So I've been crunching on this for months. Actually since Terrence first told me about what Tom was trying to do, and even more so since I saw Tom demo Memestreams at PhreakNIC in October of 02. We've had numerous discussions about the potential for reputation systems in general, and Memestreams specifically. But I could never figure out a model that a) made money unequivocably and b) didn't smack of dot.com funk. But now I think I've found one that fits.

I just recently started working at a healthcare company that is growing very rapidly and is becoming very successful. Yay! for me to not be unemployed anymore. But one of the tasks I have in front of me is looking at knowledge management (KM) systems and processes. Part of this is due to the rapid growth of the company, who's core product is 'knowledge' about how to treat a person who has serious chronic illness. The other part is related to some organizational development changes within the company.

I'm a big fan of KM. I've preached it for about a decade. It's definitely helped my career out. I've even tried applying it in one of my companies, to much intangible success. It's a Good Thing(tm) to use as our workforce populace becomes more and more comfortable with technology's pervasivness, and the importance of sharing information and expertise electronically.

One of the biggest challenges with implementing KM into an organization is getting people to utilize it. If you've never had any KM process or tools, then you probably think that you can live without them. Why change? Change is hard and painful and I'm doing my job just fine thank you cuz my performance eval from last quarter says so. Besides, we don't need no stinking message boards to talk to each other.

Typically, businesses will try and 'incentivize' (dot.com word) employees to utilize the systems in place. In some cases, they can get as Nazi as requiring you to put certain reports or follow a certain process. But this is hit or miss at best because as we all know, some managers will dismiss the KM process as 'fluff' and circumvent it. They won't require their reports to utilize it, and may even punish those that do. Another key challenge here is how do you incentivize it? You could say that the employee who contributes the most to the KM systems gets a bigger bonus than those who don't. But you could just keep ringing up posts of nonsense and still win that battle. And that got me thinking....

What's sorely needed in KM is reputation. And this could be the catalyst that incents utilization. If you had a reputation system in place, then it would be very easy to determine who was contributing the most USEFUL knowledge into the system, and bonuses and other incentives could be based on reputation capital. This could very easily motivate people to deposit info into the KM systems, and really motivate them to partake of that knowledge, because it would be required to increase one's reputation.

Of course the normal social network issues would apply, such as all your friends banding together to increase eachother's reputation capital regardless of quality. But I think there is adequate work in that area to minimize 'fixing' the system.

So the bottomline here is that Memestreams could easily plug into a lot of toolsets used in the KM universe (mailing lists, BBS's, content management, change management, etc) as a reputation engine to help drive up utilization. You get the benefit of working with a B2B market, in a very legitimate and hot sector, and you're solving a very real problem with adoption of that sector. Bling Bling!

] "Telecommuting and unions just don't mix."

Organizing Telecommuters

] Wilson says the entrepreneurs he wants to back now are
] people who come out of specific industries, and thus
] understand the problems and how customers would use the
] technology.

This article is hilarious. Basically it's the VCs saying that they are just now realizing that tech infrastructure business are now maturing and the real investments are in applying technology. DuH!

A Bubble-Era VC Is Itching to Get Started Again

] As DSL loses ground to cable, wireless technologies may
] be the phone companies' best hope for linking customers
] to the Net at high speed

This is one of the worst articles I've read about telecom in quite some time. To wit:

At the end of 2002, just 6.2 million of the 18 million broadband households in the U.S. were using DSL

hmm... not bad, considering that cable got a 2 year jump on DSL thanks to the Bells, and that most of the companies that were offering DSL in the first place are now dead. I'd take a 3rd of the market anyday given those circumstances.

The writer also fails to mention that the reason why DSL deployment is so abysmal for the Bells is because they don't want to deploy it at all.

