Here are the projects as I have gotten them from Equipoise. I have sent email to Scott Stornetta asking him what exactly the projects would involve, but have not heard back. If you are interested in one of these, let me know, and we’ll discuss timing.

The Transparent Company:
This social re-engineering effort is aimed at using transparency to help companies be more responsive and accountable to their customers, and to make a company’s public image closer to its private reality.  For example, we encourage employees to discuss customers in internal company meetings in a way that the customer would think no less of them even if they were listening in on the internal discussion.

Short-term project – we have sketched out a simple system for capturing all the emails correspondence between a particular customer and the company, and archiving them.  When that customer comes to the company website, the entire correspondence is available to them, for easy search and reference.  Each customer would of course only have access to their interactions with the company.


High-performance Reading Environment
We have done design work on a number of ways to improve screen-based reading, particularly in an html environment, and for handheld PDA size screens.  Such an effort is confounding to those who suggest that nothing will ever replace paper and books as the medium of choice for reading.  It also supports the online journals designed by universities to move control away from traditional publishers and toward the authors and their universities.

Short-term project:  we have sketched out a simple system for capturing an html page which one wants to forward to a friend, highlighting passages of interest, and adding commentary, in a way that makes the online environment more preferable than the printed page.  This project has been designed with strong viral effects, and is incremental in an interesting way in reaching the broader HPRE goal.  

Network of research seminars
This topic is the continuation of work done for another university client.  would likely require a discussion with the dean, incur expenses, and involve elin pedersen as a chief architect.  However, its potential for impact in raising the visibility of a university program in the target area is substantial.  

We have begun a system that allows one to systematically monitor and calendar all the research talks being given across the country in a given field of interest.  A combination of calendar that leads to online participation in the talks, clustered around universities that are leaders in the particular area of interest.  This would provide for exploration of a number of novel CSCW issues, using the “Beyond Being There” approach of Hollan-Stornetta to remote CSCW applications.  It also would provide VT with a chance to greatly raise its national and international visibility in areas where it has strong research programs.


A Note About Equipoise -  Equipoise Institute is a not-for-profit corporation that works to address important social issues by  bringing together best-of-class research with social entrepreneurship.  Equipoise’s expertise lies in assessing technologies and bringing them to market.  Our team’s research background allows us to establish peer-level relationships with faculty, while our business experience permits us to  serve as entrepreneurial mentors to these same faculty. We teach an approach to research and development that is simultaneously intellectually appealing but also able to have self-sustaining impact outside of academia.