Collaboration is working together to achieve a goal.^[1] It is a recursive^[2] process where two or more people or organizations work together to realize shared goals, (this is more than the intersection of common goals seen in co-operative ventures, but a deep, collective, determination to reach an identical objective^{[by whom?][original research?]}) — for example, an intriguing^{[improper synthesis?]} endeavor^[3][4] that is creative in nature^[5]—by sharing knowledge, learning and building consensus. Most collaboration requires leadership, although the form of leadership can be social within a decentralized and egalitarian group.^[6] In particular, teams that work collaboratively can obtain greater resources, recognition and reward when facing competition for finite resources.^[7] Collaboration is also present in opposing goals exhibiting the notion of adversarial collaboration, though this is not a common case for using the word.

Structured methods of collaboration encourage introspection of behavior and communication.^[6] These methods specifically aim to increase the success of teams as they engage in collaborative problem solving. Forms, rubrics, charts and graphs are useful in these situations to objectively document personal traits with the goal of improving performance in current and future projects.

Since the Second World War the term "Collaboration" acquired a very negative meaning as referring to persons and groups which help a foreign occupier of their country—due to actual use by people in European countries who worked with and for the Nazi German occupiers. Linguistically, "collaboration" implies more or less equal partners who work together—which is obviously not the case when one party is an army of occupation and the other are people of the occupied country living under the power of this army.

In order to make a distinction, the more specific term Collaborationism is often used for this phenomenon of collaboration with an occupying army. However, there is no water-tight distinction; "Collaboration" and "Collaborator", as well as "Collaborationism" and "Collaborationist", are often used in this pejorative sense—and even more so, the equivalent terms in French and other languages spoken in countries which experienced direct Nazi occupation.

Classical examples of collaboration[link]

Following are some examples of successful collaboration efforts in the past.

Trade[link]

The trade of goods is an economic activity providing mutual benefit

Trade originated with the start of communication in prehistoric times. Trading was the main facility of prehistoric people, who bartered goods and services from each other when there was no such thing as the modern day currency. Peter Watson dates the history of long-distance commerce from circa 150,000 years ago.^[8] Trade exists for many reasons. Due to specialisation and division of labor, most people concentrate on a small aspect of production, trading for other products. Trade exists between regions because different regions have a comparative advantage in the production of some tradable commodity, or because different regions' size allows for the benefits of mass production. As such, trade at market prices between locations benefits both locations.

Community organization[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

Organization and cooperation between community members provides economic and social benefits

The members of an intentional community typically hold a common social, political or spiritual vision. They also share responsibilities and resources. Intentional communities include cohousing, residential land trusts, ecovillages, communes, kibbutzim, ashrams, and housing cooperatives. Typically, new members of an intentional community are selected by the community's existing membership, rather than by real-estate agents or land owners (if the land is not owned by the community).

Hutterite, Austria (16th century)

Housing units are built and assigned to individual families but belong to the colony and there is very little personal property. Meals are taken by the entire colony in a common long room.

Oneida Community, Oneida, New York (1848)

The Oneida Community practiced Communalism (in the sense of communal property and possessions) and Mutual Criticism, where every member of the community was subject to criticism by committee or the community as a whole, during a general meeting. The goal was to eliminate bad character traits.

Early Kibbutz settlements founded near Jerusalem (1890)

A Kibbutz is an Israeli collective community. The movement combines socialism and Zionism in a form of practical Labor Zionism, founded at a time when independent farming was not practical or perhaps more correctly—not practicable. Forced by necessity into communal life, and inspired by their own ideology, the kibbutz members developed a pure communal mode of living that attracted interest from the entire world. While the kibbutzim lasted for several generations as utopian communities, most of today's kibbutzim are scarcely different from the capitalist enterprises and regular towns to which the kibbutzim were originally supposed to be alternatives.^{[citation needed]}

Game theory[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

The prisoner's dilemma is an example of game theory

Game theory is a branch of applied mathematics and economics that looks at situations where multiple players make decisions in an attempt to maximize their returns. The first documented discussion of it is a letter written by James Waldegrave, 1st Earl Waldegrave in 1713. Antoine Augustin Cournot's Researches into the Mathematical Principles of the Theory of Wealth in 1838 provided the first general theory. It was not until 1928 that this became a recognized, unique field when John von Neumann published a series of papers. Von Neumann's work in game theory culminated in the 1944 book The Theory of Games and Economic Behavior by von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern. In 1950, the first discussion of the prisoner's dilemma appeared, and an experiment was undertaken on this game at the RAND Corporation.

Military-industrial complex[link]

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The term military-industrial complex refers to a close and symbiotic relationship among a nation's armed forces, its private industry, and associated political and commercial interests. In such a system, the military is dependent on industry to supply material and other support, while the defense industry depends on government for revenue.

Skunk Works

Skunk Works is a term used in engineering and technical fields to describe a group within an organization given a high degree of autonomy and unhampered by bureaucracy, tasked with working on advanced or secret projects. Founded at Lockheed Martin in 1943, the team developed highly innovative aircraft in short time frames, even beating its first deadline by 37 days.^[9] Creator of the organization, Kelly Johnson is said to have been an 'organizing genius' and had fourteen basic operating rules.^[9]

Manhattan Project

The Manhattan Project was the project to develop the first nuclear weapon (atomic bomb) during World War II by the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada. Formally designated as the Manhattan Engineer District, it refers specifically to the period of the project from 1941–1946 under the control of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, under the administration of General Leslie R. Groves. The scientific research was directed by American physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer.

While the aforementioned persons were influential in the project itself, the value of this project as an influence on organized collaboration is better attributed to Vannevar Bush.^[9] In early 1940, Bush lobbied for the creation of the National Defense Research Committee. Frustrated by previous bureaucratic failures in implementing technology in World War I, Bush sought to organize the scientific power of the United States for greater success.^[9]

The project succeeded in developing and detonating three nuclear weapons in 1945: a test detonation of a plutonium implosion bomb on July 16 (the Trinity test) near Alamogordo, New Mexico; an enriched uranium bomb code-named "Little Boy" on August 6 over Hiroshima, Japan; and a second plutonium bomb, code-named "Fat Man" on August 9 over Nagasaki, Japan.

