You invent it, they fund it. Simple as that.

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation is running a grant competition called the News Challenge.  The News Challenge awards up to $5 million for innovative projects that use technology to transform the way communities send, receive and make use of news and information.

Applicants must only follow three rules:

1. Use digital, open-source technology (so many of us are already using open source technology)
2. Distribute news in the public interest (hey everything we do is in the public interest!)
3. Fit into one of four categories (Look at number 2, it practically shouts information literacy or news literacy.  And number 3, digital media labs anyone?)

The four categories – emphasis added by me

• Mobile: Seeks projects that use mobile devices to produce, deliver, consume, share and otherwise engage with news. The category reflects the fact that the mobile phone, with 5 billion units in use, has become an important tool for news.
• Authenticity: Looks for projects that help people better understand the reliability of news and information sources. We’re hoping to identify promising ideas for helping citizens negotiate our oft-chaotic media world. How can we help news users better evaluate the validity and trustworthiness of news and information? How can we better filter and assess the credibility of what we read and watch?
• Sustainability: Considers new economic models supporting news and information. New ways of conducting and consuming journalism may require new ways of paying for it. We’re open to ideas for generating revenue as well as ways to reduce costs.
• Community: Seeks groundbreaking technologies that support news and information specifically within defined geographic areas. This is designed to jump-start work on technologies and approaches that haven’t arrived yet. Unlike the first three categories, submissions in this area must be tested in a geographically designated community.

If you have questions you can reference the FAQ,  check the archived chat transcript and/or participate in the second live chat on November 18 at 1:30 pm EST

Deadline is midnight EST, December 1st.

Need some inspiration? Take a look at some of the winners from previous years:

• The Front Porch Forum, a virtual town hall space, helps residents share and discuss local news, build community and increase engagement.
• Local Wiki this project will create enhanced tools for local wikis, a new form of media that makes it easy for people to learn — and share — their own unique community knowledge.
• Councilpedia: a wiki devoted to local legislators
• Data Visualization: a suite of easy-to-use tools for anyone to use on any standard set of data ranging from government databases to demographics and statistics.
• Crowdsourcing Crisis Information – Ushahidi can help fill the gap by creating a free web map and timeline that journalists and citizens can use to contribute multiple reports of large news events.
• CMS Upload Utility – create new and easy to use tools that will allow news organizations to essentially drag and drop articles onto an online news site.
• Video Volunteers: will train 100 people in rural India as Community Video Producers.
• Beanstock’d: encourage green living through an interactive game. Using social networking tools and real-time news and information, players would be able to track their environmental impact, discover how they stack up against neighbors and team up in a friendly competition to leave the smallest imprint on their community.
• The Includer: The device is meant for people in rural areas with marginal online access so that messages can be physically transported to and from places connected to the Internet

Helpful Tips and Suggestions

• Tips for Applying from past winners
• How To Focus Your Application – Tips from Challenge Winner Aaron Presnall
• 3 tips to determine how much money you should ask for
• On getting feedback on your submission
• Knight News Challenge 101: The Basic Breakdown of a Successful Entry
• 5 tips on discovering what else is out there.
• Application Tips for the Challenge
• Research is Key in Knight News Challenge Applications, Winner Retha Hill Says
• How to get the most out of the Knight News Challenge, by Matt Thompson
• 5 tips on innovating in the academy, by Rich Gordon

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The fabulous Buffy Hamilton gave her Pivot Points of Change presentation at my library’s Staff Day last week.  The points were inspired by post from Seth Godin in which he states changing everything is too difficult. Buffy applied this to libraries and librarians for the 9 pivot points of change.  This is a slightly modified version of  her original 9 pivot points of change for school librarians.

