Category Archives: Community

Quora: Lessons in community development

My trial-by-fire in online community management came just over 10 years ago, when we launched SmallBusiness.com. I’ve thought about that experience a lot in the past few weeks, as Quora has exploded among the tech community. [Find me on Quora here.] When we were preparing for the real launch of SmallBusiness.com, we spent weeks scouring [...]

Community management: Keeping all the balls in the air

I was talking with someone yesterday about online community management. I am still grateful to discover that I’m talking with someone who presumes that online communities require management. I told her that I think of online community management as juggling. You have several simultaneous tasks: Care and feeding of site members [tech support] Content strategy [...]

The Era of Crowdsourcing: Guiding Principles

OK, I’m trying out a new theory this morning. I am sitting waaaay up front. I’m typically your cynical, back-of-the-class type. I’m in a conversation between Scott Belsky, founder of the Behance creative network, and Jeffrey Kalmikoff of Digg. None of the below are direct quotes, but most of them are close. Kalmikoff: My love [...]

What you shouldn't learn from the Facebook TOS incident

What not to learn from the Facebook TOS incident.