Podnosh

Let me introduce you to two new blogs about neighbourhoods in Birmingham, both run by public servants

Hands on Handsworth is written by Tracey Thorne – the neighbourhood manager for Handsworth in Birmingham;  Be Heard in Birchfield is being nurtured by Yvonne Wager – the neighbourhood manager for that particular part of the city. (Click here to see Tracey’s explanation of neighbourhood management)

Both Yvonne and Tracey are in jobs funded by Be Birmingham – the local strategic partnership.  They were inspired to start a neighbourhood blog by their colleague Kate Foley who had been running Life in Lozells – a site set up originally to address the problem of all the bad news you find when googling Lozells. Kate explains in more detail in this video made by the Chamberlain Forum.

What do they do?

They talked to us about helping them develop these sites during the Social Media Surgeries we ran in Lozells last year.  Both are built on WordPress with some changes to the back end that make it a little easier to blog and listen to what the web is saying about your neighbourhood.  There’s also a simple events system with mapping, plus the sites include a facility to easily turn plans into commentable  consultation docs.  We also provide a service that ensures the software stays updated, plugins don’t clash etc, plus training and support on using it well.

Tracey is a natural – she really enjoys writing for the site and is on a roll. Yvonne is equally enthusiastic but needs a different sort of support, so it is taking a little longer.

Why Bother

The sites are the neighbourhood managers’ home in a wider web conversation. It’s only fledgling at this stage.  The point is that over time they help the neighbourhood managers share information, ask questions, pool expertise and begin to collabroate in new ways with their community.  I’m not convinced they should attempt to become THE site for their neighbourhood.

Such an idea concerns me, because if THE site gets switched off or someone begins using it to be self serving that’s a problems for the whole neighbourhood. Instead I’m interested in how we can nurture a range of online resources and voices in a place. These blogs form  part of that process – providing a tool that can also help neighbourhood managers link to and encourage the wider conversation.

What do you think?

It will take time and patience for these sites to bed in – but what do you think? Could you encourage them by commenting a post or do you have any advice for Yvonne or Tracey?

I think it is only a matter of time before we switch from hyperlocal blogging to hyperlocal “mapping”.

Below is a short TED2010 talk from Blaise Aguera y Arcas of Microsoft Live Labs.

He is demonstrating augmented-reality mapping technology from Microsoft. It’s quite a substantial extension from where Google appears to be just at the moment and shows glimpses of great possibilities.

If you serve neighbourhoods,  interested in very local media or work for a news organisation, whether press, web or broadcast then it may be worth sparing a few minutes to watch this:

It’s a question I’m often asked.   May I start with something simple.  I’m assuming you want something that is easy to use, easy to carry and makes video which is simple to edit and very quick to upload to the internet.  If so buy this one, the Flip Mino – but not the high definition one.

If you are going to buy a flip get this one

Why?

It is light and very easy to carry in a pocket or a bag.
I’ve used and owned the larger ones but found that the red record button was prone to stick.  On these it works like a dream.
60 minutes is plenty of recording time.
The built in usb connector is darned useful.
It does wide screen, which is nice.
There’s no point in buying the high definition one because the lens is the same and the files are just bigger and take ages to upload to the net.

Tip:  the white one if often cheaper than the black one and you’ll rarely find any for less than they sell on Amazon.

What if I want something like a Flip that isn’t a Flip?

At the moment the best reason to do that is because you want better sound. The Flip does perfectly decent sound in straightforward conditions – but make it very noisy and you start to struggle a bit.

Oddly there are not that many sensible choices. There are growing number of high definition flip type camera  that allow you to do what you can’t do with a flip – plug in an external microphone.

Dave Briggs has this very informative explanation of why it’s worth buying a Kodak Zi8:

What Dave says is right, but the point of the Flip is simplicity.  Once you have to add an external microphone, plug it in,

Kodak Zi8 HD Pocket Video Camera - almost but not quite

mess with it, hope it doesn’t drop out then – to keep the file size down, remember to reset the video recording quality to less than HD (for upload speed) I’m not convinced the more complex camera will be better. It does have one advantage – you can take stills.

It is still simpler to buy the Flip and ask someone to step into a quiet room to talk to them.

However sound is all important in online video so there’s a more expensive but better solution.  I bought one a few weeks ago and love the new Zoom Q3.  You can record just audio if you wish ( a still photo combined with an mp3 makes great content) and will record very simple video with great audio. There’s a built in USB connector, you can use and sd card and the file sizes are weeny – so whizz up to the net.

This is what @documentally says about it – and I agree with him:

What then is special about it?:

Robust
Same ease of use at the Flip
Great sound without needing an external mic
Low resolution video – hence small file sizes.
Does just audio in great quality

So for for me the almost ultimate is the Zoom Q3 – give me widescreen yet low def video on the Zoom Q4 and I’ll be a very happy man.

