Calibrating Hunch Labs

[Chris van der Walt]

I have been thinking about the Hunch Lab functionality and I also
happen to be a member of hunch.com. When you join Hunch.com, you are
requested to respond to a bunch of questions which allow the algorithm
to fine tune its offerings to you. Jumo also uses this method to make
relevant suggestions to users. What do you think about using a similar
approach when a user first creates a profile on the Global Pulse
software? Questions regarding specific sectoral, regional and
functional foci could help to connect users to relevant content
already available and also to enable the Hunch Lab feature to serve
potentially relevant hunches to users...
- Chris V.

[Sara Farmer]

Hi Chris,

Sounds like a good idea - would get people set up in the right hunch
areas quickly.

One other thing to think about... I'm assuming that we've got two main
groups of users here: people who are more local, i.e. based in specific
areas and with specific areas of interest ('sectoral, regional and
functional foci'), and people who more global, i.e. have different
interests at different times as they move between crises, countries or
areas of interest. And as we connect up as communities, the first group
are also increasingly likely to be part of the second.

How could we best serve these interests? Would it be worth us adding
the ability for people to create additional temporary profiles to your
idea of setting up a first, more-permanent profile, or should we instead
include the ability to create multiple hunchbench views, or Drupal-style
organic groups? Or would that be over-complicating things right now?

I've been worrying about this because I have very different home and
work lives that I have to set up multiple search profiles to handle, and
imho it would be good to avoid people having to do this in GP.

Sj.

[Jen Ziemke]

Hi Chris,

 

Thanks for this... And Happy New Year to Global Pulse friends! 

 

Re: What do you think about using a similar

approach when a user first creates a profile on the Global Pulse
software? Questions regarding specific sectoral, regional and
functional foci could help to connect users to relevant content
already available and also to enable the Hunch Lab feature to serve
potentially relevant hunches to users...

 I think HunchLab would benefit very much from allowing users to generate profiles of themselves and their work as you suggest. This would enable analysts/users to get a sense about what the community looks like and who might be members. It would also facilitate private questions/conversations between analysts that share a common regional, topical, or analytic background for advice and brainstorming.

 

I recommend "hunch lab" includes as part of its core functionality an easy private messaging option, offering users a 2-second way to message any combination of subgroups of trusted 'friends' and networks, sorted based on relevance and issue area (gleaned from the user profiles), which will enable them to follow up on public debates in a private session if they so choose... users would of course continue to have the ability to communicate publicly on the board as well...

 

jen