So I'm sitting around today, all inspired by what happened yesterday. I think something really amazing happened, sociologically as well as technologically.

So....I wrote an abstract from scratch....and I submitted it (a day late, but that's OK) to this conference:

http://hcii2003.ics.forth.gr/

If they accept it, then I gotta write a paper. And I want our entire Team Raven group to be co-authors. Heck, mike at Hiptop Nation should be a co-author too. Whaddyathink??

Here's the abstract. Kinda "out there" and rough, but hell....it was an "out-there" experience and I conceived and wrote it all in a few hours. :P

I'll keep people posted. This could be really fun.

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"Integrating and Evolving a Mob: The Growth of a Smart Mob into a Wireless Community of Practice"


The concepts of "smart mobs" and "intelligent swarms" are a growing field of interest in social science and computer research. With the introduction of commmunication tools such as wireless PDAs and sophisticated cellular telephones, individuals are able to be extremely mobile yet stay constantly in touch with each other. These technologies are enhancing and creating new kinds of bonds between human beings, such as "smart mobs." Patterns of smart mob behavior have been observed in various cultures, particularly Japan, and these patterns are beginning to be seen in the United States and Europe.

Most communities of human beings evolve over time, changing their membership as well as their fundamental purpose and social structure. Smart mobs, enabled by portable communication technology, are a new cultural phenomenon and as such little is known about their evolutionary process. Do smart mobs evolve over time? What stimulates them to change? What do they change into? What are the technological tools necessary for these changes?

This paper examines the successful evolution of a specific smart mob into a wireless community of practice. It begins with an examination of a popular wireless blogging website "Hiptop Nation" (http://hiptop.bedope.com). "Hiptop Nation" acts as a central blogging site for owners of the "Sidekick" device, a portable handheld data communications device recently introduced by Danger (http://danger.com). The Sidekick supports wireless AOL Instant Messaging, email, SMS text messages, and web access. Users of the Sidekick can post wireless public blogs on Hiptop Nation via their Sidekick device, as well as upload photographs from the Sidekick's digital camera.

On Halloween, October 31 2002, Hiptop Nation sponsored a photo-scavenger hunt competition across the US. Participants were users of the Hiptop Nation blog site who were placed into competing teams, and participants coordinated their actions as well as acquired and uploaded photographs across the US exclusively via their Sidekick wireless devices. The hunt lasted for 24 hours.

The author of this paper participated as a member of one of the teams (Team Raven), and witnessed firsthand the evolution of an unorganized and homogeneous wirelessly-connected group of people (smart mob) into a highly motivated and organized group of team members with very common goals and flexible roles (wireless community of practice).

This paper will explore the step-by-step social and technological process of this unique evolution. It will also closely examine the new technological tools that were created within the smart mob itself, and how these new tools contributed to the team's own evolution and growth (e.g., custom tools combining MUDs, chatrooms, and central triage centers for coordinating team movements). The paper will finally examine the unique characteristics of a "wireless" community of practice as opposed to a "tethered" one, and propose general theories that predict how other smart mobs may evolve.