Public Sector Forums present PSF Buzz North East

Headed up to Newcastle today for the Public Sector Forums' event on Effective Social Media and Web 2.0 Strategies for Local Authorities - AKA PSFBuzz North East!!!

This a chance to meet up with some very inspiring, enthusiastic and dedicated local gov online people - some of whom had been at localgovcamp a few weeks ago but some of whom I had only had online conversations with so far so good to meet in person.

Oh, and the line up was pretty good too! I live blogged my notes for each session as well as I could (shaky wifi due to rampant tweeters) and will go back and try and add a sensible summary to each post. You can also catch up with the metaconference on Twitter at #psfbuzz.

Speakers for today:

• Simon Wakeman, Medway Council - Social Media: A Revolution in Local Government Communications? You can see my notes from the session or Simon has posted the presentation on his blog.
• Mike Saunt - sorry! I didn't write the title down :(
  
• Jack Pickard - Accessibility and social media
  and you can also see what Jack blogged at The Pickards
• Carl Haggerty - unblocking access to social media and creating policy / guidance
• Alistair Smith - Managing reputation online
• Stuart Harrison - Planbot / TwitterPlan
• Dave Briggs - Four steps to social media success

The whole day was a blast with the presentations being thought provoking, funny and useful in equal measure. Thanks to all involved in putting it on (PSF, Newcastle, Dave Briggs, suppliers etc). Good to see so many people there - would be great to see other events on same format in other regions :)

A few actions I have set myself after this day:

• Revisit the social media guidelines I drafted and make some changes / additions then chase to get them in place
• Start tracking the conversation happening in the online space about our organisation
• Start tracking the scope and impact of our socmed communications
• A few other things too vague to be stuck up here but have made it to the 'think on' post-it in my diary :0)
  

Are we listening #localgovcamp

Updated (21 June 2009): I made the notes below as the session was in progress and I won't change those.

Paul hosted this session around the work going on in Derby to listen and capture the conversation's happening in the online space related to the area. Paul tracked this on mindmeister.com although the map he'd produced is not generally available yet.

He had searched across many networks, including the main online gathering spaces at the moment of Facebook and Twitter, to show which groups and individuals were participating in conversation about the area or about the authorities / public sector organisations in the city.

Potential issues around gathering this information and different methods of doing so were discussed as well as highlighting how this information can be a useful tool for showing the organisation the conversation is going to be happening with or without their involvement - at the very least they need to listen.

Discussion moved on to cover social media policy / usage and participation guidelines and the need for these given existing internet and email use policies. The discussion also covered the issues around the blurring of personal / professional identity online and what work or responsibility organisations have to make employees more aware (potential education task rather than policy task).

Really interesting discussion over a broad topic and a lot of great examples from a range of councils.

Notes taken during the session (posted 20 June 2009):

