Subscribe to the social designers at Common Craft

If you read Lee LeFever's Common Craft website, I've been discussing a lot of things with him, as evidenced by a couple of nice "so I was talking to Boris the other day and..." links he's thrown my way.

If you're interested in or in any way intersect social software and/or online community, you should be subscribed to Common Craft.

What is it? They have a little note that says Common Craft "is a consulting practice and weblog operated by Lee and Sachi LeFever. The focus of Common Craft is Social Design for the Web." I like that phrase: Social Design for the Web. Which makes Lee and Sachi "Social Designers".

Most recently, we talked about Dell's IdeaStorm, which is a Salesforce AppExchange component made by CrispyIdeas. The big thing here is that the underlying technology of "social software" is being commoditized. Now comes the hard part: understanding and utilizing the technology in the context of engaging your community.

Before that I asked Lee if he felt he was a member of Flickr's community. I used to be a member of the Flickr community, waaay back in the old days when it was just getting started. But I don't think I can call myself that now: it's "just" a place to put pictures. I've moved out of the active 1% and in to the "just use it" 9%.

There's lots of technology out there: I spend more and more time thinking about the soft underbelly that's all about people.