1. Instead of thinking you can only participate in face to face conferences, consider how you can participate virtually
2. Keep your traditional means of connecting with patrons and colleagues, but innovate at every possible touch point through social media and social networking
3. Keep reading your print journals, but use a feed aggregator or information portal to access and organize your favorite blogs, journals, podcasts, youtube videos, and twitter rss feeds to stay on the cutting edge
4. Keep networking with colleagues face to face, but cultivate a personal learning network to broaden your PLN (Personal Learning Network) to include librarians and other professionals from around the world who can inform your thinking, practice, and philosophy
5. Keep your traditional productivity tools, but use cloud computing to encourage collaboration and information sharing
6. Continue sharing your library program goals and reports through traditional formats, but also compose these in a different format, such as a mindmap, video, or other multimedia/visualization medium
7. Keep your traditional services and materials, but expand those services and “containers” of materials to reflect patron needs
8. Keep positing literacy as a primary focal point of your library program, but expand that definition of literacy to include new media literacy and information literacy as mainstream literacies equal in importance to traditional literacy.
9. Keep your traditional sources of authoritative information, but let the research topic and mode of research guide the integration of social media information sources and tools for delivering that content in your subject guides

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• Pivot Points for Change
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My personally selected top 10 from the links I shared on Twitter from 2/19/2010 thru 2/25/2010

1. RT @VenessaMiemis: 16 free ebooks about social media via @fredzimny. Just look at this list of titles and authors :

1. Building a Social Media Team, Amber Naslund,
2. ContentCory Doctorow
3. Customer Service, The Art of Listening and Engagement Through Social Media, Brian Solis
4. Fish Where the Fish Are – Mapping Social Media to the Buying Cycle, Chris Brogan
5. Getting a Foothold in Social Media, Amber Naslund
6. Let’s Talk: Social Media for Small Business, John Jantsch
7. New Media and the Air Force, United States Air Force Public Affairs Agency
8. Social Media and Network Starting Points, Chris Brogan
9. Social Media Time Management, Amber Naslund
10. Social Media Tips: Sharing lessons learned to help your business grow, Jeff Hayzlett
11. The Art of Community, Jono Bacon
12. The Essential Guide to Social Media, Brian Solis
13. The New Rules of Viral Marketing, David Meerman Scott
14. The Simple Web: A Philosophy for Getting What You Want, Skellie
15. The Social Media Starter Kit, Amber Naslund
16. What is Social Media?, Antony Mayfield

2. RT @VenessaMiemis: new post – reimagining human/social capital & how to spark innovation - Tapping the Network to Facilitate Innovation – How can the power and scope of social networks, combined with a human capital inventory, be used to facilitate shared creation and innovation?

3. RT @FluffTheBunny: Unlink your feeds – A Manifesto – as someone who is driving slightly (or slightlier) crazy by friends who dump their tweets into Facebook I can’t agree more!

4. Incredibly proud to be involved in the new Libraries & Transliteracy blog with @Tombrarian & @buffyjhamilton – oh come on, you didn’t think I could leave a mention of this out did you? I’m SO excited about this project!

5. RT @rww: On Facebook, You’re Really You - “Psychologists found that “faking it” online is tougher than previously imagined.”

6. No One Knows What the F*** They’re Doing and Feeling Like a Fraud – great read! via @griffey – I don’t know about you but I feel like this all the time, I’m just waiting for someone to notice I don’t know what I’m talking about. I’ve discussed it with friends and some people have called it the impostor syndrome (don’t look at wikipedia’s definition its too

7. RT @zephoria: UX Magazine (@uxmag) has published my “Streams of Content, Limited Attention“ today: Hope you enjoy! – An important read from danah boyd on information flow and “four challenges, points where technological hope and reality collide.”

8. Why are you apologizing? – Like all of Seth Godin’s posts this one is short but gets the point across. Don’t apologize for something you’re doing. Either don’t do it, or do it and don’t apologize.

9. How Social Is Too Social? – not everything is better with friends.

10. Empowering Parents & Protecting Children in an Evolving Media Landscape –  Another important read from danah boyd et al “The FCC published a Notice of Inquiry (NOI) on the important topic of empowering parents and protecting youth in an era of an evolving media landscape.  John Palfrey, Urs Gasser, and I took the opportunity to respond to the NOI on behalf of the Youth and Media Policy Working Group Initiative at the Berkman Center. What we wrote should not surprise any of you who are following our work, but our research-grounded response may be of great value for those of you who are interested in this topic.  For this reason – and because we all believe in transparency – we have decided to publicly share the document that we crafted.”

