Key IdeasCaught Ahead Of Their Timeby Robin Good

What I Noticed

I found that defining the audience I wanted to serve gave me a clearer reference for what to do next. My early focus was what communication experts and professionals needed to know: whatever could help online publishers and communication professionals work more effectively with new media technologies. It may look broad today, but at the time it was a meaningful step toward a defined audience.

Why It Mattered

On an already crowded internet, being associated with something specific made my work easier to remember and easier to find. Findability was the main reason. Positioning also needs continual attention. As the world changes, we need to keep refining who we serve and make that choice clear to our audience.

Evidence

At Marcamp in 2007, I introduced myself and explained my work. Watch the presentation, also listed on the Interviews page. Chris Anderson’s 2004 “The Long Tail” article and book describe niche markets enabled by online discovery. Google’s 2011 report on the impact of search explains how search helps people find niche offerings, including content and suppliers.

What the Idea Means

At the turn of the century, many online businesses shared enough information to attract an audience, then kept their most valuable know-how behind something to sell. I believed the open internet changed that calculation. More people could access information and publish their own work, so keeping your knowledge secret offered little advantage if people could not find or appreciate you. I wanted to share as much of what I knew as I could, including the valuable parts. The paid value could move to helping people apply it, carry it out, and adapt it to their situation.

Why It Mattered

This was not an obvious approach at the time. I believed openly sharing useful knowledge cost me little and could help readers, my work, and the wider community. People could see what I knew and how I worked before asking for my help with implementation.

Why Sharewood Is Part of the Story

When I chose a pen name to replace my long, difficult-to-pronounce Italian name, it took me months to settle on Robin Good. The name came with its own story: Robin Good from Sharewood, the forest where people share. Sharing was not just a publishing tactic for me. It was a principle I wanted my name and work to stand for.

Evidence

Mastermind Explorer, Issue 1 is dated March 31, 2000. It is an early example of the knowledge I chose to publish. MasterNewMedia later grew into a publication for communication professionals, sharing useful ideas, tools, and resources. In a 2009 presentation about the Formula of Sharewood, I described how focusing on people’s needs, sharing useful value, and listening helped build that relationship with readers.

What Curation Means

Content curation is finding, checking, selecting, organizing, and framing information for a particular group of people. It is more than collecting links. A curator uses knowledge of the subject to decide what matters, add context, and help readers see why it is worth their attention. Tools can help monitor and organize information, while the curator supplies the judgment.

Why I Value It

I am in love with curation because it is an art and a discipline that sharpens the mind and allows me to learn. I keep looking, checking sources, comparing ideas, noticing connections, and deciding what is useful to others. Readers often have more information than they can follow. A good curator helps them find their way through it. The selections and explanations also let people see how the curator thinks and what they know about the field.

My Work in Curation

• 2000 · Mastermind Explorer: My first online publication was already a curated newsletter. Printed, each issue would run about 20 to 30 pages, with a handpicked selection of tools, technologies, and methods for communication professionals to pay attention to.
• 2003 · MasterNewMedia: Instead of starting another blog, like everyone else was doing, I created and curated an online magazine for independent writers, journalists, experts, and communication professionals. I wanted to bring them the most interesting news, resources, and research reports in their field.
• 2004 · Newsmastering and Newsradars: An idea from Stephen Downes’ “The Network Second Layer” was the first spark for me. I explored it in my MasterNewMedia article, “The Network Second Layer: RSS Newsmastering”. I saw an opportunity for knowledgeable people to monitor a field, then vet, organize, frame, and recommend what was worth seeing. I imagined a distributed network of curators doing a socially useful job.
• From 2009 onward: I spent more time explaining content curation as a discipline and exploring tools that could support it, including BlogBridge, MySyndicaat, and Scoop.it. The tools helped gather and organize information. The curator still had to decide what mattered and explain why.
• Today: I continue this work through the Content Curation Official Guide, my Trust and Credibility NewsRadar, and Curated Formats.

