[NCUC-EC] Part 2 - Lack of engagement

[João Carlos Rebello Caribé]

2) Lack of engagement
Avri pointed this lack of engagement at NCUC meeting (inside NCPH), this is really one demotivating issue, like carrying the piano, while the others are sitting over it.

For some years, from the end of the 90's I drove one big Macromedia User Group, this lack of engagement was my nightmare, since the experts felt exploited by the "Lurkers", some even cut yourself off from the group. In view of this I started a "sociological" journey trough the web to understand this behavior. Than I found the 1% Principle, something like the Pareto's 80/20 principle but exactly focused on the Internet, and the frightening resemblance to my problem made me believe it is a matter beyond this particular case.  

[..]In Internet culture, the 1% rule is a rule of thumb pertaining to participation in an internet community, stating that only 1% of the users of a website actively create new content, while the other 99% of the participants only lurk.
Variants include the 1-9-90 rule or 90–9–1 principle (sometimes also presented as the 89:10:1 ratio),[1] which state that in a collaborative website such as a wiki, 90% of the participants of a community only view content, 9% of the participants edit content, and 1% of the participants actively create new content.[..] 

Wikipedia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1%25_rule_%28Internet_culture%29 

Interesting article about it nowadays - http://www.kevinspidel.com/one-percent-rule/

I refused to agree, but trusting in this principle, that 1% do the job, 9% are the "+1" people and the 90% just watch the circus burning. Trying to break this barrier I engaged in other journey trough observation, pools, and direct interaction with the newbies and the 90% group and discovered important things:

1) Newcomers usually seek to group acceptance ( opportunity) - If they was unsuccessful on this initial try, they will join the 90% group.
2) Some prefer to stay quiet than say foolishness ( weakness) 
3) Some were mistreated by other participants, some by reopen one stressful thread, other to ask something that was often explained. On this case the user usually will evade the group (threat) 
4) The biggest asset are vanity, everyone has their level of vanity, seen this by the good eyes, It's a human motivational feeling. (strength and opportunity)

Facing this the solution we developed was:
1) Online FAQ - updated by members
2) Online Tutorials and articles, writing by the members ( the beginnings of social networks  principle)
3) Creation of mailing list animators group - group of persons that was focused on keep alive some hot topics, enhancing the newcomer's participation (saying something like: good point, adding value to this discussion, or in other cases giving the links for FAQ and/or Tutorials).

The result was amazing.
--
João Carlos R. Caribé
Consultor 
Skype joaocaribe
(021) 9 8761 1967

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