Yesterday wrong about the statement there are few people here from SE England. Allan Willimas is here from London Met. Paper on mobility but I missed it.

Day one of the Knowledge Based Economy conference. I am in the library where the web works ok but there is no coffee. Otherwise fine.

Conference has started well. the idea of knowledge is not limited to academic sources. Michael Hulme emphasised personal knowledge and collaborative knowledge creation through blogs and wikis. "The onus of critical judgement is thrown back to the individual."

John Urry commented that the role of the individual is balanced by a dependence on computers and electronic systems with 'a dark and dystopic side of systemic dependencies' liable to catastrophic failure. Not sure if systems will be seen with any encouraging potential but this is only day one.

Some discussion on whether the KBE is centred on London and the south east in the UK. One thing I notice is that the people attending are not from Oxford, Cambridge or London academic sites other than DEMOS. Not sure why this may be.

From the first workshop I discover that 'excellence' and quality are among the top issues in editorial coverage of higher education in the USA. Based on looking at 252 articles in the New York Times, LA Times and Washington Post. So quality could be a topic of interest for academics. The discussion suggested that most of the articles responding to journalists came from individual academics rather than any organised presentation by universities as a group.

I have started a topic on the Prolearn discussion space

http://www.prolearn-online.com

forums and polls , then "Engaging SMEs in e-learning"

My paper is a bit off topic for e-learning but a lot could follow. I have put some questions about 'network management learning' at the end. I still don't understand most of what is written but it could be worked through later.

I have printed out copies of the paper for the IAS conference on the Knowledge Based Economy, so that is the final version this week.

PDF version now on the Learn9 site.
Also an open document. Open Office required but I am gradually getting used to it and I think most people should have access to a copy.

The slides PDF just as previously. About 2 meg.

Meanwhile I am trying to update an article on quality for OhmyNews. Previously i did one based on Quality Circles and mentioning ISO 9000 towards the end. I am trying to do another one leading on the latest ISO survey. This continues to show growth in China and slight decline in the UK. It has been suggested I should explain more about the background so this needs working on. Maybe I will get some ideas during the conference.

One problem I can't avoid is that I do not know anything about how ISO 9000 is used in China or an Asian take on quality. The journalism takes the form of asking a question. Maybe later others will send in reports to OhmyNews and the editors will shape something together.

Current version-

Continued growth in China use of ISO 9000
Mixed sector pattern in USA and UK

The ISO survey for 2005 shows continued growth in the use of ISO 9000, a standard for quality assurance and in the environmental standard ISO 14000. The two standards are connected by a common approach to auditing, systems thinking and learning through corrective action and system review. Growth continues strongly in China, where there is now the largest number of ISO 9000 certificates. Growth in the UK has stopped but there is interest in the specialised standard for medical equipment.

China now has 143,823 certificates, up by 10,000 from 2004. The ISO comments that "the strong performance of China, which is again in the top 10 countries for growth in both ISO 9001:2000 and ISO 14001 certification, and of India, which is again in the top 10 for ISO 9001:2000 growth and enters the top 10 for ISO 14001 growth, is no doubt partly linked to their increasing participation in global supply chains, in export trade and in business process outsourcing."

The standard may be seen as essential for getting onto the list of suppliers for companies that also use ISO 9000. There has not been much research on how the standards are used but given the current scale there are probably sites where the standard is being used creatively.

In the UK the number of certificates is now below 50,000 rather than above as in 2004. There had been a previous dip while companies adjusted to the revised version of the standard in 2000. The standard originally started as a UK standard (BS 5750) so some observers have suggested that the UK decline in use shows there are problems in maintaining the paperwork and that long term benefits may not occur. The 2000 revision calls for involvement by senior management in system review. It is possible that there has been some reluctance around this.

The ISO comments on the rising importance of services in the global economy. "nearly 33 % of ISO 9001:2000 certificates and 31 % of ISO 14001 certificates in 2005 went to organizations in the service sectors. The latter statistic also illustrates that good environmental management is not just for smoke stack industry and that service providers are accepting their social responsibilities in this area."