Are we listening hosted by @paul_cole

• At different places with projects and also personal social media enthusiast.
• Using mindmeister to showcase something he has developed around the subject
• Shows what they think is going on to show what they are missing out on. Started on Facebook (nodes) to show groups, pages etc to map what conversations are going on.
• Jack Pickard (@thepickards) - done something similar but less mapped. just poking around found existing groups.
• One group (in Derby) has 600 members - more than at any public meeting...are councils integrating comments into meetings / consultation
• Also mapped employee personal profiles
• Manual process.
• Brigton doing from opposite way - identify audience then go to networks to find relevant people.
• More credence to citizen led groups for citizens - more trust
• Easy to find people talking about you on Twitter and other networks.
• Houston, we have a problem - no, houston we have an opportunity.
• Can hear the discussions and then act accordingly.
• Brighton looking to recruit a social media officer.
• People are having conversations without the council - up to council to find and jump in
• Change the way the organisation is perceived.
• Wealth of information out there.
• May be communicating with one citizen at a time but all worth it
• Many organistions use Twitter etc as broadcast channel - good baby step to pursuade stakeholders to allow you to start
• Not about the technology, about confidence to have the conversation. Gradual process to build confidence.
• Small steps - but get involved. @danslee - diving in from day one like being trendy uncle break dancing at a wedding - people who can dance think it's appalling but gets others up on the floor!
• Camden started Twitter as emergency response to bad weather but from there kept it going and started being more conversational
• Just by putting the toe in the water is a move towards providing services to citizens and they can see the council is doing something - even if they're not doing much or well at first
• keep going at it, if the answer is no today, it might not be tomorrow.
• show what they are missing out on
• need to show be benefit of engagement, allow relevant employees to attend and use their learning and networking - today good example- we're all here on our day off!
• blurred lines between professional and personal relationships of social media / comms staff using networks. how much is work? what is allowed?
• are HR telling employees what they can / can't do? outside of work hours you are still representing organisation. have been sending staff off to events without being able to manage but now can see what staff are up to in their own time - managing organisation representation online
• starting to develop social media usage guidelines - updating internet / email use policy. can share our draft guidance with anyone interested. Jake Pickard interested in seeing draft policies.
• simple guidance - what's out there is public, permanent. informal relationships - if you're blogging someone to run it past. '
• under contract not to badmouth organisation - covers social media too. code of conduct. highlight this also applies online.
• how do you raise your voice as a citizen when also an employee? #staff #citizen lol
• never off duty - comments and personal pictures can be used against the organisation! can reap benefits from the flipside
• can be used by council's to convict benefit cheats - this could be concerning - invasion of privacy - but online isn't private the way most people use it!
• moral issues rather than technology issue. journalists now can do the death knock online - example of Express / Dunblane survivors
• younger people don't view privacy in the same way
• people forget and send wrong things - @glinner phone number, Croydon council on Twitter
• Channel 4 about to launch a game to educate children about privacy online
• we're set on digital engagement and moving people to online space from offline but we are still learning - how can we support and encourage when we don't fully understand the possibilities / consequences of our actions?
• unique and different channel for engagement. different audiences within the space.
• reach out to different, hard to reach audiences. Deaf community huge users of Bebo (pos. due to less constrained language). Lots of Eastern European migrants - use Facebook to keep in touch with family. Stats somewhere on demographics for networks - will try to find!
• @paul_cole started off by ward but biggest groups are emotive groups. names impact on popularity form meta-communities.
• Are same people joining many groups across networks? Are these the engaged people anyway, just using another channel?
• Mentioned our election Twitter and Facebook and how members were different - not following on both feeds except small number of people.
• Working out how to engage not just be marketed at. Have smaller feeds for specific groups.
• If all you do is RSS you will get companies, journalists etc. If you do it manually and converse you will get people engaging with you. Better response to having a voice - have a personality don't be personal! Issues around this - see old post about our Twitter.
• Who does this out of hours etc - back to the line between on / off duty being blurred!
• Lots of tools to manage - Hootsuite, Tweet Later etc...

Public sector intranets

I've had some interesting email exchange with Ian Vaughan of Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council today about intranets in the public sector.
They are currently planning an intranet redesign and so Ian is looking to find out more about what other councils are up to. This got me thinking about our own position (again) and where we want to go with our own intranet and internal comms tools.
We're not in a position to go forward with the major overhaul of our own intranet at the moment due to other project work needing to be completed. But we've had it on the cards for a while and I (and the rest of the team) are itching to get to the point where we can take a serious look at what we've got, what we could have and go out and chat with employees about what they think we should end up with.
Intranets, generally, fascinate me. Possibly because I am nosey and anything that appears secret (which an intranet, by nature, is) needs investigating. Possibly because I am as passionate about the internal audience and online communication as I am about the external counterpart.
When our time comes (soon, make it soon) I hope to be able to find others willing to allow me to peek over their (fire)wall at what they've got. In the meantime I hope you might be willing to share what you've got with Ian? DM me on Twitter and I'll pass on his email address - or leave a comment and I'll nudge him to contact you himself.
Ian has also just completed his thesis research and has some info on web 2.0/social media usage in local gov which I am sure he would be willing to exchange for your intranet knowledge / thoughts ;)

