What kind of good is effective decision making within a self-governed organization? How do knowledge commons relate to effective decision making within the operational context where that data is relevant? And what happens if data must flow between different operational contexts (or across organizational boundaries)? This presentation aims to address these questions based on two published papers and practical experience in building infrastructure for and participating in knowledge commons. The first paper “Why is there data?” examines how “data” (and, by extension, “information,” “knowledge,” and “understanding”) form a logical supply supply chain within an operational context in order to support informed decision making inclusive of collective governance decisions. The second paper “Data Mesh Architecture: Interoperability, Co-operation, and Co-Regulation” zooms out to examine data supply chains which extend across operating contexts via technical interoperability, and human coordination across organizational boundaries. The Co-regulatory mesh of organizations offers insights into how the flow of data between organizations with independent governance structures makes visible the existing polycentricity of knowledge commons. These papers have informed development of knowledge organization infrastructure (including but not limited to data sets, microservices, access control regimes, user interfaces, practices and rituals in their use and maintenance). The example cases include a small engineering firm, a non-profit hosting community of governance researchers, and peer-to-peer protocol supporting scientific publishing. The concepts from the papers will be briefly reviewed and then demonstrated via examples.