Japan is way ahead of China on the environmental standard - 23,466 compared to 12,683. The USA has just over 5,000. Japan has other approaches to quality but the support for ISO 14000 suggests that it is possible to use the methods as part of a management approach.

Figures are also published for two specialised standards based on ISO 9000. ISO 16949 covers automative products in the car industry. This replaces previous industry and company standards. In this sector the USA leads with 3,693 compared to 2,151 for China and 2,115 for Germany. The USA also leads on ISO 13485 for medical equipment with 1310 certificates, followed by the UK with 973 and Germany with 824. There has been a view that the USA has had no need to adopt ISO 9000 as quality policies already exist. This may change with the example of automative and medical. At least there will be some sectors with relevant experience.

I am unable to explain the mixed pattern across countries and sectors. There is very little information available on how the standards are used. Other reports for OhmyNews might help to give some background on particular countries or regions. The recent conference on citizen journalism considered 'best practices' so some quality theory could be relevant without getting too lost in ISO language.

There is some evidence on the web that ISO 9000 systems can work alongside quality circles and moves for improvement. Joseph Nebus has reported on a trip to Thailand where he had his first trip in an ISO 9000 certified taxi. He found much publicity for ISO 9000 also in Singapore as well as support for quality circles with 12% of the workforce participating.

By contrast, quality circles have almost disappeared in the UK. David Hutchins recently updated an article on his website originally from 1982, with this explanation-

"In the year 1998 there were reported to be more than 20 million Circles in China and in every country in the Far East. Both Toyota and Honda announced in 2004 that they are going for 100% involvement in Quality Circles in all of their plants worldwide.

Toyota and Honda are both making huge profits in their manufacturing plants in the USA, China is about to enter that market. At the same time, General Motors are reported to have lost $1.5Bn in the first six months of 2004, MG Rover was liquidated and the plant is now owned by the Chinese.
Ford also lost money and Chrysler are currently in deep trouble. Of course it is not all down to Quality Circles, it would be stupid to suggest that it was but they are part of the reason and that is good enough! Why do Toyota and Honda clearly regard the concept to be so important whilst the West completely ignores it? Who is right? ."

My previous report "Quality Control Goes Round in Circles" covered some background to this. One possibility is that the approach to quality circles has a consequence for the suitability of ISO 9000.

I have started up a home on US Cyworld. It takes a while to get used to this. Mostly for swapping music files etc. i guess but I am also interested in how quality ideas fit in. I found out about Cyworld through OhmyNews. The US launch is a new phase. I have started a 'quality club'. Unfortunately I can't load a text or graphic. Text ok but graphic falls over and then you can't save anything. I think the launch is official, not a beta site but still an issue there I think. Maybe I should be scrolling down to some other button.

I have written for OhmyNews a report on the latest ISO survey on 9000 and 14000. The growth in Asia contrasts with UK stasis. Hard to explain and I can't claim to know what is happening. OhmyNews and Cyworld may contribute a space for a discussion. They are based in Korea but gradually involving wider communities.

Meanwhile the OhmyNews Forum has been totally solid as far as I can tell. I have been back to sleep so am more or less on UK time now. The webcast worked ok for sound, then mostly stills a bit jerky. The slides were missing sometimes. Still, a lot will turn up later.

I think the move to start something in Japan will probably work ok. There may be more podcasts and video as things turn out.

The Korean base seems really strong in social terms as well as technology. My impression is they did less visits than last year to technology sites. But there was mention of wireless speeds as a government concern.

The 'knowledge-based economy' is a reality in Incheon.

Next week there is a space for my paper during the workshop on organisations as part of the Lancaster IAS project on the Knowledge Based Economy. It seems awfully soon.

the paper is intended for the conference at the end od August. I have redone the website more or less as a sequence so I will work some more on that.