Social media usage / participation guidelines

This seems to be something that plenty of people in local gov are trying to work on at the moment and it's not always easy, so I thought I would just post up where I'm at with it in case it was useful to anyone else, and if you want to be useful to me, then I have no problem with that either ;-)
So, not always easy. I've found getting the organisation to have a peek over the edge into online space has taken time and pursuasion in itself. Getting it to be brave enough to dip a toe in more of the same. Now we're paddling in the shallow end I think we need the waterwings of documented policy and/or guidance so we can go further*.
One of the great things about working in the public sector is that we're all so ready to share, and most of the time it isn't just because we need to as resources / time / support are scant to go it alone. I throw my hands up in appreciation of those who are already splashing about (in a waving not drowning way) and have shared their progress. It got me started.
It started as a policy but soon became more of a guidance document. In my head I envisage it being accompanied by a less formal overview, probably the content of the intranet page which becomes it's home.
I've tried to straddle the line between friendly advice in a conversational tone (if we're talking social media surely most appropriate) and the established style of this sort of document. I've tried to include a bit of a summary of what each network or space is to make it more inclusive to 'beginners'.
There is still some work to do...
Useful talks with Lee Jorgensen (Blackburn and Darwen) highlighted an area I had initially shyed away from; special guidance for purdah periods. I intend to revisit this. There is also some mopping up of duplication and conflicting advice.
I'm not sure whether I am almost ready to suggest this is moving closer to version 1.0 than draft...which is the main driver for this post!
And having written it I am now annoyingly aware that there is no facility to attach documents to this post. So I guess...if you want to see where I'm at DM me on Twitter with your email and we'll take it from there. Hopefully there will be time to talk at localgovcamp too!

*I accept full responsiblity for the mixed metaphor and then pushing it too far. In defence, m'lud, I've not had resonable quota of coffee yet.

Old life vs New life

I'm currently undertaking the Digital Media and Society module as part of my masters. It's been great to get stuck into as it meets up with not only so much of what I am currently working on (online local gov) but also my undergraduate work and first industry (journalism and newspapers).
It's been good to retreive some of that undergraduate learning (hello Habermas, my old friend) and put it into context with the current state of play for both sectors.
But while all this is fascinating learning, the time has come to pick my assignment and get on with the final paper. I find myself torn between my old life and new life when it comes to assignment topics:

1. Old life: Discuss the characteristics of online news journalism, indicating where and why it differs from traditional models and practices. (You may discuss the topic either in general or with specific reference to blogs.)
2. New life: It is often claimed that digital technologies have the potential to restore ‘direct democracy’. Explain and evaluate the claim with particular reference to electoral politics.

Option one would be interesting not only as there is so much chatter about this subject at the moment but also as it would be a nice update to my undergraduate dissertation (worryingly 10-years-on).
But I already know which way I will fall. Option two it will be seeing as am in the middle of all our local election online coverage right now (perfect timing). I'm happy with my choice...but it feels a little disloyal and sad to have to choose between my old life and new life.

And the subject is...

Social media in local government internal communications.
After thinking long and hard about whether to go down this route, look at social media in local gov engagement with young people or another avenue entirely I decided internal comms would be best suited to my organisation, the limitations of a part time dissertation and perhaps be useful to others in the sector too.
I'm happy to say this has now been approved by my tutor and I'll be returning to plan the thesis in more detail from the autumn. My feeling at the moment is that an 'active research' approach may work well and be interesting, hopefully piloting some possible social media solutions next year.
While the thesis will mainly look at problems and solutions within my own organisation I do plan to research what else is already in place across the sector.
I'm looking forward to getting started and really excited that my first bit of pilot research took place in the online space!
Thanks again to everyone who took the time to read and/or comment on my post about topic ideas. I'll be happy to share the outcome of my research with anyone interested when the time comes.

Thoughts on my thesis

The time is upon me where I must get some clarity about what my thesis will focus on next year. My dissertation will complete my part time study for a masters in eCommunication.
My ideas so far have been pretty vague and I've got only as far as deciding that my study will look at social media usage by local government. I've come across a couple of other people already researching this area but don't think much has been done as it is such a new area.
Anyway, I've had a few ideas about what I might look at:

• local government use of social media to engage with young citizens
• library service use of social media and effect on take up of service

I am being encouraged to concentrate on service specific research as the other research so far looks to map who is doing what and why. While I don't want to repeat existing research I would also like to think that whatever I look at will be of use within my organisation but perhaps also to others working in the sector.
So local government web people - is there anything you would like more research on or would find particularly interesting and useful for going forward? I obviously don't want other people to decide my thesis for me but would certainly be interested in hearing the thoughts of my fellow local gov webbies.
Thanks in advance to anyone who takes the time to read, think or respond to this!

History: Part Three: Oracle vs Community

I'd explored instant messaging and blogging so where did my Internet expedition take me next? Forums...well, one forum anyway.

Offline life sort of set me off down this avenue as I got engaged and began planning for my two wedding days. Looking back it is obvious that this was probably the point at which I really began to reap the value of communicating on the Internet rather than just using it for the sake of using
it.

Wedding magazines are incredibly pricey and shows are sometimes hard to get to and don't necessarily cater for those looking to stray from the traditional path. And I didn't have any real life friends to ask for advice or recommendations being among the first of my circle of friends to tie the knot.So, online I went.

