Blockchain Online Encyclopedia

Been a long time follower of online knowledge.   Early on we used the Wikipedia as an architectural model for internal wikis, and also as a concept for contextual and metadata for analytical models.

Now I just read in Engadget about the Everipedia:  " ... The world's largest encyclopedia on the blockchain ... Everipedia's IQ Network is the world's first Encyclopedia that allows anyone to become a stakeholder in the system and earn rank, rewards & tokens for curating content. .... " .    

See the Engadget article.   And also, of course, the Wikipedia article about the Everipedia.   Not quite sure about how the use of a blockchain was needed for its architecture, and I have worked on knowledge architectures, but it does attract your attention.   Note including a reward in tokens for your editing participation, which the Wikipedia does not have.

Immortalizing Ourselves as a Chatbot?

We are still far afield from this.  Will we be able someday to chat with long gone people?   Made me think of TheBrain, this blog, Brand equities like Mr Clean?  None close.   I returned to a long ago employer and found my technology explanatory entries in a wiki we created ....  but they had removed all the bylines! ... So shall it be unless you are name-famous enough to draw a crowd.   Anyway, they are researching the idea below.

Soon you can immortalize yourself as an A.I. chatbot. But should you?   In Digital Trends by @lukedormehl

Until technology allows us to upload our consciousness to a computer when our physical bodies start irreparably failing, death is going to remain a real thing. But what if you could continue communicating with loved ones — or, at least, a reasonable facsimile of them — long after they’ve shuffled off this mortal coil? It might sound like an episode of Black Mirror (it is!), but it’s also the basis for a recently announced research project being carried out at India’s Shree Devi Institute of Technology.  ... " 

Model your Knowledge: Jerry's Brain

Do you have a map of what all you have done, written, researched?   Jerry Michalski has one.  See:  https://www.jerrysbrain.com/  We looked at this as a possible means of capturing retiring expertise, in an earlier AI era.   We connected with him and prototyped the idea.  This Blog is an outgrowth of that same extended experiment.  So was our internal Wiki experiment PGPedia.   Can this be a way to start, bootstrap, maintain knowledge for assistants?

He writes, and at the link there are some good visual examples. Taking a fresh look.

" ... Imagine if you had all the things worth remembering over the past 21 years, some 374,000 items, all curated in one giant mind map. 

I have that.   ... You can use it.

This site offers some explanations and links. Enjoy!  https://www.jerrysbrain.com/
Launch Jerry's Brain on the Web.         ...         

Get the iOS app for your iPad (iPhones not recommended) ... 

Please note: the data you'll see in the Jerry's Brain iOS app doesn't go beyond 2016, and will likely remain that way. That app is written to talk with TheBrain Server 8, and I'm now on version 10. The app would need a substantial rewrite, which is out of my hands and not economically viable, given the few copies that do sell :)

Get your own Brain at TheBrain.com

Tapping Into Tribal Knowledge

Had not heard the term 'Tribal Knowledge'.   But OK, call it key internal strategic and operational knowledge within a company, from its own internal experts, external sources, written documents, external consulting and beyond.   And effectively leveraging that knowledge against company problems.  A key to a digital company?

  We explored the idea using methods like Wikis and rule based systems in the 90s, Interviewing retiring experts, Intranet search, Knowledge Management, Semantic networks linking to data and beyond.

Each had its own positives and negatives.   How can this be done better with cognitive methods.?    Below a interesting example.  I Like the thoughts, but how does it work in practice?    How is the knowledge assembled and maintained for use?

Saving and Sharing Tribal Knowledge with Watson

Woodside, Australia’s largest independent energy company has been a global leader in oil and gas for over half a century. Their secret? Hire and develop heroes.

This formula has helped Woodside build some of the largest structures on the planet, in some of the most remote parts of the ocean, and safely transport the energy they produce to people around the globe.

To ensure the next generation could successfully carry the torch, Woodside knew they had to harness the instinctual know-how of their best employees. This goal — to create a cognitive business to augment and share their tribal knowledge — is what led Woodside into an industry-first partnership with IBM and Watson. .... " 

Knowledge Management at Boeing links to Behavior

Its about behaviors, not tools.  How often that is so true.  You need to know the behavior (decisions) before you choose your tools.  In the APQC blog by Lauren Trees.    " ... APQC recently spoke to Jyoti Patel, knowledge management strategist at Boeing, about how Boeing merged two organizations and developed common processes, knowledge management capabilities, and data system architectures while also designing a knowledge management strategy that emphasizes behaviors over tools. ... "     Worth a read.

