Author: Nick Booth

Teaming up with BBC volunteers for the Central Birmingham Social Media Surgeries

Karen Slater of the BBC helps Prinith de Alwis Jayasinghe of Home from Hospital Care.
Karen Slater of the BBC helps Prinith de Alwis Jayasinghe of Home from Hospital Care. Image: Francis Clarke – click on the picture for his website.

We’ve been running the Social Media Surgery in Central Birmingham for the best part of 5 years.  Last night we took a leaf out of Manchester’s book and teamed up with the BBC.  Steven Flower and the BBC Outreach team having been working together in Salford to bring both volunteer bloggers and volunteers from the BBC together to help at the surgeries.  We did the same last night with BBC Birmingham.  19 people turned up – although we can always do with more people looking for help.

Karen Slater from the BBC worked with Prinith de Alwis Jayasinghe from Home from Hospital Care – a charity which helps pave the way for people to get home from hospital – cutting down on bed-blocking. Prinith said

“Karen taught me about audioboo and how we can record interviews with our clients. We also talked about how we could use blogging on our webpage.”

but the video gives a much better idea of what they got out of it:

Zualfqar Hussain of the Small Heath Community Forum received help to set up this facebook page

Small Heath Community Forum on facebook.
Small Heath Community Forum on facebook.

 

But this video shows exactly how he gets the point of the social media surgeries

What next?  I’ll talk to Paul Corcoran and others at the BBC about us maybe doing more of these together and get back with dates.

I think it’s good news for the surgeries because extra volunteers will help plus the pull of an organsiation like the BBC, good news for the BBC because it connects their staff with more of the brilliant people who help Birmignham tick and good news for the charities and community groups we want to support – because it helps them with social media support and new connections into the BBC.

 

 

 

Fresh start for the Central Birmingham Social Media Surgery – new volunteers from BBC Birmingham

Central Birmingham was the first social media surgery set up to support local community and voluntary orgs –  nearly 5 ears ago on October 15th 2008.

We’ve used various venues, from BVSC who generously helped with that first surgery through to the fine Fazeley Studios and for since April 2010 the wonderful Studio Venues.   So thank you to all those who have given us free space and dealt with our relaxed, rather laissez faire approach to helping the smaller bits of the local third sector with free social media help.

This month we have a new venue and some new helpers:  BBC Birmingham.  For a couple of years now one of the surgeries in Manchester has eclipsed what we are doing here (not that it’s a competition) . Steven Flower has been collaborating with the arm of the BBC that gets it’s staff involved in volunteering.  Whereas a busy Central Birmingham Surgery might see 20 people in an evening he  (and Kate Fox) are  involving  sometimes twice that.

BBC at the Mailboc in Birmingham - window with a reflection of a crane
BBC at the Mailbox in Birmingham – image courtesy of feltip1982 on flickr

So what does this mean:

  • If you are from a local community or voluntary org sign up here http://www.socialmediasurgery.com/surgeries/central-birmingham  for our first surgery at the Mailbox on 17th September 2013. You might be getting help from a local blogger – you might be getting help from a local BBC staffer – either way it will be relaxed and useful.  Do not worry if you are new to all this – we are gentle!
  • If you know someone who might like a surgery please share this link with them http://www.socialmediasurgery.com/surgeries/central-birmingham
  • If you are regular surgeon then it’s a new venue.
  • If you would like to help manage this surgery then please contact me through @podnosh.
  • If you’ve helped us in the past – thank you.

So onwards and where-everwards.

ps:  Since we started in 2008 this surgery alone has seen 309 different people through it’s doors on 43 different evenings.  They’ve used what they have learnt to create or work on a minimum of 73 different websites (I know it many more – but we have recorded the 73).   It’s one of 147 that have sprung up in some shape or form across the UK and the rest of the world since then.   Last week we tipped the 4000 mark in term of organisations and people involved.

