The 2007 Technology Conference marked my first real introduction to ASAE. It also served as my introduction to the Jeff and Ben, which led to me introduction to the Blogoclump as a whole, which in turn jump started my blogging and involvement in the association community. That chain of events made the event more than worth the price for admission and a great reason to attend it again this year. I just made the trip from PA to DC this afternoon and am happily settled into my hotel room at the Embassy Suites.

From the look at the agenda, the educational sessions look pretty solid and definitely relevant to me, especially as I make some changes at work.

I am currently in the process of shifting my focus from the leadership online learning area to leading a very large project that will impact our component organizations and is looking at literally transforming our online components into true communities of practice. I’ve been working on this project for over a year already in a stretch assignment that I did in conjunction with my other position, but it’s become apparent that due to the complexity, critical importance and my own bandwidth that a choice had to be made. I chose to go this route because of the challenge and the fact that the project involves people, technology, processes, complex systems, and a lot of change management. I also think that the project is going to really set the help establish a new baseline for our communities for quite some time to come.

I’m going to do my best to post regularly from the event and share some of the insights, conversations, lessons learned from not only the formal event but also the informal learning that takes place. It should be great and I look forward to the days ahead.

I had no sooner finished compiling and writing about a number of the big ticket predictions for 2008 when the blogosphere and the web in general was awash in talk about one of the trends that I had referenced: data portability. But what is it? Why are organizations like Plaxo, Google, Facebook, MySpace, and a lot of other well respected organizations and individuals taking note and joining the initiative? More importantly how can/will it effect you and your association?

Before I get too far into the specifics, I think it helps to have a fundamental understanding of what data portability is. Michael Pick, a Senior Technical Editor at Robin Good’s Master New Media blog, was commissioned by the DataPortability Group to create a video on the topic that I think does a fantastic job of explaining some of the finer points in a very easy to understand manner. From the video (and thanks to the Master New Media blog):

“You login to Facebook, Gmail, Twitter, YouTube, del.icio.us.

You login to LinkedIn, Wordpress, Ustream, Utterz, Jaiku… and that’s just the morning!

Then you have to maintain your accounts…

You create a profile.

And another profile.

And another profile.

Adding your contact details, adding your friends. Adding your contact details, adding your friends.

Adding your contact details… you get the message.

Great. There goes half your life.

Now, time to add some media…

Upload your photos, your avatars, your videos, your music…

Rinse and repeat.

Again, and again and again.

Net result: network fatigue. Your data locked up, in someone else’s hands.

Everything’s changing. The dataportability workgroup brings together a distributed filesystem for data. Bringing existing standards together into a single blueprint, dataportability is all about creating a free flowing web totally within your control and privacy.

What does that mean to you? A free, open, remixable web where your identity, contacts, relationships, personal details and media are free to follow you wherever you go…

Join some of the biggest companies in the world in the conversation today at dataportability.org!“

And because a picture is worth a thousand words, and videos are worth even more here is the video:

DataPortability - Connect, Control, Share, Remix from Smashcut Media on Vimeo.

The DataPortability is by no means a slamdunk or done deal, but I think now that some big names have signed-on, you may see this initiative gain additional traction, exposure and acceptance. I also think it is long overdue. I also think it could be a potential solution to the information overload that Matt and Lindy have been discussing with regard to information/attention overload.

What if you could easily move between sites/communities with a single account? What if your members could? Is this something you could leverage as a member benefit? There are obviously a lot of questions that arise the more you think about it. This is one trend that I will definitely be keeping an eye on this year. Next week, I’ll will take a look at this topic in greater detail to see how it may/may not apply to the association world. Until then, let me know what questions are on your mind on this or any other topic.

I’ve been getting frustrated the past few weeks after hearing stories of people and organizations launching a new Facebook group or adding a blog to their website and claiming to be taking part in the new world of social media. The problem isn’t the fact that they are making an effort or getting involved, it’s that they are taking these actions in isolation without considering how the actions fit into their organizations broader strategic goals and objectives and creates member value.

In order for social media, or any other tool, technology, program, etc., to be successful it needs to be part of a larger plan or strategy. So what is social media? To me, it’s a means to an end, not an end in itself. I found this recent quote from Valeria Maltoni’s Blog: Conversation Agent to be extremely relevant, timely and similar in sentiment:

“Social media is a tool, just like the telephone is. It’s not even marketing — in the traditional sense, marketing is dead.

What social media does is simply allow you to do one thing: communicate. That’s it. Social media is not the conversation. It’s the room in which you hold the conversation. It still comes down to saying, doing, or producing something valuable for your customer. Companies which forget this will simply throw money down the social media hole. Companies that get it will find social media a valuable tool — if they they are prepared to stick it out and learn how it works.”

The first sentence warrants repeating: “social media is a tool.” Of the many definitions that exist for the term “tool” one of them is: “the means whereby some act is accomplished”. The challenge with having a variety of tools at your disposal is knowing how to chose the right tool for the task. More literally, you can hammer a nail into a wall with a screwdriver, but wouldn’t it be a lot more efficient and effective if you used a hammer instead. If you subscribe to Valeria’s thinking, which I do, social media is simply a tool that enables a conversation to take place. To take this a step further, conversations are the fundamental building blocks of community, because it having a conversation implies having something to talk about like a shared interest.

While I am not trying to downplay the impact or criticize social media in general, I do want to call into question the way people and organizations are leaping into the use of it without considering the implications and obligations of doing so. The broad availability of these tools and lack of the typical barriers to entry further exacerbate the temptation to leap before you look. There are short and long term considerations that need to be weighed and balanced related not only to the what, but also the why and how. There is definitely room for experimentation, trial and failure, and doing things differently, but I think the fundamental rules of business still apply - know your market, provide value to your stakeholders, make your service/product easy to use, focus on the benefits - however, if you fail to plan, plan to fail.

You don’t have to have a perfect vision of the future in mind to be successful but you have to have a general idea of where you want to go or you’ll never be sure that you have gotten there. Let’s start thinking deliberately about what we are trying to accomplish and how we are trying to do accomplish it instead of throwing ideas out with no expectations or criteria for success. Anybody can launch initiatives that attract a large percentage of their member-bases, but it takes real strategy, focus and commitment to create viable communities that are sustainable and create value for the member and the organization alike.