Evidence

“The Birth of the NewsMaster” (February 19, 2004) and “The RSS NewsMaster” (March 2, 2004) document the early Newsmaster idea. My article, “The Network Second Layer: RSS Newsmastering”, develops the connection to Stephen Downes’ idea. Howard Rheingold later mentions my Newsmaster work in Net Smart. You can also hear us discuss curation in Howard Rheingold’s 2011 video interview with me. My 2024 article, “Be the News: Publish a Newsradar”, looks back at when I named the role and the channel. In 2008, FERPI described Newsmastering as an emerging profession and reported on tools including BlogBridge and MySyndicaat.

The Event as a Living Process

Most events begin and end with people meeting in the same place. I imagined the gathering as the fulcrum of something larger: an experience that starts online, comes together in person, and carries on online afterward. The physical meeting gives everyone a shared moment, while the community and work around it can continue.

Before, During, and After

Part of my inspiration came from Jeff Walker’s 2005 original Product Launch Formula, which uses a sequence of material to build interest around a launch. I applied that kind of thinking to events. Before the gathering, people could meet, exchange ideas, and build a community online. During it, people in the room and those joining remotely could take part in live conversations and shared coverage. Afterward, the discussions, community, and other activities could continue online and lead to future encounters. These online parts would be part of the event itself, not only promotion beforehand and recordings afterward.

A Newsroom for the Event

An X-Event needs a dedicated newsroom to follow the different conversations, select what matters, and publish useful updates across the event’s channels. This makes event work an ongoing editorial activity. It is not just a matter of collecting photos and recordings after everyone has gone home.

Participant Contributions Become Lasting Value

Participants can contribute ideas, discussions, photos, and video. The newsroom can edit and organize this material into articles, collections, feeds, and other useful formats. Those contributions can keep the event valuable after the meeting and create further opportunities to share and support the work. Forums, wikis, and discussion channels can remain open and alive, giving the community a place to continue its conversations for as long as they remain useful.

Why It Still Matters

This approach can bring more people into an event, give participants more ways to contribute, and extend the value of what they create together. I still find the idea timely and approachable. I have not seen it explored as seriously as it deserves, and I think it offers a real opportunity for event organizers.

Evidence

“Live Events Strategy: Mashing Up Physical Conferences With Online Extended Events” (republished in 2023, with the original September 16, 2008 publication date identified in the body). It links Robin’s January 2005 precursor, “Events Break Out Of The Physical Space-Time Prison”. FERPI’s January 15, 2008 report is additional contemporary context.

The Problem and the Idea

Designers were tied up making routine changes for clients who depended on them. When clients tried to make changes themselves, the results could look inconsistent or work poorly. I proposed page apps as tools for particular jobs, such as building a landing page, gallery, directory, step-by-step guide, or news radar.

The key was to combine the right function with what I called integrated design intelligence. People would not start from a blank canvas or make every design decision alone. Templates and built-in rules would guide layout and style, while still letting users adapt the page without breaking its design or function.

Design Skills as Reusable Tools

I saw a way for designers to move from executing each custom layout to encoding their judgment in reusable patterns, templates, and guided tools. Designers could sell or rent these tools and help people use them. Clients could make their own updates, while the designer’s expertise could serve many more people.

The Prediction in Today’s Tools

Fifteen years later, this model is standard across web publishing. WordPress page builders such as Elementor, visual builders such as Webflow, and platforms such as Kajabi combine templates, visual editing, and functions for different kinds of pages. The names and details vary, but they all reflect the model I described: design guidance and useful functions that let people build and update pages without coding every change.

The problem I identified also remains recognizable. Designers need ways to move beyond routine maintenance, and clients want more independence without losing good design. “Page apps” did not become the common name, and I cannot claim these tools came from my article. Some examples I cited in 2011 disappeared, while others evolved. The label changed, but the central idea became part of how website and page builders work.

