brusqe's comments

brusqe | 17 years ago | on: Porting Hacker News links to Delicious

A record of Hacker News as a snapshot in time. Also, as all the links have been tagged, it could lead to some interesting information visualisation, for example - how the distribution of links has changed as hacker news gets older.

Edit: It also offers a new metric of how popular a submission is.

brusqe | 17 years ago | on: Ask HN: Why do non-techies simply not "get" the idea of a wiki?

I was heavily involved with a university project of designing and building an open wheel racecar. We tried to do the exact same thing, that is, reduce our paperwork while increase knowledge dissemination (as well as knowledge retention and accountability for work).

At first we implemented a wiki. The techie guys on the team saw the long-term value of it and filled it in dutifully, however, many people simply didn't "get" the idea. The wiki ended up stagnating, as only a handful of people used it. The non-techie guys would inevitably ask about what was currently happening, of which the answer was already posted on the wiki. People just never warmed to it. Knowledge management and communication should not be a struggle, or else it will fall by the way side.

The solution was to step away from a wiki system (MediaWiki) and towards something else (Basecamp). Basecamp fitted in with how everyone used the net. Message threads that were relevant to people were sent to their inbox, they could reply to from their own mail account. Milestones are clear - tasks are clear. It's just usable and seamless.

A wiki has a perceived barrier of entry. It's a lot to take on at once for a non-techie. Using the systems which are currently in place, (eg email, a homepage/dashboard setup) to disseminate info will go a long way, rather than fighting an uphill battle of getting people to understand #REDIRECT [[pagename]]

brusqe | 17 years ago | on: Beautiful zip code visualisation

Ben Fry is one of the fathers of Processing.org, he's done a lot of great stuff with information visualisation. He's done a lot of stuff looking at the relationships inside DNA,genes, emails and code. All of which are combination between art and information.
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