I tried all the (now) well established websites from offline wedding brands. Then I found what was to be my online home for the best part of four years (two and a half wedding planning then moving to the baby talk board).

At the time I was slightly in awe of the way you could get an answer to any question at all from the collective knowledge available through the forum. Now of course that seems almost run of the mill given the way social media is evolving but for my first experience of it there was a danger of being overwhelmed.

I shared many wedding days through that board as people revealed their plans, counted down to their big day and then posted their experience and top tips for future brides.It was easy to get recommendations and many smaller, independent retailers were members giving a greater depth to the knowledge available.

How these suppliers were allowed to use the boards led to member debate and self-policing when rules were broken.

The bad side of boards were here also. I loved using the boards and the people I spoke to regularly on there but never really stopped feeling like the new girl in class. There were definite cliques on each of the boards which sometimes verged on snobbery or rudeness.

Most of the time if you weren't in the clique or you were a newer member you just got fewer replies to your threads.

Maybe some of this was down to the sheer volume of posts going through the boards. Possibly some of it down to repetition within those threads.Possibly some of it was just pure flaming.

It was a definite community though with some boards being tidal (as weddings passed people tailed off, sometimes to reappear on the off topic or baby boards) others being a more stable forum.

And the communities supported each other...when women were scared or confused on the baby boards there were people there to offer comfort and try to advise (this could have been a real benefit in situations where a woman hadn't revealed a pregnancy in her real world).

When the 7/7 London bombings happened the off topic community set up an informal and impromptu check in for known London members. They also supported each other in the days after posting about why they thought London was great and shouldn't be abandoned because of what had happened. A milder but never-the-less modern version of Blitz-spirit.

Much of the etiquette being bandied about today for newer platforms stood back then especially the 'I'll scratch your back, if you scratch mine' way of community building. If you were an active poster who took time to share and post quality replies you were more likely to get more / higher quality / faster replies when you posted a query.

And the things people wanted to communicate about on the off topic boards haven't vastly changed either...what they're wearing, where they've been, what they're eating. All still popping up consistently and frequently on today's social media landscape.

I learnt a lot even from just lurking on those boards (I can name the designer of a dress at twenty paces and I know more about the signs from your body that baby-making is go than I care to list). I also had a lot of good conversations and genuinely cared about what happened to some of the people I shared offline life journeys with through that forum.

But, like many, I drifted away on the tide. I returned to work after having my son and my daily visits turned to weekly turned to ad hoc. Now (just two year's after my son's birth) I can't even recall which email address I used to register in order to go back and visit those boards.

Just like ICQ and Open Diary before, it seems that the boards of Hitched had served their purpose in my life and I'd once again hit the road in search of a new online space.

Coming together

I'm surprised and pleased by how this week has gone. Especially givent he sense of dread I felt on Monday with Batter Connected 2009 out and a trip to the dentist scheduled.
But we managed to raise ourselves a little in BC09 and the dental work has been put off for another time. Black Monday turned out to be merely a pale grey.
And the sun shone through the rest of the week with the green light being given to several ideas / projects the team had been putting forward for a while.
A happy ending to the week as @Derbyshirecc was launched into the Twittersphere as our first social media endeavour. Next week move two is on the cards and even though these are baby steps they feel like they have been so long coming it's hard not to feel elated!
I'm almost allowing myself to believe that we're turning a corner and all the stuff that was holding us back last year may get resolved.
Add to that the smugness I am still feeling over a marvellous result on my ' Social Psychological Theory in Computer-Mediated Communication' piece and yes, I think this week can be chalked up as a good one.

This so called (online) life...

I've read a couple of articles recently about whether the amount of time we spend online is damaging to us as individuals and a society (Technology is great, but are we forgetting to live? and Online networking 'harms health'). It's something that has been crossing my mind a fair bit recently so it's with interest that I read these, and other similar, articles.

My thoughts are still pretty unorganised but my general feeling has remained pretty much unchanged throughout the years I have been an Internet user; anything in life can become unbalanced and online / offline living is no different.

I think if a person were to be carrying out all interactions online all the time, even when they could make face-to-face or other contact, then the balance has gone and damage to relationships and health are possible, even likely.

However, when used as a means of enriching existing contact / relationships etc then social media really can make a difference to the quality and quantity of communication and knowledge available. Especially in people or groups where more traditional contact might be difficult (rural communities, people with disabilities, those living abroad or far away from family and friends).