Evidence

“Web Design: The Emergence of Page Apps”, first published July 26, 2011. The article describes the designer-client problem, defines page apps, gives examples, and proposes that designers turn their skills into reusable tools.

What the Idea Means

Brand to Friend is a way to build an online business around trust and relationships. Instead of treating people mainly as an audience to reach or customers to persuade, you become a useful, recognizable point of reference for a specific group. You share what you know, listen to the people who follow your work, and create products or services that answer needs they actually have.

The Formula of Sharewood

I describe the approach in five steps:

• Choose a specific niche and the people you want to serve.
• Build credibility by sharing useful information and experience.
• Grow a group of people who value and follow your work.
• Listen to them and learn what they need.
• Create products and services that fit those needs.

The business grows from the value and trust built with that community over time.

How It Differs from Promotion-First Marketing

Promotion-first marketing often starts with visibility, campaigns, and getting a message in front of more people. Brand to Friend starts with a defined group, useful sharing, and an ongoing conversation. You earn attention by helping, learn by listening, and shape your offer around what people need. “Friend” means a more personal, two-way relationship built on trust. It does not mean pretending that every customer is a private friend.

Why It Matters to Me

Good content can attract readers, but it cannot by itself show people who you are or how you will treat them. In my experience, trust grows when people see that you live what you recommend, speak as yourself, care about their needs, and show up consistently. I wrote about what my reader-organized tours taught me in “High-Value Content Is Not Enough: What Makes People Actually Trust You” (#50).

Book, Podcast & Live Tours

ROI Edizioni published the book on 20 July 2017. It also became an ongoing Italian podcast and six live tours across Italy. Readers and fans organized and hosted more than 60 events.

Sources & Tour Evidence

Book and idea: 2013 presentation · 2015 article · ROI Edizioni book page · Da Brand a Friend podcast · TRUST-able #50 on what the tours taught me about trust

Tour: 2019 announcement · Tour stops and co-organizer testimonials · Homepage live-event evidence · Dated reader testimonials

Facebook posts: Corigliano-Rossano event photo, 21 Nov 2019 · RobinGood Italia post 1 · RobinGood Italia post 2 · Facebook event post

What the Idea Says

Ordinary curation selects useful information for an audience. Meta-Curation adds another step: it looks at the curators who are already selecting information, decides whose work is worth following, and brings their strongest ideas together with context.

For example, instead of forwarding every interesting newsletter about technology, I could identify the writers who consistently find useful stories, select the pieces that matter to my readers, and explain what the writers see differently or where their ideas connect. I help readers choose not only what to read, but which guides they can rely on.

What Makes It Valuable

• It gives readers a way through a crowded field by pointing them to reliable curators and the work that is most useful to them.
• It adds judgment across sources. The value is in comparing, selecting, and explaining the connections, differences, and gaps, not simply collecting links.
• It can help an expert become a trusted guide without having to compete to publish more original material. Readers can see the quality of that judgment in the choices and context provided.

Examples

NextDraft selects important stories from across the news and adds the editor’s perspective. Techmeme surfaces developments in technology by drawing on many news sources and curators. Both examples are described in my article about Meta-Curation.

How It Emerged for Me

In my January 2026 article, I used the term Meta-Curation for this second layer of selection and context. The idea of curating other curators predates my article. I cite John Udell’s 2009 Net-radio thought experiment, which describes experts curating the already-curated streams of others. I am not claiming to have coined the term.

My work in curation began much earlier. In the same article, I describe starting MasterNewMedia as a place to help communication professionals find what was worth their attention. I see that as part of my curation history, while the specific Meta-Curation idea came into focus later.

Evidence

“The New Influencer Is a Meta-Curator,” TRUST-able #64, January 15, 2026. The article explains the two curation levels, cites John Udell’s 2009 thought experiment, describes the MasterNewMedia experience, and links to the NextDraft and Techmeme examples.