Another topic which arose out of the C&binet conference in London was the new skills in business and entrepreneurship which journalism students need to be taught to prepare for the changing landscape of the media.

City University of New York’s Graduate School of Journalism students already take a class in entrepreneurship. Jeff Jarvis, who teaches there, thinks should learn to be stewards of journalism – learning for example how to set up hyperlocal sites, invite and train collaborators, and turn the news site into a successful business.

Details of the hypothetical news model from CUNY can be found here - and it is in the process of being translated for the UK.

It is clear from developments in the US – which the UK will duly follow – journalism students need to be taught or encouraged to do entrepreneurship to make sure they take off in the new climate – rather than fall flat on their face because their traditional skill-set no longer stands up to what the market demands. Read the rest of this entry »

This is the third post in our series from the C&binet conference on what the government should do about hyperlocal. Highly developed in the US, Rachel Sterne from GroundReport presented four types of hyperlocal news models.

US Hyperlocal News Market –

Whether networked or single locality journalism, hyperlocal start-ups all have some sort of editorial position and a hierarchy and production system which favours skilled editor roles. The voluntary start-ups often have an authentic and raw feel, but can be inconsistent in maintenance (thus professionalism) and attract small audiences. Hyperlocal sites which have a media parent, such as the recently launched Guardian Local and Associated Press’ Local People sites provide an instant audience, content pool, and access to the technology and resources, but can lack innovation which is prohibited by the internal politics of the media legacy of the publisher which need to be followed.

Models from the US showed how giving content providers (who write and upload articles voluntarily) a platform to publish content rewards them with being pitched next to writers on a site which give them credibility and an impetus to work hard. Similarly deputised editors will work on the basis they feel privileged to have access and control over content. GroundReport and The Huffington Post are good examples of this.

The final slide in the presentation on hyperlocal models shows government funded sites while delivering high quality of coverage would gain limited audience and less sustainable.

This is the second in our series of blogposts on the C&binet conference in London which took place this week. Our first sesssion was introduced with a presentation from Enders Analysis (below) about the state of local media from the newspapers’ perspective. The numbers were pretty harrowing but largely expected.

The second slide shows from 2001 circulation numbers from regional and national news started to decline. And yet slide three shows how comparatively little time readers spend online than they do reading newspapers – so is less news being consumed all round?

Far from it, was the consensus from those at the conference. News is being consumed today more than ever. But the relatively little time readers will spend skimming across webpages is no incentive for advertisers to migrate online – hence the combination of the digital revolution and the recession has meant job cuts and a number of regional papers no longer able to continue.

Read the rest of this entry »

Prominent voices in the hyperlocal debate gathered at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport today to talk about the changing landscape of news and media and, if anything, what the government should do.

Arranged by Minister for Creative Industries Siôn Simon, and chaired by CEO of GroundReport Rachel Sterne and founder of Talk About Local William Perrin, the conference – called C&binet Seminar – was a collision of talking heads about their experiences and thoughts on the state of local and national news and their plans or predictions for the future of journalism. Those in attendance included Editor-in-chief of The Guardian Alan Rusbridger, Editor of Citizen Journalism at The Huffington Post Matthew Palevsky and Paul Bradshaw from Birmingham City University’s MA in Online Journalism (see a full list of attendees below).

Sessions focused on a number of areas in the debate, introduced with a presentation from those with particular knowledge of a field, and were followed by passionate discussions with attendees drawing on their own research and experiences. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the heated debates which took place at the Talk About Local un-conference ‘09 – a day designed to bring together hyper-local bloggers from across the country to discuss common issues, problems, share ideas and talk about the future – was how council press officers treat local bloggers.

For example, in Sarah Hartley’s recent article for the Guardian, Stoke Council’s head of PR and communications, Dan Barton, said bloggers were excluded from press breifings and the press table in the council chamber. He said:

Opinion should be encouraged but we do draw a distinction between what is news otherwise we are in danger of de-valuing the role of journalists.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tom Harris, MP is musing about how newspapers charging for online content will effect bloggers:

a staple of political blogging is the external link to a news site. Guido has his “Seen Elsewhere” widget and almost all of the PoliticsHome homepage is links to features and news articles in the dailies.

What happens after all these newspapers start restricting access to paying customers? Will bloggers have to assume their readers are subscribers to the external sites we link to? Those who regularly include links in their Twitter feeds, or who regularly follow such links, will face the same problem. As will those who rely on Google Media Alerts to flag up news articles on specific subjects.

Tom’s thinking of this as a potential problems for the bloggers.  However his last sentence above shows how much of a problem it is for the newspapers.  If the system they use makes people  reluctant to link to their website, then surely the newspapers site will be less likely to show up in search.

