Citation: Warburton, S. (ed.) 2010.  Digital Identity Matters. London: King’s College London

Patterns are not easy to write, especially if we consider that we might aim to achieve what Alexander (1979) termed ‘quality without a name’ (see below for the full-quote*). The day was not only a chance for a small group to sit down and discuss the complexity of pattern writing but it was also purposeful with defined outcomes. As such it followed a particular format based on the pattern writing workshop used at the annual Europlop conference that draws on the work of Gabriel (2002) and others. What is particular about a pattern writing workshop is that the author, though present, sits outside the group (or ‘shepherds’), not within it, while their work is reviewed. S/he becomes a fly on the wall – listening to the group discuss, comment and suggest changes, yet s/he is forbidden from intervening or responding.

Step 1 – Papers are prepared in advance of the workshop

The patterns are worked on and top and tailed with an introduction and conclusions to give the pattern the feel of an academic paper (though the core remains the problem, solution and context).

Each section is completed as far as is possible and where unfinished marked as TBC (to be completed).

Our papers were circulated to the workshop participants who were directed to read through each of the patterns looking for strengths and weaknesses. The four patterns that were submitted to this workshop were:

• Space for Lurking – Steven Warburton
• Identity Placemaking – Megan Smith
• Others First – Margarita Perez Garcia
• Permissioned Aggregation – Andy Powell

Step2 – Running the workshop

After the welcome and introductions amongst the group members a specific set of stages were used during the review process and respected for each of the authors:

1. The first paper is introduced by the chair;
2. The author is then invited to read a paragraph from their paper (to hear the author’s voice);
3. The author is asked to move outside the circle and only listen to the group discussion;
4. The chair asks for comments on the strengths of the paper, moving around each group member in turn;
5. This is repeated for the weaknesses in the paper – but importantly there should be constructive suggestions to solving any highlighted problems;
6. There is then a final round of commentary and encouragement;
7. The author is now invited back into the circle and may ask for clarifications, if needed, on what has been said by a group member;
8. To close the session, the group thanks the author with a round of applause;
9. The group then moves to the next paper and repeats the process until all the papers have benefited from this group shepherding process.

Note: If you do happen to have a lot of papers then timing needs to be strict and due to the level of discussion I cannot imagine reviewing more that eight to ten papers in a single day.

Step 3 – Updating patterns after the workshop

Authors are asked to update their patterns, taking as much or as little of the advice and suggestions as they feel is needed to improve their work. For our workshop we asked the four authors to resubmit their work back to the group.

So how well did this ritual-like format work? This was the first time any of the workshop participants (myself included) had been involved in a writers workshop and I can say it was enlightening for all. As both an author and a commentator/shepherd I experienced both sides of the process. The format works on the principle of a trusted circle and introductions were important even though we already knew each other to some degree – and although the term shepherd feels slightly strange at first it does convey the way that one approaches reviewing others work. The idea is to help the author produce a better piece of work – in this case a design pattern. This is not about ego or competition, or about rubbishing other people’s efforts. It is about guiding and in that guidance being positive and encouraging even when highlighting weaknesses. If you spot a problem then what can you offer as a shepherd to help improve or solve it. It might sound disconcerting to have the author present while the group review takes place and here space is an important consideration – it needs to be comfortable and provide a natural area for the pattern author to sit outside the circle. In this way the discussion between the group can flow freely without interruption or distraction.

Listening to my own work being reviewed was strangely relaxing – being there but not there. Sitting away from the group, with no eye contact or direct presence forces one to simply listen – a rare opportunity. There is no point in feeling defensive – how can you when you have no voice? So I was left to concentrate on writing down and capturing as much of the help, insight and advice as possible … and there was plenty of it, reflected in the copious notes I gathered on the day. What you receive is a sense of what readers will understand in the work you have written. If you have not explained something well enough then you can hear it the comments – and have a chance to correct it.

Since the workshop all of the patterns have been amended and resubmitted to the group. These four patterns will now go towards publication, most likely in a new edited collection on Digital Identity and Social Media.

Finally, just to add thanks to all of those who put the effort to write the patterns up in advance and thanks to all those present on the day for their valuable comments and input, including Yishay Mor our excellent chair.

References:
Alexander, C. (1979). The Timeless Way of Building. Oxford University Press, UK.

Gabriel, R. P. (2002), Writer’s Workshops and the Work of Making Things, Addison-Wesley Longman Publishing Co., Inc. Boston, MA, USA.

