Walt on Social Software
August 9th, 2004Walt Crawford says that he doesn’t understand Social Software. Because of the good timing on my social software posts tonight, I feel the need to respond.
When I talk about Social Software, I’m not necessarily talking about Orkut, Friendster, and the rest per se , but a concept that I have been trying to form in my brain about how people working together in groups (the “social” in social software) to form better concepts, theories, and work product than the sole individual. Librarians (or any other professionals) can use online resources (the “software” in social software) to collaborate, work out problems, form ideas, etc for the common good of the profession. It’s not just about meeting people. It’s about working with these people in a group effort. I’ll understand more as I read up on the topic (I have The Wisdom of Crowds on order and have a few more like it on interlibrary loan). In remembering back to my masters work in psychology, there are many theories about how groups work and interact with each other that build confidences as well as enhanced production. I can’t wait to delve into this more.