Project management[link]

The 2,751 Liberty ships built in four years by the United States during World War II required new approaches in organization and manufacturing

As a discipline, Project Management developed from different fields of application including construction, engineering, and defense. In the United States, the forefather of project management is Henry Gantt, called the father of planning and control techniques, who is famously known for his use of the "bar" chart as a project management tool, for being an associate of Frederick Winslow Taylor's theories of scientific management, and for his study of the work and management of Navy ship building. His work is the forerunner to many modern project management tools including the work breakdown structure (WBS) and resource allocation.

The 1950s marked the beginning of the modern project management era. Again, in the United States, prior to the 1950s, projects were managed on an ad hoc basis using mostly Gantt charts, and informal techniques and tools. At that time, two mathematical project scheduling models were developed: (1) the "Program Evaluation and Review Technique" or PERT, developed as part of the United States Navy's (in conjunction with the Lockheed Corporation) Polaris missile submarine program;^[10] and (2) the "Critical Path Method" (CPM) developed in a joint venture by both DuPont Corporation and Remington Rand Corporation for managing plant maintenance projects. These mathematical techniques quickly spread into many private enterprises.

In 1969, the Project Management Institute (PMI) was formed to serve the interest of the project management industry. The premise of PMI is that the tools and techniques of project management are common even among the widespread application of projects from the software industry to the construction industry. In 1981, the PMI Board of Directors authorized the development of what has become A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK), containing the standards and guidelines of practice that are widely used throughout the profession. The International Project Management Association (IPMA), founded in Europe in 1967, has undergone a similar development and instituted the IPMA Project Baseline. Both organizations are now participating in the development of a global project management standard.

Academia[link]

Black Mountain College

Founded in 1933 by John Andrew Rice, Theodore Dreier and other former faculty of Rollins College, Black Mountain was experimental by nature and committed to an interdisciplinary approach, attracting a faculty which included many of America's leading visual artists, poets, and designers.

Operating in a relatively isolated rural location with little budget, Black Mountain College inculcated an informal and collaborative spirit, and over its lifetime attracted a venerable roster of instructors. Some of the innovations, relationships and unexpected connections formed at Black Mountain would prove to have a lasting influence on the postwar American art scene, high culture, and eventually pop culture. Buckminster Fuller met student Kenneth Snelson at Black Mountain, and the result was the first geodesic dome (improvised out of slats in the school's back yard); Merce Cunningham formed his dance company; and John Cage staged his first happening.

Not a haphazardly conceived venture, Black Mountain College was a consciously directed liberal arts school that grew out of the progressive education movement. In its day it was a unique educational experiment for the artists and writers who conducted it, and as such an important incubator for the American avant garde. Black Mountain proved to be an important precursor to and prototype for many of the alternative colleges of today ranging from the University of California, Santa Cruz to Hampshire College and Evergreen State College, among others.

Learning Community

The Evergreen signature clock tower

Dr. Wolff-Michael Roth and Stuart Lee of the University of Victoria assert^[11] that until the early 1990s the individual was the 'unit of instruction' and the focus of research. The two observed that researchers and practitioners switched^[12][13] to the idea that knowing is 'better' thought of as a cultural practice.^{[14][15][16][17]} Roth and Lee also claim^[11] that this led to changes in learning and teaching design in which students were encouraged to share their ways of doing mathematics, history, science, with each other. In other words, that children take part in the construction of consensual domains, and 'participate in the negotiation and institutionalisation of … meaning'. In effect, they are participating in learning communities.

This analysis does not take account of the appearance of Learning communities in the United States in the early 1980s. For example, The Evergreen State College, which is widely considered a pioneer in this area, established an intercollegiate learning community in 1984. In 1985, this same college established the Washington Center for Improving the Quality of Undergraduate Education, which focuses on collaborative education approaches, including learning communities as one of its centerpieces.

Classical music[link]

Although relatively rare compared with collaboration in popular music, there have been some notable examples of music written in collaboration between classical composers. Perhaps the best-known examples are:

• Hexameron, a set of variations for solo piano on a theme from Vincenzo Bellini's opera I puritani. It was written and first performed in 1837. The contributors were Franz Liszt, Frédéric Chopin, Carl Czerny, Sigismond Thalberg, Johann Peter Pixis, and Henri Herz.
• The F-A-E Sonata, a sonata for violin and piano, written in 1853 as a gift for the violinist Joseph Joachim. The composers were Albert Dietrich (first movement), Robert Schumann (second and fourth movements), and Johannes Brahms (third movement).

Contemporary examples[link]

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Arts[link]

A piece of collaborative art created by students in Currier House at Harvard University

Collaboration—or joint production by two or more artists—is a common style among musicians and performance artists. It has not been so popular, on the other hand, in the world of art, and especially in modern art. But the strong sense of individualism long possessed by artists of fine art began to wane around the 1960s, and some artists working in units have emerged and become widely known along with the development of new media based on the advances in information technology. They have changed the concept of art into something that can be engaged in by more than individual artists alone.

Art groups[link]

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Fluxus

An international network of artists, composers and designers noted for blending different artistic media and disciplines in the 1960s. Fluxus encouraged a do it yourself aesthetic, and valued simplicity over complexity. Like Dada before it, Fluxus included a strong current of anti-commercialism and an anti-art sensibility, disparaging the conventional market-driven art world in favor of an artist-centered creative practice. As Fluxus artist Robert Filliou wrote, however, Fluxus differed from Dada in its richer set of aspirations, and the positive social and communitarian aspirations of Fluxus far outweighed the anti-art tendency that also marked the group.

