I just wrapped up a final project for an aesthetics course this semester, the assignment being to create a “Database of the Self.” I chose to make the database as a representation of the roles we play in terms of how we interact with information online. The roles are overlaid on a panarchy, which shows a visualization of adaptive lifecycles. Though the evolution of every idea or meme won’t necessarily follow this specific path, (it may in fact be rhizomatic, with multiple feedback loops), this begins to flesh out what we become as nodes within an enmeshed series of networks.
The cycle can be thought to begin with the “Activators,” in the lower right side of image.
For an interactive version of the graphic, click here. (Thanks to @gavinkeech for transforming my sketches into the web page). Scroll over the icons for descriptions and traits of each role to pop out. Roles also listed below.
I found this to be an interesting exercise when thinking about the impact and influence we have on the web, and how information travels. For instance, when you RT something on Twitter, you’re fulfilling a “Propagator” function, when you’re introducing people or bridging information you’re a “Connector,” when you’re developing a new theory or model or practice, you are a “Pathfinder,” and so on. It’s a different way of thinking about our relationship with information – one that puts more control in the hands of the user verses just drowning in “information overload.” It’s also an interesting way to think about who to send information to when trying to plant seeds of information and spread ideas.
Thanks to @wildcat2030 for inspiration from Friendships in Hyperconnectivity mindmap and to @gavinkeech for visual design.
Activators are the catalysts of transformational change, manifesting new ideas.
- traits: evolutionary creativity, novelty, experimentation, innovation, freedom, divergence
Pathfinders give meaning to information, illuminating a new direction to pursue.
- traits: clarity, vision, inspiration, foresight, intuition
Facilitators create conditions for information to flow smoothly.
- traits: coordination, positioning, reconfiguration
Enhancers add perspective and insight to what is already known.
- traits: growth, resonance, supplementation
Connectors bridge structural holes and forge new pathways between information.
- traits: adaptation, learning, unification
Propagators build momentum and accelerate the spread of information.
- traits: mobilization, persuasion, diffusion
Amplifiers direct attention and awareness to information of potential value.
- traits: evaluation, recognition of opportunity/risk, discernment
Assimilators show how information is implemented.
- traits: synthesis, integration
Stabilizers maintain equilibrium and balance.
- traits: sustainability, conservation
Disruptors draw attention to chaos and uncertainty, highlighting the potential for new growth.
- traits: dissonance, entropy, degradation
<cycle repeats>
Observers & Scribes
- Archivists, Spectators, Analysts, Advocates, Critics
emergent by design 
I like this very much. Shows how we shape ideas and knowledge – rather than just being consumers. i wonder if it could be adapted to show flow of knowledge development (or maturing) between individuals and organisations (see Mature project – http://www.mature-ip.eu
Astonishing post Venessa! And a very nice visual
I find myself moving up and down that panarchy as you call it, depending on the topics at hand. My Observers & Scribes also differ
Very interesting though, a nice breakdown, and when I read the memes and think of topics a few people on Twiter come to mind – vivid!
Great graphic. I can see it as a parti diagram for an architecture project….
Love what I’ve read from you so far and look forward to devouring your archives!
I really enjoy your clarity of vision. I feel like we are working together without even talking.
I have a similar slide about a role system in my product designs and how different roles will interact with the data in different ways. Mine is more specific, and less sophisticated, but the similarities are kind of eerie. 🙂
I want to hear more about the observers.
It feels like a circle has been closed, I’ve been working with @spirospiliadis , @openworld , @nedkumar tweeting about #ebdish . (Emergent by Design -ish )
From my point of view, the challenge has been to invent a language to describe complexity in rigorous ways in the service of being able to craft minimally invasive interventions (MII) that could be used to more easily improve the outcomes of Urban education.
Your chart and Gavin’s rendering are very, very helpful.
Here’s how it might work so far.
Consider that a “self” is framed as an Activity Space that moves through Space and Time what we’ve been calling an As/t. I think that with that simple replacement, we’re onto something that gets close to capturing what @openworld put on the table as a “scale independent” “narrativefractal.’
If “self” is framed as a network node and As/t is framed as a network node, I think it becomes more clear.
The maybe new thing about #ebdish is that it may have a way to capture “emotion” in the mechanisms of Network Science. As of today we’re using Ewaves (Emotion) , Cwaves (Cognition) and Pwaves (Physical). A neat part is that we’re talking about lumenes (courtesy of @Openworld ) memes and genes as observables where the ECPwaves “collapse.”
My personal passion is Print. In that context E*Cwaves “collapse” to “standing” Pwaves in a book, a newsletter or a poster. I think the same thing works for other Architecture, Painting, Fashion and other art forms that are not time driven. The notion provides a meaning for the statement
“Print Stops Time.”
Venessa, thank you again for beginning and even more, maintaining your focus, that has made this extraordinary journey possible.
