About EPSS & Technology - Knowledge Management - articles about knowledge management technologies and practices.
Love Is the Killer App
If you want to fix your future, start by fixing yourself. In the face of war and recession, what the business world needs is less greed -- and more love. So says Yahoo senior executive Tim Sanders, who argues that now more than ever, the road to prosperity is paved with a commitment to generosity.  (2002-03) Interesting... a bit of a weird take on KM" - Gloria Gery

Structuring the Unstructured
ClearForest announces ClearTags 4.0, an auto-tagging platform that includes semantic, statistical and structural tagging.  (2002-03-06)

Power to the users
Managing content across multiple Web sites and portals.  Vignette has released V6 MultiSite Content Manager (VMCM), an extension to its V6 Content Suite. It claims VMCM is the first application to allow organizations to easily manage content on multiple sites and portals within an organization via a single application. (2002-03-04)

Knowledge Management Vendors Go Vertical
Struggling against a tough economy, some players in the knowledge management industry are trying to increase their business proposition to potential clients by developing offerings aimed at specific vertical industries. This article talks about how these companies are targeting these specific industries and what a variety of business sectors are looking for in a knowledge management solution. (2002-03-12)

Mapping the Information Society Literature: Topics, Perspectives, and Root Metaphors This article concerns the Information Society literature and is set in the context of teaching and learning about it, particularly in educational technology settings. In spite of the infancy of the Information Society phenomenon, a large literature has emerged in recent years that discusses its nature. Not surprisingly, the literature does not present a uniform view; rather, there are differences of opinion as to the nature and significance of the Information Society. We argue that the literature constitutes an educational problem for those teaching and learning about this complex territory. The discussion visits the complexity by constructing a comprehensive map that charts 1) topics, 2) perspectives, and 3) root metaphors. Mapping the literature helps both teachers and learners find their way in a potentially confusing field of study. Special emphasis is devoted to root metaphors - philosophical views about the nature of reality that in turn help teachers and learners become more sensitive to critical, underlying features of the Information Society discussion. We argue that some root metaphors are more helpful than others for understanding literature about the Information Society. (2001-12-27)

I don't watch TV to like learn anything":The Leisure Use of TV and the Internet
This paper is an analysis of how Norwegians use television and the Internet in their leisure time. It sets up a taxonomy using the degree of engagement in the mediated information on one axis and the degree of sociability on the other. Within this matrix one can examine the similarities and differences between the two media and also differences between the generations. The analysis is based on 15 in-home interviews with Oslo-based families. (2001-12-27)

Case Study: Connecting Students, Teachers, Parents and Librarians with bigchalk's Timely Newsletters

Bigchalk, inc.
is a comprehensive education destination for the K-12 learning community, with both subscription-based and free learning tools for educators, parents and students. Bigchalk's vast array of library resources, supplementary curriculum, and assessment professional development Web products provide access to unparalleled instructional resources.

Among the bigchalk suite of tools is bigchalk Library, a research database designed for ease of use and breadth of content, providing access to more than 2,000 full-text magazines, newspapers, reference books, and TV, radio and government transcripts, plus thousands of maps, pictures, and streaming audio and video. Other research products include the acclaimed ProQuest® products, each of which provides uncompromising coverage for every research need, and eLibraryTM, an easy-to-use Web reference tool for students of all ages. Bigchalk has superb curriculum products designed for subject comprehensiveness and ease-of-use. In particular, ClassMateTM Earth Science, Language Arts and U.S. History, and bigchalk's Integrated Classroom provide excellent solutions for classroom needs. Complete information about bigchalk's product line can be found on the company web site. (2002-01-30)

The Case Against Knowledge Management
Companies waste billions on knowledge management because they fail to figure out what knowledge they need, or how to manage it. In his latest book, Thomas A. Stewart explains how to answer both questions. (2002-02)

Book Excerpt: Content Management for Dynamic Web Delivery Page III
An Information Model provides the framework for organizing your content so that it can be delivered and reused in a variety of innovative ways. Once you have created an Information Model for your content repository, you will be able to label information in ways that will enhance search and retrieval, making it possible for authors and users to find the information resources they need quickly and easily.(2002-30-01)

