Tag: Brighton

“Aren’t there enough people using the Internet already?”

 

Our Digital Planet
Our Digital Planet – from Nominet Trust

Home for the next couple of weeks with @nominettrust #ourdigitalplanet

I’m just finishing the first week managing the Internet Station for the Nominet Trust’s Our Digital Planet exhibition which Podnosh are supporting as it moves around the country.  We’re helping people who’ve not had much exposure to the internet to have a go and see what else there might be for them online.

We’re on the promenade in Brighton this week and naturally only a few of those I’ve approached as they walk along have felt they needed to come in for more.  There are plenty though who want to engage in conversation about whether we should be doing it or not which is where the quotation above came from 🙂

Nevertheless, it’s extremely heart-warming to work with those who are brave enough to step inside and sit down at a laptop.  It’s like doing a Social Media Surgery but with people who have even less idea of what things are possible or how technology might fit into their lives.  I’ve helped people use Google Maps to plan family day trips, showed them that downloading and using Skype to keep in contact with far-flung family members needn’t be so daunting and today I helped a man to get his photographs off the old phone that he was carrying around simply because it had his favourite pictures on and onto his smart new Samsung from which he was already comfortable sharing to Facebook!

I’ve also had the pleasure of meeting some inspiring people from projects like History Pin, the local AgeUK group, and BeatBullying as well as Clem Wilkinson who came along to run Social Media Surgeries.

We’ll be back in Brighton from 28th-31st next week and then the exhibition all gets shifted up to Bristol where John Popham will be in charge for a couple of weeks, then I’m with it in Cardiff in early October before it goes on to Liverpool and Glasgow.

 

5 simple things a council should do to make a website work better for social media

I’ve just presented at Building Perfect Council Websites 2010 on a panel shared with Dr James Munro and his brilliant Patient Opinion and Jane Postlethwaite – and her experience of  being the social media officer for Brighton and Hove Council.

I talked, as I often do, about online civic activists, social media surgeries and the nurturing of neighbourhood level civic activity online.  The presentation is below but the 5 key points are: Read more