You are a Rock Star!
Interesting ctaegorization of our daily functions at the web good work
Vanessa,
Could this not be as easily applicable to the “real world”
Hello Venessa,
Interesting work you did here, however some issues I believe need be addressed as well as directed, prime amongst these issues is the visual representation of the infinity loop or Lemniscate.
There are many problems with this visual aid, first of all is the factuality it may embed in the minds of the beholders, taking their cue of hyperconnectivity from this sign (as in semiotics). The symbol is a closed system representation, and though originally meant to stand for unboundedness, the symbol is a misrepresentation of hyperconnectivity if for nothing else than the Lemniscate stands for a ribbon like reality in which change happens and recourses upon itself, moreover if taken literally the ribbon of infinite recurrence implies that the set of possible functions within a given infocology is finite and repetitive, nothing could be further form the actuality of an active node actuation.
As a matter of fact we do not ‘become nodes’ in a network space, the infosphere of possible (and ambiguous) virtualities ‘allows’ the emergence of nodes of meaning. These possible, potentials and quite ambiguous virtualities might become nodes of functionality and meaning but in this case the semantic phase space we call our own reverts to our connectivity in action of allowance, this in turn implies that the openings and outlets are endless (exit points need be free to bifurcate as they may), in other words it must be rhizomatic, not only by action but by function of meaning as well.
Having said the above I appreciate the work you do here, but, and there’s a great but here, the network of actuation need be malleable and plastic, unbiased and unrestrained in its possible implications if betterment of the mind is in question.
Finally one small point of contention I have with the name of it all, ‘database of the self in hyperconnectivity’, if hyperconnectivity is to serve us into a better future we need relinquish the idea of specification of coherent identities (since we have none of such) and turn our gaze into a multiple identity scenarios none of which will take precedence, all of which will play a game of aesthetic management in hyperconnectivity.
Thank you for the warm acknowledgment, your work is important in more ways than one.
I’ll be back for more later
Venessa,
You made a comment a month or two ago on the value of seeing things in “sideview.” It sure resonated. I took the comment to mean that anything – when framed through a head-on look – loses a bit of its intrinsic quality.
In the same way, I feel the post and diagram in their current form are missing emergent aspects of the system they aim to describe.
One problem arises from the role-playing categories. As far as I can see, there’s no reference in the diagram or the post to the energizing ways in which participants in online communities can evolve beyond their initial role “boxes” to contribute to meme-shaping in multiple roles.
A deeper problem, I think, is the lack of a “side view” into the P2P quality of self-organizing networks. The current diagram’s focus on support roles in a single foreground activity makes it hard to see the participant’s “whole person” – their roles in other, undepicted meme-shaping activities. A database of the whole self would be defined by the full range of initiatives and roles that a person undertakes to spread valued “idea viruses” (memes) and “emotion viruses” (lumenes, or replicable qualities of spirit).
Is there a way to overcome these problems – a way to toggle between people and their valued initiatives so that one can zoom any item into the foreground, without losing context? Nested social tetrahedrons may offer such an opportunity (http://is.gd/e3pdP ) for navigating in and among personal profiles.
Within each user profile, valued projects also can be shown in a context-aware way. The essence of the Narrative Fractal concept, as noted by @spirospiliadis and @toughloveforx in their replies here, is to create a standard framework into which useful tweets, hyperlinks, and other resources for valued initiatives can be dragged and dropped. These can then be reviewed and given feedback by the project initiators or their designees. (More on the framework is at http://www.quora.com/What-are-narrative-fractals ). With a standard, scale-free system such as this, new talent can earn its way into valued team roles (such as the roles you described in this post and diagram) as individuals demonstrate specific value-adding expertise. Trails of well-rated contributions to diverse initiatives can become a cornerstone of credentials in the nested social tetrahedron profiles.
Do you see such a grassr00ts-driven, nested system as workable? I’d love to have your thoughts (as well as @gavinkeech, @technoshaman, @notthisbody, @sebpaquet, @mgusek555 @goonth and any other EBDers) on ways that this might evolve and take form in a beta test or pilot useful to #junto and #elanmap. And I’ll be overjoyed if it turns out that narrative fractal structures help set in motion the kind of resonance in Emotion and Cognitive “waves” that Michael, Spiro, and Ned have speculated may crest into activities in social networks.
Drew DiGenova (@andrewdigenova) and I will soon have some wireframes uploaded on the user profiles and narrative fractals as a complement/convergence to the foundations here – and will welcome any and all ideas for improvement.
Best,
Mark
@openworld
Wildcat ,
thanks for your comments. the points you raise need to be taken into account to get to a useful model.
