What do you think of this?

The Blog squad has had an ongoing conversation regarding possible changes that could be made enhance LCB. Here is a brief summary of a preliminary remake of LCB. Your reactions are welcomed. (please don't edit the content between the lines.)

• The core blog would be made of posts filtered from Atom feeds from the existing blogs of the Blog Squad.
• In addition, we would maintain an adjunct blog in which
  • Contributors who don't maintain a personal blog could contribute posts
  • One time or infrequent contributors could post
    • These posts would be moderated and would not post to LCB until approved
• The core blog team would also have a listing of there atom feed listed separately (see Web 2.0 Work Group as an example of this.)
• In addition to this core blog, we would run occassional features (Beyond the Blog is one example of this)
• Also in addition to the core blog, we'll have tools to encourage ongoing and dialogue:
  • an adjust discussion wiki's like this one for further exploration and discussion of key topics.
  • a threaded discussion which could read from LCB as an observer or joined via a link to participate.
  • other ideas?

I like the idea of some kind of hybrid blog/threaded-discussion format. The ability to post mini-articles or blogthoughts is essential, since that is what provides a stimulus for discussion. the ability to discuss with ease is also essential, because without it we flounder and ideas never get polished to an actionable stage.

(Godfrey Parkin)

If we want more participation from "lurker authors" such as myself, we have to have a way to include external blogs in the LCB. It is just too cumbersom to write one's own blog and then copy posts over the LCB for inclusion. And it is too hard to monitor two blogs for comments - we will have to figure a way we can make LCB alert the original author when there's a comment to be addressed (yes, we can do that). I work a 9-to-3 workday (9am to 3am) and I just do not have the time to dual-post. This is why "cross-posting" to Usenet lists became contentious many years ago, but it is truly necessary if one is to reach a broad audience. (Jim Schuyler)

I'm not sure I agree that we have to include external blogs, at least for me email would be better. Otherwise, we don't get the cross talk. See the audience discussion, but the notion is that we're conducting a community of practice discussion negotiating understanding over new topics/issues.

So here's a suggestion:

I think it'd be of potential benefit to use email (threaded discussion list) to discuss a series scheduled of topics (having a 'discussion owner' every week?). We need a channel for audience input, both to the discussion (to raise issues we don't), and to the discussion topics (to keep us from coddling our pet hobbyhorses).

The model is that our visitors are listening in to an ongoing panel discussion. It's a cross between community and pulpit. A nice side result of the discussion is that we're a community of practice and *we'll* learn from the discussions as well.

We'd (er, the royal we...) maintain a list of the upcoming topic and 'discussion owner'. During that week, the owner would seed the discussion with a brief screed about the issue, and opening questions or controversial statement, and would receive that week's audience comments. Afterward, (royal) we'd archive the discussions at the end of the week, and people could peruse them historically as well. One question is whether and how we could include comments posthoc.

(Clark Quinn)

What if we were re-think the role of the blog-squad? We have been authors of short articles. I fear that sometimes we come across as experts trolling for praise. How would this change if we were discussion facilitators? Pick a topic, say "Google in China" or "Mashups and eLearning" or "Simulation in Second Life." The facilitator encourages comments and stokes the conversation.

For example, were I to tackle "Google in China," I would solicit input from a group of Chinese bloggers I met last year. I would invite Dan Gilmor, EFF, and Larry Lessig to contribute to the conversation. I would link to recent news stories. I might host a debate. I'd seek publicity from high-profile bloggers and Wired news. After a month, I'd write up our activities as an article for Learning Circuits.

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