[Icommons] Explaining the iCommons site better.

Judy Breck judybreck at gmail.com
Tue Jan 29 07:30:37 EST 2008


Hi All,

There is a new book I have found very interesting: Tim Ash's "Landing Page
Optimization." It is 357 pages about the single phase between website
visitor acquisition-conversion-retention. Ash writes about conversion,
meaning getting your visitor to do an act you want him to do. I now have 5
new books on SEO, which is about acquisition from search engines. My simple
goal is to maximize how well my new blog for  getting visitors and sending
them to granular level open education resources works. The project is still
very rough:
http://www.learnodes.com/

All of that is to say, I agree with Eve that an objective look by an expert
could be useful for iCommons.org. From my landing page reading I am learning
that different pages in a website can serve different groups. I for one feel
a little like I am not on the right page when an education article I post
gets accepted into iCommons.org and it is surrounded only by copyright and
artistic subject matter.

I think the bottom line is to try not to be too critical of ourselves in
designing Web stuff. There is as yet no way to do it right or do it well.
Things are very, very primitive. We are working with the beta version of the
Model-T Ford. It bumps along and clatters. Still, we should be willing to
listen to experts and try some outside help. I think iCommons is serving
some purposes very well. The adventure is to keep that happening and learn
how to do more.

Judy



On Jan 29, 2008 4:16 AM, Eve Gray <eve.gray at googlemail.com> wrote:

> Hi Jamison and Daniela
> I think Jamison has a point. I am an inveterate web user and know iCommons
> well and yet still find it difficult sometimes to navigate the iCommons
> website, which confuses with the wealth of stuff on it. The reason I am
> responding, although I have a million other things to do right now, is that
> I think putting this problem right would be an exercise that might address
> some fundamental issues that perplex iCommons - like 'Who are we?' anmd 'How
> do our different communities relate to one another?'.
> A web site needs to be customer-facing if it is to work well and to be
> customer-facing, you need to have a very good idea of who your
> customers/users are and exactly what they are looking for. So it might be
> worth the while for iCommons to raise the money to hire a good information
> architect, who would before anything else, insist on a rigorous
> customer/user analysis and then ensure that the website is structured in
> such a way as to  meet these  needs  and provide answers to what people are
> seeking. I know of at least one world class (young) information architect in
> Jozi who is well-disposed towards the Commons and might give more insight on
> this than I can.
>
> Yours
>
> Eve
>
>
> On 29/01/2008, Daniela Faris <daniela at icommons.org> wrote:
> >
> >  Hi Jamison
> > *Anyone* is free to contribute information, resources, news and events *
> > r**elated to the commons* from around the world. Artists are very
> > welcome on icommons.org - as an artist yourself, you have contributed to
> > icommons.org many times, and had many stories published on the front
> > page of the site. :) We are using the term 'social entrepreneur' as an
> > overarching term for people who recognise the need for social change related
> > to the Internet and the digital commons, and are mobilising themselves and
> > people around them to work for that change. So the term could include anyone
> > - from media creators, to teachers, to business people, students and artists
> > - the list could go on and on and on...
> >
> > You have a good point that people new to the Commons movement might need
> > some extra information on the FAQ, and we could definitely look into
> > providing some links to additional reading, for example. This might even be
> > a good start for gathering materials for the CC 101/Academy that we are
> > hoping to have at the Summit. Do you have any resources that are good
> > introductions/explanations of Open Source, Open Content, Free Culture etc.
> > that you'd like to recommend Jamison?
> >
> > As for your queries regarding how to to contribute to icommons.org, and
> > what the site is about, please refer to the FAQ page.<http://icommons.org/help>
> >
> > If you have any further questions, please feel free to mail me.
> >
> > Regards
> >
> > Daniela
> >   On 28 Jan 2008, at 5:58 PM, Jamison Young wrote:
> >
> > The iCommons website (to my eyes) has been set up for the people that
> > come to summit, it provides little resource to people new to the open
> > source. If an artist/creator that knows nothing about the open source
> > comes to this site. Are they going to register? should this be the
> > focus of the site?
> >
> > Where is the link to "What is open culture?" "What is this site
> > about?" "Where do i fit into the open source movement?" "How can i
> > contribute?" The about this page makes out that iCommons is about
> > education and getting more funds to educate further, at a glance.
> >
> > I understand that the mission of icommons.org is "iCommons.org's
> > mission is to provide a valuable service to the global commons
> > community by providing valuable information and networking tools to
> > the social entrepreneurs that make up this movement."
> >
> > What Icommons.org does not seem to want to understand is that lot of
> > artists might be "social entrepreneurs" that have ideas that relate
> > to this movement. from Wiki
> > "while social entrepreneurs' principal objectives include the
> > creation of a social and/or environmental benefit." Just about every
> > artist i know is a "social entrepreneur" under this definition.
> >
> > Yet i never met an artist that called her or him self a "social
> > entrepreneuse" or entrepreneur! its possible that many artists have
> > very like minded values to that of the iCommons community. The way
> > iCommons have things explained for now means that few artists are
> > going to understand how their views fit in with what's going on.
> >
> > Can the iCommons.org mission include an artist/creator focus as well?
> > Is it part of the iCommons mission to bring the users of the licences
> > together?
> > _______________________________________________
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> > Icommons at lists.ibiblio.org
> > http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/icommons
> >
> >
> >  Web Manager: iCommons
> >
> > www.icommons.org
> >
> > +27 11 327 3155/3201 (Office)
> > Skype/Aim: danielafaris
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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> > Icommons at lists.ibiblio.org
> > http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/icommons
> >
> >
>
>
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-- 
Judy Breck
http://goldenswamp.com
212-734-1899
330 East 85th Street, Apt. 1B
New York NY 10028

NEW EMAIL ADDRESS: judybreck at gmail.com
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