Hot or Not?

Have you heard the hype about Web 2.0? Have you wondered what makes the grade? Well, I have... that is until I found this "hot or not" style list for Web 2.0 -- what a find!

Web 1.0 --> Web 2.0
DoubleClick --> Google AdSense
Ofoto --> Flickr
Akamai --> BitTorrent
mp3.com --> Napster
Britannica Online --> Wikipedia
personal websites --> blogging
evite --> upcoming.org and EVDB
domain name speculation --> search engine optimization
page views --> cost per click
screen scraping --> web services
publishing --> participation
content management systems --> wikis
directories (taxonomy) --> tagging ("folksonomy")
stickiness --> syndication

Read the full (and by full I mean 20 page) article.

IBM Leads (er, Blogs) the Way

I have been a fan of Sam Palmisano, CEO at IBM, since reading an article in the New York Times a couple of years back entitled, "Less Tech, More Touch." Now, in the same reach out and touch someone fashion, IBM has launched a full scale employee blog initiative. This appeals to my belief that internet skills are a new core competency for each of us to add to our communications (and software) toolbelt to expand our relationship circle. And, in the case of National Wildlife Federation (an organization I obviously care deeply about), I can spread the good word and do my part to grow the environmental movement.

How do we rank?

Since I am directly involved in the creation of National Wildlife Federation's web presence, I am always curious to know how we stack up in the world of environmental organizations. As a barometer, I compare us on alexa.com. Try it, check us against your (other) favorite organization.

It's a design based economy

In Fast Company (April 2005), Roger Martin asserts to compete we must learn to think like designers. And just how does one do that?

It's a project world
Forget about permanent assignments. Your work will flow from project to project, and you'll organize your life around those projects.

Rewards go to the problem solvers
Status won't come from managing big budgets and large staffs. Like designers, managers will be rewarded for solving tough mysteries with elegant solutions.

There are no perfect solutions
The work style in conventional companies is to seek the perfect answer. That's inefficient and slow. Designers try it, prototype it, improve it, and move it.

Don't wait for the proof
Traditional companies reward those who prove that something actually operates or that something must be. Design shops reward those with the foresight and courage to act on what might be.

Play At Work

How might you go about the business of having fun at work, here is one possible answer from "Reframing Organizations."

In most organizations, play and humor are sharply distinguished from work. Play is what people do when they are not working. Images of play in conversation typically connote aggression, competition, and struggle ("We've got to beat them at their own game"; "We dropped the ball on that one"; "The ball is in his court now") rather than relaxation and fun. But if play is viewed as a state of mind, any activity can be playful. Play permits relaxing the rules to explore alternatives. It encourages experimentation, flexibility, and adaptiveness. March (author of "Ambiguity and Choice in Organizations") suggests five guidelines for play in organizations:

1. Treat goals as hypothesis.
2. Treat intuition as real.
3. Treat hypocrisy as transition.
4. Treat memory as an enemy.
5. Treat experience as a theory.

Why You Can't Learn To Like It

Before strollin the net, I was a stroller of the New York Times in messy get it all over your hands in black and white print. From those days, I have a stack of press clippings of articles I knew I would read again and again. This one named in the title is from January 25, 2004. Being a staff member of an environmental organization and having a degree in microbiology, what stood out to me most is this, "That leap from "understand" to "appreciate" is long and blind. The word understand remains elusive. I don't understand an elm tree, but give me the right one, and I like to sit under it. Knowing its biology may help, but the heart is not a biologist." National Wildlife Federation has an emerging program, Green Hour, to help us find our appreciation of the natural world and maybe a little understanding along the way.

From Invention to Inspiration

Al Gore inspires an online communications campaign...

As you may know, each year, Free Range Studios offers a grant of up to $15,000 worth of design and strategic communications services to a non-profit organization or coalition working on progressive issues. We call it our Gratitude Grant. This year, we received dozens of applications and as usual, we were inspired by the incredible projects presented to us, making our process of choosing a final winner a very difficult one.

After much deliberation, we decided to put our talent and energies behind one of the most vital issues facing the entire world today: global warming.

I'm pleased to announce this year's recipient is the Global Footprint Network. Launched in 2003, the Network aims to make ecological limits central the decisions made by governments, businesses, households and individuals worldwide. To accomplish this goal, the Network is advancing the scientific rigor and practical use of an Ecological Footprint calculator, a tool that quantifies humanity’s demands on the planet and compares them to the Earth’s capacity to meet these demands.

Free Range is excited to contribute online strategy and web design services to ensure the Eco Footprint tool is designed effectively and distributed as widely and strategically as possible. Ultimately, we look forward to seeing the positive change this tool incites.

Earlier this year, I attended the D.C. premiere of Al Gore's film, "An Inconvenient Truth." I sat in the audience with our Online Strategy Director, Susan Finkelpearl, watching Gore walk through his incredibly instructive and revealing presentation on global warming. As he outlined evidence of the unnatural spike in our planet's temperature and the existing and potential ramifications of this ominous change, we pledged that Free Range would respond to the moral imperative facing us and tackle this issue with all of the ingenuity we could offer.

We believe that our partnership with Global Footprint Network allows us to take one step toward fulfilling this commitment.

The Free Range Studios Gratitude Grant is an annual happening. Look for our 2007 announcement in February. In the meantime, we’re always on the lookout for great project concepts– especially those that float an entire movement or involve a coalition of organizations. So please give us a shout if you’d like to discuss ideas of this nature.

15 Websites that Changed the World

In celebration of the Web's 15th Anniversary (can you believe it?), The
Observer ranks the websites that changed the world.

What's in a name?

Why Strollin' the Net, you ask? My mom is my inspiration, for many reasons of course, but let me explain her particular contribution to this title.

My mom is 57-years-young and an avid stroller of the net. A few years ago she discovered on her own the power of social networks courtesy of Yahoo! Groups. There, she found a common bond with a group of ladies (as she calls them) around an actor named Lane Davies (yes, he has his own wikipedia entry).

Her relationship with the ladies has turned into a true friendship that transcends the online space. Tracy, who lives in Georgia, talks with my mom on the phone often and even sent a gift for my new baby. Jocelyn, who lives in Washington D.C., visits my mom in Maryland on weekends. And, a group of the ladies including my mom travel regularly to see Lane Davies performing Shakespeare in L.A. and Davy Crockett in Tennessee.

And, back to the name. My mom's fondness for the internet created a new career for me in technical support, and because I love my husband deeply I drafted him to the cause. While providing this support, my mom wanted to show us something on a web page so she said, "stroll up" and we dutifully took the mouse and scrolled up. My mom very frustratedly said, "no, stroll up!" Well, as you have guessed "stroll" translates to "scroll". What you might not have guessed is the confusion between up or down which depends entirely on your perspective. You see, my husband and I are speaking about the behavior of the scroll bar while mom is speaking about the behavior of the page. Yes, it's true, when you scroll down, the page strolls up. And, "the net"? Well, my mom frequently calls to tell us what she found or more likely ordered "on the net."

And so, this blog was born in tribute to my mom and all of the cool stuff one can find while strollin' the net.

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