I get the impression there is more readiness to look at quality and organisation, even as part of a critique of some rhetoric. There will be a look at cultural industries involving the local RDA as part of the conference so there must be some reality to it.

I notice Peter Checkland has a new book coming out - Learning for Action - that seems to be an introduction to other works, including information systems. I think I will add this in. I have always thougt that SSM was about learning but somehow the Department of Management Learning has rarely made much of a connection. And contrarywise. I can't remember anyone from Management Science being at the conferences organised by Management Learning.

The Institute for Advanced Studies is not based in a particular discipline so this could be a good chance to look at this again.

The OhmyNews Forum is about to start. They are eight hours ahead of UK so tomorrow is a bit sooner.

There is a story already with a welcome and comments from Oh Yeon-ho, founder and CEO of OhmyNews

------------------------
"Two of the most prominent buzzwords in recent years have been Web 2.0 and UCC (user-created content). Underlying both concepts is the belief that collective participation will lead to an optimum solution or conclusion. In other words, decisions will best be made when there is truly mass participation through the Internet.

While giant corporations rush to find a way of commercializing these concepts, citizen journalism, I believe, represents the most developed model for Web 2.0 and UCC. It depends not only on the participation of the masses but on the participation of those who think critically and creatively.

Writing a news story requires a good deal of time and consideration. It is much more difficult, for example, than leaving a comment or posting a blog entry. Though we are an open platform accessible to everyone, not everyone can write a news story. Only those citizen reporters who are passionately committed to social change and reporting make our project possible. The main reason that citizen journalism has not grown and spread more rapidly is the difficult task of finding and organizing these passionate citizen reporters in waiting."
----------------------

I think these issues are very relevant for my attempts to link ideas about quality and learning. Oh Yeon-ho speaks of the difficulties of "organizing" so there is an organisation aspect to what OhmyNews is developing. I think there is a quality aspect when he says that underlying both the concepts of Web 2.0 and User Created Content "is the belief that collective participation will lead to an optimum solution or conclusion."

To say that citizen journalism is "the most advanced model" for both Web 2.0 and UCC is a significant claim and is making sense so far.

The webcast could be about 2 or 3 pm UK time. Not sure if there is a repeat.

I have added a page about stats for the paper draft. The recent Deming SIG meeting on SPC reminded me that this an aspect of websites I often forget. The problem with the UK Acrobat Services site is that most of the audience is not from the UK. Nothing seems to change this. I started the US focus site with a ".com" and the first page of the co.uk suggests people go there if they are not in the UK. Not much difference, the process is not in control.

But the Swickis seem to be working ok in terms of getting searches more or less as expected.

'soft systems' is doing well on the learn9 swicki. I may try to look at this again. There may not be enough time for this at the conference but it could come up as part of looking at Deming on systems thinking.

I have started to look at Prolearn again. They are an EU project on professional e-learning. My impression is they have no problem in admitting 'quality' as an element in their thinking. They want to end up with methods that can be shared with people working in companies. That is not to stop them coming up with new research ideas of course. Just because they accept quality they are not restricted to a 'positive' methodology. Recent conference on social software. Links to blog. Links to blog conference. Maybe it is just another example of rhetoric to disguise a neo-liberal project. But I think there will be more to find on Prolearn that is interesting for the KBE discussion.

Later today there should be a guide to other blogs that I work on or at least a diagram as part of my learn9 website. This is about learning so one current idea is to make the blogs at least appear more coherent. I have tended to just start another one and then not continue.

Just had another look at M@n@gement. The site design has been updated. Much better, in my opinion. More space around things. Previously it looked to me that the list of articles was the only focus. Now it is easier to navigate the site. Also there is a search option, using Google. The only problem I find is the page with a form for submitting an article. At least this has a date - autumn 2006 - when nthe form will be available. This is consistent with a corrective action procedure.

Also the description of what they will accept mentions video, sound anything that fits. So far I can't find examples where this is used.

My paper proposal has been accepted for the Lancaster conference. Update needed for the website, maybe tomorrow.

