eekim.com: EEK Speaks

Sat, Feb 25, 2006

The Pete Paradox #

PeterKaminski has a great maxim, which those of us who know and love him commonly call ThePeteRule: (K8N)

"Time together in person is too important to spend working." T (K8O)

I think it's a great rule, but there's a corollary, which I'll call ThePeteParadox: (K8P)

Time together in person is the best time to work. (K8Q)

I actually had a specific experience with Peter last October that led me to think about this paradox. (K8R)

At RecentChangesCamp earlier this month, I faced this paradox first-hand. On the one hand, I didn't want to waste the opportunity to really get to know some of the excellent folks in the Wiki community who aren't local to the BayArea. On the other hand, I had some specific things I wanted to work on -- namely SisterSites with WardCunningham and other Wiki developers and a YADIS implementation with the good folks at JanRain. Working on these projects meant breaking away from the larger group, popping open the laptop, and focusing on the work at hand. (K8S)

The paradox resolved itself to my satisfaction. I got both projects done. We implemented SisterSites in PurpleWiki and a bunch of other Wikis, and BrianEllin and I wrote a YADIS library in Ruby. I met several interesting and cool people for the first time, including Brian, and, I got to know folks like BayleShanks a lot better. On the second night, after the conference party, I decided to go to the main ballroom to check my email, even though I was exhausted. The ballroom was empty at first, but about half an hour later, Bayle showed up. We had met at WikiSym, but this was the first time we had a chance to sit down and really talk, and we stayed up past 3am. That was excellent. I had already known that Bayle had done some cool stuff, but it was great to dig deeper into his ideas as well as to talk about non-Wiki stuff. (K8T)

I even got to discuss ThePeteParadox with Pete in person. (How's that for meta?!) And here's how I finally resolved it in my head. Both ThePeteRule and ThePeteParadox are about maximizing engagement. When you are working closely together, you are engaging in a way that is not only more productive, but more meaningful. Face-to-face time spent working can be a waste, but face-to-face time spent truly working together usually isn't. (K8U)

/collaboration | Posted at 2:52am

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EEK Speaks

A blog about collaboration, community-building, and the various goings-on at Blue Oxen Associates, with occasional digressions on food and other vital matters.