@T: ALWAYS THE TWAIN

Today I found out that my ‘The Global Brain, the Semantic Web, the Singularity, 360-2020 Consciousness….’ knol has not only been designated a Top Pick Award, it’s also receiving an “Honorable Mention” as one of the best top picks amongst the hundreds of thousands of knols written to-date. I’m really happy and glad that the knol is adding perspectives to others online and that its popularity has remained consistent throughout the last 12 months.

According to the Knol community panel who track the Google statistics:

“Winners are produced by the most objective criteria: Google’s secret algorithm that evaluates a combination of reader page views, ratings, reviews, comments and even how quickly each Knol gains popularity. Statistically, these are the best Knols of the month. Google calls them “Top Pick.” There are no conflict-of-interest human votes, no juries of questionable judges.”

When I originally started the knol on 26 November 2008, it was in honor of my father (he would have turned 65 that day had he survived his coma which, sadly, he did not). During the first few days and weeks hardly anyone read the knol — the topic matter is so niche, obscure, not about baking cakes — but still I felt that it was important to explore the very serious and substantial issues of the Global Brain, what online consciousness is, what human consciousness is, how we can harness the Web for more constructive purposes and what we need to evolve about online tools, to enable us to reach an Enlightened/Conscious Web.

So from those small beginnings and first steps this has happened:

* exposure to the amazing talents and knowhow of other writers from all over the world (most of them qualified medical and business professionals)

* recognition from Knol’s community of authors

* respectable viewing metrics

* a documentary in which I was interviewed about online consciousness

* a personal philosophical framework which informs what I’m doing with the 360-2020 system

A certain CEO from a Semantic Web play once wrote that my writings had “NO effect on viewer metrics” and that no one even read what I wrote because I was “crazy” and a “spammer”. Quite apart from that being libelous, defamatory and a total untruth — since I have the screenshots to prove my postings on that SemWeb platform garnered good view counts — Google Knol now proves him completely wrong (again).

Now, should we rely on Google’s algorithms which are an industry-standard, out there and publicly available for everyone to see or should we rely on the intentionally hurtful words of a CEO who decided to hide his own platform’s view counts from even inside the community and who is known to spin user metrics out of proportion?

Hmmn……….

That was not a pleasant experience but certainly one I learnt from. When someone who claimed to be your friend, does a shocking volte face, spreads falsehoods and tries to smear your reputation, STAND UP FOR YOURSELF AND LET YOUR WORK & THE QUALITY OF IT DO THE TALKING. Even if those who would spread falsehoods outnumber you in quantity and even if they may seem to have the power+influence to silence you (by deleting your content or excluding you)…….YOUR QUALITY & CHARACTER WILL CUT THROUGH THEIR CRAP, somewhere, somehow, sometime.

Quality hands of aces, kings and queens trump s*** decks in the long-run, and all smart players know this.

My position now — particularly following the global financial crisis — is that the ignorant, incompetent, disrespectful and unconstructive CEOs and leaders should step aside and let the quality ones come to the fore to get business, value and societal creation models to operate more effectively (or they risk getting steamrollered by the rise of the QUALITY BRIGADE anyway).