How Citizen X will infiltrate us

Comment by Cian Gregory Accuardi Shelley on March 16, 2010 at 5:16am

but we might as well humor him right? (he might suspect something. . . shhh)

Comment by Raymond M. Kristiansen on March 16, 2010 at 6:23am

Who, me? :D

Actually most conversations on here are not about innovation at all. Just reposting of old solutions, reposting of current 2nd best practice. There is no collection of definitive steps to innovation. Well, there is, but the golden nuggets are so well hidden among all the other stuff that it becomes invisible.

For some days I got worried there, that this site might turn out to be something different from the other sites. That the site would manage to hack the attention hierarchy. But at the end, its just the same. Just the same, in a new wrapping.

And so, I decided some days ago to pay my attention elsewhere. I check the site now and then, but the amount of spam and back-patting is just too much :)

Comment by David J on March 16, 2010 at 6:42am

My question to Raymond: What is a better use of your time?

I agree with the things you say... but I appreciate the ideas behind this site, too. Isn't it enough to get another generation excited about solving the world's problems?

So, where do you turn your attention? I am actually curious (I do not have an answer, myself). These are big problems, and I feel like the solutions are out there... but how should we approach them?

Comment by Raymond M. Kristiansen on March 16, 2010 at 7:29am

Good question David:

Me, I am currently reading the book "Petromania" by Norwegian journalist/author Simen Sætre. It is an interesting look at small countries who scored the jackpot in finding a ton of oil. Countries like Qatar, Kuwait - - or Norway, my own country. He writes about how the oil is affecting the country, the mentality of the people, the way we view money, and our own role in the world. It is an interesting book about a topic which also has engaged me the last years: How do we as Norwegians view ourselves? How are we seen by the world?

I am also working on the magazine I am editor of. I am preparing a workshop on "network 2.0" which I will be holding for some Filipino au pairs in Norway next month - the workshop is more or less based on a similar workshop I held in Tbilisi last year, but I am working on improving my methods.

Oh, I didnt mean to be normative. This site is working well by itself, it just doesn't need my input really. I was simply describing my own relation to it. I feel that I have been through all that "yay a social website about changing the world!" 8 years ago with Taking IT Global (here is my profile there) and I don't think the time investment here is worth it. Again: For me. This doesnt mean that I wont check in or write blog posts now and then - but I guess I will be a bit more targeted in what I write about. Maybe more meta, more about methodology of information management in social websites such as this.

This site is important, I never meant to claim otherwise. :) It is important for those who find a way to get involved here. I have read already quite a few say that "I used to not pay attention to such issues, or be involved myself - now I have changed my perspective". That is great.

I just wrote a blog post about attention hierarchy, btw.

The problems are huge, and the solutions are out there. That is true. But in our approach to these questions, we often end up feeding just our own commanding self. (Oh, regarding the writings of Idries Shah please ignore the culture/religion-specific material. It is the psychological processes which are interesting, not the context in this case)

I have mentioned it a few times here on EVOKE: emotionalism.

Let me give an example:

There is a meeting. People attend the meeting awake and eager to learn. Someone is going to hold a talk.

After the talk, there is a discussion. Let's say there is a heated discussion about Israel vs. Palestine. In this heated discussion, maybe the Israeli ambassador sees everyone criticizing Israel as being anti-semites, and so on. The usual thing.

What happened to people's emotional energy?

Maybe at the end of that heated discussion, some common ground was found. Maybe 'peace' was settled among the different factions in the room. Emotional energy was spent during all of this process.

At the end of the meeting the organizer will thank everyone for attending, and for the good discussion.

And: That's it.

The emotional energy is spent. There is no next step. People are maybe more aware of the arguments used by either side. Maybe a few more facts are visible. But that's it.

Questions: When does a discussion lead to further analysis of "the steps ahead"?

How do we manage a discussion in a way where the emotional energy is reserved also for the steps following the Current discussion?

Social websites such as this are excellent for inspiration. People feel inspired. "WoW, all those inspiring people on this site! I am amazed!". But what are the Results?

Numbers?

"10.000 people contributed during the 10 weeks". Tons of bits and pieces, bits and bytes.

But I guess you are right. I should be more patient, and maybe do what I can to contribute more to the site. Hacking the attention hierarchy. Work with a few others, in the AWAKE guild or elsewhere. Come up with new narratives.

How should we approach the solutions?
How should we implement some solutions?

Comment by Brian Ballsun-Stanton on March 16, 2010 at 1:07pm

We need to take a page from Little Brother here. This network is unsecured, unauthenticated, and unidentified. No real secure topics should be discussed here. Anything sensitive should be taken to standard secure channels. And, as always, trust begins with a physical contact. (Vinge).

Finding agents provacateur, however, will be difficult. Policing the community is effectively impossible.

Comment by Claire Moylan on March 16, 2010 at 1:21pm

That's what I was thinking. If you look at some of the leaders, they have few posts and Alchemy or someone else hypes them up for some reason. Doesn't make sense.

Comment by Ssozi Javie on March 16, 2010 at 1:55pm

Agent Raymond thanks for sharing this insight - gives us much more time to give it thought and FIGURE OUT OUR WAY FORWARD.
Personally I believe in TEAMWORK, thats one of my CORE values.
Guys, even if we have C X or C Xers, LETS STICK TOGETHER!
Teamwork is about having a COMMON OBJECTIVE and ACHIEVING it - NO MATTER WHAT!
Please read this Blog post: Not me (us) against (you) them!. Let me know What you think! :)

Comment by Wasserperson on March 17, 2010 at 9:40pm

At the moment, Citizen X is more of an abstract threat than a practical one.
We have almost no information on their activities, intentions, or existence at all.
However, from what we do know, we can derive some very concrete resistance methods:
1. Think critically
2. Trust, but verify

When we simply act as repeater nodes for information, we become indistinguishable from Citizen X... As far as we know them to be right now...

Comment by Wasserperson on March 17, 2010 at 9:46pm

1. Like any media product, we'd evaluate the content independent of the funding
2. We'd look for the underlying contracts and see if there's language about editorial oversight
3. We'd reread the terms of use...

Comment by Wasserperson on March 17, 2010 at 10:12pm

I'm not a lawyer, but overall the terms seem boilerplate. Lots of advisories saying the WBI doesn't guarantee accuracy, usefulness, access, but they do seem to say we can reuse any content for personal or non-commercial uses... So, pretty innocuous as far as I can tell.
What do you think?

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