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cc image used courtesy of Vermin Inc on flickr

We hear a lot about innovation and change these days. Everyone is talking about it, every is doing it, or at least trying to. There’s a problem though, change and innovation require more than lip service. Declaring that you are innovative does not make it so.

You know what I’m talking about, someone reads an article, attends a presentation, has a conversation over coffee and comes back to work and says – we’re going to be innovative! Maybe there are even a few committees put together. But then what? Nothing. The committees quit meeting and things go back to the way they were. Maybe one or two people are still trying, but no one is listening.

You know why? Because innovation doesn’t happen by committee or decree.

Organizations do not innovate. People innovate. Inspired people. Fascinated people. Creative people. Committed people. That’s where innovation begins. On the inside.

The organization’s role — just like the individual manager’s role — is to get out of the way. And while this “getting out of the way” will undoubtedly include the effort to formulate supportive systems, processes, and protocols, it is important to remember that systems, processes, and protocols are never the answer. - Mitch Ditkoff

So how do you create a culture of innovation? You start with the people who think differently than you do.

Diversity is one of those sticky terms that people seem to boil down to creating a Benetton ad. Diversity isn’t about some magical collection of five differently colored skin tones. It’s about bringing different perspectives and backgrounds to the table and creating an environment that values what can be gained from different voices who’ve taken different paths. Skin color (or gender performance) is often interpreted as a reasonable substitute for this and, for many reasons, it has been historically. But bringing in a woman whose attitude and approach is just as masculine as the men isn’t going to help your team break outside of its current mindset. They key is to bring people who think differently than you - danah boyd*

Then get out of their way.

Once you’ve hired a good staff, you sit down, you formulate a plan and then you get out of their way. John Limbert

Let them do what you hired them to do.

The really good people want autonomy — you let me do it, and I’ll do it. So I told the people I recruited: “You come in here and you’ve got to keep me informed, but you’re the guy, and you’ll make these decisions. It won’t be me second-guessing you. But everybody’s going to win together. We’re part of a team, but you’re going to run your part.” That’s all they want. They want a chance to do it. - Gordon M. Bethune

You can not force innovation to happen. You can provide the autonomy, the trust to allow people to be innovative.

Read more:

• Smart Leaders Get out of the way
• Remember to Share the Stage
• Treat Your Staff Like Adults and See What Happens
• Why Your Employees Are Losing Motivation
• Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us
• Control is an Illusion You Need to Let Go

*danah boyd’s post is about gender issues and being a woman in todays workforce. It’s worth a read (and mostly likely a blog post) in is own right.Similar Posts:

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• The Hazards of Leading Culture Change
• For Those Who Are an Overnight Success and For Those Who Aren’t a Video Series From Chris Brogan

The Eight Irresistible Principles of Fun

Get Focused
1. Stop hiding who you are
2. Start being insanely selfish>

Be Creative
3. Stop following the rules
4. Start scaring yourself

Use Your Wisdom
5. Stop taking it all so damn seriously
6. Start getting rid of the crap

Take Action
7. Stop being busy
8. Start something

An oldie but a goodie found via The Heart of InnovationSimilar Posts:

• The Seven Deadly Sins of Innovators
• 60 Things We Need Less and More Of, What Would You Add?
• Want Innovation? Get Out of the Way

These videos are from Chris Brogan’s Over Night Success Series. There are 9 videos total covering topics such as Grinding vs Clocking – Time and the Overnight Success, Pity Party, Small Talk is Big, Belief Systems, The Competition, What it Takes, No Excuses & A Call to Arms. These videos are great even if you aren’t an over night success, even if you aren’t a success.

These 3 are my favorite (although it was hard to pick)

Take time off – I’ve said it before you need your down time but I’m always happy to point out when others say the same thing.  :-)

Don’t believe the hype – I included this one because Chris says – by over night success I mean 10 years of hard work.

Here’s another bag of money – on excuses. We all make excuses that become between us and our goals. Decide what your priorities are. Stop making excuses.
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Do you know what they are? Are you committing them?