Just Buffalo Literary Center, CEPA Gallery, and Big Orbit are three nonprofit arts organizations in Buffalo, New York, that have shared space and certain administrative functions since 2005. Just Buffalo offers an array of literary arts and arts-in-education programs. CEPA Gallery presents contemporary photo-related art and supports working artists. And Big Orbit has an art gallery and programs in the fields of experimental theater, literary performance, new music and sound art.

Once they co-located their administrative offices they quickly started to realize a number of advantages. Financial savings was an obvious one (they share equipment, a software contract, phone and Internet services and more). Physical proximity also helped the three executives develop a strong sense of trust and respect, and they soon looked for other ways to collaborate, such as hiring a shared grant writer who brings in grants for all three organizations.

There have been many benefits: financial savings because of their shared space, increased donations, and improved artistic programming. Beyond the tangible benefits, there are important intangibles. The agency directors share information and ideas, and they coordinate mailings. Perhaps most important, the organizations have increased their creativity; being in the same space has led to a "think tank" atmosphere. One of the three directors notes that "We work so closely … it's helped us come up with new thinking to expand our capacity and create a built-in brain trust and support system for problem solving and practical help."

Situationist International

The Situationist International (SI) was a small group of international political and artistic agitators with roots in Marxism, Lettrism and the early 20th century European artistic and political avant-gardes. Formed in 1957, the SI was active in Europe through the 1960s and aspired to major social and political transformations. In the 1960s it split into a number of different groups, including the Situationist Bauhaus, the Antinational and the Second Situationist International. The first SI disbanded in 1972.^[18]

See also Experiments in Art and Technology, Dada and Colab.

Business[link]

Collaboration in business can be found both inter- and intra-organization^[19] and ranges from the simplicity of a partnership and crowd funding to the complexity of a multinational corporation. Collaboration between team members allows for better communication within the organization and throughout the supply chains. It is a way of coordinating different ideas from numerous people to generate a wide variety of knowledge. Collaboration with a selected few firms as opposed to collaboration with a large number of different firms has been shown to positively impact firm performance and innovation outcomes.^[20] The recent improvement in technology has provided the world with high speed internet, wireless connection, and web-based collaboration tools like blogs, and wikis, and has as such created a "mass collaboration." People from all over the world are efficiently able to communicate and share ideas through the internet, or even conferences, without any geographical barriers.

See also : Management cybernetics

Education[link]

Generally defined, an Educational Collaborative Partnership is ongoing involvement between schools and business/industry, unions, governments and community organizations. Educational Collaborative Partnerships are established by mutual agreement between two or more parties to work together on projects and activities that will enhance the quality of education for students while improving skills critical to success in the workplace.^{[by whom?]}

Collaboration in Education- two or more co-equal individual voluntarily brings their knowledge and experience together by interacting toward a common goal in the best interest of students for the betterment of their education success. Students achieve team building and communication skills meeting many curricular standards. Students have the ability to practice real-world communication experiences. Students gain leadership through collaboration and empowers peer to peer learning.^{[Third-party source needed]}

When collaborating in education, according to ISTE NEST-S and NEST-T standards, there is cultural understanding by engaging learners with other cultures and develop technology in enriched learning environments.^{[Third-party source needed]}

Societal changes that have taken place over the past few decades allows new ways of conceptualizing collaboration, and to understand the evolution and expansion of these types of relationships. For example, economic changes that have taken place domestically and internationally have resulted in the transformation from an industry-dependent economy to an information-centered economy that is dependent on new technologies and expansion of industries that provide services ^[21]. From an educational standpoint, such transformations were projected through federal reports, such as A Nation at Risk in 1983 and What Matters Most: Teaching for America’s Future in 1996. In these reports, economic success could be assured if students developed the capacity to learn how to “manage teams… and…work together successfully in teams” ^[22].

The continuing development of Web 2.0 technologies, such as wikis, blogs, multiplayer games, online communities, and Twitter, among others, has changed the manner in which students communicate and collaborate.

See also :

• Collaborative Partnerships: Business/Industry-Education
• Learning circle

Music[link]

Musical collaboration occurs when musicians in different places or groups work on the same album or song. Collaboration between musicians, especially with regards to jazz, is often heralded as the epitome of complex collaborative practice. Special websites as well as software have been created to facilitate musical collaboration over the Internet resulting in the emergence of Online Bands.

Several awards exist specifically for collaboration in music:

• Grammy Award for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals—awarded since 1988
• Grammy Award for Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals—awarded since 1995
• Grammy Award for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration—awarded since 2002

Entertainment[link]

Collaboration in entertainment is a relatively new phenomenon brought on with the advent of social media, reality TV, and video sharing sites such as YouTube and Vimeo. Collaboration occurs when writers, directors, actors, producers and other individuals or groups work on the same television show, short film, or feature length film. A revolutionary system has been developed by Will Wright for the production of the TV series title Bar Karma on CurrentTV. Special web-based software, titled Storymaker, has been written to facilitate plot collaboration over the Internet. Organizations such as Orange_County_Screenwriters_Association bring together professional and amateur writers and filmmakers in a collaborative manner for entertainment development.

Publishing[link]

Collaboration in publishing can be as simple as dual-authorship or as complex as commons-based peer production. Technological examples include Usenet, e-mail lists, blogs and Wikis while 'brick and mortar' examples include monographs (books) and periodicals such as newspapers, journals and magazines.

Science[link]

Though there is no political institution organizing the sciences on an international level, a self-organized, global network had formed in the late 20th century.^[7] Observed by the rise in co-authorships in published papers, Wagner and Leydesdorff found international collaborations to have doubled from 1990 to 2005.^[7] While collaborative authorships within nations has also risen, this has done so at a slower rate and is not cited as frequently.^[7]

Medicine[link]

In medicine the physician assistant - physician relationship involves a collaborative plan to be on file with each state board of medicine where the PA works. This plan formally delineates the scope of practice approved by the physician.

