How can new technologies be introduced to help the growth of Communities of Practice?. What are some useful tools and how do you choose the most appropriate technologies to develop and enhance the Community.

1. FET8605 Conference How are Communities of Practice used for Knowledge Management, and how is technology impacting and/or assisting?

2. Paul Penfold

16. Technologies and Polarities Technologies and Polarities (from Smith et al, 2006)

18. Comparison of Technologies Complicated & can be difficult to manage Allow non technical people to publish, & distribute content Mambo, Joomla CMS Very structured & not user-friendly compared to other tools Good for organizing course contents Blackboard, Moodle LMS Can be difficult to learn and technical issues Realistic, engaging community Second Life Virtual World Difficult to find discussion threads Instant online conversation Yahoo groups, MSN/ICQ Forum/IM Blogs can be monopolized & unreliable Communicating at a personal level Wordpress, Blogger Blogs Many connections not useful, info can be hard to find, dormant groups Users can find relevant content, network & share news & photos Facebook, MySpace, Elgg, Xanga Social Networking Sometimes not easy to use and can become cumbersome Collective knowledge, great for documenting consensus ideas Mediawiki, Wetpaint Wiki Cons Pros Example Technology ↓ Purpose ->