William H. Dutton

Rick Goossen has posted a useful overview of our research on distributed problem solving networks, which I’ve come to call ‘Collaborative Network Organizations’. As Goossen suggests, research in this area is going to have a very difficult time in keeping up with developments. The article he based his blog on is posted on SSRN.

Shoshanna Zuboff has introduced a new term in her blog to build on the discussion of top-down versus bottom-up networks. Her terminology is the concept of ‘bottom-out politics’ or ‘populism’. I think this is a good alternative to conceptions of ‘peer networks’ or ‘peer production’, since horizontal and vertical networks are often mixed in so-called [...]

Osaro Odemwingie, a Media and Communications Officer for Oxfam GB in Nigeria, joined us at the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, through the Ford Foundation’s support for an OII Civil Society Practitioner Programme. Despite a productive few weeks at the OII, Osaro also had some wonderful cross-cultural experiences — one of which he recounts [...]

The OII has designed a document to provide a few highlights drawn from our many research projects. The PDF version of this 2008 profile of the OII is available online at: http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/about/OIIProfile_200807.pdf I would welcome your comments on the profile. You may comment through this blog or by contacting me at the OII. We hope [...]

The UK’s Prime Minister is launching a Webcast, which he and the Financial Times refer to as ‘his own TV channel’, “Number10TV”. This is another step for the Web in supporting communication between politicians and the public, among many other e-Democracy initiatives, such as the Conservative Party Leader’s ‘Webcameron’, launched well over a year ago. [...]