I think the visualizations of these types of systems will always suffer a dimensional collapse until they are fully interactive and 4 dimensional. But until volumetric projection/amplification we’ll be stuck in these hypercubist intermediaries with all of their aesthetic shortcomings. Nonetheless, the efforts of Venessa and Gavin are admirable and I am eager to see this iconography iterate to the next level, and perhaps be involved in its iteration. 🙂
This is very well orchestrated and a glimpse of simplicity to understand “what’s going on” very well done.
This also in my opinion is a correlation for Mark’s @openworld thoughts on Narrative Fractals…
1. Attractor – Curiosity
2. Challenge – Tension
3. Opportunity – Inspiration
4. Strategy – Hope
5. Test – Confidence
6. Decision – Resolve
Michael says “If “self” is framed as a network node and As/t is framed as a network node”
A/st first becomes a place to “attract” in the diagram it’s called “release” and it’s participating role is the “activators” and disrupters what activators are really doing is (imo) conscious of their own A/st and that of the whole of A/st… they are bringing or dropping the idea virus into place…
That A/st is also a “lumenes” an emotion (energy in motion) that collapses towards Pathfinders which is to create C/st (cognition) from that energy derived from the Activators….
The release then begins to go into the challenge stages, pathfinders begin to work with facilitators and enhancers to break tensions which is the challenge to keep the e/st flowing in this case information so that the “meme” is developed and cognition is derived….the challenge is in the “reogranization” phase…
connectors and propagators begin to spread the “meme” so that it sticks and spreads, which leads towards the growth phase, these are the amplifiers… they bring inspiration
then we reach the conservation phase which is strategy, test, decision… these are the stabalizers and assimilators,
in this entire “cycle” lets call it, things like “serendipity” synchronicities, “connections” are all going on in this space, tipping points happening and all that is complex and chaotic….
(please note, i just improvised now with this information) so that i can come to an understanding as an observer what happens day in and day out with information systems such as twitter….
thus in ebdish Activity space/time is bringing what we can’t see into the first stages, an idea, that is derived from emotion energy that needs to be derived with cognition, then it’s physical space….
the cycle provided above i think clarifies in a good way how “information” is beginning to show us how it’s IN—-FORMATION…. or how it “works”
The infinity sign yet again pops up again, if we look closer we can also see that the infinity sign is but a section of how dna is… it’s cycles of the infinity sign…
thus consciousness works in such a way that when we are “conscious of the “ness” in other words, conscious awareness we can see that pattern recogntion and the other parts Venessa has mentioned in her previous posts all come into affect….
co-creation, innovation, value, openness, collaboration, have such relevance with this piece of information and diagram,
to be continued……
Hmm, interesting and cool. My first instinct would be to use a classic diffusion curve to describe the development of a meme, so it’s interesting to see the panarchy cycle used instead. Not sure it totally fits, but viewing a meme through the lens of a cycle rather than a curve makes intuitive sense.
I have two suggestions for the roles observers and scribes:
-I would add synthesizer, those that create new knowledge by synthesizing seemingly disparate pieces.
-For analyst, I would use a pie chart icon with the pieces separated for each other because analysis means to take apart the pieces.
Thank you, Venessa and distributed cocreators, for helping a self understand its larger self.
This coincides with and appears useful to apply to Clouds, big data, and smart assets: Ten tech-enabled business trends to watch by McKinsey Quarterly.
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Inspiring work and comments. Thank you all.
A short comment about the infinity symbol used, mixing Michael and Spiros’ comments about it:
“the infinity sign is but a section of how dna is… it’s cycles of the infinity sign…”
I find the open-ended spiral, possibly double-helix (interesting, come to think of it, that it has 2 brand, like dual, opposite sides of a magnet, dancing together ever-forward), very intuitive when considering evolution.
Looking at the diagram makes me feel more clearly once more that I am not the owner of my thoughts, I just can own the precious part of the process that is my own contribution, and release it to those who can move it along further. We are flux.
Venessa,
Great work and as always your post provides multiple courses for thought.
Some of the things I might have commented on has already been brought up by others and so will try to avoid repetition. Couple of notes:
– I personally don’t consider Analyst to be a standalone role or function. All of us are analysts consciously or unconsciously at various levels and using various means. Anyway, I think the analyst function transcends the functions you mention helps many of the roles to perform their tasks.
– I too am of the belief that while these are great labels, they are not distinct identities. The reality generally is an amalgamation of roles serving a specific purpose. As an example, I might be retweeting or forwarding something with the intention of being a propagator, assimilator, and a path-finder (depending on the additional comment I add to the tweet).
– What I really like about your model/description is that something like this can very well be applied not just to an individual but to a business (internal to it and as it relates to the market).
Enjoyed the read.
Regards,
Ned
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Reading the comments posted the last couple of days, i think it’s important to understand that “identity roles” need some level of detachment from the human aspect.
