So much to say! I have been a fan of the Grass Commons vision (not to mention the team) for some time. So much so, I’ve recently joined their Board!
When I first learned of the vision to develop the Network of Integrated Consumer Knowledge – NICK I was stunned. It’s something we clearly need. I thought: how the heck are we going to get there? It takes some chutzpah to even dream this thing, but that is exactly what we need more of. And we do need NICK. Though it looks to be a long-range project, it may be better to think of NICK as establishing a standard and a technology for sharing consumer knowledge. That’s what I like about it. The Open API for Consumer Knowledge.
If that wasn’t cool enough, look at the underlying technology they have evolved in trying to bring this big vision to the world: WagN
They say Wiki + Tagg’n = WagN, and that’s a good mash-up style descriptor. But being a stickler for the evolution of our language and logic in these new worlds I wonder how we will describe it in the future when it is more natural to us…. when we are, let’s say, more fluent in WagN. And I do think we ought to think of these applications in terms of a grammar of what they make possible. We’ll leave that aside for now.
And then there is Hooze.
Abbott & Costello aside, Hooze will help us to know or remember who’s behind a product and that will help us mean what we pay as the Grass Commons saying goes.
Doc Searls is working on a thing called Vendor Relationship Management
(VRM as opposed to CRM) where we manage our own data in relation to
vendors. Have you heard of it? When I want to buy something, I put out
specs and the vendors that have what I want respond. If I buy, my
personal data for the purchase including credit card info comes from
my online identity area and I only share what’s necessary for the
purchase.
That’s a really gross simplification and it goes far beyond.
But Grass Commons sounds like something you’d want to integrate with
the VRM system if I want to make green choices or choose companies
with sustainable models.
VRM Wiki Page
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/projectvrm/Main_Page
Thank you Peter! I let the Grass Commons people know. They are looking into it.
-MM
Hooze and Sourcetree Commons are both worthy projects in the NetSquared N2Y2 challenge.