Author: Nick Booth

Make a film for the big city plan.

Dominc Campbel phot of Big City Plan poster Birmingham

I’ve just received an e-mail from Richard Rees at the city council encouraging me to mention the digital challenge which the council is throwing out for anyone who wants to contribute more to the big city plan process. Thanks for prompting me to do this, I meant to write something when the competition launched last month.

The council want you to use video or still photography to express your opinions about the plan.  You can win a flip camera. It’s a great idea and I would encourage you to use any combination of video, still and or audio to show what you want changing in the city centre.  How about a two minute world wind tour of your neighbourhood?

Sadly I can’t enter because the rules appear to prohibit people who are professional image makers from doing so.

If you want to take photos or make a short film then the closing date is April 20th and the rules are here.  If you want to read the big city plan (work in progress)  as the council expresses it please go here, if you would also like to look at a plainer English version please go here.

Some of you may know I took part in creating a plain English translation of the plan for the bigcitytalk site. It was mentioned as an example of the future of consultation (link to mentions of Birmingham) in the Cabinet Office sponsored Power of Information Report:

The original Power of Information report was one of the first to be re-worked and presented on CommentOnThis as an experiment.  CommentOnThis was an early innovator in reworking government consultation documents online so that they can be used more easily.   More recently a team of civic bloggers in Birmingham has translated and re-purposed Birmingham’s ‘Big City Plan’ on the web in Big City Plan Talk.

These technical developments could improve the effectiveness of policy development in consultation, but will require new skills amongst policy makers and communicators.  A plan for supporting the change needed in policy development skills should be developed by Government Skills by end 2009, with a concomitant training plan from the National School for Government.

The big city talk site saw a conversation emerge involving 274 comments.  Not sure how those comments have accounted for in the consultation report itself. The council tells us:

All attributable comments submitted to date have now been processed on our consultation database and are visible to all. As of 4 March, a total of 1,864 comments from a total of 273 contributors have been logged as follows:

Directly into the consultation portal:  719

Via e-mail:  679

Post 409

Other 57

I’m imagining big city talk would best be covered by other? What do you think?

Kirklees Council allows the public to comment on their press releases.

Steven Tuck drew my attention to this remarkable piece of openness on the part of Kirklees Council. Like other local authorities they pop their press releases online, but unlike other local authorities they give the public space to say what they think.  Have a look at this example here, it is so simple it is powerful.

I’m not alone in thinking this.  When I mentioned this on twitter this morning I got these responses:

abeeken @podnosh Brave and bold – excellent engagement! I like it; shows Kirklees has balls.

supercoolkp @podnosh Well I never. So open – and it must make folk in Kirklees really feel listened to. I wish BCC would do it – what are the chances?!

getgood @podnosh Wow, that’s something.

Social Actions WordPress plugin.

I love the idea behind this WordPress plugin from Social Action. It makes me think of Paul Bradshaw’s 2007 5w and an H idea for news organisations.  The plugin is described as:

“Related Ways to Take Action” enables you to share ways to take action based on the stuff you’re already writing about.

The WordPress plugin works by scanning each of your posts for the top three keywords and then searches for related actions from Change.org, GlobalGiving.com, Idealist.org, DonorsChoose.org, Kiva, Care2 and over twenty other Social Action Platforms. It then automatically loads the top three campaigns for those keywords at the bottom of each of your posts.

There are also extra customization features for enabling (or blocking) certain keywords, choosing platforms, and choosing action types.

“Related Ways to Take Action” makes it super easy to activate your WordPress blog for social change by sharing related campaigns, petitions, fundable projects, and more ways your readers can make a difference based on your blog content.

The “Related Ways to Take Action” WordPress Plugin is a project of Social Actions Labs and was developed by Eric Cooper.

Thanks to Alice Casey for spotting this one.

Animation for Mobile Technology: Birmingham Event.

I’ll just quote this press release including very bold use of the words spectacular (fireworks?) and unparalleled:

On 4th March, Animation Forum WM and LUCID are hosting a spectacular evening to explore the unparalleled new possibilities that stem from animating for mobile technology. The event, When Animation Goes Mobile! is free to attend and will take place at The Telford Room, Austin Court, Brindley Place, Birmingham (B1 2NP). It will start at 7.30pm on Wednesday 4th March 2009, include a break for complimentary wine and nibbles, and be followed by a Q&A with the speakers Madevi Dailly and Richard Morris. Animation Director and Producer Madevi Dailly will take animators through the practicalities of animating for mobiles, and the potential for linking mobile animation to external factors, such as the surrounding environment or the time. Here’s a short she created for 4mations last year (warning, contains strong language): Madevi will be followed by Richard Morris, Director of Video & TV at mobile animation distributors PlayerX, who will take everyone through the strategic side of mobile animation, outlining how your studio could blossom in the mobile animation market. To attend, simply RSVP to david.luke.allen@bcu.ac.uk with ‘When Animation Goes Mobile!’ in the subject title as soon as possible.

Enjoy.