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digital ecosystem
A digital ecosystem is a community composed of multiple, independent individuals and organizations sharing a common mission and responsibility for a portion of a complete process, seamlessly functioning as unit using automated workflows to securely exchange information and digital media in context, even though no single individual or organization is in charge.

Overview
The concept of the biological ecosystem has long been defined and discussed in the scientific world. The relationships that exist between and among organisms within a biological ecosystem are the model for the digital ecosystem. If the biological ecosystem model of inter-relatedness is applied to human interactions, it can be said that all people are part of a human ecosystem. Each of us fits into a variety of social, economic, even political ecosystems. As computing technologies continue to advance, significant changes result in these human social and economic ecosystems. Social networking sites and virtual communities are changing both how we interact and what bounds our concepts of community. The Internet and electronic transaction technologies have immutably restructured financial transactions worldwide, initiating a truly global economy. In recent years, several writers and organizations have used the term digital ecosystem to reference portions of the then-evolving concept. On October 16, 2000, then CEO of Hewlett-Packard, Carly Fiorina presented a talk on “The Digital Ecosystem” to the World Resources Institute Conference held in Seattle, Washington. In her speech, Fiorina confirms that technology is not the focus of the digital ecosystem; instead it is “connections that will allow all of us to access the best that each of us has to offer.” Then, in November 2003, the Information Society Technology Programme of the European Commission created the Digital Business Ecosystem Project, a 3-year, €14m pan-European project for research and development in Information Society Technologies centered around business ecosystems. http://www.digital-ecosystems.org/fp7/fp7-overview.html In June of 2006, Open Philosophies for Associative Autopoietic digitaL ecosystems, OPAALS, was created in a Framework Programme of the European Commission, picking up and expanding work on the idea of digital ecosystems in business.

Components
A transaction between digital ecosystem partners involves multiple layers of relevance, interaction, and complexity and goes beyond just the technology to make it happen. A complete digital ecosystem addresses the following components to ensure the confidence and trust of participants remains paramount.

Platform
The technology infrastructure underlying the transaction must maintain the context, integrity, security, and privacy of shared information in order to maintain trust among participants in the digital ecosystem.

Paper
The information that typically changes hands via manual processes can be any digitizable content. This opens the arena for information sharing beyond that of typical data exchange.

Process
The processes and workflows of the specific industry must be upheld. Manual processes which are no longer necessary because of the protected nature of digital ecosystems will be eliminated.

Policies
The policies of how information is handled must be upheld. Policies are central to the confidence of digital ecosystem participants because policies typically define who sees what information, when, and why.

People
The participants in the transaction, including the subject the transaction centers around, must be identified and authorized to handle the information of the transaction.

Politics
The policy makers who direct the transactions which occur in the digital ecosystem must support and properly fund the ecosystem initiative.

Governance
The organizations involved in the digital ecosystem must come together and agree on common processes, shared policies, and mission definitions.

Structure
A central concept of the digital ecosystem is the focus on the individual (place, event, or thing) as the causal factor in any transaction. The individual generates a grouping, collection, or packet of information which is relevant in a specific context. This context applies within a given ecosystem, and may transcend the boundaries of other ecosystems in a cross-ecosystem transaction. In a most informal example, when you refer your mechanic to your dentist, you have just created a cross-ecosystem transaction. Your referral transcends the ecosystems of your dentist and your mechanic. What distinguishes digital ecosystems from other data sharing mechanisms is the context of the individual at the center of each transaction. As Paul Saffo wrote in 1994, “It’s the Context, Stupid.” Digital ecosystems deliver relevance, a requirement of human existence. That relevance reverberates from the individual across one or more ecosystems, much like ripples in a pond.

[edit] Examples Examples of ecosystems on the cusp of going digital include: •	The Criminal Justice ecosystem, where multiple organizations, each with a different focus on the process of delivery public safety and justice, must come together and share sensitive, private information in ways which accomplish their mission while preserving individual rights and privacy. Legal responsibilities preclude shortening processes to save time. •	The Health Care ecosystem, where multiple providers work together to deliver the best and most efficient medical care and coverage to individuals. Privacy issues reduce the timeliness of information sharing. •	The Education ecosystem, where students, each of whom learn at an individual pace and in an individual manner, must be brought to a common knowledge standard. Presently, data is captured about student achievement, but timely access is problematic because the data is stored in ways solely applicable to measuring organizational achievement. Each of the ecosystems in these examples has been “digitized” to the point where they have computerized records within their own individual organizations. Now, the task is to digitally connect the individual organizations. The data warehousing model is costly and has proven unwieldy in practice, often due to privacy and data ownership issues. It is critical to comprehend that the digital ecosystem is not a computerized replication of the manual ecosystems now in practice, but a transcendent platform for maintaining relevance in communities by allowing protecting information sharing. [edit] References 1.	http://webservices.sys-con.com/read/529865.htm 2.	http://www.digital-ecosystem.org/DBE_Main/index_html

[edit] External links Category:Ecosystems The Ecosystem Categories: Ecosystems |