Cybrargonians on the Net #7

By Terry Brainerd Chadwick, InfoQuest! Information Services

This issue discusses knowledge management resources on the Internet. Once you've increased your knowledge base, have some fun by exploring some of the holiday-related sites on the Net.


KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT (KM)

The big buzz word today in business is Knowledge Management, particularly in regards to corporate intranets. Knowledge Management can be described as "the systematic process of finding, selecting, organizing, distilling and presenting knowledge in a way that improves an employee's comprehension in a specific area of interest." (Knowledge Management Server) Given this definition it would seem that librarians -- those people trained in the organization, analysis, retrieval, and dissemination of information and knowledge -- should be in the thick of implementing KM within their organizations. But once again -- as in the appropriation of "information services" by computer professionals -- we haven't had been a major influence in the development of this field.

It's not too late. To bone up on KM, visit some of the sites listed below. To find out how to get involved in making KM work within your organization, join the new Knowledge Management for Librarians mailing list described later in this column.

A Business Researcher's Interests: Organizational Knowledge Management & Organizational Learning
By Yogesh Malhotra
This is a major index site for knowledge management issues with sections on articles, books & bibliographies, tools for knowledge management, WWW knowledge management resources, and related topics. If it's on the Net and it has to do with KM, it's probably listed here.
http://www.brint.com/OrgLrng.htm

Thomas Bertel's Learning Organization Home Page
This is one of the most thoughtful pages dealing with the overall issue of intelligent organizations. Although the focus is on the concept of "learning organizations," there are links to resources about the narrower field of knowledge management as well.
http://www.rzuser.uni-heidelberg.de/~jseng/tom/home.htm

Knowledge Management Server
This page, developed by students participating in the Masters in Business Information Management Department of the University of Texas at Austin, is dedicated to the investigation and exploration of the topic of Knowledge Management as it relates to the business world of today. It contains a KM FAQ and glossary, resource reviews, and a list of publications about KM.
http://knowman.bus.utexas.edu/index.htm

Reality Check: Uneasy Pieces, Part 1: Knowledge Management
By Anne Stuart, senior editor at CIO
This article describes what knowledge management is, how it works, what it promises and the pit, falls. The page also contains links to knowledge management information on the Internet.
CIO Magazine, June 1, 1996.
http://www.cio.com/CIO/060196_uneasy_1.html

KM Metazine
The Knowledge Management Metazine is produced by Knowledge Transfer International (KTi). It is available as an executive summary called KM Briefs in Acrobat PDF format and as the full text KM Metazine in both HTML and PDF formats. Issue 1 KM Metazine is on "Knowledge, productivity and competitiveness; " Issue 2 is about "Who owns knowledge management?" and Issue 3 is called "The 'knowledge worker' gets down to business." Articles include a summary of top firms knowledge management programs, the terminology of knowledge management, skills needed in a Chief Knowledge Officer, moving from information worker to value worker, as well as descriptions of conferences and other upcoming events in the field.
http://www.ktic.com/topic6/km.htm

Knowledge Management Forum
Hosted by Bo Newman
This is a web forum peopled by practitioners in the field, who discuss the theories, methods, and practices of Knowledge Management. The forum contains discussions on what knowledge management is and isn't. The site also includes a definition of KM, a bibliography, papers in KM, related links, as well as information in how to become involved in the forum.
http://revolution.3-cities.com/~bonewman/

Knowledge Management for Librarians (libknow-l)
InfoQuest! Information Services announces the launch of a new mailing list discussion group called Knowledge Management for Librarians, aka libknow-l.

This list is designed to be a forum for librarians and information specialists to discuss the issues of how to manage knowledge in our, or our clients', companies and organizations. The main topics include how to get librarians involved in our organizations' efforts to implement knowledge management and intranets; the general issues of knowledge, information and library management; technical and systems questions related to the issue of knowledge management and intranets, etc. Secondary topics would be related to general library-related questions, including some research questions. The list will also contain announcements from the Oregon Chapter of SLA. Although the list will be unmoderated, only subscribers will be able to post messages to the list.

The list launches December 1st, 1996. To subscribe, send mail to:

majordomo@teleport.com
In the body of the message type:
subscribe libknow-l
To participate in the discussion group, send messages to:
libknow-l@lists.teleport.com

Update:
The Intranet Journal, featured last issue, also contains a lot of information about knowledge management. It has a discussion forum called Intranet Soundings that is a good place to find information about intranets and knowledge management issues. The Journal has a new address:
Intranet Journal: http://www.intranetjournal.com/
Intranet Soundings: http://www.intranetjourlnal.com/ijx/

FUN STUFF

The Holidays are upon us. Here are just a sampling of holiday-related web sites on the Internet.

Holly and Sara's Christmas Page
Melanie McCluskey has put this site together for her daughters Holly and Sara. This site has "The Christmas Carol," "The Night Before Christmas," different ways to say Merry Christmas, the lyrics to "Frosty the Snowman," and how to make angels from paper bags -- lots of things for parents and children to share.
http://www.logicnet.com/melanie.mccluskey/xmas.htm

Alice's Advent Calendar
Alice Bowen has put up this online advent calendar for kids. It starts with December 1st and goes all of the way through Christmas. Click on a day and you get a pretty picture, just like the real thing. The page also includes links to other online advent calendars and Christmas web sites.
http://www.comlab.ox.ac.uk/oucl/users/jonathan.bowen/children/alice/advent/

Ancient Origins of the Holidays
Nightkitchen presents its links to holiday sites with an emphasis on explaining the origins of the holiday traditions. There's information about the Winter Solstice and Yule rituals, songs and poems (including alternate versions of "Twas the Night Before Christmas"), Christmas clip art, Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, Christmas, and more.
http://www.nightkitchen.com/sollink.html

Family Planet Holiday Specials
This is a page full of family-related things to do. For November, they've got a Thanksgiving page with Giblets o' Fun, Sage Advice, and Talking Turkey. There are games, crafts ideas, and electronic Thanksgiving cards. After Thanksgiving, check back for Christmas fun.
http://family.starwave.com/funstuff/

CLAUS.COM
Visit Santa Claus Village and check your status on the "Naughty or Nice List," attend Santa's Elf School with weekly holiday activities, track Santa's travels on Christmas Eve, exchange e-mail with Santa, create a gift wish list, access daily updates on North Pole activities, learn the origins of holiday traditions or tap into holiday recipes from Mrs. Claus that kids can make and will love eating.
http://www.CLAUS.COM./village.html

Chanukah: Festival of Light
This site, developed by Chabad-Lubavitch in Cyberspace, opens December 4th.
http://festival.chabad.org/

Yahoo Holidays
As usual, Yahoo is the place to go to find lots of holiday-related web sites. They list 16 advent calendars, thanksgiving pages for kids, how to cook a turkey, an online menorah, virtual cards, and much more.
Thanksgiving: http://www.yahoo.com/Society_and_Culture/Holidays/Thanksgiving/
Hanukkah:
http://www.yahoo.com/Society_and_Culture/Religion/Judaism/Holidays/Hanukkah/
Christmas: http://www.yahoo.com/Society_and_Culture/Holidays/Christmas/
Kwanzaa: http://www.yahoo.com/Society_and_Culture/Cultures/African_American/Kwanzaa/

Please send any suggestions or coments to tbchad@teleport.com. Cybrargonians on the Net will be archived at: http://www.teleport.com/~tbchad/index.html.

Copyright November 1996, Terry Brainerd Chadwick. Reproduction/distribution is allowable for non-profit purposes with the author's consent.


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