Author and speaker Fredrik Härén defines creativity semething like ”the combination of two old ideas into something new”. So here are two olds creatively combined into something new (I believe).

Take the idea of crowdsourcing a job application (as invented by Barry Judge, CMO at Best Buy, contextualized by Neville Hobson) and combine that idea with the need to put a CV together (as exemplified by Susanne Lindahl, one of the best students in my giicod experiment at Stockholm University).

The Curriculum Vitae (CV), or Résumé, is the old idea of summarizing ones relevant job experiences and education.The new idea, as just struck me, is to crowdsource your CV. That is, letting your social network co-create your CV.

If I google ”curriculum vitae” the first hits are guides and services about how to create and use a CV. ”You can write your general information”, taken from One of the free guides, clearly reflects the established idea. That is, the applicant should write her own CV.

Who knows best how it is to work with you? Who knows best how much you have learned in formal educational settings? OK, those are kind of philosophical questions. But really, should not a CV reflect how it is to work with you. Not how you think you are.

As Neville Hobson pointed out, one of the unusual items in Best Buy’s original job ad was the preferred qualification ”250 followers on Twitter”. That highlights the value of your network’s interest in you. And almost two years ago Bryan Person, at that time with Monster.com, ignited conversations with his post ”Die, resume! Die! Die! Die!”. He also gave credit to Christopher S. Penn for coining the term ”social media resume”. Around the same time, still close to two years ago, Mitch Joel wrote ”Marketing yourself in a connected world – is it time to kill the traditional resume?”.

So, for many of us we have for many years understood the value of a social media perspective in the CV, or Résumé. But now I think it is time to take one step further and open up its production to peers, friends, teachers, relatives, past and present coworkers, etc. It is perhaps a very controversial idea. Especially when we consider openness and privacy issues. Still, I think it isan idea worth persuing.

Personally I’m in no desparate need of a CV right now. Which honestly will give low priority to crowdsource my own social media resume. But I bear the possibility in mind.

Meanwhile, if you (for example Susanne) would like to start one, just let me know (if I know you) and I’ll add my piece to its formation. Perhaps Dan Schwabel’s ”HOT TO: Build the ultimate social media resume” is a good starting point. Just add ”wiki” and go ahead!

A while ago I noticed a new library, the Sture Bibliotek at the Östermalmstorg subway station in Stockholm (map). As a matter of fact, this library opened May 11 2009, and I cannot believe why I previosly just rushed by. Today I entered through the Espresso house entrance (just after the ticket gates), walked up the stairs and was immediately amazed. Without further ado I picked up my HTC Magic, kicked on the Qik app and streamed the video embedded below.

As I shot the video I noticed the ”Mediejukeboxen”, which also is available at two other of Stockholm’s libraries. This jukebox allows you to borrow audio books, films, language courses, games, and more. Simply select what you want on the touch screen, stick in any USB device, and touch ”download”. Within minutes I had an audio book (”Djävulsstjärnan” by Jo Nesbø), a course in German, and two movies in my Dell XPSM1330 laptop. The book, which is in MP3-fomat worked perfectly in my phone. Unfortunately the film format available are only WMV (för mobile devices) and Divx/AVI for laptops. Neither is playble in my HTC Magic. The number of titles are currently limited (about 10 films, 100+ audio books, around 40 language courses, etc). The content is watermarked and one is supposed to delete the stuff within 30 days. I did not have to identify myself, but I guess if people start the file share the files neither the library nor the content providers will be very inclined to expand the experiment.

In addition to some books (a few shelves), some magazines, and goodie bags, there is a children’s corner, a place for reading (and working as I do ;), around 10 stations hooked to the Internet, and free WiFi for us with a library card and a pin code (although I rely on 3:s mobile broadband). The staff is friendly (and curious, wondered what I was doing with my phone ;).

Sture Bibliotek is well worth a visit. Thanks Stockholm!

A week ago at TEDxStockholm I met Fredrik Härén, from Interesting.org, and author of a range of books focused on creativity and ideas. One of his latest is The Idea Book. I asked Fredrik if he could give me some copies of it, which I in turn could handle over to people from the British Council during my my key note today for the eTwinning National Conference. Fredrik said yes, and in the video below you can see how I fulfilled my promise. Last night, before the gig, I gave the fifth copy to Michael O’Donnabhain who was kind enough to invite me to this conference.

I believe that the inspirational advice from a fellow audiencer at my first TED in 1995 guided me to Nottingham next week. For the British Council I will do a gig entitled ”I do not know?!?” Three days ago I asked the crowd to help me prepare for here and now. And indirectly for next week and a fantastic future. The crowd responded. Here is what we put together – together.

(TED will publish a video of the presentation, the slides here does not justify neither the work involved from everyone that contributed, nor the content of their inpsirations)

If you get anything from TED, here is your chance to contribute back! Please help me to present a stunning and inspirational five minute talk a couple of days from now. I therefore ask you to create some material that I might present in less than a minute. Hopefully at least four (4) of you will hear my request, thus giving me one minute to introduce and round up your contributions.

Yesterday I was invited to give a five (5) minute talk at the pre TEDxStockholm conference, which takes place north of Stockholm this Saturday (June 6, 2009). It’s an independet TEDx event, operated under license from TED, that gather a small group of around 40 specially invited persons. These include Klas Hallberg, Janne Gunnarson, Stefan Einhorn, and David Lega who will each talk for 18 minutes. Myself and Björn Jeffrey are limited to five minutes. Behind it all is a concept to disseminate TED.COM via TEDx events. TEDxStockholm is developed by Fredrik and Teo Härén (interesting.org), with help from among others Henrik Ahlén, and the ambition is to arrange the first public TEDxStockholm September 19, 2009.