This (imo) isn’t about human roles rather roles of entities that configure to formulate consciousness or unravel it….
to me this complex adaptive system is about understanding the role of how information plays out, if we want to look at it a different way we are the information, if we can see it that way we don’t have to box ourselves in believing you are this or that, rather it allows us room to understand a process…
Right on, diagram and reality both point to a distributed “self”. We arise from networks.
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I wouldnt picture any activity as closed in a sircle 🙂
well, the mobius strips are actually nested, always evolving (though i didn’t represent it as such in the graphic). here’s an example: http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol13/iss1/art39/figure7.html
Hi Venessa:
Our team in Minneapolis is developing a universal interactive generative visual
format that tries to avoid words and instead uses high level models to describe everything complex.
We are followers of yours and believe you epitomize every meme word in your model. Pretty cool!
I emailed you a while ago and have not heard back.
If you have a chance, please contact us before I travel to NYC next week.
Happy to talk to anyone about our work so feel free also to contact us.
a.yelsey@gmail.com
612-616-5430.
Hi A.Yelsey,
Is your team doing anything with Processing or other visual programming languages?
Hi Gabriel:
Just saw your comment. Yes, we are doing most of our modeling with Processing.
We are focusing on controlling generative graphics and sound to build our models.
Are you working with Processing etc?
Venessa, I don’t know if your ways of grouping things is accurate (it appears to have a lot of overlap), but the general idea of finding categories to describe social networking actions and processes is useful.
I’d expect you could make it more accurate by finding similar things between brains (how 1 person thinks) and social networking and “self in hyperconnectivity” as you call it.
More generally, whats happening on the Earth now is similar to how brains evolved. It changed from nerves (like 1 cell) to multi-celled brains, and the organization expanded from there. Similarly, people in social networks act a lot like networks of neurons (brain cells), but they use sentences and text and pictures etc instead of patterns of electricity. Like neurons in brains, the Human species is becoming more like 1 brain made of many people.
As you wrote in another thread: “The future is networks.”
Therefore we should find the fractal patterns between cells and brains and social networks and use that instead of 1-level-deep categories/observations about how it works. How we think in groups is similar to how groups of neurons think. We should use the same categories for brain processes and social processes.
Self in hyperconnectivity + MouseSearch3d + CogSpace = new kind of mind simulation including social networking but as a unified system thinking as 1 mind and understanding parts of itself.
I’m proposing a software project here, between me (Ben Rayfield), you (Venessa Miemis), and the creator of http://CogSpace.net (Michael Gaio).
You tweeted about CogSpace recently. Michael wrote he is going to open-source it soon. I’m proposing you create a similar mind map for this “self in hyperconnectivity” using whatever categories you choose as dimensions the same way Michael created a mind map using cognitive science ideas as dimensions.
My part in this is http://MouseSearch3d.com ( which is already open-source at http://sourceforge.net/projects/natlangmouse ) and the approximately 10000 Wikipedia page names (and links between them) which I used an algorithm to find (the most important of) from 1.3 million Wikipedia pages. http://MouseSearch3d.com already thinks like a brain a little and forms intelligent thoughts sometimes in the patterns you move the mouse (input) affecting the Wikipedia page names that appear next (output). http://MouseSearch3d.com and http://CogSpace.net both use 3d space (x y z) and 3d color (red green blue) for a total of 6 dimensions that you control with the mouse.
You make a grid for this “self in hyperconnectivity” thing. Michael already has a grid for cognitive science (calculated from many people who took his survey). I have a much higher-dimensional grid for Wikipedia. We combine all this, have it automatically use multiple grids to create more grids as its way of thinking, and see where the project goes from there.
Lets build a self-aware mind. This could be part of the Junto project if that ever gets started. Theres lots of projects I want to hook into this thing.
Are you interested? How should we get started?
hey ben,
sounds like an interesting project, but i’m involved in a bunch of things already that are high on the priority list. if you and michael team up, keep us posted!
The infinity loop symbol seems implied in the representation of synchronized collaboration in your earlier post.
https://emergentbydesign.com/2010/07/01/guidelines-for-group-collaboration-and-emergence/
I really like this explanation. I think it’s interesting how people naturally assume roles in networked environments. A study of why people gravitate towards certain roles would be an interesting read.
Great discussion. I took some time to reflect upon the graph and all the comments. The DNA metaphor felt very usefull to me not only because of the shape, but also because I see the roles you described as a set of multiple behaviours that become active, just as parts of DNA do, according to context.
For me there is no necessary sequence of roles (although I understand the way they complement each other to compose the movement described on the spiral), and the difficulty is greater if you think of the multiplicity of the self. We can have different roles in every network we participate.
I also saw an interesting issue about rythm. We can stay a long time at one role on the graph or just have acess to it for a brief moment.
It was a great visit!
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I’ve a presentation next week, and I’m on tthe search for such information.