Loomio
Wed 8 Apr 2015 2:57AM

Keynote: Reaching great heights by building with others’ blocks

AI Alanna Irving Public Seen by 257

We are posting a series of Loomio discussions about sessions and talks coming up at the conference, so participants can have a chance to discuss the topics, ask questions, and interact with the presenters.

Keynote: Reaching great heights by building with others’ blocks

"Many people are afraid of sharing their ideas and plans, I used to be. I used to think great products or services existed in isolation and you could work away on something and suddenly - piow! launch it out and wow everyone. And sometimes, that is the case. But what I have learnt in the journey with establishing Wiki New Zealand is that when you really share what you have, and incorporate others’ thinking and tools, you find yourself with something grander than you could have ever done alone."

Lillian Grace brings a new perspective on data, one where data is a language in which everyone can be fluent. She believes societies and individuals will benefit when anyone can use data to inform their thinking and insights without requiring intermediaries. Lillian is the CEO and Founder of Wiki New Zealand, the first organisation to designate everyone as a user of data and to build systems and software to deliver to this standard. Wiki New Zealand puts data in simple charts using consistent standards so that people can easily play with and explore data. Critical to this solution was the development of Grace, a backend application that can extract data from a variety of formats and apply a transparent standardisation process that results in the data being consistent, clean and easy to find and use. Collaboration is central to Wiki New Zealand, and Lillian believes the most comprehensive collection of data about New Zealand will only come from working together with domain and data experts. Lillian engages with those in Government, private sector, academia, media, schools, and the general public to involve them in the effort and inform the evolution of Wiki New Zealand and its offerings.

AI

Alanna Irving Wed 8 Apr 2015 2:58AM

Please post your comments and questions and @lilliangrace will be around when she can to respond.

GC

Greg Cassel Sun 12 Apr 2015 3:14AM

I've been more than a little distracted lately, and the conference is coming up so quickly! For what it's worth at this late juncture, I'm very interested in how Wiki New Zealand relates (or doesn't relate) to other open data/ linked data efforts worldwide.

I don't know anything about the Grace data standardization application yet, so I hope that Lillian will be referring to that. Loved her TedXAuckland talk, and I'm really glad she's speaking at OS//OS. :)

LG

Lillian Grace Tue 14 Apr 2015 6:34PM

Thanks Greg! I'm happy to talk afterwards about anything I don't have time to cover in my pres.

IC

Isabella Cawthorn Fri 8 May 2015 1:04AM

Hi Lillian

Your talk is one that made the most impact - is there anywhere you've written down the same ideas and messages? I would love to get other people imbibing it.

Cheers!
Isabella

LG

Lillian Grace Fri 8 May 2015 2:02AM

Oh awesome! That’s nice to hear.
No I haven’t written the messages down anywhere. Was the talk videoed? From a transcript of that I could pretty easily flesh it out into something written that makes sense

Lillian Grace

CEO, Wiki New Zealand

+64 21 234 2374
@GracefulLillian ( https://twitter.com/GracefulLillian )
wikinewzealand.org ( http://wikinewzealand.org )

SZ

Silvia Zuur Fri 8 May 2015 2:36AM

Videos are coming soon!

M

Mark Fri 8 May 2015 8:39AM

I think it was @lilliangrace who said (something like) "Community is a nice, welcoming word when you're in it, but can be intimidating when you're not". Great point!

IC

Isabella Cawthorn Fri 8 May 2015 10:28AM

That got a lot of airtime in the roundup for LINZ people today :-)

P&B

PAN & BAM | Creator: Stephen Chernishov Fri 8 May 2015 11:42AM

WOOD
I had an interesting discussion with a guy yesterday who works with literal building blocks - he owns a wood yard in Eastern Southland, and has been running it for more than 35 years. We talked about making wood accessible and cheap to others, and about business, development, relationship building, and his experiences.

He said that relationship building and finding ways to work together with others was something he'd tried several times and totally failed at. He knows his business, how to make it work, acknowledges that he cannot grow on his own, and yet he's been burnt by unbalanced business deals where some work harder than others, or stuff doesn't get finished.

Some of the biggest questions are,
"Who will stick around if I open this up?"
"How can one who has blocks supply technology & knowledge to empower/motivate/reward everyone?"
"What do we do when we realise that not one person can be relied on to finish something they started?"