Corporate media learns collaboration
Rob Paterson's blog has a fascinating post about a St Louis public TV station apparently getting to grips with the role of old media in the world of new media. KETC’s H1N1 Blog - FluPortal.org
When the mortgage crisis began, KETC experimented with blogging as “a way to get information out to the community” during critical situations, Berenc said. The station’s mortgage-crisis blog (which is still up and running) “proved highly successful,” she told me. It generated lots of audience comments and drove traffic to KETC’s site.
So when swine flu emerged, Berenc said it was a no-brainer to create another blog “as part of an overall strategy to connect people to information on-air, online, and in the community.” To get started, KETC “convened a group of community organizations that have a stake in H1N1,” she explained, to solicit advice on “how to connect people to trusted resources.” The group included people from the city and county health departments, regional school districts, the United Way of Greater St. Louis, and the American Red Cross, St. Louis Area Chapter. Using their input, the station created a Wordpress site and started a group blog. KETC’s web coordinator vets posts written by staff, interns, and the Red Cross.
Although KETC doesn’t have stats yet on the success of the H1N1 blog, Berenc assured me that the station will continue it until H1N1 is no longer an issue. She believes the H1N1 page as a whole is “a prime example of what happens when public media organizations collaborate with trusted partners — the community wins.”
At the EYC conference in Wellington last month we had a couple of questions about how expert or authentic organisations working in specific social areas could be sure that the community is getting good information rather that being hijacked through Twitter or Facebook into donating to either outright scams or well-meaning, but inappropriate or ineffective actions.
This might be the answer. Of course, it will mean that your local media people wake up to their role online, which may take a while yet.
How effective are your local media in
- using online technologies to improve the quality of information they publish and
- using your expoert and informed resources to do that?
Comments open.
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December 16, 2009 No Comments
Webinar invitation: online collaboration using free tools case study
Pressure to reduce travel costs and the carbon footprint associated with flying to meetings led scientists from the Australasian Conversation Breeding Specialist Group (CBSG) to trial running a conservation planning process using free web tools.
Focused on saving the endangered mala, which inhabits Australia's dry centre, an online workshop process unrolled over a two month period from early August 2009.
The online workshop mimics a similar process typically run using face-to-face meetings. Just as important as the technology (which included Google Sites, Vyew web conferencing and Skype) is adapting processes and activities from the face-to-face world, and mentoring around technology uptake for the participants.
Caroline Lees, co-convenor of CBSG Australasia, has generously agreed to talk about the workshop process, including sharing some early lessons and reflections. Although this case study is about a conservation project the lessons have very broad applicability to any organisation wanting to trial online collaboration at low or no cost.
If you’d like to find out how to make effective use of online tools, come along to an online seminar. Find out more about webinar.
Webinar details:
2pm Monday 23 November
RSVP required. Use the contact form or email me and I will send you login information.
[Read more →]
November 17, 2009 2 Comments
Watching change happen
Some days you can get to see that something big has shifted in the way the world works. Twenty years ago it was the sudden and unexpected collapse of the Berlin Wall and when things happen on that scale seeing the change is easy, but sometimes the change needs to seek you out and slap you awake. Like this. I’ve Got Nothing: Crowdsourced Song Created by YouTubers [Read more →]
November 10, 2009 No Comments
How to deal with negative comments
Engaging with the world via online media is a great idea, its also a hazard. Actually, it doesn't matter whether your have a website, a twitter account, a Facebook page or jot, your organisation could easily find itself being talked about, and criticised, online anyway so keeping an eye on what is being said matters.
But when someone starts to unload on you, and others pile on as well, what do you do? Don't panic for a start, we all need a bit of thick skin anyway and it may not be more than a few pinpricks. But be aware, and read this from Kate Hennessy at NETT.com. How to: deal with negative comments [Read more →]
November 4, 2009 No Comments
E-engage your community – putting IT to work in an organisation
Disclaimer: as a trustee of the 2020 Communications Trust I am trying to find a way to scale up this conference and workshop programme to a national level.
Wellington IT Trust is mounting another E-engage Your community event in November for non-profit organisations to make better use of their IT investment. This is a great way to gain some practical knowledge about the role of IT in meeting your real-world objectives and mixing with a bunch of smart people who have the answers to almost all the questions you might have that start, "how the hell do we .....?" Engage Your Community - a web conference for community organisations [Read more →]
October 29, 2009 No Comments
