This essay is part of the Autonomy and Cohesion series. We can’t deal with most things in life on our own. We don’t have a large enough repertoire of responses to all the stimuli of the environment. We get together and form tribes, communities, companies, networks, states, or, in … | Continue reading
This article is part of the series on Autonomy and Cohesion. It is the second part of the basic overview of the balance. If you haven’t read the previous part, I’d recommend doing so before reading further. Cohesion forces Liquids and solids are in those states because there are … | Continue reading
The viability and welfare of socio-technical systems depend on their ability to balance autonomy and cohesion. Is that true for other systems? Yes, it is remarkably universal. It works for biological systems like bacteria or elephants and social systems like packs of wolves, term … | Continue reading
The city is charged with tension and a sense of urgency. After years of oppression, people’s frustration has reached its boiling point. The streets are flooded with bodies, united in their demand for equality. As you navigate through the crowd, you are just one among the countles … | Continue reading
This blog started in January 2011. That was 13 years ago. Many readers assured me the content was valuable and has aged well. To help new readers find their way, today I published a short Reader Guide to the blog. It’s time to experiment with new forms of publishing. I’m now laun … | Continue reading
If you look to the east, you’ll see the Outliners Forest. It is a magical place where branches and leaves can talk to each other. Trees can do that, too, using the fungal network that entangles their roots. You can hear various bird songs, but what grabs the attention is the scre … | Continue reading
When the virus hit the planet, it induced other parallel pandemics. They did not spread through the air and did not require physical proximity. They spread online. Some were conspiracy theories, of which a good part related to the virus itself. Others were political propaganda, a … | Continue reading
We see patterns, create patterns, and think in patterns. Looking back at what I’ve written through the years in this blog, I see a macro pattern I can call, for the lack of a better name, the “What’s wrong with…” pattern. The object is usually some common practice or a discipline … | Continue reading
Several times last week, in different circumstances, I was asked a question containing these three words or their synonyms. That’s not new. It happened previously. But this concentration triggered the write-up that follows. Nothing original and neither is the reason to write it: … | Continue reading
This is the last, 5th instalment on Roam. Here I’ll share how I use it. This part will be easier to write than some of the previous ones. What won’t be easy is to keep it short. Here are the links to the previous post in the series: Part 1: what is it, Part 2: […] | Continue reading
There are such kinds of tools which, when you interact with them, an organization emerges that modulates the interaction. That organization takes on a life of its own. The design and affordances of some tools for thought enable the emergence, persistence and adaptability of such … | Continue reading
Here’s my talk “Better Project Management with Knowledge Graphs” from the Benelux PMI Fair 2021. And can render the slides from my public nodebook graph. Related posts Personal Knowledge Graphs Roaming through contexts with Roam (series) | Continue reading
I shared previously a short description of what is SASSY Architecture and a more detailed deck here. This is a shorter but more recent deck from my talk at the IRMUK EA Conference in 2019. This is an embedded Microsoft Office presentation, powered by Office. (if the slidedeck doe … | Continue reading
Video Slides This presentation is also available on my public graph. | Continue reading
Linked Data is a universal approach for naming, shaping, and giving meaning to data, using open standards. It was meant to be the second big information revolution after the world wide web. It was supposed to complement the web of documents with the web of data so that humans and … | Continue reading
It was early November 2020. I escaped for a long weekend to Tenerife, where I played tennis for the last time of what turned out to be a 5-month ban back in Belgium. It was over 20°C and sunny, two more things I was going to miss in the long winter of the second lockdown. […] | Continue reading
The balance between autonomy and cohesion is one of the three balances, essential for everything living and social. It’s fascinating to watch when there is a shift both in the balance itself and in the way it is achieved. The times of Coronavirus are exceptionally rich in new way … | Continue reading
Metaphorum was established in 2003 as an NGO to develop Stafford Beer’s legacy and has organized a series of management cybernetics conferences and workshops over the years. I attended three Metaphorum conferences so far. In Hull, 2015, I shared ideas on how some of the findings … | Continue reading
Linked Data is still largely unknown, or misunderstood and undervalued. Often, people find it simply too difficult. So I keep looking for new ways to make Linked Data more accessible. And with some success. In my training courses so far over 60% of the participants had no IT back … | Continue reading
This is the second part of the series on Roam. The first part was about what is Roam like. If you’ve read it or if you know already, carry on. The concept of digital twin became popular thanks to the digital transformation fad. It’s now amplified by both market research companies … | Continue reading