 

 

 

OpenStreetMap and a festival of #hyperlocal and global mapping in Birmingham

I’ve just received this from Brian Pringle about this weekend’s – open streeet map event.  Birmingham will be hosting this global festival of the collaborative openly licensed map of the world.    It was back in Feb 2009 that we blogged about how Birmingham was the first city  in England  to be fully street mapped by the volunteers of Mappa Mercia.  Here’s the news release about this weekend:

——

“Hundreds of digital mappers from around the world will descend on Birmingham on Friday 6th September as OpenStreetMap brings its annual international State of the Map conference to Aston University for three days. Cartographers, mappers, software developers, outdoor sports enthusiasts, civic activists, governments and businesses with an interest in location-based data will be there.

So if you see lots of people in Birmingham over the weekend avidly photographing and taking notes, its just OpenStreetMap mappers using their spare time to improve the map of Birmingham.

OpenStreetMap is transforming the way maps are made and used. Collecting, editing and publishing geographical data with a global army of over 1.3 million volunteers creates maps with levels of detail unachievable by other means. Its data dynamically and constantly evolves — just as places do

The nine-year-old crowdsourced geodata project is powering mapping apps (Skobbler and, in places, Apple Maps), recommendation tools (Foursquare), sports watches (Leikr), classifieds (Craigslist) and property search engines (Nestoria).

Volunteers collect data that is of specific interest to their communities, which might not otherwise be collected. Mappers who edit the data have usually had personal interactions with a place or locale. They know locations intimately, making their contributions detailed, rich, and hyperlocal. This means more accurate, “fresh” maps for users and an enhanced experience which is critical for successful services. More and more startups and services are focused on providing hyperlocal  functionality and features, so hyperlocal data is a necessity. Only OpenStreetMap’s army of contributors can provide that. Traditional corporate map providers are painfully aware of this.

All of the data collected is published under an open license so anyone may use the data freely and for free. Because OpenStreetMap publishes data and not just a map, anyone can make a map to their own style highlighting whatever data they choose, and there are now hundreds in use across the world.

Local authorities are warming to OpenStreetMap: Warwickshire County Council will be showing delegates how they used OpenStreetMap for realtime publishing of their local election results. Delegates will also be hearing from the National Trust about how they’re using OpenStreetMap data.

Speakers from Ordnance Survey and IBM’s Smarter Cities project will address the conference on the  impact volunteer-collected map data is making.

Aid and development NGOs, including the World Bank, were quick to recognise the advantages of OpenStreetMap’s methods and now regularly request volunteer teams to build maps rapidly in areas of the world where humanitarian crises erupt. The Humanitarian OSM Team will be updating delegates on their latest projects in the poorer countries of the world.

“This is a golden opportunity for West Midlands and indeed UK software developers to meet the people changing the face of digital maps; and to investigate new lines of business in an increasingly mobile and information-hungry world” said Brian Prangle local organiser for State of the Map 2013.

For further information contact:

Henk Hoff henk.hoff@osmfoundation.org Skype: toffehoff  Phone: +31 6 4808 8925

Brian Prangle brian@mappa-mercia.org Phone: 0121 604 1141 Mobile  07811667653

Conference Co-ordination (live from 12 noon Thursday 5th September) 07742 011690

Background Information for Editors:

Conference commences at 0930 am Friday 6th September in the Main Building Aston University. Request press credentials at info@stateofthemap.org before 12 noon Thursday 5th September.

Full Conference Programme is here

http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Press_Kit

http://hot.openstreetmap.org/

http://www.stateofthemap.org/

Here’s a video link to a whole year of edits over the entire planet for 2012.

Watch live  updates to the map”

Taking some #hyperlocal bloggers round the Library Of Birmingham #lob2013

This week we had a very enjoyable 90 minutes taking some fine local bloggers around the new Library of Birmingham – which opens next Tuesday.

One, Catherine Munyarari who blogs at Hands on Handsworth, was – well, wowed:

When a new public library starts someone thinking about where they might  choose to study for a degree it does beg the question how else might it get people thinking.

