I want my Green.tv
at 3:39pm on Thursday, 5th October 2006
Why should voluntary organisations care about 'web 2.0' and what do we mean by that word anyway? What ICT developments in the near future should VCOs know about?
Megan Griffth held a workshop today at NCVO to get at these questions (see a list of some of the participants). The discussion centered around what value new media tools provide for voluntary organisations, and how these new media tools challenge their business models and working practices. Do we need new models for membership? Are VCOs using social software to try to get noticed or to get something done?
It's a fact that every day, more people are blogging (Nancy White has more in this article for the Knowledge Tree about what blogger communities look like), uploading and sharing videos and creating and sharing music (on MySpace, for example). People are also jogging and bungee jumping for their personal causes. How are these activities related? All of these actions let me, the participant, see something powerful: they let me see the network of people doing similar things, so in turn I know immediately that my individual actions have ripple effects.
In other words, I can now see the value of participation. And that may make it easier to take actions that previously seemed difficult or even pointless.
There are two approaches organisations could take to building a kind of 'collective' awareness - and hopefully - action. One would be 'let's build a network' and the other, 'let's see what people are already doing in their own networks and tap into that'. The danger of the first approach is that you build it but no one comes. The danger of the second is that it seems to take time and know-how and may even challenge your current organisational practice.
(For example, we all recently saw how the Defra wiki - a sincere attempt to open consultation on the environmental contract - was used for, er, less-than sincere commenting. David Wilcox describes the episode here.)
The first approach seems to be behind "ThePeopleChoose' site (featured on socialEdge) where you can upload your own video about US elections. Green.tv and others are building their own online TV stations around issues. This is great, and by creating the space for people to share their own content, the result is much richer than if your organisation tried to produce all the content on its own.
The second approach might be easier and potentially just as effective: put a video out on the biggest networking site and let people come to you. This is useful because you might be surprised by who's interested, and what emerges.
What are the barriers to experimenting with new social software tools? They are, for the most part, free. And they are getting MUCH easier to use. But we continue to have questions about identity, capacity and reputation.
join the conversation...
Megan Griffth held a workshop today at NCVO to get at these questions (see a list of some of the participants). The discussion centered around what value new media tools provide for voluntary organisations, and how these new media tools challenge their business models and working practices. Do we need new models for membership? Are VCOs using social software to try to get noticed or to get something done?
It's a fact that every day, more people are blogging (Nancy White has more in this article for the Knowledge Tree about what blogger communities look like), uploading and sharing videos and creating and sharing music (on MySpace, for example). People are also jogging and bungee jumping for their personal causes. How are these activities related? All of these actions let me, the participant, see something powerful: they let me see the network of people doing similar things, so in turn I know immediately that my individual actions have ripple effects.
In other words, I can now see the value of participation. And that may make it easier to take actions that previously seemed difficult or even pointless.
There are two approaches organisations could take to building a kind of 'collective' awareness - and hopefully - action. One would be 'let's build a network' and the other, 'let's see what people are already doing in their own networks and tap into that'. The danger of the first approach is that you build it but no one comes. The danger of the second is that it seems to take time and know-how and may even challenge your current organisational practice.
(For example, we all recently saw how the Defra wiki - a sincere attempt to open consultation on the environmental contract - was used for, er, less-than sincere commenting. David Wilcox describes the episode here.)
The first approach seems to be behind "ThePeopleChoose' site (featured on socialEdge) where you can upload your own video about US elections. Green.tv and others are building their own online TV stations around issues. This is great, and by creating the space for people to share their own content, the result is much richer than if your organisation tried to produce all the content on its own.
The second approach might be easier and potentially just as effective: put a video out on the biggest networking site and let people come to you. This is useful because you might be surprised by who's interested, and what emerges.
What are the barriers to experimenting with new social software tools? They are, for the most part, free. And they are getting MUCH easier to use. But we continue to have questions about identity, capacity and reputation.
join the conversation...
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