What the Idea Says

Paradata is information that shows how a piece of work came about. It can explain why I chose a subject, where I looked, how I selected what to include, what I left out and why, what I checked, which tools I used, and when I did the work. The article or recommendation shows you my conclusion. Paradata lets you see the judgment and work behind it.

Why It Is Worth Attention

Polished writing can make a claim look convincing, whether or not it has been checked. Paradata gives readers something they can examine: the sources, criteria, checks, limits, and dates behind a recommendation. They can decide whether the work fits their situation and whether the evidence is strong enough for them.

How It Emerged for Me

The word predates my use of it. I encountered Paradata while researching Meta-Curation and the ways experts show credibility. The idea stayed with me because it gave a name to something I wanted readers to see: not only what I recommend, but how I arrived at it.

Examples in My Articles

• Measure Your Personal Website Credibility in Less Than 2 Minutes: Trust Grader (#94): I explain why I built the tool, how I reviewed its criteria, and where readers can inspect the research and reasoning behind its 34 checks.
• What I Think, Who I Read (#92): I describe checking each viewpoint against the published issues, finding 17 errors, and recovering 3,104 links from 208 PDFs, then checking 80 important links individually.
• 25 Ways to Show Your Expertise (#93): I explain how I built the resource from my knowledge base and state where the map is incomplete and where my criteria are editorial estimates.
• Liquid Content: From Articles to Resources People Keep Using (#91): I show how I researched the idea, revised the AI-assisted draft, and brought sources, reasoning, and verification into the final piece.

Evidence

I first set out this idea in “Build Credibility and Trust by Using Paradata: The New Signature of Serious Expertise,” TRUST-able #66, published February 4, 2026. The recent examples above show what this looks like in practice.

The Papers That Drew My Attention

In 2025, Luciano Floridi’s paper “Distant Writing: Literary Production in the Age of Artificial Intelligence” gave a name to writing in which a person directs the work while AI generates the text. In February 2026, Tiegue Vieira Rodrigues’s paper “The Apt Curation Model: An Epistemic Virtue Theory of AI-Assisted Authorship” described four kinds of work a person can do when writing with AI. These papers gave me a way to look more closely at where authorship comes from.

What the Ideas Mean

Distant Writing means that you set out to write something, guide the process, and use AI to produce some or most of the words. You remain involved in deciding what the piece is for and what it should say.

• Architectural design: Choose the subject, the reader, the main point, and the order. For example, decide that an article will help readers understand what makes someone the author of AI-assisted work, then plan the questions it needs to answer.
• Dialogical refinement: Work back and forth with AI. Read a draft, point out what is missing or unclear, and ask for a better version. Keep doing this until it says what you mean.
• Evaluative verification: Check the claims and sources. Look for mistakes, weak reasoning, and missing evidence. Decide which suggestions to keep and which to reject.
• Integrative synthesis: Bring the useful parts together into one piece that makes sense and expresses your view. Decide how the new material fits with what you already know and have written.

My Synthesis

These two papers helped me answer a question I kept coming back to: if AI typed the words, am I still the author? I believe authorship depends on who makes the meaningful decisions, not on who physically types every sentence. The author sets the purpose, chooses the direction, keeps refining the work, checks what it says, shapes the final piece, and takes responsibility for it. I bring Floridi’s idea of Distant Writing together with Rodrigues’s four curatorial acts to explain how a person can write with AI and remain the author.

Robin’s Article

In TRUST-able #79, “Who Is the True Author When Writing with AI?” (May 27, 2026), I bring these ideas together and apply them to the question of authorship.

Evidence

Luciano Floridi’s paper (2025) · Tiegue Vieira Rodrigues’s paper (published February 26, 2026) · Robin Good, TRUST-able #79.

