Meta-24

From espians

Remember: the emphasis is on the future, where we are now, our intentions, and the hope that we can induce a more fluid collaboration... ie non-managed co-elaboration...

A primitive co-ordinating tool which will replaced by the espian system. Think of this as scaffolding, not the actual building.

It is clunky, and requires that people fiddle a little. As time goes on, this might be improved, and if some developers are interested, they can create the espra alpha 1 by week8. It is scaffolding.

We don't want to re-invent the wheel, neither do we want to adopt the rather complex system that wikipedia have evolved for their astounding task. We need simple. It only works if you take part. If we have consensus.

sections of each person's user page

about page

A brief self-description of the person; all people can be found by clicking the title...

contact details

In case you want more direct contact with the individual...

todays intentions and achievements

Your plan for the day, which you update regularly and include achievements; all people's daily activities are found by clicking on the title.

requests from others

When collaborating with others, they may define specific tasks for you... they can only do this if you have included them on your page... eg include me by adding this text: {{requests|Happyseaurchin}}

needs

General needs which you are putting out there...

skills

What you offer the community.

week 8 projection

Your specific targets for the next big event, to help everyone co-ordinate their actions. This enables everyone on the network to monitor what you are doing, enabling them to contact you if their intentions are similar, enabling confluence...

week 12 projection

Slightly longer term projections...

week 24 projection

Definitely useful projection, which will become firmer and more precise as we approach the end of the project...

the operating system

At a deep level, everything is in threes.

• people, timing, projections
• wish-list, feasability check, actual project
• hot-air, confluent discussion, committed task-orientation
• interest, realistic appraisal, committed action
• dream, targetting projection, actual effort and work
• expressing stuff somewhere, virtual communication, meeting in person

Think air, liquid, solid. It is kind of fractal, and operates at all levels, which is why we are having difficulty sharing our developments. The most important by far is the people, timing, project.

people

This is where it is happening, whether it is dreaming something or actually writing code. People are doing things. I don't really want to bog them down by getting them to write proposals for things, or write reports on what they are doing. It is important to know they are doing what they are doing, however, so that I can engage them, perhaps invite them to collaborate, etc.

So, the central mechanism is like facebook, where each player registers on this wiki, which means they have page like Happyseaurchin. The information on this page tells everyone what their plans are, what they are doing, as well as archives of what has been done in the past (future, present, past). A list of people's self-descriptions might also be useful for others to find us -- peoplepage

We often get too bogged down with the past, or confused about what we plan for the future. The thing to remember is that each of us is alive now, thinking and doing things right now, like you reading this. This system (and perhaps the Espian system) is to help us align our intentions, our projections into the future, so that we can realise our dreams, ambitions, interests, needs.

timing

If we are to produce a system where there is no 'project management', no authority which is imposing control, or we are constantly running around trying to get attention or money or power from larger organisations or established people, then we have to think differently about time. Targets are set by individuals respective to a time. Dead-lines are for people who have to produce various things by certain times. They have to, otherwise they are dead. We need a different way of thinking about it.

Timing is the single most important thing about collectives. Individuals become collectives when they act together NOW. The trick is aligning ourselves so that whatever it is that we are doing or are interested in, intersects with other peoples interests and actions. Hence, timing is merely an opportunity to come together. Meetings become historic, in the sense that everyone values the time that people are putting in to meet, the rich communication available, the affirmation of trust, etc.

So, the sections that all individuals write regarding what their intentions are for the day are collated on the today collective intention page. You will see that the sections here are copies of what people have written on their own pages. This enables anyone to view at a glance (well, ideally), what everybody else is doing today. Ideally, we should be able to filter this and show things that are relevant to our interests...

Think timing is about intention. The trick is for each of us set our own targets so that they converge with others. The best way to experience this for me, in a deep way, is GO, or Tango. The idea is not to tie yourself down with meetings etc, but to keep your time free to be able to respond to things that occur.

projections

These are things that people are working on. There is a lot of confusion about 'projects', since there are people working on various projects, when actually the similarity between them may be vast, from people just getting together and talking, to actual real things happening. Also, most searches are done in terms of projects, which is essentially what people have done, rather than aligning themselves with the people and what their intentions are.

So, instead, we have the idea of projections, which is an externalisation of people's intentions with some notion of work output. Hence all work is outlined in short bullet points of intentions, whether daily or weekly or at other times, eg after 24weeks. We don't have to agree on them at the outset. This system should allow us to pursue multiple perspective, to co-ordinate without management, and achieve things collaboratively.

A good way to think about project is not to think of it as a noun, a project, but a process, to project.