Focusing on what we CAN do (which is a lot)

Hey all,

Thanks again for joining the Web Interest Group, for your excitement for all things Webbie/library, and for your interest in more in-person meetings. I feel a little guilty about letting the discussion get more into institutional culture and other topics that are really out of our scope. But, I promise the next meeting will be more concrete and less loosey-goosey, with specific assignments and reports. Different members of the Web Team will be coordinating the meetings, and next time it'll be Stuart. (And although he has a panache for clever comments and a flair for amusing graphics, he's a task master--be forewarned ;)

Now, there will always be issues that come up in our discussions that are a little out of our control--or at least things that we can't remedy as WIGgies. So, for everything that comes up that seems to be a bit of a barrier or something that makes our task at hand more difficult, but is really out of the scope of our group (because believe me, we have plenty of work to do), we'll note it, recognize that it's out of our scope/hands, and then we'll move on. And I'll pass on these noted issues to Coordinating Committee with a report of what the WIG is up to. Not that they can/will do anything about them either, but I think it's important to note these issues, let folks know they are in fact issues, but then move on, and get back to work on the Web.

And speaking of Webbie work, yesterday danah boyd wrote a great post on beta forever... (she is a PhD student in SIMS at Berkeley and a social media researcher at Yahoo! Research Berkeley --her blog is : apophenia).

boyd writes, "I, for one, *love* the persistent beta. It signals that the system is continuously updating, never fully baked and meant to be organic. This is the way that it should be. Web development is fundamentally different than packaged software. Because it is the web, there's no vast distance between producers and consumers. Distribution channels cross space and time (much to the chagrin of most old skool industries). Particularly when it comes to social software, producers can live inside their creations, directly interact with those using the system, and evolve the system alongside the practices that are emerging. In fact, not only *can* they, they're stupid to do anything else....." Read the whole post at her blog...