NASA did a 60 day pilot with Socialcast technology to build NASAsphere, a sphere of influence or circle of peers network. It’s tag line: Socializing, innovating & inventing. It went from 78 to 295 via colleague invites and included pictures each person which was unsual for the organization. They used twitter, tagging, asked questions, got answers, shared interests and backgrounds and more. It accelerated peer to peer communciation and problem solving, captured knowledge worker know how for reuse by many, and created peer to peer communication in context so people could see threads of ideas and decision making. As one participant observed, “The network of a conversation spreads based on it’s topic rather than by person-to-person sharing.” Online social networking for business at NASA enabled: sharing a “day-in-the-life” of a scientist, asking where to find information and data to support a NASA task, presenting and vetting an idea to NASA’s collective intelligence, enhancement of the employee directory with interests, expertise, and contact info. It was very popular with the gen Y employees. Suggestions for others trying this kind of project: set the rules of engagement/participant expectations, give them a task, allow them to invite work colleagues. Thanks to Celeste Merryman, KM Leader, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory for sharing this experience.