Santa Barbara Forum on Digital Transitions

Author and online enthusiast Howard Rheingold at the CITS Santa Barbara Forum on Digital Transitions. Interview in which he talks about online community and his work to help people understand the current state of online communities given the lessons he has learned.

Howard Rheingold served as editor in chief of the Millennium Whole Earth Catalog. Shortly thereafter, he was hired on as founding executive editor of HotWired, one of the first commercial content web sites published in 1994 by Wired magazine. Rheingold left HotWired and soon founded Electric Minds in 1996 to chronicle and promote the growth of community online. Electric Minds, like so many other San Francisco-based Internet startups, quickly depleted its venture-capital funds and stands as one of the most spectacular Internet flame-outs of its era. Despite accolades, the site was sold and scaled back in 1997. In 2002, Rheingold published Smart Mobs, exploring the potential for technology to augment collective intelligence. Shortly thereafter, in conjunction with the Institute for the Future, Rheingold launched an effort to develop a broad-based literacy of cooperation.