Technology[link]

Due to the complexity of today's business environment, collaboration in technology encompasses a broad range of tools that enable groups of people to work together including social networking, instant messaging, team spaces, web sharing, audio conferencing, video, and telephony. Broadly defined, any technology that facilitates linking of two or more humans to work together can be considered a collaborative tool. Wikipedia, Blogs, even Twitter are collaborative tools. Many large companies are developing enterprise collaboration strategies and standardizing on a collaboration platform to allow their employees, customers and partners to intelligently connect and interact.

Enterprise collaboration tools are centered around attaining collective intelligence and staff collaboration at the organization level, or with partners. These include features such as staff networking, expert recommendations, information sharing, expertise location, peer feedback, and real-time collaboration. At the personal level, this enables employees to enhance social awareness and their profiles and interactions Collaboration encompasses both asynchronous and synchronous methods of communication and serves as an umbrella term for a wide variety of software packages. Perhaps the most commonly associated form of synchronous collaboration is web conferencing using tools such as Cisco TelePresence, Cisco WebEx Meetings, HP Halo Telepresence Solutions, GoToMeeting Web Conferencing, or Microsoft Live Meeting, but the term can easily be applied to IP telephony, instant messaging, and rich video interaction with telepresence, as well. Examples of asynchronous collaboration software include Cisco WebEx Connect, GoToMeeting, Microsoft Sharepoint and MediaWiki.

The effectiveness of a collaborative effort is driven by three critical factors: - Communication - Content Management - Workflow control

The Internet

The low cost and nearly instantaneous sharing of ideas, knowledge, and skills has made collaborative work dramatically easier. Not only can a group cheaply communicate and test, but the wide reach of the Internet allows such groups to easily form in the first place, even among niche interests. An example of this is the free software movement in software development which produced GNU and Linux from scratch and has taken over development of Mozilla and OpenOffice.org (formerly known as Netscape Communicator and StarOffice).

Commons-based peer production

Commons-based peer production is a term coined by Yale's Law professor Yochai Benkler to describe a new model of economic production in which the creative energy of large numbers of people is coordinated (usually with the aid of the internet) into large, meaningful projects, mostly without traditional hierarchical organization or financial compensation. He compares this to firm production (where a centralized decision process decides what has to be done and by whom) and market-based production (when tagging different prices to different jobs serves as an attractor to anyone interested in doing the job).

Examples of products created by means of commons-based peer production include Linux, a computer operating system; Slashdot, a news and announcements website; Kuro5hin, a discussion site for technology and culture; Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia; and Clickworkers, a collaborative scientific work. Another example is Socialtext which is a software that uses tools such as wikis and weblogs and helps companies to create a collaborative work environment.

Massively distributed collaboration

The term massively distributed collaboration was coined by Mitchell Kapor, in a presentation at UC Berkeley on 2005-11-09, to describe an emerging activity of wikis and electronic mailing lists and blogs and other content-creating virtual communities online.

See also[link]

Look up collaboration in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Wikiversity has learning materials about Collaborative_play_writing

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Daugherty, Patricia J, R. Glenn Richey, Anthony S. Roath, Soonhong Min, Haozhe Chen, Aaron D. Arndt, Stefan E. Genchev (2006), "Is Collaboration Paying Off For Firms?" Business Horizons, Vol. 49, pp. 61–70.
• Lewin, Bruce. "The Tension in Collaboration".
• London, Scott. "Collaboration and Community"
• Marcum, James W. After the Information Age: A Dynamic Learning Manifesto. Vol. 231. Counterpoints: Studies in the Postmodern Theory of Education. New York, NY: Peter Lang, 2006.
• Richey, R. Glenn, Anthony S. Roath, Judith S. Whipple, and Stan Fawcett (2010), "Exploring Governance Theory of Supply Chain Integration: Barriers and Facilitators to Integration," Journal of Business Logistics, Vol. 31, No. 1, pp. 237–256
• Schneider, Florian: Collaboration: Some Thoughts Concerning New Ways of Learning and Working Together., in: Academy, edited by Angelika Nollert and Irit Rogoff, 280 pages, Revolver Verlag, ISBN 3-86588-303-6.
• Min, Soonhong, Anthony S. Roath, Patricia J. Daugherty, Stefan E. Genchev, Haozhe Chen, Aaron D. Arndt and R. Glenn Richey (2005), “Supply Chain Collaboration: What’s Really Happening,” International Journal of Logistic Management, Vol. 16, No. 2, pp. 237–256.
• The Power of Collectives, IT NEXT, Jatinder Singh http://www.itnext.in/content/power-collectives.html
• Spence, Muneera U. "Graphic Design Collaborative Processes: a Course in Collaboration." Oregon State University. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: AIGA, 2005.
• http://www.iste.org/standards/nets-for-students.aspx
• http://www.iste.org/standards/nets-for-teachers.aspx

Clay Shirky
Clay Shirky at the 2006 O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference
Born	1964 (age 47–48) Columbia, Missouri
Occupation	Writer, consultant, lecturer[1]
Known for	Writing

Clay Shirky (born 1964^[2]) is an American writer, consultant and teacher on the social and economic effects of Internet technologies. He has a joint appointment at New York University (NYU) as a Distinguished Writer in Residence at the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute and Assistant Arts Professor in the New Media focused graduate Interactive Telecommunications Program (ITP).^[3] His courses address, among other things, the interrelated effects of the topology of social networks and technological networks, how our networks shape culture and vice-versa.^[4]

He has written and been interviewed extensively about the Internet since 1996. His columns and writings have appeared in Business 2.0, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Harvard Business Review and Wired.

Shirky divides his time between consulting, teaching, and writing on the social and economic effects of Internet technologies. His consulting practice is focused on the rise of decentralized technologies such as peer-to-peer, web services, and wireless networks that provide alternatives to the wired client–server infrastructure that characterizes the World Wide Web. He is a member of the Wikimedia Foundation's Advisory Board.

