I love the blog world.
I held the 2008 Bloggle awards recently here at martyholman.com, and while
I was checking out the nominees for the award “Best Blog Post”, I began
searching through all my favorite posts over the last 6 months. Google
Reader makes this easy by allowing me to star my favorite posts as I read them.
One thing I learned however is how much of the content of my favorite posts were not original
to the author of the post.
And by the end of looking through my 300 starred posts, I narrowed them down
to about 30 which I thought were absolutely amazing.
But as I scrolled through the 30, I realized that 20 of them were not actually
written by the author, but simply used (no doubt with permission) from another post.
Now I’m glad that this is being done, as it allows me to read posts that I otherwise
would have never read, but it also makes me wonder…
Who’s original?
Part1, part 2, or part 3
Hey, guess what I’m doing right now. Come on, guess, just this once…
I’m creating content, the number 4 way that is changing the world and my world right in front of our eyes. The freedom and ability of all of us to do what we can do when we like to do it at a low cost (if any). So I blog because I like to write. WordPress or blogspot or typepad give us the “freedom” and the platform to blog and to start a conversation about life or religion or politics or any number of topics that we may associate ourselves with. Facebook and Myspace give us the freedom to start a web site about ourselves that can interact with other web sites that talk about our friends. And with google, I can have the weather, a map, all the blogs I read, my to-do list, my news, my calendar, my podcasts from Fellowship Church, and any free itunes downloads I can have access too all on the same page. And it’s all “created by me.” (Everything but the codes)
And this is just the social aspects of it. New academics can join the Wikipedia community and write (or rewrite) essays for the encyclopedia version of things that we want to know about like William Wallace and The War of 1812. New reporters can make a name for themselves without having to interview inside of any newspaper establishment. Computer programmers who want to go beyond the scope of their jobs can do so on their own time solving problems in “open source” software communities. Bible teachers can now wax eloquent with their own studies in places like You Version. Retired? Thats a thing of the past if you want to keep going. I read a story recently about a retired scientist who had retired from a company and then got involved with solving “open source” problems offered on the web by the scientific community. He solved problems to the tune of $25,000 a pop.
And this is in our hands. We now have more tools to do what we love and to create content. Sure we might have to still stay up late and write or solve or search or draw, but the point is this – we can create content and be a part of something bigger than ourselves, and do it with things we love to do. Now the only question is…
What do you love to do?
Special thanks to those of you who have helped “create” this discussion on where our world is going.
Yesterday I wrote here that there are 4 ways that the ever-changing world is changing my life, and focused on “Going Public” as the first way. Today I want to focus on participating in “open sourcing”.
Currently this term is a buzz word for individuals and companies coming together to collaborate on projects and problems in order to hurdle each problem and situation that comes up in life’s arenas.
Open sourcing focuses on the idea that I do something well (I hope anyway) and I enjoy doing certain things, and by pooling my talents with others who enjoy that thing, we can move ahead faster than I could alone.
For instance, I love small groups. It’s one of my favorite parts about being a part of this era of church. I think I have a good grasp of how to effectively do small groups and have an interest in excelling in this arena. But I don’t know everything, so I gladly share with other pastors or on this blog or in any number of ways what I do know about small groups, and do so in a way that is inexpensive (blogs are free, so is word of mouth), and easy to read or apply. Then others do the same, and through this experience, my knowledge and understanding of the small group environment is enhanced.
Google, IBM, Sun, Firefox, Lifechurch.tv, and Wikipedia are just a few of the successful companies that have “open sourced” their organization, and enhanced our lives as people over the last few years.
I’m no expert, but if I ever become one, even by default, I’d like to be able to say that as an expert, I still “open source” my expertise for the greater good of those who can take it and expand upon the work I’ve done.
My own mind is swimming right now after One Prayer about how the church can do this better. I’ve been having these radical thoughts about how we can come together to out source and open source our expertise as we watch the body of Christ form into what He actually wanted it to be. Like maybe if I’m an “expert” on small groups, and another church in our area is an “expert” musically or in their Sunday service or their work with the less fortunate, how can we utilize and link up with one another, for the purpose of leading people into a growing relationship with Jesus Christ?
Your feelings on open sourcing please?
Sometime in 2005 I took a test to find out what my strengths were. I found that my top 5 were as follows: 1. Ideator, 2. Positivity, 3. Connectedness, 4. Competition, 5. Developer
I noticed as several of my friends took the same test that several of us had one of those in common. Out of the 7 people I know that took the test, 5 of them had connectedness as a strength.
Some qualitites of someone with this strength – “That I gain confidence from knowing that we are not isolated from one another or from the earth and the life on it; I am part of a larger picture, and I must not harm others because I will harm myself; and I am a bridge builder between people of different cultures.”
Enter the beauty of web 2.0 to people like me.
I’m not a fan of compartmentalizing my life. I like things, whether it’s people in my life or web sites I go to, to all be connected to one another. This makes my mom and google both very happy.
How does this affect me?
I like it when my family and my friends and all the people in my life meet. What makes this interesting is when they don’t get along. I think everyone should get along. Not like each other, just get along.
I like using google and itunes. My friend Clay swears against itunes, and probably rightfully so, but I like when things connect together easily, so I use it. I know, I know Clay, I sacrifice things to use itunes. Google connects a lot of things in my web life, like my Calendar, my way to find where I might be going, my blog reader, my connect with Fellowship Church podcasts, and even my weather, not to mention my documents (I don’t have to pay for Microsoft office again!)
Weather
