Digital Habitats

Orientation
Spidergram Activity

From: Digital Habitats: stewarding technology for communities

Etienne Wenger, Nancy White & John. D. Smith, 2009
http://www.technologyforcommunities.com
http://www.flickr.com/photos/viamoi/3221971368/
 … meetings
… open-ended
… projects
conversation

… content … access to
publishing Community expertise
activities
oriented to …

… individual
… relationships
participation

… community
cultivation … context

Base material from:

Digital Habitats: Stewarding technology for
communities
© 2009 Wenger, White, and Smith
 Orientations
What do they mean?
• Meetings – in person or online
gatherings with an agenda (i.e.
monthly topic calls)
• Projects – interrelated tasks with
specific outcomes or products (i.e.
Identifying a new practice and refining
it.)
• Access to expertise – learning from
experienced practitioners (i.e. access
to subject matter experts)
• Relationship – getting to know each
other (i.e. the annual potluck dinner!)
• Context – private, internally-focused
or serving an organization, or the wider
world (i.e. what is kept within the
community, what is shared with the
wider world)
Base material from: Digital Habitats: Stewarding technology for communities
© 2009 Wenger, White, and Smith
• Community cultivation – Recruiting,
orienting and supporting members,
growing the community (i.e. who made
sure you’re the new person was invited
in and met others?)
• Individual participation – enabling
members to craft their own experience
of the community (i.e. access material
when and how you want it.)
• Content – a focus on capturing and
publishing what the community learns
and knows (i.e. a newsletter,
publishing an article, etc.)
• Open ended conversation –
conversations that continue to rise and
fall over time without a specific goal
(i.e. listserv or web forum, Twitter, etc.)
 Weekly bird walks, winter bird
Example: The Birdwatchers … meetings feeding fillings, irregular
of Central Park celebrations and events…

Bump into another

… open-ended bird-watcher? Have a
conversation … projects
conversation…

Advocacy drives, adopt

parts of the park, bird
counts…
The “Register”
(print) is central
to community…
… content … access to
publishing expertise
activities
oriented to … The participation of the
“Big Guns,” and
Anyone can bird watch, but “Regulars.” Mostly F2F
sharing what you see/know is
important…so the community
accommodates both Note when people
missing… Invite
people in
… individual
participation Internal and External
focus: Publishing, the … relationships
“Register,” available
While everyone pays
… community to media… … context
attention to the community,
no centralized efforts… cultivation
Base material from: Digital Habitats: Stewarding technology for communities, © 2009 Wenger, White, and Smith
 Community Name: KM4Dev Once a year and only about
global knowledge sharing network … meetings 10% do/can participate.

Email list is core of

… open-ended community activity
conversation … projects

When funding allows. E.G.

Community knowledge wiki, supporting ShareFair
content management system
to bring together resources.

… content … access to
publishing expertise
activities
oriented to … Informally via the email
With only one meeting a
list by asking/answering
year, large size and
questions.
diversity, KM4Dev
focuses on enabling
individual participation.

Relationships mostly via

meetings and core group.
… individual Strongly
participation external – all … relationships
resources
public/shared.
While everyone pays Base material from:
… community
attention to the … context Digital Habitats: Stewarding technology for
community, no cultivation communities
© 2009 Wenger, White, and Smith
centralized efforts…
 Comparison:
Birdwatchers and KM4Dev-ers … meetings

… open-ended
conversation … projects

… content … access to
publishing expertise
activities
oriented to …

… relationships
… individual
participation

Base material from:

… community Digital Habitats: Stewarding technology for
cultivation … context communities
© 2009 Wenger, White, and Smith
 What can we do with this?
• Identify where your community/group/team is
now to assess for design, facilitation and
technology stewardship.
– Refocus activities to increase engagement
– Identify tools and processes to support current
activities
• Identify where your group wants to go as a
planning tool.
• Look backwards and forwards as a reflection
tool.
Base material from: Digital Habitats: Stewarding technology for communities
© 2009 Wenger, White, and Smith
 Orientations
What tools?
How?
• Meetings – Web meeting tools for
online, shared calendars and wikis for
planning, wikis, blogs,
images/audio/video to capture and
share during and after.
• Projects – Email lists/forums to
coordinate, shared calendars, project
management trackers, blogs to
journal/report.
• Access to expertise – Online profiles,
social networking sites, “yellow pages,”
discussion forums, blogs.
• Relationship – Twitter/IM to share
small frequent messages, member
directories, Skype/VoIp for
conversation.
• Context – Public, open websites for
outward facing. Password protected
for inward facing groups.
Base material from: Digital Habitats: Stewarding technology for communities
© 2009 Wenger, White, and Smith
• Community cultivation – Outward
facing web sites to attract members,
Twitter/IM to feel connected, Skype for
voice.
• Individual participation –
RSS/aggregators, tagging, so people
can craft what content they get,
customizable settings on web tools,
using synch and asynch
• Content – content management
systems, blogs, wikis, podcasts, social
bookmarking, tags, video/audio,
images, mindmapping.
• Open ended conversation – email
lists, forums, Twitter, chat.
 Community Name:
… meetings

… open-ended
conversation … projects

Put a mark on the arrow to indicate

… content … access to
how important a particular
publishing expertise
orientation is to your community. activities
The more important the orientation, oriented to …
the further out on the arrow the dot
should be placed. Then draw a line
between the dots. See the next
example.

… individual
participation … relationships

Base material from:

… community Digital Habitats: Stewarding technology for
cultivation … context
communities
© 2009 Wenger, White, and Smith
 Community Name:
… meetings

… open-ended
conversation … projects

… content … access to
publishing expertise
activities
oriented to …

… individual
participation … relationships

Base material from:

… community Digital Habitats: Stewarding technology for
cultivation … context
communities
© 2009 Wenger, White, and Smith