I've found I have more contact with family abroad and have made contact with more local family and friends again through social networking sites. However, if this contact remained only online I would see it as of no more 'social' value to me than having their address / phone number in a book somewhere. I might be more aware of them than the address book but there is no more social value to me. Moving from online to offline contact provides that value.

Different channels of communication or contact are more suited in different circumstances - my 90-something grandad hasn't been disowned because he isn't online (or ever likely to be) but rather a face-to-face visit or telephone call suits us both better. However, my friend in Australia (who I actually met on ICQ) is mainly communicated with via social networking sites and email and occasional postal packages of compilation cds. I keep in touch with my husband with occasional online messages but wouldn't dream of communicating with him this way if we were both at home together!

Balance, and purpose then.

For me online communication / social networks / media should be seen and used as an extra channel through which contact can be made and not a replacement for existing means.

History: Part two: Or private thoughts in public spaces.

As I left university and entered the workplace in my first ‘proper’ job (Internet journalist) I moved my offline diary-keeping into the online space. I was an active member of Open Diary (OD) from the start of 1999 until sometime in 2001, just before they launched the paid-for version.

I don’t recall what initially spurred me to start publishing my thoughts online (although, clearly, it still appeals!), perhaps the standard attraction of vanity publishing, perhaps because I was online so much of the time it seemed easier to keep writing from the desktop than go back to pen and paper.

It was quite an eventful time in my life so perhaps I just thought I had lots to say and liked having a record I could easily flip back through as I completed university and left full-time education, entered the workplace, moved back to my hometown and transformed a friendship into a relationship (with my now husband).

Whatever made me start with OD it was the community that kept me coming back. I was soon in a circle of seemingly like-minded diarists and we would regularly (in some cases more like religiously) read and comment on each other’s entries. For me it was the best of both worlds – a place to pour out private thoughts, feelings and worries while also getting feedback from people who wouldn't know me in real life. My feelings and experiences were out there in public and yet still remained intensly private.

I valued those comments from diarists I respected as much, sometimes more, than my real life peers. Some of their words still stay with me although I have no complete record of my online entries. Certainly when events in my life were hard to talk about with those who knew me in real life I was able to honestly and openly catalogue them online and receive support from those who read me – it gave me access to people who had experienced what I had (or something similar) when offline there was no such person around.

I know over the time I was with OD I made more than 100 entries and that my usage was tailing off by the time they announced it would split into two sister sites – one paid for and one not. Many of my ‘circle’ went with the paid for service but I lost my diary before I made a decision.

Losing that diary marked the start of a quieter period for me in online life as I moved to my first flat and had no Internet connection. I was spending all of my working day online and exploring possibilities for the space in my everyday job so for a while I didn’t feel I was losing anything by not using the Internet in my personal life.

The value I got from being part of an online community stayed with me though. Not only did it give me the skills I needed for my next job (online community coordinator) but it was there at the back of my mind when once again I found myself in a different position to my real-life peers (more of that in part three).

It’s interesting as well that of the two people from my circle who have stuck in my memory for their unfailing advice and support back on OD a Google search shows that one of them is still with OD (and still looks to be on a similar life path to me) and the other one has an ongoing blog / personal website. We’re all still out in the online space just not tethered together under one banner anymore. I wonder if I should give them a wave?

History: Part One

‘eh-oh’ ‘eh-oh’

I hear this noise and instantly smile at the thought of a new message from an ICQ buddy while the petals of a daisy rotate on my mind’s monitor.

One of the first internet-wide instant messaging systems (see Wikipedia for more) ICQ was probably my first real experience on the internet. Or, at least, the first one I remember. And so, I guess, I could say that not only was it the first hook but what set me on this path to the online communications world I inhabit now.

So…when did it all begin for me??? I would guess sometime around mid-1997 or toward 1998. And who introduced me? Well, my then boyfriend of course. He was already using ICQ and playing with MP3 downloads and stuff...he got me interested and then enthused about what lay out there in the online space.

I remember me taking a while to get it and not really seeing the point. And then I found a few people all over the world with similar interests to me. At first the novelty and then the sheer amazement of being able to have a pretty much real-time conversation with someone on the other side of the world that I didn’t even know existed before was overwhelming for a while.

I don’t think it took very long for it (or rather the online me, IndiaBlue) to be a part of everyday 'real' life though. Certainly from September 1999 it was everyday as I had my own computer and own dial-up internet connection (clickety-click, hummmmmm, buzz, bing, bing, click) and from my dank uni room I explored other bits of the internet while ICQ buddies chatted with me.