*This oneness, or the lack of it, is the fundamental quality for anything. Whether it is in a poem, or a man, or a building full of people, or in a forest, or a city, everything that matters stems from it. It embodies everything. Yet still this quality cannot be named. (Alexander 1979, p28)

The presentation sums up the work to this date on the use of the participatory pattern methodology to develop design patterns in the area of digital identity and introduces a basic framework for thinking about the negotiation of identity in online settings. I came away with one question from the audience  – “How does your digital identity effect your real-world interactions and behaviours?” – that highlighted the importance of acknowledging that authoring the self in online spaces is a two way process and not merely a projection or extension of identity but integral.

'No photos please' by Paul Kelly

For this year’s Educa Online Berlin conference we [Marga and Steve] were asked to comment on one of the issues that we identified for the Digital Identity symposium that we called ‘Growing up Public’.

Our responses are repeated here:

Q. What impact do you  expect on young people’s lives from  ‘growing up in public’?

A. When we [Rhizome project] use the phrase ‘growing up in public’ we refer to the increased visibility that many young people have and will continue to experience throughout their lifetime engagement with social media. The Internet is now a space dominated by the connections between individuals and their ability to [re]use and create rich content – something that now lies within everyone’s grasp, not just that of the technically and technologically privileged. This coupled with the diversification of devices we [people] use to access Internet within a pervasive always connected environment mean that we now have a multiplicity of what Holland (1998) might call ‘spaces of authoring’ or self-fashioning.

One of the main impacts that we are interested in, that results from this increased level of life exposure via the Internet, is the ongoing work that is required in the construction of digital identities. How do young people manage and maintain coherent and purposeful digital identities when public and private boundaries are often blurred and the tools for controlling digital histories are lacking. Real issues emerge from the complexities of this process within for example the world of job seeking and active engagement in online communities of practice.

Q. How can we mitigate the risks? Do we need more rules, limitations or more control?

A. Among the solutions to help citizens to manage their digital identities, there are three that interest us as educators, parents and citizens. The first is awareness raising to increase young people’s digital identity literacy. By this I mean the ability of individuals to manage their digital identity in an efficient manner in accordance with their changing life goals. I am particularly interested in the responsibility and accountability parents and guardians have towards the digital identity of their children, especially when they have not started to craft their own digital identity spaces. Here, specific actions to support parents and children in acquiring digital identity literacies are lacking. Secondly, in the area of technology, we need to see improvements in the level of granularity and access control to user generated content. Individuals need to be empowered to decide what they share, with whom and for how long this is required. The standard three level sharing policy – with all, with my friends and with my family – is not sufficient. Finally, we need to be able to assert our right to control user-generated content about ourselves. By developing the tools and processes to discover and delete undesired persistent content we should all have the ability to remove those digital traces that might impact negatively our lives.

Q. Should parents be responsible for their children activities on the web?

A. Parents should be responsible for their children’s education in matters related to digital identity literacy, helping them to gain awareness about the extent of their digital personas and support them in the crafting of their digital selves – for example by discussing with them at the relevant age (each has different needs) about: the extent of their digital identity, who contributes to it, the reach of their activities within the different social networks and communities they participate in, the persistence of their digital traces and their short, medium, long term impact, the creation of alternative digital selves, how to track unwanted information about themselves, digital identity etiquette, and awareness about cyber security and identity threats.

Q. Is there any recommendation from your side, on how to handle the own presence in online communities or on websites?

A. This is an area that the Rhizome project (http://www.rhizomeproject.org) is currently investigating using a particular methodology based on identifying successful practices through the production of a set of design patterns for digital identity. This is an approach that seeks to empower individuals to design their own solutions to the problems they encounter when constructing and managing their digital identity, be it within online communities or operating in a professional work-based setting. In terms of recommendations then these will vary according to the age and the purpose of the subject. For us, a useful framework to understand digital identity management could be ordered around the following processes: increase your awareness of your digital self, craft a home for your online presence, claim the trusted sources relating to your digital persona, aggregate sources and traces of your digital selves for specific purposes such job-seeking, compartimentalise and protect the digital selves you don’t want to be exposed to all via the Internet, for example maintaining the professional-personal divide.

Margarita Perez-Garcia and Steven Warburton

There was a real mix of participants from across Europe (and beyond), including Italy, Finland, Greece, UK, Australia, and Hungary. This richness in nationalities immediately foregrounded what is an often overlooked dimension in discussions around digital identity – namely the impact of cultural difference. Different cultures both create and consume their [digital] identities in different ways. This was most keenly reflected in the shared conversations around where we perceive the boundary between our public and private lives. The mass use of social services such as Facebook can appear to have a homogenising effect, erasing cultural distinctions through normalised ‘social-networking’ practices. Many of our participants felt that this was an area that would benefit from further empirical  research to, at the very least, expand our dominant Westernised perspectives of online identity.