In The Long Tail, Chris Anderson calls Shirky "a prominent thinker on the social and economic effects of Internet technologies."^[5]

Education and career[link]

Photograph of Shirky taken by Creative Commons chairman and MIT Media Laboratory director Joi Ito.

After graduating from Yale University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in fine art in 1986, he moved to New York.^[6] In the 1990s he founded the Hard Place Theater, a theatre company that produced non-fiction theater using only found materials such as government documents, transcripts and cultural records.^[6] and also worked as a lighting designer for other theater and dance companies, including the Wooster Group, Elevator Repair Service and Dana Reitz.^[7] During this time, Shirky was vice-president of the New York chapter of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and wrote technology guides for Ziff Davis. He appeared as an expert witness on cyberculture in Shea v. Reno, a case cited in the U. S. Supreme Court's decision to strike down the Communications Decency Act in 1996.

Shirky was the first Professor of New Media in the Media Studies department at Hunter College, where he was key in developing the MFA in Integrated Media Arts program.

In the fall of 2010, Shirky was as a visiting Morrow Lecturer at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government^[8] instructing a course titled: "New Media and Public Action".^[9]

Views[link]

In his book Here Comes Everybody Shirky explains how he has long spoken in favor of crowdsourcing and collaborative efforts online. He uses the phrase "the Internet runs on love" to describe the nature of such collaborations.^[10] In the book, he discusses the ways in which the action of a group adds up to something more than just aggregated individual action.

He points to four key steps. The first is sharing, a sort of “me-first collaboration” in which the social effects are aggregated after the fact; people share links, URLs, tags, and eventually come together around a type. This type of sharing is a reverse of the so-called old order of sharing, where participants congregate first and then share (examples include Flickr, and Delicious). The second is conversation, that is, the synchronization of people with each other and the coming together to learn more about something and to get better at it. The third is collaboration, in which a group forms under the purpose of some common effort. It requires a division of labor, and teamwork. It can often be characterized by people wanting to fix a market failure, and is motivated by increasing accessibility.

The fourth and final step is collective action, which Shirky says is “mainly still in the future.” The key point about collective action is that the fate of the group as a whole becomes important. In a presentation called "Gin, Television, and Social Surplus",^[11] Shirky popularized the concept of cognitive surplus, the time freed from watching television which can be enormously productive when applied to other social endeavors. He also notes that we are experiencing an era where people like to produce and share just as much, if not more than they like to consume. Since technology has made the producing and sharing possible, he argues that we will see a new era of participation that will lead to big change. In 2010 Shirky published Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age.

Shirky has also written about "algorithmic authority," which describes the process through which unverified information is vetted for its trustworthiness through multiple sources.^{[12] [13]}

The Shirky Principle[link]

In April 2010, Kevin Kelly cited the phrase "Institutions will try to preserve the problem to which they are the solution," and called it the "Shirky Principle", as the phrasing reminded him of the clarity of the Peter Principle.^[14][15][16]

Response to Evgeny Morozov[link]

In March 2011, Shirky responded to questions raised by Evgeny Morozov about consulting he had done for the Libyan government. Shirky explained that he had been invited in 2007 to speak in Boston to Libya's IT Minister.^[17] Shirky stated that the talk was "about using social software to improve citizen engagement in coastal towns. The idea was that those cities would be more economically successful if local policies related to the tourist trade were designed by the locals themselves." Shirky added that nothing came of the project beyond his initial talk. He defended his underlying desire to expand representative government in Libya and concluded that "the best reason to believe that social media can aid citizens in their struggle to make government more responsive is that both citizens and governments believe that."

Bibliography[link]

• The Internet by E-Mail (1994) - ISBN 1-56276-240-0
• Voices from the Net (1995) - ISBN 1-56276-303-2
• P2P Networking Overview (2001) - ISBN 0-596-00185-1
• Planning for Web Services: Obstacles and Opportunities (2003) - ISBN 0-596-00364-1
• Selected Articles in The Best Software Writing I, Joel Spolsky ed. (2005) - ISBN 1-59059-500-9
  • A Group is its Own Worst Enemy by Clay Shirky
  • Group as User: Flaming and the Design of Social Software by Clay Shirky
• Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations (2008) - ISBN 978-1-59420-153-0
• Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age (2010) - ISBN 978-1-59420-253-7

See also[link]

• Collective action

Footnotes[link]

References[link]

• Shirky, Clay (2003). "Power Laws, Weblogs, and Inequality". Writings About the Internet. http://shirky.com/writings/powerlaw_weblog.html. Retrieved 2006-02-16. 
• MacLeod, Hugh (2006). "Shirky's Law: "Equality. Fairness. Opportunity. Pick Two."". gapingvoid. http://www.gapingvoid.com/Moveable_Type/archives/002238.html. Retrieved 2006-02-16. 
• Clay Shirky's Bio
• Gillette, Felix (2010-06-08). "Feats of Clay". The New York Observer. http://www.observer.com/2010/media/feats-clay. Retrieved 2010-06-09. 

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Clay Shirky

• Clay Shirky's homepage
• Clay Shirky on Twitter
• Clay Shirky’s writings on the O'Reilly Network
• Profile and videos at TED.com
• Profile and talks at Fora.tv
• Socially Intelligent Computing A Dialogue with Daniel Goleman
• Ontology is Overrated: Links, Tags, and Post-hoc Metadata - a presentation (mp3) from the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference held in San Diego, California, March 14–17, 2005.
• Futures of the Internet (Flash,mp4,RealVideo,3gp,mp3). Internet Society - NY Chapter. 2008-04-16. http://www.isoc-ny.org/?p=214. Retrieved 2008-04-27.  - Colloquium @ NYU.
• Clay Shirky at Web 2.0 Expo SF 2008
• "It's Not Information Overload. It's Filter Failure." Video, Clay Shirky at Web 2.0 Expo NY, Sept. 16-19, 2008.
• Video (and audio) of interview/discussion with Clay Shirky by Will Wilkinson on Bloggingheads.tv
• Let a Thousand Flowers Bloom A talk about journalism and pay walls.

