Ward Cunningham just recently set up his own channel on YouTube and has edited a conversation we had last Fall.  His philosophy for conducting interviews is simple and effective: make guests feel comfortable and ask them questions that make them look good. He did a great job making me feel comfortable.

We start by talking about how, in writing the book, we tried to not “just” be experts, but to also get at our experience and the more intimate level at which communities live. At the very end I remember to tell him that his interaction with the community that formed on his wiki was one of the first instances where I glimpsed what the role of a technology steward might be about.  It has taken a lot of work to write about “less technical” people might take on the role, but I’m convinced that you don’t have to be a Ward Cunningham to serve your community with respect to its technology needs.

Tags: technology_stewardship