What the Idea Says

An expert who regularly vets resources, research, tools, people, and ideas can build a special kind of authority: people come to trust that person’s judgment.

• The expert questions, tests, and compares what is available, then explains what works, what does not, and what deserves caution.
• A company, firm, or startup can submit its tool or idea to that expert for review. If it meets the expert’s criteria, the company can say, “Vetted by X,” and show what the review found.
• The expert’s name and public record give the claim its meaning. The company can use that trust to show customers that someone with recognized judgment has examined its work.

Why It Could Matter

As polished outputs become cheaper, appearance alone tells us less about what works. A reliable record of careful vetting could give an expert a valuable, well-paid service to offer and give companies a credible way to show that their tools or ideas have been checked. For “Vetted by X” to mean anything, the expert must be free to report what failed or what they would not trust, as well as what passed their review.

Evidence

TRUST-able #78, “Vetted by X” Is the New Michelin Star, May 20, 2026. The article presents this as an emerging possibility, not a proven market pattern.

What Liquid Content Means

Most articles are written as complete pieces to read. Liquid content takes the useful knowledge inside them and makes it possible to use those pieces again, in different combinations.

• A piece can be a finding, an explanation, an example, a recommendation, or the evidence behind it.
• The source, reasoning, and checks stay with each piece, so it keeps its context.
• Pieces can be combined into practical resources such as comparison tables, decision trees, maps, directories, and tools.
• A person or an AI can bring relevant pieces together to answer a question no single article was written to address.

How It Works

The first step is to gradually turn your content and ideas into small, self-contained units of knowledge, or atomic knowledge objects. An object captures the essence of an article or story. It could be a conclusion, a claim, a decision, or a set of criteria. An LLM wiki, or second-brain knowledge base, can create these objects automatically as you add content. It identifies and stores the ideas, concepts, entities, and summaries in what you put into it. Once the knowledge base holds these objects, you can combine them in whatever form fits the use: an article, a tool, a decision-making app, a catalog, a collection, a directory, or a map.

Examples Built from Knowledge Objects

I have used this approach to build different kinds of resources:

• Curated Formats turns my knowledge of 25 editorial formats into a map and selector.
• What I Think organizes my viewpoints and the people whose work has influenced me so readers can explore them by topic.
• Trust Grader puts my credibility criteria to work in a tool that reviews a website.

Together, they show how knowledge objects can become resources people can explore and use.

What the Reader Gets

Instead of reading several articles and connecting the pieces alone, a reader can use a resource made for the task: a tool or decision app to make a choice, a catalog or directory to find what fits, or a map or collection to explore a subject. The knowledge objects can be remixed for that use, while their sources and reasoning stay attached. Readers can see why a recommendation is there and check whether it still holds. An AI can also bring relevant objects together to answer a question no single article anticipated, with the evidence left available to inspect.

Evidence & Related Roots

#91, Sep 9, 2026. Earlier related writing: June 3, 2026, knowledge-infrastructure foundation: Oct 29, 2025. Related roots do not prove the named formulation existed then.

What the Idea Says

An article can explain what I know and how I see a problem. But the reader still has to imagine how my thinking would apply to his own situation. A tool gives him a chance to try it for himself.

In the questions it asks, the details it notices, and the way it weighs options, a tool can show how I think and what I consider important. Someone can bring his own question to it and see what it notices and recommends. He gets a taste of my judgment and can decide whether that way of looking at the problem is useful to him.

I think articles will still have a place. They can explain where my thinking comes from and how I built the tool. But a tool can make my attention to detail and strategic thinking visible through something a reader can actually use.

Three things point in this direction: tools are easier to build, much online content is starting to look the same, and AI chat app directories are appearing.

What Remains Open

This is still an idea to explore. We do not yet know whether tools help experts build more trust, find clients, or earn more than articles.

Evidence

TRUST-able #97, “Tools Are the New Articles” (October 2026). The comparative claim remains a hypothesis.