The Climate Web is a knowledge solution for understanding and tackling climate change, and is built with TheBrain knowledge management software.
If this topical doorway is your first exposure to the Climate Web*, you might want to take a look at one of these introductions:
Note: Right-clicking on links like those above will keep this page open in your browser so you can easily come back to it.
The doorway below uses active links to let you explore the breadth and depth of topical coverage in the Climate Web. Right clicking on links opens the Climate Web to that exact spot (each thought in the Climate Web has its own URL). Links open into the on-line version of the Climate Web, and allow you to see the range of curated topical resources available to you. Note that the on-line version of TheBrain software doesn’t do a good job of demonstrating the power, the speed, and the ease of use of the software, and this carries through to applications like the Climate Web. We’ll discuss below the ways you can leverage the knowledge curation available in the Climate Web, while avoiding the limitations.
Climate Experts Doorway
This Doorway is a bit different from all the other Topical and Audience Doorways into the Climate Web, since it focuses on the expert input used to populate the Climate Web. As such the Doorway focuses on illustrating how the work of experts is collected and curated for incorporation into the Climate Web.
Carla O'dell, one of the mothers of knowledge management, has noted:
"If only we knew what we know!"
While Woodrow Wilson, former U.S. President, has noted:
"There is no idea in our heads that has not been worn shiny by someone else's brains."
Both of them could have been talking about the situation we face with climate change decision-making. Infinite information with which to make good decisions, but very little of it translates into the actionable knowledge that would drive decision-makers of all kinds to make better climate change decisions
The Climate Web is not a bibliographic database. We are not trying to ensure that every piece of work from every expert relating to climate change makes its way into the Climate Web. The goal of the Climate Web is to facilitate access to actionable knowledge that might influence decision-makers of all kinds regarding climate-relevant decisions. That goal is reflected in the choices we've made to include the approximately 15,000 documents in the Climate Web, and the 20,000 URLs in the Climate Web.
15,000 documents is a lot of documents, but it's only a fraction of the climate relevant literature. We're constantly adding new materials, and we would welcome your suggestions to that end if you think they would contribute to the objectives of the Climate Web.
The Climate Web organizes the work of thousands of experts working on climate-relevant topics. This page helps you understand how that is done, and how track down the work of specific experts, including yourself.
Finding Your Topic in the Climate Web
We don't see the Climate Web's goal as being to teach experts more about their areas of expertise. Instead, the Climate Web is designed to help experts explore other climate-relevant topics. Everyone talks about breaking down disciplinary silos; the Climate Web actually makes that possible.
You can use the Climate Web's Index (or its Search feature) to find your area of expertise. There are about 3,000 Index Entries in the Climate Web which will quickly jump to topics all over the Climate Web.
We would certainly welcome your help in improving the treatment of topics in the Climate Web that represent your areas of expertise. Whether in the form of missing materials, or useful insights, help with building new Doorways, etc.
How Experts Can Use the Climate Web
We would like to think that the Climate Web can be useful to you as an expert in a number of ways.
To access climate topics you might not have had the opportunity to explore before.
To make sure your work is available to relevant audiences. The goal of the Climate Web is for good ideas to get disseminated. Far more people would benefit from the ideas in many papers and reports than will ever see those paper or reports. If you explore the Climate Web you'll see what we're trying to do in that respect. For example, access Oliver Geden's Index entry in the Climate Web to see his work in the Climate Web, or the Knolwedgebase that organizes the thinking from much of that work. Those ideas then get linked to topics throughout the Climate Web. But it makes it possible for someone to scan a lot of his work without reading a dozen papers (which no one is likely to do anyway). We'd like to be able to do this with far more people than we've been able to so far.
If the Climate Web contains multiple pieces of work by a single author, there is likely to be a thought organized as Last Name, First Name. If you input that combination into the Search field at the bottom left of your screen, it should turn up.
If it doesn't, try Searching for the last name alone. All sources are organized via the formula:
Year Last Name_Title
so the Search should turn up any documents associated with that last name. Note that we only use the lead author's name to organize materials in the Climate Web.
We've been able to do much more advanced work with some authors' materials. Below, for example, is a partial screenshot of the works you can find in the Climate Web from communications expert Dr. Susanne Moser. All of the listed work are integrated into the hundreds of topics organized in the Climate Web. You can jump to the spot in the Climate Web shown in the image below through this link.
But there is something else that would make this information a lot more useful as potential actionable knowledge, namely not having to read all of the documents to know what's in them.
The Knowledgebase shown below (partial screenshot) pulls together ideas extracted from Susanne Moser's work. The Knowledgebase allows users to scan on a single screen many of the key ideas found in dozens of her publications. All extracted ideas and graphics remain linked to their original source document, making it easy to dig deeper. You can jump to the spot show through this link.
We welcome experts' assistance in adding new materials to the Climate Web; feel free to send us your work to info@climatographer.com. Please note our intellectual property procedures. We would also welcome experts' assistance in fleshing out parts of the Climate Web in which you might be an expert, and in helping us curate relevant materials.
Accessing the Climate Web
This Topical Doorway has pointed you to a lot of topical resources. Since the Climate Web is open-access on-line, you’re free to explore these resources there. But as discussed above, on-line access is not an efficient way to leverage the Climate Web. The desktop and mobile versions are much more flexible, powerful and at least 500% faster when it comses to exploring the Climate Web (a function of TheBrain software itself).
If you want to take advantage of the Climate Web we strongly recommend taking advantage of the ability to download it, whether through our Your Climate Brain or Premium Access. You’ll be surprised at how cost-effective we’ve made these options as a way to leverage thousands of hours climate knowledge curation, but if they are still financially out of reach please contact us through the contact form at right to explore a free license.
Premium Topical Roadmaps are also an option for exploring topics in more depth, and they can be used even in the on-line version of the Climate Web. Representing hundreds of hours of research and knowledge curation, Premium Roadmaps link together together explanatory materials, topical headings, individual reports, news stories, videos, websites, and curated topical dashboards to explore a topic in depth, even including links to individual ideas and graphics extracted from a wide range of key sources.
Premium Roadmaps tell the story of a topic in far more detail than a Topical Doorway like this one. To clearly see the differences between a Topical Doorway and a Premium Topical Roadmap, you can take a look at both versions for “Under-Estimating Climate Risks:”
Another option you have to access topical knowledge in the Climate Web is to work directly with the Climatographers. We can deliver uniquely cost-effective customized briefings, webinars, E-courses, and more for utilizing the topical knowledge curated in the Climate Web To learn more about topical briefings, for example, take a look at our Climate Briefings page.
Want to see what other Doorways are currently available? Click here!
To learn more about how the Climate Web is structured and its capabilities, click here!
Want to leverage the Climate Web into a fit-for-service knowledge management solution for your organization? Contact the Climatographers!
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