One segment talks about their own internal wiki, something we also attempted.  I would make similar comments about hurdles to address:

" ... Our wiki, e-Book, has over 550 pages of content and 955 users; it has been built over 6 years as an entirely grassroots effort. I’ll speak to the cons first. It’s difficult to maintain a navigational structure that works for a diverse range of users, which happens when new groups join. We want to grow the user base to drive more participation, which leads to a higher standard of content. I think striking the balance between the right number of users while maintaining relevance to your core users is key. We have a lot of content consumers, but only a subset of those are content creators/editors, which means that there is a critical mass of users for a wiki to maintain efficacy. Another con is that our engineering population values content approved by experts, so it has been a hurdle for those folks to accept an open source model. Also, it’s slow to build content momentum within an organization where the demographics are so polarized and the level of comfort using a wiki is very inconsistent among employees. This is a long-term resource with long-term gains and had to be approached accordingly.   .... " 

Artificial Intelligence in the World University

It has been a while since I have looked at Wikis outside of Wikipedia.  We developed intra-Wikis experimentally, but not with great success.  Check some of my other links for the 'why'.   Here is an example brought to my attention called the World University. ...  The topic is artificial intelligence.  Good to be back looking at this knowledge management tool.

Company Gets Rid of Email

In FastCompany.  I saw this direction proposed some time ago.  At that time it was suggested that a wiki like structure would be set up, and any communication would be placed in its appropriate knowledge position.  So you would also get knowledge management as well.  Course you would still need email for external communications.  Will have to see if I can find my writing then to see if that example has survived.

Wiki Management

A slideshow.  And book on the concept: 

" ... It’s a brave, new hyper-connected world… We now live in a “wiki” world where mass collaboration is not only possible—it’s often the best solution. Conventional management thought assumes that command-and-control is the most effective way to organize the efforts of large numbers of people, but rapid change and increasing complexity have rendered that model obsolete. As a result, most managers today lack the skills and knowledge needed to succeed in an age when networks are proving smarter and faster than hierarchies. Designing organizations for mass collaboration demands a new and very different model—wiki management.... " 

Wikipedia Editing Bots

Editing Bots: Did not realize that so much WP editing was done with bots.  Implications and dangers are still unclear. How does it influence confidence in the knowledge provided?

Psych Statistics Wiki vs Wikipedia

I was recently asked to look at a number of online sites for introductory but practical resources on statistical methods.  This made me look back at some of the ways we used Wikis to in the enterprise to integrate this kind of knowledge with corporate data and examples.

It also made me explore online examples.  Notable is the psychology statistics Wiki implemented in Wikia.   This includes more than 34,000 pages, still updated frequently.  Reasonably simply written.   I examined equivalent pages in the Wikipedia for topics like ANOVA and Multiple Regression, and found them generally better for explanation in the Wikia.

There are many similar resources online.  It is interesting to compare the relative value of a more focused wiki resource and a general Wiki encyclopedia.

Wikis, beyond the Wikipedia,  have seen less exposure lately.  Does anyone know of studies that compare alternate tailored technical resources?

Decline of the Wikipedia

We followed Wikipedia from the beginning.  We attempted to use the Wiki model to store and retrieve corporate knowledge internally.  Learning much about what worked and does not work using wikis for corporate knowledge.  You do see a decrease in the use of the wiki model, but it is still used.  The Wikipedia did  take over the general encyclopedia industry, first making printed encyclopedias obsolete, and then dominating the online industry.  Now is the Wikipedia being threatened by the volunteer system that creates and edits entries? 

Wikipedia Change Map

In ArsTechnica:  An open source map of changes to the Wikipedia.  Had we been successful in building an enterprise wikipedia inspired  knowledge map, this could have show how innovation was being developed and spread.  It could have also indicated how knowledge was being used in the company.  But alas the effort was not successful.

Wiki Writing

Still very interested in the subject of how knowledge can be effectively and collaboratively shared. There seems to have been less on the topic written lately. See also my posts about Zakta, another collaborative-expert approach. And posts on Kyield, an approach for looking at the enterprise semantically, initially focusing in health care.

I am just looking at the free online book below on wikis:

Wiki Writing
from Information Literacy Weblog: EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative by Sheila Webber
This book is free online:
Cummings, R.E. and Barton, M. (Eds) (2008) Wiki Writing: Collaborative Learning in the College Classroom. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press and University of Michigan Library.
Information Literacy is mentioned specifically in the chapter by Mark Phillipson, Wikis in the Classroom: A Taxonomy ... '