Howard Rheingold
Born	(1947-07-07) July 7, 1947 (age 64) Phoenix, Arizona
Occupation	Critic and writer
Website
http://www.rheingold.com/

Howard Rheingold (born July 7, 1947) is a critic, writer, and teacher; his specialties are on the cultural, social and political implications of modern communication media such as the Internet, mobile telephony and virtual communities (a term he is credited with inventing).

Biography[link]

Rheingold was born in Phoenix, Arizona. He attended Reed College in Portland, Oregon, from 1964 to 1968. His senior thesis was entitled "What Life Can Compare with This? Sitting Alone at the Window, I Watch the Flowers Bloom, the Leaves Fall, the Seasons Come and Go."

A lifelong fascination with mind altering and its methods led Rheingold to the Institute of Noetic Sciences and Xerox PARC. There he worked on and wrote about the earliest personal computers. This led to his writing Tools for Thought in 1985, a history of the people behind the personal computer. Around that time he first logged on to The WELL - an influential early online community. He explored the experience in his seminal book, The Virtual Community.

Also in 1985, Rheingold coauthored Out of the Inner Circle: A Hacker's Guide to Computer Security with former hacker Bill Landreth. In 1991, he published Virtual Reality: Exploring the Brave New Technologies of Artificial Experience and Interactive Worlds from Cyberspace to Teledildonics.

After a stint editing the Whole Earth Review, Rheingold served as editor in chief of the Millennium Whole Earth Catalog. Shortly thereafter, he was hired on as founding executive editor of HotWired, one of the first commercial content web sites published in 1994 by Wired magazine. Rheingold left HotWired and soon founded Electric Minds in 1996 to chronicle and promote the growth of community online. Despite accolades, the site was sold and scaled back in 1997.

In 1998, he created his next virtual community, Brainstorms, a private successful webconferencing community for knowledgeable, intellectual, civil, and future-thinking adults from all over the world. As of 2011, Brainstorms was in its thirteenth year.

Rheingold in Mill Valley.

In 2002, Rheingold published Smart Mobs, exploring the potential for technology to augment collective intelligence. Shortly thereafter, in conjunction with the Institute for the Future, Rheingold launched an effort to develop a broad-based literacy of cooperation.

In 2008, Rheingold became the first research fellow at the Institute for the Future, with which he had long been affiliated.^[1]

Rheingold is a visiting lecturer in Stanford University's Department of Communication where he teaches two courses, "Digital Journalism" and "Virtual Communities and Social Media".^[2][3] He is a lecturer in U.C. Berkeley's School of Information where he teaches "Virtual Communities and Social Media" and where he previously taught "Participatory Media/Collective Action".^[4] He is also a frequent contributor to the DMLcentral blog on topics ranging from new media literacy to learning innovation.

Rheingold lives in Mill Valley, California, with his wife Judy and daughter Mamie. In an entry on his video blog, he provides a tour of the converted garage that became a "dream office" and an "externalization of [his] mind" where Rheingold absorbs information, writes, and creates art.^[5]

Partial bibliography[link]

• Talking Tech: A conversational Guide to Science and Technology, with Howard Levine (1982)
• Higher Creativity:Liberating the Unconscious for Breakthrough Insight (with Willis Harman, 1984)
• Tools for Thought: The History and Future of Mind-Expanding Technology (free in HTML form) (1985)
• Out of the Inner Circle, with Bill Landreth (1985)
• They Have a Word for It: A Lighthearted Lexicon of Untranslatable Words & Phrases (1988)
• The Cognitive Connection: Thought and Language in Man and Machine, with Howard Levine (1987)
• Excursions to the Far Side of the Mind (1988)
• Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming, with Stephen LaBerge (1990)
• Virtual Reality (1991)
• The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier (free in HTML form) (1993) ISBN 0-201-60870-7
• Millennium Whole Earth Catalog: Access to Tools and Ideas for the Twenty-First Century (1995)
• The Heart of the WELL (1998)
• The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier, (2000 reprint with some new material) ISBN 0-262-68121-8
• Rheingold, Howard (2002). Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution. Basic Books. 
• Rheingold, Howard (2012). Net Smart: How to Thrive Online. The MIT Press. ISBN 0-262-01745-8. 

See also[link]

• Collective intelligence
• Information society
• The WELL
• Virtual community
• Peter Kollock

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Howard Rheingold

• Howard Rheingold's Web site
• Howard Rheingold's Twitter feed
• Howard Rheingold's FriendFeed page
• Smart Mobs weblog/book site
• Talk on collaboration at TED conference
• Reed College Alumni Magazine Profile
• Howard Rheingold and Andrea Saveri Introduce the Cooperation Project a 48MB Quicktime movie, hosted by the Internet Archive

Bruno Mars
Bruno Mars performing in Las Vegas, Nevada on September 19, 2010
Background information
Birth name	Peter Gene Hernandez
Born	(1985-10-08) October 8, 1985 (age 26)[1] Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.
Genres	Reggae fusion, pop, soul, R&B
Occupations	Singer-songwriter, record producer, model, dancer
Instruments	Vocals, drums, guitar, keyboard, bass, piano, harmonica
Years active	2005–present
Labels	Atlantic, Elektra
Associated acts	The Smeezingtons
Website	www.brunomars.com

Peter Gene Hernandez (born October 8, 1985), better known by his stage name Bruno Mars, is an American singer-songwriter and record producer. Raised in Honolulu, Hawaii by a family of musicians, Mars began making music at a young age. He performed in various musical venues in his hometown throughout his childhood. He graduated from high school and then moved to Los Angeles, California to pursue a musical career. Mars produced songs for other artists, joining production team The Smeezingtons.

