Pace of Encephalization

Humans have so much in their brains and so little shared outside. This has to change for true intelligence and species advancement and there is a great opportunity in developing tools to facilitate this.

1) Communication and interaction are currently limited by the mindset of the individual

Human interaction is fragile and conditions have to arrive at some optimum before meaningful communication can take place. A physical presence is generally though increasingly less required. Certain mixes of other people must be there or not be there and trust which generally must be developed over time must be present.

Only the few people in close proximity circles to others [may] have some level of understanding of what is in human minds. Peers, those that share similar ideas and values, may have a deeper but still sparse knowledge.

2) Communication and interaction are currently limited by language as the dominant tool

Communication is necessarily governed by the narrowband of language. Language was certainly an amazing evolutionary advance when it arose but it is time for new communication tools. Language is essentially a few pithy comments trickling out of multi-dimensional plane of existence or thinking on a topic. Other options to language that would allow the permissioned knowing of value systems, beliefs and history would contribute to enriched communications. Mechanisms for sharing clusters of thought rather than individual ideas would also be a start.

Tools
Two types of additional tools are needed: more tools for creating and sharing content and better tools for making the content meaningful. Content has proliferated but step function increases are coming. Humans will be creating and sharing more and more personal content (ideas, creative endeavors, personal life details, how-tos, resources, etc.) on the Internet via blogs, video blogs, tumblelogs, lifeblogging, interactive lifecasting, twittering, FaceBook, LinkedIn and other new methods. Aggregation, summarization and abstraction tools (like meta tag clouds and jaiku-style diverse feed aggregation) will be increasingly important to mark content relevancy and make it findable and interactable.

Just like businesses are wikinomically learning that they should not have boundaries at the edge of their properties, employees and ideas, individuals will hopefully start to realize the great benefits of extending their personal content boundaries.

How would you use passively multiplayer gaming?

Passively multiplayer gaming is using applications that track one's computer usage and transform the information into fun, productivity and interesting interactions with others. Passively multiplayer gaming is also called "myware" (as opposed to spyware) articulating the self-controlled element. Multiplayer gaming denotes the possibility of getting bonus points and leveling up to demonstrate progression like in the gaming world but in computer applications: World of Warcraft drum roll please, you have leveled up in Excel! These ratings could be shared with others (employers, online reputation networks) to communicate skill and experience.

Biggest benefit
The biggest benefit of passively multiplayer gaming is the ability to increase the interconnection and synergistic cooperation of human brains. Teillard de Chardin and others long ago voiced the idea of the increasing encephalization of the earth; the increasing interconnectedness of human minds extending and implementing knowledge and information. Technology is quickening the linked human hypermind, initially via cities, newspapers, BBS, etc., then with Internet-based email lists, forum discussions and search, then with podcasts and text and video blogs, now the latest step is electronic event calendars that can be shared with others, the mobile computing platform and passively multiplayer gaming, including permissioning friends into real-time personal location data via GPS. Minds no longer need to be individual but are becoming interconnected hivemind clusters.

Other benefits
First, passively multiplayer gaming contributes to the evolving trends in transparency and life documentation with lifecamming, lifeblogging, flickr photo streams, etc. Second, passively multiplayer gaming contributes to personal productivity. We know we spend too much time in WoW, the blogosphere, Internet news feeds, etc., but actually seeing the numbers tabulated and using applications that will spring up to overlay the data and make it useful for estimating project phase completions, etc. will be very useful.

Third, next level non-hackable smart monitoring could allow skill-acquisition and ratings that are used to communicate expertise. The gaming achievements currently listed on resumes could extend to many other areas, including job force training and life-long education activities. Some sort of smart monitoring is important for measuring effectiveness as time spent alone does not confer expertise.