The Entrepreneurial Free Agent and Dejobbed Small Business R&D Lab
Software for nanocorps
Technical Special Interest Group
Making 'Small is Good' Real in the New Economy

[ Center for Community Collaboration Technologies ] [ The Nanocorp Game ] [ Recommended Reading ]

Welcome to our TechSIG area

Highly Recommended
David Gelernter's Mirror Worlds is the most important book about the Internet that isn't an Internet book! [ More... ]

Some things you just have to do yourself. Developing the software technologies for maximum competitiveness of ''Small is Good' Business Webs' is one of them. Entrepreneurial free agents (nanocorps) and our dejobbed small businesses simply will not get the products and related services we need if we leave the necessary R&D to Big Business providers.

Not only are our needs different than conventional 'Big is Good'-oriented business, our mind-sets are very different as well. We 'Ride the wave, don't own it.' within collaborative elastic networks of shared responsibility and benefit.

Because we think differently, the solutions we envision will be different. That is what we are working on here in the Sohodojo TechSIG -- collaboration technologies by nanocorpers, for nanocorpers, software to build 'Small is Good' Business Webs.

The Center for Community Collaboration Technologies (CCCT) is a special project of our TechSIG in collaboration with the Communities of the Future. The Center is the manifestation of our boundary-level change agent role within the wider Open Source technology development community.

The truly important characteristic of Open Source technology is not that it is free. (Open Source doen't have to be free software. Here, however, we're talking about free Open Source software.) Rather, it is the shared responsibility and shared benefit that comes from 'You ride the wave, don't own it.' Even Big Business is catching on... though there are growing pains, for sure.

Two forces are at work that can divert the self-organizing, self-managing dynamics of Open Source technology development away from what nanocorping entrepreneurial free agents need for success:

• 'Big is Good' thinking underlying conventional venture capital investment

• 'Technology for its own sake' thinking by Open Source developers

The CCCT is how we are formalizing our participation in the Open Source community to counter these two counter-productive dynamics in the wider business world we live within.

It is widely believed that the wheel entered human experience in toys before its being turned to widespread practical applications. Humans have a long history of playing with innovations before trusting them to Real World usage.

	Highly Recommended
	Michael Schrage's Serious Play captures the excitement and opportunity of the executable businss model approach to system design and implementation. Stop thinking 'application'. Think 'simulation'. TechSIG Leader, Jim Salmons, spent nearly 16 years as an 'extreme' Smalltalk programmer. Smalltalkers know first-hand that good problem space analysis, creative modeling and a bit of clever programming can create executable software models that, as Schrage suggests, take on a near life of their own. These software models have what might be called the Mirror World Effect. This is what we are shooting for here at Sohodojo... to create jaw-dropping, innovative software technologies to power the 'Small is Good' business webs that will revolutionize 21st Century business. If this sounds interesting to you, consider joining our TechSIG community. Drop us a note with your ideas and interests.

The military services pioneered the use of simulators for training personnel in the effective use of all kinds of complex vehicles and pieces of equipment. We reduce Real World risk and expense through 'serious play'.

David Gelernter described the evolving interplay between computer simulations and the Real World in his landmark book, Mirror Worlds. Gelernter described a world so transformed 'through the looking glass' that convicted Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski, was willing to kill to keep Gelernter from writing another book as important as Mirror Worlds.

The Nanocorp Game is our R&D exploratory learning laboratory for the study and development of 21st Century 'Small is Good' business webs.

Aspiring entrepreneurial free agents and dejobbed small business owner/operators will play the game to develop and extend the skills and strategies they need to be effective, trusted collaborators in these 'Small is Good' business webs.

Forward-thinking venture capitalists, community bankers, economic developers and others will play the game to develop the skills and strategies to work with this emerging force in the New Economy.

Here's what we are up to so far that relates to The Nanocorp Game:

• We have described a role/actor-based scenario model consistent with the gaming context of venture capital in The Nanocorp Game.

• We've described a role/actor-based scenario model consistent with the gaming context of organizational dynamics within The Nanocorp Game.

• We did a 'close but no cigar' application for an Small Business Innovation Research grant (SBIR) last year seeking U.S. Department of Commerce funding for the development of XML-based component technologies to support 'The Nanocorp Game' platform. We'll regroup and reenergize our effort to develop a winning SBIR application.

• We've discovered some extremely exciting technology at the Argonne National Labs (U. Chicago) ideal for 'The Nanocorp Game' project. Check out this informative paper Facet: A Simulation Software Framework For Modeling Complex Societal Processes And Interactions. We're actively soliciting research funding to build 'Mirror World' extensions for FACET. We want to help take this exciting technology from its simulation domain roots into the 'Mirror World' domain of role-actor executable business models. Learn more about the Dynamic Information Architecture System (DIAS) at the Argonne Lab web site.

Before you drill down to fine-grained 'techy' tech readings to expand your understanding and skills in our TechSIG's area of interest, here are some inspirational Big Picture titles you should consider.

If you have read these great books 'in their day', consider reading them again in the context of today's global networked economy where 'Small is Good' can be a viable competitive strategy. These books will help you help us research and develop the software technologies needed to unleash the 'other side of Capitalism':

• Mirror Worlds: Or the Day Software Puts the Universe in a Shoebox: How It Will Happen and What It Will Mean by David Gelernter

• Serious Play: How the World's Best Companies Simulate to Innovate by Michael Schrage

• No More Teams! Mastering the Dynamics of Creative Collaboration by Michael Schrage

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