The Swickis seem to be working. Somebody has pushed a relevant result for CMS up the list in the Anti-Performativity one.

Should be this one. Not sure if it will still be top of the list. This is about how to engage through CMS but I still don't know how people have followed this up.

It turns out my comments on the blog were not that relevant as the blog is only meant for an audience that already understands some Buddhist ideas.

The Coaching Buddhists website as more.

Phone conversation with Viramitra convinces me that things are more complex than I like to assume. Terms like 'Asian values' are not obvious in meaning as Buddhism can be western. I still think there is something about the approach to quality in Asia that is different to what I usually come across in the UK.

One theme that will probably come up in Lancaster is that on the web there are many 'weak links', so many that ideas around a 'community of practice' stop making much sense.

Recently a friend in Exeter has started to blog so I can experiment a bit in exchanging some words online and then check out what he makes of it in real time and space. The blog is here.

My first comment is that this is not yet much of a blog as such. It is a copy of an article. Also as it was originally written for a Buddhist audience it needs more explanation for the open world of blogging. What are the "Brahma Viharas" ? I have found a website through Google but need some confirmation this is along the same lines as the blog.

Western Buddhism is definitely a useful reference point, relevant currently for discussing OhmyNews and ideas about quality. Fortunately if I try to write about 'Asian values' and management theory the editors at OhmyNews can rewrite it to appear resonable. Making sense of this in a way that can work in the UK is going to be more complicated. There are a lot of Christians in Korea by the way. Generalising is problematic but that probably won't stop me.

OhmyNews have published my report on the Knowledge Based Economy conference coming up in Lancaster.

They have changed the headlines and rearranged the text so it appears a lot more sensible. I managed to slip in some of the argument I hope to include in a paper proposed for the conference. You do get a 'voice' with citizen journalism, that is a major point.

I am trying to think of the next few months as one event, maybe up to the Online Information show. Even if the 'paper' is not accepted, I will get some feedback and the words can take some other form.

Manchester as a Knowledge Resource

Conference to close with a return to reality

(this is text as submitted for OhmyNews)


An academic conference on the 'knowledge economy' will close with a keynote from Dr Cathy Garner, currently Managing Director of Manchester Knowledge Capital. It can be assumed that this will relate at least some of the discussion during the conference to a description of actual Manchester as it exists.

Themes include "Discourses and Narratives of the Knowledge-Based Economy" so there could be analysis of some claims as if they were rhetoric, intended to disguise something else. The conference description states that "The Knowledge-Based Economy (KBE) conjures a world of smart people, in smart jobs, doing smart things, in smart ways, for smart money, increasingly open to all rather than a few. It has become the dominant economic strategy for many countries, regions, and cities and is endorsed by many economic, political, and social forces. It has also been criticized for creating a digital divide, new forms of social exclusion, and restricting access to the intellectual commons."

There is a "critique" strand in academic thinking that tends to see any set of words as part of a neo-liberal project to assist globalising capitalism. KBE could be interpreted as just the latest version of this.

Some of these topics relate to the OhmyNews conference on best practices for citizen journalism, both about technology changes and associated developments in culture and social organisation. The 'ubiquitous dream hall' is clearly a showcase for the Korean IT industry but the main topic will be the practice of citizen journalism and wider access to 'the intellectual commons'. My own impression is that citizen reporters are just a part of citizen journalism and that the editors, software and organisation are significant elements. Studies of formal organisation are not always seen as interesting, but I think they remain relevant.

This will be the first major conference organised by the Institute for Advanced Studies, a new initiative for interdisciplinary and postdisciplinary research in Management, Social Sciences and the Arts & Humanities. The Knowledge Based Economy is the focus for the inaugural annual programme, a series of workshops leading up to the conference.

Previous conferences at Lancaster have included two about 'Management Theory at Work'. The idea that 'citizens' or 'practitioners' can contribute to such conferences is officially welcomed. See the recent article by Claire George. However this cannot always be easily reconciled with other views expressed. One closing keynote by Chris Grey argued that Business Schools could not and should not claim to offer any managerial knowledge, but should continue the university role of critique in society. Similar ideas are expressed in a PDF working paper 'Against Learning', available for free download from the Judge Business School in Cambridge.