Mars had an unsuccessful stint with Motown Records, but then signed with Atlantic Records in 2009. He became recognized as a solo artist after lending his vocals and co-writing the hooks for the songs "Nothin' on You" by B.o.B, and "Billionaire" by Travie McCoy. He also co-wrote the hits "Right Round" by Flo Rida featuring Ke$ha, and "Wavin' Flag" by K'naan. In October 2010, he released his debut album, Doo-Wops & Hooligans. Anchored by the worldwide number-one singles "Just the Way You Are" and "Grenade", the album peaked at number three on the Billboard 200.^[2] Mars was nominated for seven Grammys at the 53rd Grammy Awards, winning Best Male Pop Vocal Performance for "Just the Way You Are".

Mars' music is noted for displaying a wide variety of styles and influences, and contains elements of many musical genres. He has worked with an assortment of artists from various genres. Mars acknowledges the influences that his collaborations have had on his own music. As a child, he was highly influenced by artists such as Little Richard,^[3] Elvis Presley and Michael Jackson and would often impersonate these artists from a young age. Mars also incorporates reggae and Motown inspired sounds into his work. Jon Caramanica of The New York Times referred to Mars as "one of the most versatile and accessible singers in pop."^[4] Worldwide, Mars became the best-selling digital artist in 2011. He had three singles in the top ten, including first place with "Just The Way You Are," which sold 12.5 million copies.^[5] Mars won Best International Male Solo Artist at the BRIT Awards in 2012.^[6] Bruno Mars has sold 5 million albums and 36 million singles worldwide.^[7]

Early life[link]

Bruno Mars was born Peter Gene Hernandez on October 8th, 1985, and raised in the Waikiki neighborhood of Honolulu, Hawaii, by parents Pete Hernandez, of Puerto Rican descent, and Bernadette "Bernie," a Filipina.^{[8][9][10][11]} His mother emigrated to Hawaii from the Philippines as a child and his father moved to the island from Brooklyn, New York.^[12] Mars' parents met while performing in a show, where his mother was a hula dancer and his father played percussion.^[12] At the age of two, he was nicknamed "Bruno" by his father, because of his resemblance to legendary professional wrestler Bruno Sammartino.^[13]

Mars was one of six children and came from a musical family who exposed him to a diverse mix of reggae, rock, hip hop, and R&B.^[14][15] In addition to being a dancer, his mother was a singer and his father used his musical ability to perform Little Richard rock n roll music.^[3] Mars' uncle was an Elvis impersonator. By the age of three his uncle had Mars up on the stage performing. He also performed songs by artists such as Michael Jackson, The Isley Brothers, and The Temptations.^[10] At age four, Mars began performing five days a week with his family's band, The Love Notes, in which he became known on the island for his impersonation of Presley.^[16]

In 1990, Mars was featured in MidWeek as "Little Elvis", going on to have a cameo in the film Honeymoon in Vegas in 1992.^[10][17] He later reflected on the influence Presley had on his music: "I watch the best. I'm a big fan of Elvis. I'm a big fan of 1950s Elvis when he would go on stage and scare people because he was a force and girls would go nuts! You can say the same thing for Prince or The Police. It's just guys who know that people are here to see a show, so I watch those guys and I love studying them because I'm a fan."^[18] In 2010, he also acknowledged his Hawaiian roots and musical family as an influence, explaining, "Growing up in Hawaii made me the man I am. I used to do a lot of shows in Hawaii with my father's band. Everybody in my family sings, everyone plays instruments...I've just been surrounded by it."^[19] In 2003, shortly after graduating from President Theodore Roosevelt High School at the age of seventeen, Mars moved to Los Angeles, California, to pursue a musical career.^[10][17] He adopted his stage name from the nickname his father gave him, adding "Mars" at the end because "I felt like I didn't have [any] pizzazz, and a lot of girls say I’m out of this world, so I was like I guess I'm from Mars."^[20]

Career[link]

[edit] 2004–10: Career beginnings and It's Better If You Don't Understand

Bruno Mars performing in Houston, Texas in November 2010.

Shortly after moving to Los Angeles, Mars signed to Motown Records in 2004, in a deal that "went nowhere".^[21] However, Mars' experience with Motown proved to be beneficial to his career when he met songwriter and producer Philip Lawrence, who was also signed to the label. Mars, Lawrence, and engineer Ari Levine began writing songs together, and formed the production team The Smeezingtons.^[21] In 2006, Lawrence introduced Mars to his future manager at Atlantic Records, Aaron Bay-Schuck.^[22] After hearing him play a couple of songs on the guitar, Bay-Schuck wanted to sign him immediately, but it took about three years for Atlantic records to finally sign Mars to the label.^[22] In the meantime, Bay-Schuck hired Mars and the Smeezingtons to write and produce songs for the label's artists.^[22] According to Bay-Schuck in an interview with HitQuarters, Mars had stated that although his ultimate goal was to be a solo artist, he was willing to write and produce for other artists, both to help improve his songwriting and help him discover the type of artist he ultimately wanted to be.^[22] Bay-Schuck credits this as a period of "self-discovery" that contributed significantly to Mars' later success.^[22]

Before becoming a successful solo artist, Hernandez was an acknowledged music producer, writing songs for Alexandra Burke, Travie McCoy, Adam Levine, Brandy, Sean Kingston, and Flo Rida.^[14][23] He also co-wrote the Sugababes' hit song "Get Sexy" and provided backing vocals on their album Sweet 7.^[24][25] His first musical appearance as a singer was in Far East Movement's second studio album Animal, featured on the track "3D".^[26] He was also featured on pastor and hip hop artist Jaeson Ma's debut single "Love" in August 2009.^[27][28] He reached prominence as a solo artist after being featured on and co-writing B.o.B's "Nothin' on You" and Travie McCoy's "Billionaire"; both songs peaked within the top ten of many charts worldwide.^{[29][30][31][32]} He said of them, "I think those songs weren't meant to be full-sung songs. If I'd sung all of "Nothin' on You", it might've sounded like some '90s R&B." Following this success, Mars released his debut extended play (EP), titled It's Better If You Don't Understand, on May 11, 2010.^[33] The EP peaked at the 99th position on the Billboard 200 and produced one single, "The Other Side", featuring singers Cee Lo Green and B.o.B.^[34][35] Mars collaborated with Green once more in August 2010 by co-writing his single "Fuck You!". He performed a medley of "Nothin' on You" and "Airplanes" with B.o.B and Hayley Williams at the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards on September 12, 2010.^[36]

