from 74 countries

– 2,000 active blogs

– Conversations range from technology to business to the personal

– Potential to be integrated into established collaboration tools

“Wiki Central” created as offshoot to Blog Central

– Hosts several hundred wikis, from open source to book clubs

Growth of Blog Central and Wiki Central is “grassroots” – no top-down publicity for either feature


A wiki in action

Established a Wiki to create IBM’s blogging guidelines

Received 118 discrete, traceable entries and edits

Enabled completion of the guidelines – with blogger “buy-in” – in less than 30 days

Using wikis to build strategic campaigns


Blogging guidelines launched on May 16


IBM executive blogging: Irving Wladawsky-Berger

Launched May 2005.

Perspectives on technology, business and collaborative innovation.

Engaging with key thought leaders and influencers – e.g., Thomas Friedman, Nicholas Carr.


IBM relationship blogging: GameTomorrow

Launched July 2005.

16 IBMers involved in gaming in some dimension, posting once or twice a week.

Purpose: to spark more discussion about the long-term implications of gaming and third-generation user interfaces.

The conversation is key: By having IBMers engage with the community, we’re raising awareness, and building relationships.


IBM issue blogging: HealthNex

Launched Sept 2005.

A dozen IBMers in healthcare (life sciences, consulting, HR and technology), posting once or twice a week.

Purpose: to catalyze standards-based integration across the healthcare ecosystem, and to establish IBM as a healthcare leader.

This is not “marketing”: Business and societal goals alike require new infrastructure, policies and economics in healthcare.


IBM product blogging: Mainframe

Launched Sept 2005.

IBM and non-IBM experts on mainframes, posting once or twice a week.

Designed to create an active community (18,000 page views to date).

Purpose: Make mainframes relevant to a new generation of computer scientists.


Investor podcasts: “IBM and The Future of…”

• Nearly 10,000 total downloads of “IBM and the Future of…” in first three weeks• One-fourth of the audience is IBM internal, three-fourths external• 3,800 downloads from “podcatchers” – software programs that allow users to subscribe to and manage podcasts


“IBM gets it … As we move further along in this ethic of information sharing for mutual benefit, direct corporate communication and contact will become the norm. How close do you feel to GM or to Ford? Odds are, not very close. Today, however, we're all a lot closer to Big Blue.” – Modus Cooperandi

“The guidelines themselves are detailed and are worth close study… Really, a visionary approach to corporate blogging.” – NevOn

“IBM appears to be at the forefront of podcasting to investors.” – News & Observer

Reactions in the blogosphere


Architecture for a blog-enabled enterprise

Blog Entry

Comments

Trackbacks

Authoring

(Browser, Rich Client)

Blog Engine

WorkFlow

Content Miners

Database

LDAP Server

Internal Platforms

External Platforms

Publishing

(Browser, RSS Feed, Rich Client)

Enterprise Content Analysis

External Data Sources

Enterprise Data Sources

Services

Search Application

Content Aggregation

Content AnalysisIssues

Management


Jamming at IBM: Birth of a new medium

WorldJam (May 2001) – a new collaborative medium to capture bet practices on 10 urgent IBM issues.

Results: 72 hours 52,595 participants (unique users) 6,000+ ideas 268,000+ views of posted ideas

IBM Meets with 52,600 Virtually:

"IBM invited all 320,000 employees to a marathon brainstorming session... capping a nine month effort to imagine and build a suitable room in cyberspace for an event that would be impossible to hold anywhere else.“

-- The New York Times, May 28, 2001


What is a jam?A jam is not:

An announcement vehicle A top-down communications tool A community creator / definer: it’s a population, not a community A personal soapbox A chat room: no one is anonymous

A jam is:

Best-practice capture: idea socialization vehicle Global collaboration – find people you otherwise would never meet Democratic – equal access and freedom-of-action for all Pragmatic – participants rate actionable ideas and behaviors Organizational research tool – a population snapshot, a barometer of

culture change An event – an organizational intervention that begins and ends


Jamming at IBM: Two epiphanies

The intranet can transform the relationship between employees and the company. Jamming extends that.

Scale makes it more likely, not less, that you’ll get concrete results. It gets you past silos. And it gets you to culture.

– Perceived value to employees: Jamming presents the corporation as an accessible quorum of the whole: trustworthy because all are empowered.

– Perceived value to management: Jamming cuts across processes and siloes to brand, culture and purpose. It makes divisional and overseas employees into “IBMers.”


Taking jamming to a new level: defining values

ValuesJam (July 2003) – an in-depth exploration of IBM’s values and beliefs by employees.

Results: 72 hours 22,007 participants (unique users) 9,337 posts/replies 1.25 million views to site Set of new core values defined by IBM’s workforce (210,000 downloads)

Homebred CEO Summons IBM's Past, Present, Future:

“To create this old/new culture, Palmisano got IBM's 320,000 employees involved. ‘It couldn't come from the top,’ he says. ‘It's got to be theirs. And, almost, it's more important it's theirs than what it is.’ Over the summer, IBM held

what it called an online jam — a massive, 72-hour chat room where employees could voice ideas.”-- USA Today, November 19, 2003


Interview with Samuel J. Palmisanohttp://www-306.ibm.com/e-business/ondemand/us/growth/harvard_sam.shtml

“You could say, ‘Oh my God, I’ve unleashed this incredible negative energy.’ Or you could say, ‘Oh my God, I now have this incredible mandate to drive even more change in the company.’… I’m convinced that we wouldn’t have gotten to this point if we hadn’t found a way to engage the entire IBM population in a genuine, candid conversation.”


First non-IBM Jam: HabitatJam – Dec. 2005A joint project of the United Nations, the Government of Canada and IBM

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