One of the research clusters at the Lancaster Institute for Advanced Studies is around 'Performativity'. As described on the website,- "Organizations, institutions, nation states even global regions are often portrayed in terms of their performance. Performance itself can be viewed as institutionalised, ritualised, commodified even deified if the discourse pervading managing the public sector is anything to go by."

It is also the case that "Anti-Performativity" can be seen as having so strong a base in universities that it is a problem for practitioners to grasp where theory can be related to any form of activity. My own interest is mainly in quality systems. Since the book 'Making Quality Critical' by Wilkinson and Wilmott was published in 1995 it seems to have been difficult in the UK to relate quality assurance ideas with the study of 'learning organisations'.

The discussion around citizen journalism includes an aspect of 'critique' based on American pragmatism. At last year's OhmyNews Forum, Jeremy Iggers spoke about how he started an experiment in civic journalism in the U.S.

"At the time, I was finishing up a doctorate in philosophy at the University of Minnesota, and writing a dissertation about the ethics of journalism. One of the philosophers who influenced me most was the American pragmatist, John Dewey, who wrote about the importance of having a knowledgeable engaged public that played an active role in democratic life. My thought was that it would be a good idea to see what the newspaper could do to foster public participation, and to encourage better public understanding of important public issues."

There is a connection between Dewey's ideas on education and Deming's ideas on knowledge as part of his approach to quality. This may come up in the discussion about best practices for citizen journalism.

Whatever the reservations about 'performativity', there will also be pragmatic conclusions from the conference on the KBE, at least relating to Manchester.

On 7th January 2005 UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown opened the new North Campus Incubator Unit, part of the University of Manchester.

"What a pleasure it is to be in Manchester to see the huge changes taking place in this great city that led the Industrial Revolution and is now leading the knowledge revolution of the 21st Century," he said.

The Chancellor added that the university would be a future world leader and the city and region would become one of the most prosperous in Europe.

This could be seen as just more "spin" but there is some basis in reality.

The good news is that comments are now working ok on the Auricle blog. Not sure why this never worked for me before. I started a Talk topic at the Guardian instead. I will try to keep the Guardian one going enough not to be deleted. It should be a useful place for comments around learn9.net . For the next few months I will be working around a paper for the conference on the 'knowledge economy' organised by the Institute for Advanced Studies at Lancaster. I don't think the paper will be accepted but it is a useful chance to sort out some ideas.

Meanwhile I am getting some response on the new swickis for learn9 and 'anti-performativity'. A swicki is a form of managed search engine that builds on feedback. I get stats on existing terms and new ones. At the moment 'anti-performativity' gets most interest. 'learn9' is not known, I guess. I think the 'critique' view is definitely part of the discussion, evn though i see it mostly as a block to linking ideas on learning and quality. Maybe during the conference someone will explain how a form of action would follow from 'anti-performativity' in the context of the knowledge economy.

I have also done a guide to several swickis as a hello for spiders.

David Weinberger is still working on 'Everything is Miscellaneous', a book version of his talks from last year.

Apparently there will be about a year between delivering the manuscript in July and the actual publication. So "the book" is still in there. Cobbling together bits of blog will also serve some purpose, especially if something new crops up while the editors are still working on the text as delivered.

Still concentrating on IPEX, but this has carried over into learning.

"Web 2.0" keeps turning up as an explanation of what is happening. Print has to operate in this context.

However "Web 2.0" is still so loosely defined that it could involve anything. There could be a quality aspect, a learning aspect, and an aspect for communications or whatever print is part of.

I think this IPEX could clarify a few things so this blog could be sorted out soon as well.

"e-learning" has even been mentioned in the Bookseller part of the Saturday Review. So the Guardian is moving the bookish discussion online, even if slowly.