Yi-Tan Tech Call 274: Digital Habitats

Do you need a technology steward? Are you one already?

Etienne Wenger, Nancy White and John D Smith are black belts in social learning and online community formation (as well as longtime friends of ours). Their new book, Digital Habitats: Stewarding Technology for Communities, focuses on how communities and technology intersect, with practical advice for the stewards — the people with enough experience in the workings of a community to understand its technology needs, and enough experience with technology to take leadership in addressing those needs.

If you are a member of a community (who isn’t?) and you’ve made use of a mailing list, wiki, web conferencing system, Skype call or other collaboration tool, you’re probably curious already.

With Etienne, Nancy and John, let’s discuss:

• How has technology changed what it means for communities to “be together”?
• What is the role of a technology steward? the key skills? the new terms of art?
• Where can we see these stewards in action? How can we learn these skills?

There’s also a site for their new book, here.

Here’s the podcast: Digital Habitats

You can also download the podcast here.