Post-Modern Knowledge Management: A One-Question Interview(TM)
Kevin Werbach, the editor of Esther Dyson's Release 1.0 (http://release1.edventure.com), wrote an excellent issue on Knowledge Management that's much in accord with what we've been blathering on about. Further, he says he's writing about "Post Modern KM" and we here at JOHO are such suckers for anything POMO that we once paid a guy at eBay an extra $25 because he offered to say the uninterruptible power supply we'd bought was in fact post-modern. So, we put the question to Kevin:"What is postmodern knowledge management?" (2002-02)

Shareware can help trim strained computing budget - No longer available online.
Tough economic times are upon us. Nearly everyone must be more careful when making purchases, including paying careful attention to the computer hardware and software we buy. We've lived through some incredibly prosperous times when the cost of computer technology was not a big issue. Many of us spent whatever it took to get the software we thought we wanted, only to find we made some poor choices. Now that money is tighter, it may be time to take another look at shareware available for downloading online. It could be exactly what you're looking for at a cost you can afford. (2001-11)  

ScrollKeeper: Open Source Document Management -  No longer available online.
Operating systems are very complex these days, composed of many parts and pieces. Linux, like other Unix-like, free software operating systems, is really just a collection of autonomous and dependent software packages. On my workstation there are about 850 packages at last count. A moderately busy, production Internet server might have as many as 650 packages. And a development server, supporting diverse activities of a complex development team, might have as many as 1,000 packages…

The Day the World Changed: Implications for Archival, Library, and Information Science Education
The terrorist attacks of September 11th on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon have had profound implications for many aspects of American and global society. This essay explores the many implications for library and information science schools educating the next generation of information professionals. The essay considers an array of opinions by the faculty located in one such school regarding how to reflect on the aftermath of the attacks for basic aspects of teaching, research, and curriculum design in library and information science schools. Topics examined include disaster preparedness and recovery, knowledge management, workplace design and location, technology and the human dimension, ethics and information policy, information security, information economics, memorializing and documenting the terrorist attacks, the role of the Internet, and preservation. (2001-29-11)

Libraries, the Internet and September 11
As the public clamored for information after September 11, libraries and librarians answered their call. This paper examines the response of libraries and librarians while noting some unexpected impacts on the profession. (2001-03-12)

What is KM
Darwin Magazine: A knowledge-based company builds its competitive strategy on the processing of intangible, often invisible nuggets of information that cannot always be quantified or recorded. Such knowledge may include information about competitors or the understanding of a crucial market segment. It also encompasses the expertise of individual employees that, when mined, can increase a company's competitive advantage. (2001-09-02)

Managing Unstructured Content in Enterprise Information Portals
destinationCRM.com: Today, a new class of software, enterprise information portals ("EIPs") promises to bring order to this corporate jungle of information -- often referred to as unstructured information -- which knowledge workers need to perform their jobs. A recent estimate put unstructured information at 80 percent of all corporate information. This white paper focuses on the issues related to the management, organization, contribution, searching and indexing of unstructured content through the use of a content directory and an organizational taxonomy as part of an EIP solution. (2001-08-19)

Portals: The Power and the Peril
The purpose of portals is to leverage existing applications into a better view, one that is familiar to people. Creating portals is a good first step in leveraging unstructured information. The problem is how do you use it, maintain it, keep it current. Creating a business MyYahoo! is a pretty good rough diagram for a business plan, but it’s a long way from there to complete solution. And what we have learned from compiling this White Paper on Enterprise Information Portals is: we ain’t there yet.  (2001-08-12)

Extending Document Management Systems with User-Specific Active Properties
Xerox Palo Alto Research: Document properties are a compelling infrastructure on which to develop document management applications. A property-based approach avoids many of the problems of traditional hierarchical storage mechanisms, reflects document organizations meaningful to user tasks, provides a means to integrate the perspectives of multiple individuals and groups, and does this all within a uniform interaction framework. Document properties can reflect not only categorizations of documents and document use, but also expressions of desired system activity, such as sharing criteria, replication management and versioning. (2001-08-12)