Other key points that came back from the session were, in brief:

• An acceptance that in a connected global space, not only is it difficult to avoid having an online identity but that it is also advantageous to be proactive in managing it. Therefore the importance of teaching what we might call  digital identity literacy skills needs to be on the agenda at all sectoral levels;
• There must be more awareness raising and advocacy around the potential risks associated with the use of social media and the long term impact that digital tracks and traces can have on our online identities, for example in relation to career building and the job market;
• Rather than try to respond to fears around using the Internet by heavily monitoring and containing our online activity we should over time learn to accept the contradictions between the differing roles and perspectives that are presented by ourselves and others;
• Separating personal from professional activity is difficult, if not impossible to achieve. But do we really need to maintain this divide? We could not reach consensus on this issue and the debate circled around the question of aggregation versus compartmentalisation of online activities;
• Towards the end of the session someone asked “How should we interpret other people’s online presence?”. An interesting question suggesting that reading and interpreting online identities is in itself a skill.

It was a valuable session and we are grateful for the input of all those who attended and we hope that the person who at the end of the workshop declared “I do not want to have a digital identity as it makes me too nervous” has now overcome her anxieties.

Next on the agenda: we are looking forward to Online Educa Berlin ’09 where will we take these issues forward into our symposium discussion session on (yes you guessed it)  ‘Digital Identity’.

There is a Call for Chapters for a new book entitled “Digital Identity and Social Media” which will be published by IGI Global in early 2011. It is an exciting project and we encourage anyone with an interest in digital identity matters to look through the details and send us a proposal. Submissions on any of the following themes are encouraged:

• Conceptual frameworks and approaches to understanding digital identity;
• The impact of new technologies, social software and social media, on conceptualisations of [digital] identity;
• Authenticity and trust in identity based transactions;
• Machine mediated identities;
• Digital identity management – defending identity, reputation management and risk;
• The digital self and blurring boundaries between public and private spaces;
• Lifelong learning and the importance of digital identity for transitions from school to adult life and beyond;
• Negotiating individual, group, community and network based digital identities;
• Personalisation software and the impact on digital identities;
• The economic, societal, ethical and political issues raised by the increased availability of personal information;
• Digital literacies and accessibility in relation to digital identities;
• Identity, trust and authenticity in social networks;
• Relations between communities, networks, groups and individual identities;
• Personalisation technologies and digital identity;
• Cultural dynamics of online identity;
• Social media and emerging identity practices;
• Presence technologies, online visibility and digital identity.

Full details here: Call For Chapters Digital Identity Book (pdf)

We look forward to hearing from you.

Interoperability scenario diagram

Using the plugin to create CVs is a simple three step process: create a Master CV, customise Views and Export them!

1. Once plugged into the WordPress blogging platform, the user can store his/her data in a single XML file that acts as a vault for personal and professional information: this is the Master CV. The user can create one storage file or Master CV per language, in any of the official languages of the European Union.
2. With the data contained in the Master CV, the user can create as many customised Views he/she needs. At least three structured formats are provided: a short profile, the standardised Europass CV format and a HR-XML compatible CV. The user can also take advantage of customisation functionalities in terms of choice of information display and integration with other media to create free form CVs.
3. For each View, a range of Export possibilities exist: ODT, PDF, HTML, XHTML and XML. Online publishing can also be password protected to target CVs to particular audiences.

The second workshop deviated from the ‘standard’ Participatory Pattern Workshop format. Rather than focusing on developing and iterating the patterns identified during the first workshop we decided to tackle scenarios, in other words unsolved real-world problems around how we manage or use digital identities. From these scenarios we then worked with our patterns from the first workshop, applying them to create solutions, and in the process identified new case-stories and patterns as they arose.

Before the workshop we asked the participants to submit scenarios and we recorded nine separate entries on the Planet xWiki platform. These ranged from the use of micro-blogging tools like Twitter to using data portability technologies to solve the problem of digital identity aggregation.

The workshop itself broke down into to distinct phases:

Part 1: Mapping the forces within the scenarios. Here we asked each group to identify and map out the forces in tension within a particular scenario. These were the tensions that a pattern would need to resolve to produce a potentially successful solution.