I have an idea for a talk that I might produce myself, but hopefully yours are more inspirational. The conference theme is ”inspiration”, and I will focus the content around providing the best start in life for our children. The TEDx license implies some limitations, which I do not yet know in detail. But the talks should be in English; they will be recorded; TED reserves the right to republish all material whenever and where they want; hence the materials used must be cleared for that copyrightwise. [Update: It will be Creative Commons 3.0, and by submitting to me I assume you grant me and TED the required rights].

As I begun complentating the opportunity I remembered an idea I in December 2007. It sprung up during a meeting about social media with a small group of members of the Swedish Parliament. One of them, Christer Winbäck, raised the concern about finding time to (mikro)blog and participate in social media. Among other things he for instance ”had to write motions/bills”. I suggested he might outsource that task to his constituents. His response was something like ”have you ever let your audience write the manuscript for your gigs?” Afterwards I published a blog post that I would like to try that. And now it’s time – I hope.

If this works out I am open for your creativity. Please comment or e-mail me (richard.gatarski@weconverse.com) your ideas or material. It might be a video, slides, a manuscript. Whatever that I will be able to present during 55 seconds. Consider the limitations I hinted upon above, and I’ll make a concluding slide listing all contributors. I reserve the right of what to include, and if I at all should fulfill this idea at TEDxStockholm (depending on if I get anything from you). Remember, the theme is ”inspiration” and my focus is ”best start in life for our children”.

Thank you in advance.

(I will announce this post in Twitter, Jaiku, Bloggy, Facebook, PPlist and some other social media outlets, and update it with more links as soon as I have time).

[Update 15:10]: It can´t be a selling, it’s about sharing inspirational ideas. In another forum Gunnar hinted about Swedish Radio’s show På Minuten (On the minute), as a way to cope with the time constraint ;). Plus I added links to some stuff above.

[Update 20:20] Tank you all for ideas, support, retweets and other ways of spreading the opportunity! So far we have recieved a lot of interest and some more or less conceptualized ideas, but nothing complete. Hopefully you will join the crowd and the content will come from you. It would be cool if you posted your idea here as a comment, and published complete contributions somewhere on the web (tagged as ”TEDx Stockholm, crowdsourced”) and include a link in the comment. BTW, the organizers point out [I’ve recorrected this after comments] that the correct spelling is ”TEDxStockholm” (except for microblogs use ”TEDx Stockholm” with the space). Hence I edited this post, including its title.

[Update 21:50] A few minutes ago Johan Ronnestam submitted his contribution (after a couple of e-mail passes). I wish I knew of any web based tool for collaborated storyboarding/scriptwriting, do you? Compare Celtx, whis is a downloadable app for personal use. Perhaps I should setup a wiki. Meanwhile I tentatively work out the script below.

[Update Thursday 15:10] Added my intro text and re-corrected TEDxStockholm spellout.

[Update Friday 23:59] Edited the script, added introductionary quote at top of this post.

[Update Saturday 18:50] Sligthly adjusted the intro of the post and added the slides. I did not really follow the script below, as you will se in the video when it gets published.

Script (kind of) With reservations for rearrangings, additions, and removals pending on what comes in and what you say on the way.

50s, Richard Gatarski speaks: Nicholas Taleb tells how we humans tend to simplify the causes of complex phenomena. Even so, I still believe that the inspirational advice from a fellow audiencer at my first TED in 1995 guided me to Nottingham next week. For the British Council I will do a gig entitled ”I do not know?!?” Three days ago I asked the crowd to help me prepare for here and now. And indirectly for next week and a fantastic future. The crowd responded. Here is what we did together.

55s Ladislaus Horatius: Freeze-dried wisdom
05s switch
30s Joakim Vollert: 5th grader with Phun
05s switch
40s Katarina Graffman: Look at the kids behavior [preview, to be extended]
05s switch
XXs open
05s switch
30s Christina & Stellan Löwing: This is Lisa
05s switch
50s Johan Ronnestam: Act 4 Kidz
05s switch
15s Richard Gatarski speaks: She, at TED5, adviced me to save for my childrens education. I re-thought that into investing in their and their friends future. It’s time to stop ego-shopping and pay back our own parents sacrifices.
We will do it – right! Thank you for having us here.
Us were [slide with credits].

.SE (Sweden’sThe Internet Infrastructure Foundation) have without much buzz moved over from their old publishing platform(s) to a host of WordPress installations. I was really suprised when I learned about this a few minutes ago in a meeting for the .SE project Webbstjärnan (which I consult for).

Perhaps I should have guessed this direction when I was briefly involved when WordPress was used to revamp the site for .SE:s main conference Internetdagarna, which previosly was built with Joomla.

I can only compare with my memory about how the old design looked like. But judging from that I cannot see any differences at ii.se (the main site, old proprietary CMS). I addition new sites such as .SE Direkt (domain management), Internetstatistik.se (statistics) are built with WordPress. In sum, a really impressing step, that again illustrate the power of WordPress and open source solutions. Although I wish .SE had credited the WordPress community (e.g. the ”powered by WordPress” footer have been removed).