Sohodojo’s Omidyar.net Blog

Hello Lawrence, Christina, Lars, and the members and supporters of the LiA/WE/I4C communities,We are so sorry to hear of the drought and its impact on your ability to work and have Internet access. We hope you will soon have a generator that will help to alleviate the darkness.When you do have a flash of power and Internet access, we’d like to point you to a short article that we posted as a personal news item. Divide and Conquer… the Flat World is not directly about website technology, nor web design nor software development. But we were inspired to write this piece in response to this thread.

In this article we reflect on the insights we’ve developed and on the ideas we’re working on at Sohodojo. The lesson to be learned from this article and from the articles to which it links to is this:

Technology, especially Internet and software technology, is not the source of power for you and your community. It is the ideas (what is often called the business model) that you capture and reflect in the software that is the source of your individual and collective power.

This means that it is not enough to just look at Internet software technologies and build the LiA/WE/I4C web platform based on a laundry list of features that you like and think that you will need. These software features are only a means to an end. The values and goals for your community, how you want to relate to and support each other, the customers and partners you want to attract and retain, et cetera, these are the ends to keep in the front of your mind as you design and build the LiA/WE/I4C web sites.

You will only reach your destination if you keep in mind where you want to go as well as how you want to get there.

–Sohodojo Timlynn and Jim–

Hello Lawrence, Christina, Lars, and the members and supporters of the LiA/WE/I4C communities,We are so sorry to hear of the drought and its impact on your ability to work and have Internet access. We hope you will soon have a generator that will help to alleviate the darkness.When you do have a flash of power and Internet access, we’d like to point you to a short article that we posted as a personal news item. Divide and Conquer… the Flat World is not directly about website technology, nor web design nor software development. But we were inspired to write this piece in response to this thread.

In this article we reflect on the insights we’ve developed and on the ideas we’re working on at Sohodojo. The lesson to be learned from this article and from the articles to which it links to is this:

Technology, especially Internet and software technology, is not the source of power for you and your community. It is the ideas (what is often called the business model) that you capture and reflect in the software that is the source of your individual and collective power.

This means that it is not enough to just look at Internet software technologies and build the LiA/WE/I4C web platform based on a laundry list of features that you like and think that you will need. These software features are only a means to an end. The values and goals for your community, how you want to relate to and support each other, the customers and partners you want to attract and retain, et cetera, these are the ends to keep in the front of your mind as you design and build the LiA/WE/I4C web sites.

You will only reach your destination if you keep in mind where you want to go as well as how you want to get there.

–Sohodojo Timlynn and Jim–