Other newspapers writing freely and openly about the subject will get the links, as will other blogs, as will people like politicians who’ll be saying their own things on their own sites.  The New York Time’s David Carr hinted that people will be bookmarking new news sites, but the links problem is surely even more fundamental. It is the start of a spiral of decline, isn’t it?

Of course Murdoch and his team may have had a uniquely brilliant new thought about this and the paid for content problem.  A cunningly brilliant  idea that hasn’t yet occurred to the tens of  thousands of people who’ve been worrying about this for many, many years.

If they have then that is content I would pay to read. Once.

Birmingham Post on help Me Investigate

Whether it is the social media surgeries, the grassroots channel podcast or Be Vocal I’ve always been interested in helping active citizens find new ways to collaborate and communicate.

So it is with Help me Investigate, a site I’ve helped establish alongside Paul Bradshaw (who had the original idea) and Stef Lewandowski (who’s building our prototype site).

Help Me Investigate allows people to ask civic questions and work together to find answers. Since it emerged into life a couple of months ago people have sought answers to questions ranging from:

• “Why wont’ Birmingham City Council hand over the running of Lightwoods Park to Sandwell Council”
• “Help me investigate why my doctor has an 0845 number”
• “What is the tracking process for petitions handed into Birmingham City Council.”

The site feels quite Birmingham centric at the moment simply because we are experimenting using questions about the place where many of us live. As the site evolves that will change.

Who pays for this?

It is funded by Channel 4’s 4ip fund, Screen West Midlands and Advanatage West Midlands and it’s launch attracted interested from the mainstream media. The Guardian summed it up like this:

Rather than a publishing platform, the site is a tool that could equally benefit news organisations and the public; it follows the MySociety mould of successful activism sites like TheyWorkForYou and FixMyStreet.

“Journalists think investigative journalism should be very secretive, but [HelpMeInvestigate] has to be seen to be owned by the community than by journalists because that puts off the public. People can contribute their expertise to answer specific questions, and journalists with no resources could use the site to call on the community for help.”

Today the site, still in a private experimental phase, saw it’s first spin off mainstream media news story.

The Birmingham Post runs an HMI story on Parking Tickets.

This morming the post ran this story about how HMI had found the worst street for parking fines in Birmingham.  The story began here, with a question from Heather Brooke:

Help me investigate on which Birmingham Streets are the most parking tickets issued?

It’s an interesting HMI question because it is about something which bothers many  of us, but it’s also specific and local.  It’s also a classic local newspaper question, but what thye may not take the time to ask.

The next stage was  a freedom of information request, which you can see here on MySociety’s brilliant WhatDoTheyKnow service, which makes FOI requests public and easy to make.

When the information finally arrive in three files another user of the site stepped into to help. Neil Houston likes messing around with spreadsheets (part of the point of Help me Investigate is to allow people to play to their strengths).

He quickly established the 10 worst places to park for ticketing were:

•Alum Rock Road, Washwood Heath (3,995)
•Stratford Road, Sparkhill (2,418)
•Corporation Street, city centre (1,748)
•Alcester Road, Moseley (1,545)
•Waterloo Street, city centre (1,455)
•High Street, Harborne (1,391)
•Gas Street, city centre (1,083)
•Whittall Street, city centre (1,022)
•St Paul’s square, Jewellery Quarter (1,008)
•Dean Street, city centre (978)

Neil normally blogs about food, so even though he wanted to right about this he didn’t want to contaminate his normal blog.  He borrowed some space on Be Vocal to write this piece, including the observation that:

it’s surprising to see that the warden BM739, issued 5,080 tickets.  The next ‘top’ ticketer issued 3,559.  This shocked me, as that’s a LOT of extra tickets by BM739.

Tom Scotney at the Birmingham Post started to use his papers position to seek explanations for the figures from the council, and this morning he posted the article including explanations for these questions:  1/2) Why is Alum Rock Road the most ticketed area in Birmingham?
3) Why did the number of tickets given out rise significantly over the last full recorded year?

So what do I make of this?

• Thanks to the Birmingham Post for running the story and more importantly sharing credit for the story. It’s important for news organisations to get used to being open and generous with sources.
• It’s good to see citizens and journalists (who are also citizens, I know) collaborating with each other to get to the bottom of something
• This one set of data has already triggered new questions about car clamping and could lead to a  flurry of similar questions across the country.

The other thing to remember though is that this may not be typical of what happens on Help Me Investigate. This is a question which has general interest, hence useful for a mainstream news organisation.  Many of the questions though may be, on the face of it,  more mundane and more about how thre system works or perhas problems that are very very local.

For these the collaboration could involve public servants using the questions as a means to improve the work they do.  At least let’s hope so.