Stel Je Vraag

www.steljevraag.nl

Steljevraag.nl (“ask your question”) has been invented and developed in April 2001 by the Knowledge Explosion Network foundation, in short KEN (which means “know” in Dutch). KEN’s primary goal is to make scientific knowledge accessible to a broad audience, and to reduce the distance between science and society. According to KEN a low-pitched question-and-answer service via the internet is one of the best ways to accomplish this. Following the nature of the home of the Network, the Technical University in Delft, the emphasis is mainly on the technical sciences. With the help of Digitale Pioniers KEN wanted to widen the scope of the subjects, and the framework of the questions and answers. The idea was to develop an independent application with which individuals as well as organizations can share their knowledge. Next to this KEN also wanted to extend its website with the ”shopping for knowledge” function.

Final Products

The module that KEN developed enables organizations to disclose their knowledge in a better way, for their own employees as well as for external parties like clients or visitors to the website. From various points of view and scientific disciplines experts can give their opinions in a discussion forum.

Impact

Since the launch of the new Steljevraag.nl website the number of visitors has grown enormously. The experts’ feedback is positive as well. They are more in control of the flow of questions and therefore are more concerned with Steljevraag.nl. This eases the KEN team’s job. The TU Delft is going to be the first cluster export, and completely unexpectedly the system also turns out to be very convenient for parties that are not so much concerned about sharing knowledge, but are confronted with big flows of questions from outside. For instance, the Grote Griepmeting (“great flu measuring”) is going to use the module to deal with the enormous amount of questions on the site in a faster and better way.

Contactgegevens

Stichting The Knowledge Explosion Network, The KEN, Delft
Joris Schuurmans
www.steljevraag.nl