Heads Up
eCFO: Are corporate portals a high-tech “window” to keep staff well informed, or are they a glorified filing cabinet to store useless information? Groupware, intranets, and portals are simply fancy ways to manage information, but not knowledge. And the only way that these tools can help firms manage knowledge is if they are combined with programs that focus on people, not technology. (2001-07-22)

Enterprise Information Portals and Knowledge Management
Meta KM: What we will be examining in this paper is the portal as the means by which people within an organization can obtain access to the knowledge and information that an enterprise possesses which will improve their effectiveness. Many consider the portal to be more than just an antidote to the information glut. Larry Hawes, a senior analyst at the Delphi Group, a Boston eBusiness consulting firm, says the portal is “…really the killer application for knowledge management It provides a way for people within an organization to find each other, to find information that they need and to solve real business problems.”  (2001-07-22)

Getting Down to Brass Tacks with Knowledge Management
DM Review: KM isn’t a fad; it solves real problems in good and bad times. But like weed seeds, doubts about it are likely to be sown along the way. The next time you hear one of these three myths, remember that KM provides real solutions and is here to stay. (2001-07-22)

Information Literacy in the Workplace
Pity the poor employee who deals with this bombardment on a daily basis! Knowledge management has been considered by many to be the solution to our information woes. But the focus on technology in most knowledge management programs has only contributed to the problem. The key is how people deal with information. (2001-07-15)

Enterprise Information Portals: An Evolution of Knowledge Management Tools
Today’s enterprise information portals are an evolution of several years of knowledge management lessons learned. They have evolved to support organizational changes over the past decade and are very powerful tools and if deployed correctly offer organizations the ability to streamline business process and connect with their employees, suppliers and customers. (2001-07-08)

Unfolding Knowledge
Knowledge Management: The value of knowledge is largely tied to the way in which that knowledge is organized. If you can’t find it, it’s not likely to be of much use to you. Taxonomies, simply put, are ways to organize corporate knowledge so it can be located, accessed and maintained more easily by your employees. Often represented visually as hierarchical branching trees, taxonomies are one of the oldest ideas in knowledge management. Yet they are as relevant to the modern corporation as they were to the original librarians in ancient Greece--perhaps even more so. (2001-07-08)

Control Your Content
destinationCRM.com, Carla O'Dell: Without systematic content management, most KM initiatives founder. To sustain a knowledge management initiative, "magnet" content that draws people to it is a must. The goal is to get people "just" the right information--just enough, just in time and from trusted sources--so they can do their jobs well. However, there are many detours on the road to making this goal a reality. (2001-06-10)

The State of KM
A recent survey found that more companies now realize that KM deployment is not an overnight installation but a complex shift in business strategy and process, one that requires thorough planning and must involve end users. The survey found that a pivotal issue in migrating to a knowledge strategy is the creation of a culture to support trust and collaboration. (2001-05-27)

Grassroots KM through blogging
elearningpost.com: In this article, we share our experiences with a strategy and technology so simple in design, that it could present the next wave of grassroots KM implementations. We are talking of the "storytelling" as the killer strategy, and "blogs" as the killer technology. Both of them share one common ground: grassroots interaction.  (2001-05-27)

Control Your Content
Knowledge Management: To sustain a knowledge management initiative, "magnet" content that draws people to it is a must. The goal is to get people "just" the right information--just enough, just in time and from trusted sources--so they can do their jobs well. However, there are many detours on the road to making this goal a reality. (2001-05-13)

Expertise Software Revolutionizes Knowledge Management Market
Yahoo News: A new report released today by Basex shows how Knowledge Management still has the potential to move from a "fad" to an integreted part of the corporate IT landscape. This report clearly explains how companies will need to collect, organize, classify and distribute their enterprise's expertise throughout the organization to those who need it, whenever they need it - via so-called "Expertise Software." The paper, "Expertise Software: KM's 'Killer Application'?", provides CIOs with the previously-elusive evidence that KM warrants both major investment and tremendous reorganization along more people-centric lines. (2001-05-13)

Portal Quest
University Business: Most recently, many organizations have built enterprise information portals (also known as enterprise-resource, business-to-employee, or corporate portals). They're still gateways, but instead of only providing access to the Internet, they are also a way into a particular company or organization; they consolidate information, provide access to internal and external resources, and serve as platforms for information tools. The browser becomes the front end for the entire enterprise information system. (2001-05-13)

