On April 16th, 2010 we will hold the first TEDxMonterey event with the theme: Be the Solution. The theme is the motto of the Monterey Institute but also the best unifier of all that we do at MIIS and in the Monterey Community. We brainstormed concepts that were important to the identity of Monterey County – agriculture, jazz, tourism, oceans, languages, cultures, creative economy, conflict resolution, environmental sustainability (and many more) and realized that in each area of Monterey, we were striving find new and creative solutions to these problems that we face. Creating a TEDx event around solutions will enable us to dialog about different issues and how we might come together in unique ways to find solutions.
With our theme in hand, we are currently approaching potential speakers, partners and sponsors to help shape this exciting event. You can now follow us on twitter or become a facebook fan to keep up to date with this project.
Flickr photo by Anecin Exterors
Over the last few years I have dabbled into the art of community building through social networking. I first experimented with Ning when a returned from an organizational development conference and I wanted to connect all the people that attended a my innovation session in a virtual community. This idea flopped, but I learned alot from it. I believe some of the reasons it didn’t work was because we had no goal. We had no reason to interact, only just to continue a good conversation from a conference. I was also bringing people into a new space where they weren’t already active. A new space, no goals, with very little background (just sitting in on my 90 minute session) = not the greatest online community
My next adventure into social networking was for a class I was co-teaching on digital media for social change. This classes used a ning as its course space. This was highly effective as we had a large class (41 students) and this space made a place people could interact in a way they actually couldn’t in the class. It fit right in with the goal of the class as it was real easy to share media. The only problem with this space was that once the class was over, most of the action stopped in the ning even though we wanted to continue it as a sharing space.
I also made a ning space for my innovation pizza process to promote cross-fertilization of ideas and discussion over what the school needed to innovate. This became a fun space, but was primarily used by me as a communication tool for me to the folks involved with the pizza process.
Has those past attempts with social networking got me down? No way. I’m now trying again using facebook to promote the TEDxMonterey event that will take place on April 16th, 2010. I’ve created a facebook fan page and I already have twice as many members as I have ever had using ning. I think going to a space that people are already using has helped this page grow in numbers but I’m still struggling with the social interaction. I’m again the primary participant in this group, but it is proving to be an excellent communication tool. I have connected with so many more members of the Monterey community through this space and I think the event will draw bigger crowds due to its presence on facebook.
What have I learned? There is no tool that is perfect for online social networking. The most important components of creating online spaces is really thinking through the idea before its online and figuring out what my goal is and how I will accomplish that goal with a variety of tools. What is the goal or incentive to bring people back to the space and how can their interactions benefit them, not just me. So while I haven’t yet perfected the online community space idea, I do know it has tremendous potential and there is still room to experiment and find the best suite of tools and practices to get the job done well.
To prepare for the video editing workshop that the TLC is running in January, Kristen Byers and I worked on a sample video to show what other faculty or staff might be able to do in the week of training. Our goal was two-fold; explain our office in less than two minutes and also experiment with iMovie 09 so that we’re ready to teach the tool. You can tell in the video that we tried to play with lots of different components of iMovie 09! ; )
Show me, don’t tell me. As a part of the website redesign process, we’ve been working on storytelling as a tool for communicating the message of the Monterey Institute. As an example for the web strategy team, I made this one minute video showing what Irina Shestiperova has done with her MIIS degree rather than just telling us that she loves MIIS.
This video has since been added to the rotation of videos showcased on Monterey Institute homepage.