Andy Mabbett, of the B44 Blog, looked round and he started thinking about long term archiving.  The days before a library opens might be a small piece of history, so he added a set of picture to the wikimedia commons (a remarkable place where you can put media which others can use within constraints) see Library of Birmingham Interiors – before opening and a set of Views from the Library of Birmingham.  Many of you will know that wikipedia is one of the first things that comes up when you google something – and many people search by images.  So who knows what impact these collections may have on how people view Birmingham.

Library of Birmingham - interior 2013-08-28 - 44

He also wrote a wikipedia article about one of the people we found there:

Francis Clarke – who blogs about many varied things,  posted this set of pictures on Flickr, including this of Karen Strunks.

Karen Strunks and others in a lift at the Library of Birmingham - image copyright Francis Clarke
Karen Strunks and others in a lift at the Library of Birmingham – image copyright Francis Clarke

Karen shared this video:

Of Tom Epps talking about the curious new performance area.

Lol Thurstan has been running his local blog for Sheldon for the last few months (after learning how at a social media surgery).  He’s written this fab post about his preview of the new library.

When I arrived to have to have a proper look at this building which has circular wire framing around the whole of the building, which is intended to highlight Birmingham’s famous jewellery industry, at the pinnacle of the building is a gold turret top. I was unsure whether I liked it, perhaps it was too modern for my liking; however, the more I looked at the more I started to like it.

Or take a look at Kerry Leslie’s strong images on the irrepressibly brilliant Created in Birmingham blog:

I really enjoyed walking around and seeing the new spaces. I especially liked the children’s library decorated with illustrations, the colour block book rotunda, and the rooftop terraces filled with fragrant flowers, which have already attracted lots of bees! There’s also a really good view of the Central Library from the new Library too.

Kerry is a fan of the Central Library – so visiting the new one would probably have been a little bitter (sweet?).  She’s also written about the launch events coming up from next week. Other thoughts shared on twitter:

https://twitter.com/NajmC/status/372727689293332480

https://twitter.com/NajmC/status/372751296807587840

Thanks to Becky  Bartlett for inviting us all and Tom Epps – Events manager at the Library – for his enthusiastic tour plus  thanks to all those who joined us …  any more stuff you share I’ll update here.

bloggers in the library of Birmingham
A bunch of bloggers from Birmingham in the new Library of Birmingham
Our pics are here.
Update:
Steph Jennings says here:
….that’s not even half of it – Each and every floor has the most wonderful array of seating, and nooks and holes inviting you to grab a book take a seat and loose yourself for and hour. There as 2 cafes, blue sky views from the ground floor ( no really), a host of activities for all ages and free wifi throughout.

If it sounds like I’m gushing it’s because I am!

I really did think it was a library suitable for the Birmingham of today, that people of all ages could use appriciate and take some joy in.

Francis Clarke blogged here:
In a political climate in which public services are often disparaged and viewed of as merely a safety net for people who do not have any other options, the high quality of the new library gave me hope that citizens of Birmingham will continue to believe in the value of high quality, universal public services.
Meanwhile Bournville Village blog  (originally set up by former Podnosh staffer Hannah Waldram) made it to a separate tour and has been asking the key hyperlocal question about the new library and community libraries, would it lead to ,local libraries closing:

Deputy Leader of the Birmingham City Council, Ian Ward said that three and a half million visitors are expected every year and that the new library is a “once in a generation opportunity to change the physical, cultural and economic face of the city”.

Brian Gambles said they were concentrating on how the money invested into this library would help the 39 other libraries in the city and not treat them as outcasts while ensuring that connections with them are “strongly made and strongly felt”.

When asked about the opening hours of Stirchley Library on Bournville Lane being reduced, Brian said there was no direct link between the funding given to the central library and the cuts the community libraries were facing.

Good piece from Sharika Nambiar – her first for this doyen of  hyperlocal sites.