Part 2: Designing solutions using patterns. Using the force map each group then looked through the pattern collection to see if any of the patterns developed so far could be applied. One of the major themes that had emerged from the earlier analysis of the scenarios was how to control who views our data. This was related to two dimensions of managing distributed digital identity data (i) aggregation versus compartmentalization and (ii) public versus private.

A solution was developed that addressed both of these tensions using the architectural metaphor of the house and the notion of progressive disclosure. This represented a simple but powerful idea whereby access to our digital identity is managed through the creation of differing spaces for intimacy. Megan Smith gives a deeper insight into the ways that this approach might work in a posting written for her blog.

What developed was a link to two patterns. The first from the Digital Identity pattern collection called ‘Facet Me’ and second, to one of Alexander’s patterns. As Jim pointed out this idea had resonance with number 127 ‘Intimacy Gradient’:

Conflict: Unless the spaces in a building are arranged in a sequence that corresponds to their degrees of privateness, the visits made by strangers, friends, guests, clients, family, will always be a little awkward.
Resolution: Lay out the spaces of a building so that they create a sequence which begins with the entrance and the most public parts of the building, then leads into the slightly more private areas, and finally to the most private domains.

Overall the format of this workshop worked well and produced two new candidate patterns with supporting case-stories:
Pattern 7: Purposeful delay
Pattern 8: Leaving trails

So what next? We want to build on the success of this workshop and hold a final session to complete the series, which we are planning for September 2009. Invites will be sent out shortly and we look forward to seeing you there.

Practical design patterns for teaching and learning with technology

With close to 35 people attending there was a lot of pressure on everyone, not least our facilitators Yishay, Jim, Mark and myself, to work hard. We started off with a quick paper and pen warm-up activity called the ‘faces of identity’. We asked everyone to draw three facets of their identity on three pre-drawn heads and then turn to their group and describe (i) what these identities represented and (ii) which they promoted and which they kept hidden in online settings. This was a powerful exercise and created some intense discussion that ran over the allotted 10 minutes for the exercise. Comments on this activity (including the rest of the day) can be found over on Margarita’s blog.

There were 19 case-stories in total and we split participants into seven discreet groups each led by a starting case-story. Stories were shared, discussed, questioned and argued over. With some gentle, and not so gentle, pushing and prodding from our facilitators a series of seed patterns were eventually documented. Identifying patterns can be a tricky process and articulating a common problem is more challenging than describing the solution. To scaffold this process and help the participants to move successfully from case-stories to patterns we employed two active approaches:
1) Three Hats Pattern- to share and interrogate stories in a small group setting
2) Table Top Concept Mapping – to draw out the key issues and tensions within case-stories

The full outputs from the day, including the six patterns that were established, are summarised here on the Planet design patterns repository page: http://purl.org/planet/Groups.DigitalIdentities/outputs.

Pattern 1: Others first
Pattern 2: Digital Identity panic
Pattern 3: Whats my name
Pattern 4: Space for lurking
Pattern 5: Facet me
Pattern 6: Permissioned aggregation of identity information

The power of the patterns approach is one of stripping out the specifics to produce transferable solutions that address common problems. But sometimes it can feel that by losing some aspects of the context and moving to a more generic instantiation of the core issues that we lose something of its’ [the case-story] vitality – perhaps this is particularly noticeable when we analyse our [digital] identities and are guilty  of stripping away certain subject positions – such as class, race and gender. Yet I would still argue that producing a solution that can be applied in multiple places is a powerful and revealing process. This issue came up in a case-story that started with motherhood and the uploading of family pictures to a photo-sharing site. This case eventually formed part of a pattern called ‘Others First‘ about parental responsibility towards the digital identity of dependents – particularly children. In this pattern the subject position of motherhood seemed to come under erasure. My thoughts are that this does not necessarily detract from the value of the pattern – it does not erase motherhood, rather in the use of the pattern in solving particular scenarios motherhood will become [re]surfaced as one of a number of [possible] subject positions. The case-stories also remain linked as part of the underlying evidence that supports the patterns. I think in this case there is more than one pattern, particularly surrounding the complications of motherhood and gender in relation to building professional representations of the self. This is not a new issue, where work and motherhood compete, but one that raises new problems when we make choices about how we portray ourselves online. One of the issues with running the workshop over a single day is dealing with the constraints on time that limit the amount of work that can be done to pull out of these related patterns. Many of the groups realised they were dealing with case-stories that held multiple patterns that could have been addressed through developing complimentary patterns.