1. Lust: Innovating in a space you have no business being in.

2. Gluttony: Trying to create too many initiatives with too few resources.

3. Greed: Taking short-term profits at the expense of long-term growth.

4. Sloth: Taking short cuts—not doing the hard work, not following the proven process.

5. Wrath: Being so focused on your competition that you miss the same opportunities your rivals are missing.

6. Envy: In the context of innovation, envy means launching a “me too” product instead of finding a space you can own.

7. Pride: You won’t give up on your favorite idea—even when the numbers prove you’re wrong.

From a Business Week article on the sins of innovation and how you can stop yourself from committing them.  See the full article for complete description and most importantly, how to stop yourself from committing them.Similar Posts:

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Notes from the 2009 Internet Librarian Conference

Rebecca Jones
Nicole Henning

Nicole Henning
Avoid abstraction like the devil
Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die

We should reward success and failure, punish inaction

Innovation comes from quantity

The Art of Woo: Using Strategic Persuasion to Sell Your Ideas

Results only work environment ROWE, came from Best Buy
Frustrated with cooperate environment, that work was all about coming in early & leaving late, or look like they were, in workplace we are treated like children,
We have more autonomy as college students that we do as adults
Set up system so not punching clock only judged on out put, meetings were optional, needed to show value of meeting to get people to it
After 2 years of keeping stats & showed productivity went through the roof, took to upper mngment, did it across the company, then wrote a book called Why Work Sucks and How to Fix It: No Schedules, No Meetings, No Joke–the Simple Change That Can Make Your Job Terrific

Find the right audience
One small step
Under the radar
Speak the language of the ppl you want to convince

MIT Libraries Betas page
Libraries.mit.edu/betas
Can put things out there and get feedback from users to help support if/when do a larger project.
Easy to get onto beta, hard to get off or graduate, criteria at libstaff.mit.edu/uig/betas.html

I can’t understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I’m frightened of the old ones – John Cage

Rebecca Jones
To influence others we first have to understand ourselves
We have to see ourselves as influencers
We must be clear on what we want ot see happen
We must learn new approaches

Effective influencers tend to be
Expert in a specific domain
Early adapters
Opinion leaders
Knowledge about the issues
Views as trust worthy
With connections
Use knowledge & connections to help others

Assume everyone is going to be an ally
Be clear with your message
Whats in it for them

Get to know ppl keep in touch regardless of lvl
Understand what your org hidden org chart is
Build trust
Be clear on what you want
Be clear on what you have to say & where your lines are drawn
Communicate clearly

Being part of the quotient

Ask for the sale
Close the sale
Is there any reason why we can’t move fwd with this

The facts will not persuade people, the more you throw out the less they listen

When ppl see something new they think you’re taking away the old, so start with what is staying the same

Clarity
Competence
RelationshipsSimilar Posts:

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Putting in all those extra hours, either from the office or home, isn’t helping you. At least not with creativity, innovation or those ah-ha! moments.

Some of our greatest moments of insight happen where we least expect them to. From the Wallstreet Journal:

It happened to Archimedes in the bath. To Descartes it took place in bed while watching flies on his ceiling. And to Newton it occurred in an orchard, when he saw an apple fall.

From the same article but even more interesting:

Left to its own devices, our brain activates several areas associated with complex problem solving, which researchers had previously assumed were dormant during daydreams. Moreover, it appears to be the only time these areas work in unison.

Of course it’s not as simple as just lounging about in your robe & fuzzy slippers.  You have to prepare in order to enable those insights to happen. From Fast Company:

The researchers found support for the idea that blinding insights favor a prepared mind–that is, you’ve got to really internalize the problem at hand if you’re to find any sort of solution. But to actually bring those insights to life, you’ve got to step back.

More Readings

• A Wandering Mind Heads Straight Toward Insight: Researchers Map the Anatomy of the Brain’s Breakthrough Moments and Reveal the Payoff of Daydreaming
• Hard Work’s Overrated, Maybe Detrimental.
• The Eureka Hunt
• How to Become a Design Genius: Take Time Off. Lots of It.
• Stefan Sagmeister: The power of time off – TED talk video

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This is great slideshow by Buffy Hamilton on change. I love that it emphasizes that you don’t have to throw away everything and starting anew.  Rather adding new tools and technology to what you are currently doing.

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