[edit] 2010–present: Doo-Wops & Hooligans

Bruno Mars' debut album, Doo-Wops & Hooligans, was released digitally on October 4, and saw its physical release on October 5, 2010.^[37][38] The lead single, "Just the Way You Are", was released on July 19, 2010,^[39] and has reached the top of the Billboard Hot 100 as well as several other charts worldwide.^[40][41] The music video was released on September 8, 2010.^[42] The second single, "Grenade", was released September 28, 2010, and has also seen successful international chart performance.^[43][44] In the United States, Doo-Wops & Hooligans debuted at number three on the Billboard 200 for the week of October 13, 2010, selling 55,000 copies.^[2] The album also received generally positive reviews from critics. Entertainment Weekly's Leah Greenblatt praised Mars for his "instant-access melodies" and "sly snatches of dance-floor swagger", but noted weaknesses in songs deviant from his conventional pop and soul genres.^[45] He opened for Maroon 5 on the fall leg of the Hands All Over Tour starting October 6, 2010 and co-headlined with McCoy on a European tour starting October 18, 2010.^[38]

On September 19, 2010, Mars was arrested in Las Vegas for possession of cocaine.^[46] When talking to a police officer, Mars reportedly stated that what he did was "foolish" and that "he has never used drugs before".^[47][48] Mars pled guilty to felony drug possession, and in return for his plea, he was told that the charges would be erased from his criminal record as long as he stayed out of trouble for a year, paid a $2,000 fine, did 200 hours of community service and completed a drug counseling course.^[49]

On February 13, 2011, Mars won his first Grammy Award for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance, having received six nominations; Best Rap Song and Best Rap/Sung Collaboration for "Nothin' on You", Record of the Year for "Nothin' on You" and "Fuck You", Song of the Year for "Fuck You", and Producer of the Year, Non-Classical at the 53rd Grammy Awards.

On September 16, 2011, Bad Meets Evil released their single, "Lighters", which featured Mars in the song. The song was met with mixed reviews from critics and many criticized Mars for doing this type of song.^[50] On September 22, 2011, it was announced on Mars' website that his new song "It Will Rain" will appear on The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 Original Motion Picture Soundtrack which was released on November 8.^[51] On October 30, 2011, Mars gave an exclusive performance of "Runaway Baby" on the results show of The X Factor UK, the same day that Mars received six nominations for a Grammy Award; Album of the Year and Best Pop Vocal Album for Doo-Wops & Hooligans, Record of the Year, Song of the Year and Best Pop Solo Performance for "Grenade", and Producer of the Year, Non-Classical at the 54th Grammy Awards. During the ceremony, Mars performed "Runaway Baby" but he did not win any awards as Adele won in all the categories he was nominated in and also lost to Paul Epworth for Producer of the Year.

Mars has confirmed on Twitter that his work on his second album has begun.^[52] On March 22, 2012, it was announced that Mars had signed a worldwide publishing deal with BMG Chrysalis US.^[53]

Musical style[link]

Mars performing on November 24, 2010. Mars plays several instruments including piano, guitar, bass and congas.^[54]

Mars' music has been noted for displaying a wide variety of styles and influences, including pop,^[55] rock,^[55] reggae,^[55] R&B,^[56] soul,^[45] and hip hop.^[57] His co-producer Philip Lawrence says, "What people don't know is there's a darker underbelly to Bruno Mars." Mars himself says, "I blame that on me singing to girls back in high school."^[58] Jon Caramanica of The New York Times called him "one of the most versatile and accessible singers in pop, with a light, soul-influenced voice that’s an easy fit in a range of styles, a universal donor."^[4] Mars was initially influenced by R&B artists such as Keith Sweat, Jodeci and R. Kelly, as well as 1950s rock 'n' roll and Motown.^[59] In high school, he began listening to classic rock groups such as The Police, Led Zeppelin, and the Beatles.^[59] All of these genres of music have influenced Mars' musical style; he observed that "It’s not easy to [create] songs with that mixture of rock and soul and hip-hop, and there’s only a handful of them."^[59] Mars also stated that he is a fan of Alicia Keys, Jessie J, Jack White and The Saturdays.^[60]

In addition, Mars claims that his work with other artists influenced his musical style, saying that "'Nothin' on You' had a Motown vibe, 'Billionaire' was a reggae acoustic guitar-driven song, though one of my favorites is the Cee-Lo [Green] song ['Fuck You']. I don't think anyone else could've sung that song. And there's 'Just the Way You Are.' If you know my story, you know I love all different genres of music."^[61] He cites doo-wop as a major influence on his music, referring to the genre as "just straightforward love songs – so charming and simple and romantic."^[61] In addition, Mars states that growing up in Hawaii influenced his music, giving the songs a reggae sound. He explains that "In Hawaii some of the biggest radio stations are reggae. The local bands are heavily influenced by Bob Marley. That music brings people together. It's not urban music or pop music. It's just songs. That's what makes it cross over so well. The song comes first."^[12] Lyrically, many of Mars' songs have been described as "feel-good", carefree, and optimistic,^[62] however, darker subjects are addressed in songs such as "Grenade", "Liquor Store Blues", and "Talking to the Moon", which detail failed relationships and self-destructive behavior.^[45][63]

Discography[link]

• Doo-Wops & Hooligans (2010)
• TBA (2012)

Tours[link]

• Doo-Wops & Hooligans tour (2010–2011)

Awards and nominations[link]

References[link]