The Knowledge Crunch
CIO Magazine: A KM portal is a single point of access to multiple sources of information and provides personalized access. Companies are starting to pay attention to portals because they offer an efficient way to capture information. This article documents how Frito-Lay built a KM portal for their sales team and the results of that effort.  (2001-05-06)

How to make knowledge management more rigorous
KM World:  "Although the knowledge management field is maturing, a great deal of hand waving and hype surrounds it. False promises and over-expectations are being created; many vendors are calling their products “knowledge management” tools even though they might simply be database, information management or document management tools; a dearth of rigorous methodologies for doing knowledge management exists." The paper presents the outline of a methodology called SMARTVision.  (2001-04-22)

When Bad Things Happen to Good Ideas
Darwin Online: If done right, KM is supposed to create a more collaborative environment, cut down on duplication of effort and encourage knowledge sharing—saving time and money in the process. The problem is, in many cases KM devolved into a purely technical process, resulting in expensive software implementations sitting unused by oblivious, fearful or resentful employees. Larry Prusak, executive director of IBM's Institute for Knowledge Management, says he's observed about 220 KM implementations and at least half have been "deeply suboptimized" because it was easier and faster to just buy technology than think through the strategic issues. (2001-04-08)

Gathering Knowledge While It's Ripe
Knowledge Management Magazine: The ultimate goal of knowledge harvesting is to capture an individual's decision-making process with enough clarity that someone else guided by it could repeat the steps of the process and achieve the same result. To get there, the harvester should constantly ask, says Fredericksen, "If I was in this situation, would I get to the same place they did?" If the answer is no, the harvester must focus on filling the gap between what the user currently knows and what is needed to duplicate the expert's practices. (2001-04-08)

Application: Knowledge must be spread around
This article summarizes a study of the knowledge management practices of 15 companies with varying degrees of success. "The less successful companies tend to take a top-down approach: pushing knowledge to where it is needed. The successful companies reward employees for seeking, sharing, and creating knowledge. It requires effort to develop "knowledge pull" - a grass-roots desire among employees to tap into their company's intellectual resources. Successful companies - even those with IT systems facilitating smooth and broad exchanges of data - know that the challenge goes beyond developing information networks. Much of a company's most valuable knowledge is tacit: embedded in the minds of employees. Tacit knowledge is difficult to manage, but successful companies have figured out ways." (2001-03-11)

Measurement for Knowledge Management
American Productivity Quality Center: "Measuring knowledge management (KM) is not simple. Determining KM's pervasiveness and impact is analogous to measuring the contribution of marketing, employee development, or any other management or organizational competency. It is nonetheless a necessity if KM is to last and have significant impact in an organization. " (2001-02-25)

Knowledge Pays
CIO Magazine: Superior knowledge management frees companies to operate on fewer assets, collect their cash faster and have less volatility. The challenge is to make sure that the scope and the goal of the process is clear and focused. (2001-02-18)

Knowledge management with human smarts
InfoWorld.com: "The real payoff in the knowledge management arena is still three to four years away. As neural networking techniques evolve, knowledge management solutions will become not only more adept at distilling and classifying vital information, but will also extract hidden trends and relationships from huge volumes of data, requiring knowledge workers to sift through less information and giving them more relevant information for making decisions." (2001-02-18)

Exploring the KM toolbox
The Business Lounge: "With a plethora of KM tools and portals products on the market, it is increasingly necessary to define a framework to categorise, better appreciate the power of these tools and to relate them to common types of KM applications. This article defines such a framework. By identifying the dominant fields of KM and Artificial Intelligence (AI) research, it is possible to develop a broader perspective of the applicable technologies available for KM. Criteria for the evaluation of tools and portals as well as future challenges are also outlined." (2001-01-21)

Knowledge Management on the Shop-Floor
This article report that a: "Comparison of the successful and failed implementations of Task Supporter and the prototypes suggest that a successful introduction of a shop-floor information support system requires three things: (1) a clear definition of the objectives of the new system, (2) solid co-operation between the developers and end users of the system and (3) an in-house "agent" driving the project from conception to upkeep of the results." (2001-01-14)

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