I had the happy fortune to read two articles back-to-back; Hypertext and Our Collective Destiny: Tim Berners-Lee talking back in 1995 …

… and Slide 43 of 44 of Matt Webb’s reboot11 talk.

The thread that joins them together, Tim Berners-Lee talked a lot back then about how he hoped the Internet would help solve problems …

“It is, then, a good time 50 years on to sit back and consider to what extent we have actually made life easier. We have access to information: but have we been solving problems? Well, there are many things it is much easier for individuals today than 5 years ago. Personally I don’t feel that the web has made great strides in helping us work as a global team.“

Although this talk was 14 years ago I think it still applies. The web for all the “great strides” is still right in it’s infancy, no matter how developed we currently think it is, with it’s Flash and it’s CSS and it’s HTML5 and whatever.

Collecting Information

We are still primarily at the information collecting stage. Wikipedia is collecting information, Flickr is collecting photos, Facebook is collecting users, OpenStreetMap is collecting data.

Personally at the end of my time at Flickr, and even now, I’m not ultimately interested in the how and why of collecting more stuff, I’m interested in doing something will all that information.

The comment about “we have access to information: but have we been solving problems?” struck a chord. And I thought “Yeah, we should be solving problems”.

Problems

I think there are two types of problems…

1. Obvious Problems; OpenStreetMap collects information to solve the problem of not having information. Wikipedia collects information to solve the problem of not having information, etc.
2. Non-Obvious Problems; (see I’m good at this) The problems that we realise can only be solved when we’ve gathered a sufficient amount of information.

This was gearing me up for the Problem Solving Stage, we’re getting better at collecting information, still not so good at solving problems.

However …

Inventing Culture

Matt Webb, on Slide 43 said …

“Because when you contribute, when you participate in culture, when you’re no longer solving problems, but inventing culture itself, that is when life starts getting interesting.”

… and because Schulze &amp Webb and all who sail in her are way smarter and far more future thinking than me, I tend to listen to them, even if I don’t fully understand it all :)

From this I take away that, if, we really want to be smart we need to look beyond collecting information, beyond solving problems, to changing culture and inventing new forms of culture.

I think that Flickr is kinda 80% collecting, 16% problem solving and 4% inventing culture.

I haven’t decided what my 100 hours are going to be, but I’m going to try and look beyond problem solving as being a topic.

An Example with Open Street Map

Stage 1: Collecting Information, we’ve seen now that OSM is getting better at collecting information, so …

Stage 2: Solving Problems. Well what are maps good for, in the scope of mass cultural/social consumption, i.e. what do I use them for rather than someone with a specific job?

Well, I use maps to get somewhere.

But do I really need a map for that? I really just need a compass and a bearing and then walk/drive in that direction until I eventually get to the place I want to go.

The only problem with that, is that I may not get to where I want to go in time. So for me, a map solves a time based problem rather than a location based on, and I suspect that applies to most users of maps.

Stage 3: The problem of getting to somewhere on time can either be solved with maps or removed by a cultural shift.

Leaving the question; What can we do to remove the need to be at certain unknown places at a set time and in the long run, the need to collect information for maps at all?

Photos by revdancatt, russelldavies and we-make-money-not-art.