Broadband Internet service is fast becoming the cable industry's biggest moneymaker: CIBC cable analyst Alan Bezoza estimates that its operating margins on high-speed data run as great as 60% before interest, taxation, and amortization.

yeah, it also helps that a lot of those customers they acquired for pennies when @Home got raided. Compared to the typical $500+ acquisition cost for a DSL customer (or even a new cable HSI customer), that makes the economics look gooooood.

Verizon Chairman Larry Babbio predicts that his company will break even on DSL once he signs up 3 million subscribers.

LOL! 3M? Larry.... who's running your network? How is it that investors allowed a big dinosaur who doesn't even want to deploy DSL cook up a scheme to blow billions of dollars and not make a penny until they've got 3M customers, when dozens of CLECs were left to die who had business plans that showed profitability with one tenth that?

A large niche market is developing that the Bells could have all to themselves: Internet access from rural areas -- those huge stretches of the country where cable doesn't go.

and every economic analysis of this market is that it will never be profitable unless you are a satellite company. No matter what tech you're using.

BellSouth also is testing fixed wireless as an alternative to DSL in both suburban and rural areas.

It fails to mention that the reason why BellSouth is doing this is because they have significant FITL in the suburbs and they don't want to share that fiber with anyone, or allow anyone to colo at the remote terminal. Sounds like good business practices to me.

"There's no advantage," declares Ed Charleton, SBC's vice-president for Internet product management, who explains that SBC's research has shown that it would cost about the same to provide wireless broadband as to upgrade existing copper network to handle DSL.

Hey? How'd this get in there? I was sure this was a flak piece from the wireless lobby!

Moreover, in February, 2002, the Federal Communications Commission ruled that the Bells wouldn't have to share high-speed fiber lines with competitors, as they are required to with copper phone lines. That means they have an incentive to invest in fiber, not wireless technologies, as a way to shut out competition.

BINGO! Hey Jane, didn't you put 2 and 2 together after you wrote this? Oh I forgot, you're just another idiot flak.

Saving the Bells' Broadband Bacon

] Conventional wisdom, you may remember, once rode side by
] side with the prophets of change. When the stock market
] hit the puke stage, conventional wisdom turned. The whole
] new economy thing had been a bad thing. Time, talent, and
] capital were thrown away on unsustainable enterprises
] like point-and-click pet food; it was good for Odwalla,
] but not good for America.

I couldn't have written this article better myself.

Why the bust was for the best for the rest of us.

blogged for future reference.

The McKinsey Quarterly: Hidden flaws in strategy

Article about outsourcing HR and finance processing to other companies.

Tech businesses in disguise

] Here's why AT&T should buy Covad: it'll keep losing
] customers like myself if it doesn't get with the program
] and offer another product.

First, Bambi looks like Haifa.
Second, the reason why ATT couldn't do anything with Northpoint was because there was no one with a brain in their head left at Northpoint when ATT bought up the assets.
Third, if ATT can't make anything of Northpoint when it only cost pennies on the dollar, what makes her think they could plow $300M+ for COVD and get anything?
Fourth, I really really want to slap the guy that says that this is an obsolete service. What the hell is this guy gonna buy next month? Telepathy?
Finally, as much as I'd like to see ATT buy COVD, if just to have a somewhat blunt instrument against the Bells, it will never happen. No one wants to touch COVD because they've got stink all over them. A feature that is well, quite deserved.

Why Ma Bell should buy Covad

] The five members of the Federal Communications Commission
] defended their new telephone and broadband policy in
] front of a Congressional hearing today

or When multi-billion dollar corporations throw temper tantrums.

F.C.C. Members Testify About New High-Speed Rules

] The nation's Bell companies are quietly lobbying the
] nation's top regulators at the Federal Communications
] Commission. Their goal is to slap new charges on
] Internet-based calls in order to protect their own
] system. If the FCC goes along, it will effectively crush
] the growing entrepreneurial drive by numerous Internet
] providers to provide consumers with this service.

I'm curious where she gets some facts in this article, but nonetheless, she paints the picture as it really is.

Will the Bells crush Net calling?