After my first impressions, here is my slideshow I used on the first day of UrbanLabs. I was given the possibility to held a brief presentation before the participants in the group proposed some projects and then started to gather in order to talk about those projects.
We all were not sure about presentations, because we had so little time for the groups, but I tried to give this presentation (and it was my first presentation about Open P2P Design in Spanish) in order to give the group a starting point and a direction for the projects.

Maybe it was too long, maybe it was too rich of inputs, but a lot of people gathered to watch it and participate in the group (it was one of the biggest groups of UrbanLabs): this means that people are very interested in Open Innovation now, and especially in methodologies for enabling Open Innovations such Open P2P Design is.

It has two sections: the first is about understanding Open P2P Communities (analysis is the first step in a design process) and how to approach them, and the second part is about the methodology adopted in UrbanLabs, but I’d like to talk about it a little more in another post…

UrbanLabs08_Grupo_A_presentacion_Massimo_Menichinelli.pdf (1.7 Mb in Spanish)

Do you have any suggestion about it?

(…to be continued)

A week after UrbanLabs 08, I can finally write a post (the first of 3 posts) with my general impressions about it while I caught the flu!
It was an event that I’ve been waiting for since several months, and that by its nature it was very quickly between so many changes in language between Castilian Spanish, Catalan, English and Italian!

I would have liked very much to participate to such an event even if only as simple participant, and I was invited as a facilitator! For this reason I’d like to thank Ramon Sangüesa, Enric Senabre and Josep Vives for the opportunity they gave me, for the hospitality and for helping me in the role of facilitator.

One of the best things about these events is always the opportunity to know a person who is behind a blog or an initiative known for some time only in the web. It’s very hard to write about all the people I met there, in addition to the organizers reported above, but I try to point out some of them here.
First of all the other facilitators (albeit with some of them we met very briefly because everyone was so involved with the event): Xavier Mas de Xaxàs, Boris Mir, Juan Freire, Carlos Guadián, Roc Fages.

(more…)

I’m very happy to say that a Design Research Initiative that influenced me very much during the development of my thesis has been selected among the finalist projects for the most important Italian Design Award.

EMUDE (Emerging User Demands for Sustainable Solutions) was a programme of activities funded by the European Commission, the aim of which was to explore the potential of social innovation as a driver for technological and production innovation, in view of sustainability. To this end it seeks to shed more light on cases where subjects and communities use existing resources in an original way to bring about system innovation. From here, it intends to pinpoint the demand for products, services and solutions that such cases and communities express, and point to research lines that could lead to improved efficiency, accessibility and diffusion.

As we can see here, has been selected among the finalist projects for the Compasso d’Oro.
(more…)

And the second announcement refers to the UrbanLabs 08 event, which will be held on 9-10-11 October 2008 in the Citilab-Cornellà (Barcelona), a space designed to activate, promote and expand the creative and innovative capacity in technology entrepreneurs, companies, citizens of the information and knowledge society and knowledge.

The aim of the event is to think and propose new projects, practices and usages for cities and citizens, based on existing examples of appropriation of information technology and communication (ICT) and of innovation originating from social demands. The interaction between digital technology, digital culture and citizens’ space provides opportunities for citizen action affecting many different areas and open up potentially more creative and innovative participatory dynamics. These innovations can be translated into new opportunities for socio-economic development and local cultural as well as for strengthening civic networks and their mechanisms of participation in urban governance. The local objective, therefore, from a global perspective and tools.

The news that gives me great satisfaction is that Ramon Sanguesa invitated me to participate as a facilitator for Group A, Productive collaborative innovation: concepts of open innovation in the social, technological and entrepreneurial field. So this will be a very important opportunity to confront, share and experiment the themes of open innovation for communities and cities through the role of facilitator (enabler).

The intention of the six groups is to enable spaces for conversation, discussion and planning for specific projects related to each of the six subjects. The objectives of the Group A are:

• to work on collaborative innovation for civic-based and business-based projects;
• explore the concepts of open innovation in the social, technological and entrepreneurial field;
• explore the open and collaborative design; see how the concept of the culture changes after the collaborative and innovative “digital culture”.

Before the event, the pages of each working group the contextual framework and potential contents and projects that may arise, as well as initiatives, are developed in the pages of each working group. Each can be edited by its facilitator and other people interested in attending the working group, while broadening the discussion in the respective discussion page.

Other good reasons to follow this event are the presence of Michel Bauwens from P2P Foundation and of Juan Freire.

Registration is free for the first 100 seats, and then, for organisational reasons, there are still 50 seats reserved with a registration fee of 50 euros. And during those days it will be possible to follow the conference through videostreaming on the website.

I hope you will participate in the website and in the Citilab!