Learning - by doing the website

I realise my LearnByDoing blog has been badly neglected of late. I certainly have not stopped learning by doing, and I have not stopped reflecting on what I am learning - but at present I cannot prioritise blogging about what I am learning. However I want to make a few quick notes about what I am doing - even if I cannot also write about what I am learning in the process.

I am working with Andy Broomfield and Ryan Cartwright on Dadamac's webpresence. This isn't "just a website". It is also an attempt to pull together all kind of things that are currently scattered across the internet. These are things that relate to work John Dada and I have done in the past, and are doing now (together and separately).

In my mind the Dadamac website will be the virtual equivalent of a reception area in a physical building, and the physical building in question would be the head office of our organisation - Dadamac. I want this "head office" to connect up with all the things related to Dadamac elsewhere on the Internet - all the Dadamac online meetings and emails and so on that relate to present and past projects. So the "front end" of our website will need to connect up with the new structures we are gradually putting in place behind the scenes for our present projects, and all of this will help us to be effective and able to grow with confidence. If all goes well it will also bring in new people, and help them to choose defined areas of work where they can work as independently and proactively as they choose. When that happens it should mark the end of me being an information bottle-neck. I look forward to widening my areas of interest and active involvement again in all kinds of related activities that have been neglected of late while I have been focussing on structure rather than new ideas and interests.

In a way all the Dadamac interactions and archives currently scattered around the Internet are a bit like the work done in annexes or in the branch offices of an organisation. In fact much of the content I put on this blog last year was put here as a tempoarary measure, because "the right Dadamac online space" was not ready. Of course in the physical world there are reasons to spread across various locations, and stay spread out, and it is true that in Dadamac we are situated physically in various places, some very far distant from others. But in the virtual world the head office and branch offices can be located in the same virtual space, so that everyone can easily connect with each other and know what is happening, and it is our virtual space that I am working on. However, just like in the physical world it takes time and effort to create a new space, move into it, and get everything working effectively.

This explanation probably makes little sense at present, but perhaps it will after the webpresence is fully functional in the way I imagine it - probably through a slow, gradual, unfolding at first, then speeding up when it is big enough to interest and attract new people and other resources.