I explored the possibilities of ICQ as well. The idea of being anonymous and revealing only parts of your identity was there and had a novelty value but no real worth in developing conversations and online relationships (and I’m not talking romantically). It was interesting though to play in such a place and develop my online needs from what I discovered about myself and the medium.

On reflection, I am much more excited and satisfied with the social media I use now as a means of enhancing existing relationships by complimenting other channels of communication than as a way of being someone else with someone you don’t know.

There are few people I remember from the ICQ-era although I do recall having several intense but ultimately short-lived friendships strike up across the messages. There are a couple though with whom ICQ was just the introduction to a friendship which has spread and survived other social media and even crossed over to become face-to-face friendships on occasion.

I don’t even know what ICQ looks like now…I know it still exists. Does it do only what it did back them (instant message and a pretty crude – but fun – real-time chat where you could watch people try and delete something as they went along)? I doubt it. I would guess it must have evolved to survive.

As time went on I followed buddies onto other systems while keeping true to ICQ. I sampled AOL chat with the guy from BJ and the Bear (now there’s a concept I can’t get enough of) and used Messenger as well, which now vies with Skype as my IM of choice.

But by the tail-end of 2000 I was moving away from ICQ toward the raggedy edge of the Blogosphere. And perhaps it says something about the online me that I don’t feel the curiosity to go back to ICQ and see what has become of it but would rather look back on it fondly as the beginning of things…

(Note to self: there are a few ideas I would like to look at further here around the difference between old style / new style social media.)

Local government and social media - response to Ingrid Koeler at IDeA

An interesting blog post from Ingrid Koeler at the IDeA about the questions facing local government using social media and an even more interesting response prompted me to post some of my own thoughts following on from discussions happening more frequently in these parts.

What are the greatest areas of potential benefit in councils using social media?

I think it is too early to tell what the real benefits to local government might be from social media and when they do become apparent those benefits may be hard to measure due to the fluid landscape and fast evolution of the online space.My feeling at the moment is that, if adopted, it could be the beginning of a change in the way in which local government engages with communities and the way they are perceived in return.In our own case moving forward with social media is the obvious next step from the concept we ran with for the websites – information presented in plain English and a friendly tone (or in other words moving The Authority from the authority). Social media in its many forms could boil down to taking that information and making it interactive.This could encourage greater engagement as the channels into the organisation become more open, easier to find and more two-way. And this, right now, is probably my best guess about greatest potential – social media is presenting a real opportunity for the organisation to understand the community and engage with them on neutral ground in a transparent and equal manner.

How can councils support local communities and individuals in becoming digitally enabled and empowered?

I would go along the lines that local gov can support communities and individuals by inhabiting the online space themselves. By engaging in online conversation and reaping the benefits of social media local gov can empower local communities and individuals who may not have had a voice in a more traditional channel.In terms of enabling others – providing access through local gov services such as libraries and making resource available to encourage and enthuse communities and individuals to see how digital technology can benefit them is probably a good tack to start on.

How can local and hyper-local social networks increase community cohesion and empowerment?

I need to formulate my thoughts more fully on this one before I can give any kind of sentient answer!

How can councillors develop their leadership and communication skills using social media?

I think the first issue is for a councillor (in the same way as the organisation) to understand what social media tools, if any, are appropriate channels of communication with the constituents. If online communication is a relevant way then I think it is an extra dimension for councillors to add to being available and transparent in their role. The least effective way to use the online space in the current climate is as a platform for publishing ‘brag’ pieces. I think a cultural shift needs to happen where online communication is seen as two-way rather than a broadcast medium. To grasp this councillors and organisation would have to accept the conversations about or with them may not always be positive but can all be constructive.

How can social media be used for more effective social marketing encouraging the behaviour change necessary to achieve complex outcomes?

I’ve not fully formed my thoughts on this – I may come back to it at some point in the near future.

What’s the “next practice” in social media, including virtual worlds and more?

I don’t think local gov should be looking for the next thing but rather learning how to utilise the tools already available for the best service to communities and reward to themselves. In my mind local gov is more suited to evolving rather than pioneering and unless it can make best use of social media at this stage it really won’t matter too much about what the next step is!

I'm thinking about this all a lot at the moment as part of the daily buck-earning but also in choosing a thesis topic. There is likely to be more to come as thoughts form more fully...