"A crisis is a terrible thing to waste."

Economist Paul Romer once said, "A crisis is a terrible thing to waste."


How can associations in general - and yours in particular - take advantage of this economic crisis by recognizing and capitalizing on opportunities to develop new governance models?


In a recent blog entry, CIO Lev Gonick discussed how the proliferation of technology has affected the practices of educational institutions. The evolution was marked in part by the way professors interacted with students by posting syllabi online and using e-mail to supplement their office hours. Soon, classroom presentations were supplemented by "student-published Web pages, searchable discussion forums, and collaborative wikis."


According to Gonick, "In a curve that has only been accelerating these past 20 years, we now have an educational economy of information abundance confronting an educational delivery system that was built for a time of information scarcity."


Gonick says that future generations will, "... look back at the global economic crisis of 2008-9 and reflect on which institutions were agile enough to make a difference by bringing the wisdom of their scholars together with the acumen of their technology officers and the ingenuity and determination of their university leaders. It’s actually not only the future of the university that is in play. How we produce, organize, and distribute open education resources is at the heart of the future of education around the world."


Associations such as yours are already adopting new technology-enabled practices. Join the DigitalNow community to learn what is already working and how you can apply best practices to your organization. DigitalNow 2009: The premier conference for association leaders Early Bird Registration is still availale!

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More 2009 predictions by John Battelle

Every January, John Battelle publishes his list of predictions for the coming 12 months. Admittedly, his list was a little late this year; he was himself challenged by the scope of the economic downturn and what it may bring. But he does hold out hope that the difficult choices we all have to make during these times will eventually result in long term health. Read his list for 2009.

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Where will we end up after the recession?

Everyone seems to agree that we are in the midst of one of the worst economic times since the Great Depression. But one major thing that sets us apart from the way our parents or grandparents dealt with hard times is that we are wired. Individuals and businesses are finding innovative, lower cost ways to accomplish tasks and deliver services. As this innovation proliferates, it will necessarily render some traditional methods and means obsolete.

In a recent article at ComputerWorld.com, author Mike Elgan lists the 10 things he doesn't think will survive the economic downturn - including Wi-Fi you have to pay for, and movie rental stores. Read his article here.

Make the most of today's digital alternatives and protect your association against obsolescence by staying informed. Join us at DigitalNow 2009: The premier conference for association leaders Early Bird Registration ends soon!

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A World without Email?

If imagining a world without email fills you with glee and a sense of relief, then you may be interested in a new report by ad agency JWT (formerly J. Walter Thompson). In its report on future trends in personal technology, JWT says that email is widely regarded as a productivity drain. However, with no alternative fully in sight, we are both victims and beneficiaries of this and other personal technologies which we have wrought.

So where are we going from here? According to the report trends in personal technology include:

• The use of mobile devices will continue to increase


• Television and computers will continue to converge


• Netbooks will increase in popularity

Read an overview of the report at www.infotoday.com

Trends in personal technology affect your association in specific and direct ways. Be a part of the conversation at DigitalNow 2009: The premier conference for association leaders Early Bird Registration ends soon!

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20 reasons why 2009 will be the year of the Ebook

Gutenburg.com predicts that 2009 will be the year of the Ebook. Not least among the reasons is that the average high school student's backpack weighs about 20 pounds, while the latest ebook reader weighs only one pound.

Among the other reasons listed:

• Cost of entry is still low; potential is high


• Critical mass has been achieved; now it's about growth


• Millions of people will experience digital ink for the first time and they will love it


• It takes the same amount of digital resources to download 1,000 books as it does to download one movie


• Authors, publishers, and distributors benefit financially

Read the rest of the reasons at Gutenburg.com.


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United States ranked top innovator

The Global Innovation Index has ranked the United States as the world's number one innovator. The index ranks 130 countries on criteria such as the number of internet users in a nation, the ease of doing business, and the stability of banks.

The index was created by Soumitra Dutta, a professor at French business school INSEAD, along with New Delhi based non-profit organization The Confederation of Indian Industry. Read more about The Global Innovation Index and its recent findings here.

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Who's top blog?

Technorati.com was founded to help bloggers collect, highlight, and distribute the online conversation. As the leading blog search engine, Technorati indexes more than 1.5 million new blog posts in real time.

So, which blog platform is the most popular? Out of the 100 most popular blogs, 27 of them are hosted through Wordpress. Wordpress is blog software that users download and host on their own servers. Coming in second place among the 100 most popular blogs is Typepad, which is a blogging service. With a blogging service (such as Typepad, or Blogger), the software is hosted at a remote site, and users simply publish their content through it.

To see a list of the top 100 blogs and what platforms they use, read this article at Royal Pingdom.

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Taking personalization to new levels

It seemed furturistic when Amazon.com started recommending books to us based on what we'd browsed or bought previously. Quickly, that level of personalization became a standard of service. Now we expect our interactions with technology to consistently offer us more than we ask for; we want it to get actively involved in the process.

One of the latest new tools designed to take the work out of search is Surf Canyon - a free browser add-on for Internet Explorer and Firefox. After serving up a list of search results based on your input, Surf Canyon uses an algorithm that analyzes which results you click on, which you ignore, and how much time you spend looking at a page. It then uses that information to modify the results as you go.

"We have invented real-time personalization," says CEO Mark Cramer.

In her article at TechnologyReview.com, author Kate Green discusses the functionality of Surf Canyon, and reports on the user experience. Read more here.

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