David Wilcox on social media, engagement, collaboration
ABOUT
Mainly about engagement and collaboration using social media and events, with some asides on living in London. More about David Wilcox and also how the blog started.
While at the February 2008 Circuit Rider conference in the UK, I introduced Matthew Edmonson to Nick Booth on the basis that both of them had an interest in open collaboration. To capture the conversation I gave Matthew the camera - and after a shaky hand-over it worked really well.
I came back to find Matthew and Nick having a fascinating conversation about how capturing conference archive material, and making it available for editing, could create a new non-hierarchical experience for participants and others who couldn't attend. Of course, not all organisers will go for it ... because they want to protect and assert their brand.
A new UK initiative for web-enabled social innovation was born yesterday evening in the time honoured way: some inspiration from our friends in the US, mixed with beer and sandwiches in the upstairs room of a London pub.
The result was a decision to set up Netsquared in the UK, loosely based on the US Netsquared conference and community, which has now led to a host of meetups and other activities through which geeks and activists find common cause and do good stuff for social benefit.
As I wrote earlier, there has been quite a bit of activity in recent months in the UK on social media for nonprofits. Last night's event stemmed from Dan McQuillan's ideas for a European Netsquared, and matching enthusiasm from the chief executive of the Charity Technology Trust William Hoyle, who had also been to the States and met the N2 folk.
William took Dan's earlier call to action one step further by offering us free refreshments in the Newham Arms, Fitzrovia. Among familiar faces were bloggers Nick Booth, Steve Bridger, Steve Moore, Michael Ambjorn, Paul Miller and Simon Berry - remarkably fresh after his recent 1230-mile ride. So no shortage of ideas. We talked about organisating an event, running competitions to stimulate innovative projects, informal meetups and much more.
After a futile attempt to capture conversation in the hubbub of the room, I pulled William off to the pub kitchen, where he provided a very coherent summary.
The focus of discussion was not just about how nonprofits could use Web 2.0: in fact Dan - who has recently left an international charity - went so far as to say "the Third Sector is broken" ... I think. I'm sure he'll correct me if that's an overstatement. While some people felt social media could help in fixing, others of us were more interested in the new set of values and ways of doing things bubbling up around social media, unbounded by historic notions of public, private and nonprofit sectors. We talked about whether the focus should be on enabling organisations, supporting causes, promoting new methods and processes of innovation. Hopefully all of them.
The gender-balance was a bit better than my initial list of bloggers suggests. I'm looking forward to finding more about Nathalie McDermott's Onroadmedia - a social enterprise that "delivers training in podcasting, video blogging and social networks to marginalised groups and organisations so that they can have their say about the issues at the heart of their communities", but there's some way to go on balance. Why is it different in the US - where Beth Kanter, Michele Martin, Britt Bravo - to mention only a few - do such wonderful stuff? Maybe Devon-based Laura Whitehead, who wrote recently on this, would have been along if she were in town. (Which raises another point ... how not to be London-centric. We came around to "N2 in the UK" as a working name - a sort of initial convening brand - to suggest N2-ish activities could pop up anywhere in the UK and and hopefully elsewhere in Europe. Just like the Web - these days people and organisations are seldom just in one place.)
Notwithstanding the desire not to be too London, there was a feeling that this is a hot place for technology innovation at the moment. Paul Miller was lyrical about the experience of the School of Everything crew at Seedcamp. Steve Moore reckoned we could stage something next year in London to equal or better the Reboot or Lift conferences.
I got the feeling that N2 in the UK has legs ... not just because of the ideas developed, but because of the style and spirit emerging from those present ... open, generous, and unbounded. William's beer and sandwiches helped a lot. I particularly liked the fact that he chose the Newman Arms because that was where, some years back, he met his wife when she was supporting her studies by working behind the bar. A bit of real life rooting.
When I left, discussion about next steps was focussed around what the Facebook group will be called. I'll post an update ... but if you are in FB with any friends in the field, I've little doubt you'll get an invite. Do find me there. Otherwise I'm sure William would be glad to hear from you at CTT. There's also an earlier n2eu wiki with more background on Dan's ideas, and a mailing list.
Update: There's now a Facebook group Netsquared - Newman Arms
Before the web became live, offline people would chastise those online for paying too little attention to friendship, sociability, introductions and the warm feelings and relationships engendered by a good get-together. I think we may be coming full circle, and our social networking places like Facebook have lessons for those organising face-to-face events. Particularly if they are about Facebook and the use of Web 2.0 social media for campaigning.
These thoughts were prompted by a meeting last night organised by Amnesty International at their London HQ, as part of a bigger launch. As the Guardian reported earlier:
The group was launching a campaign, Unsubscribe, to highlight human rights abuses in the war on terror and reach out to websites such as Bebo and Facebook, Amnesty officials said.
The campaign is the latest step into the 21st century for Amnesty, which was set up in 1961 and has traditionally engaged in letter-writing campaigns to encourage action over human rights abuses around the world.
Appropriately enough, Amnesty used a Facebook group to invite bloggers, activists, second lifers and other networkers to the event. (Warning: what follows is going to sound a bit churlish. I think Amnesty is fantastic. They do amazing work. They are in the lead with online campaigning. I have signed up to help. You can too)
Unfortunately the evening event followed the standard pattern I've found too often with think tanks and large charities.
Generous drinks on arrival, but no hosting ... so if you don't know anyone you immediately feel not part of the network. Clearly there are amazingly interesting people here, but you aren't one of them, and you probably won't meet them unless you are brash in self-introduction. Then... the meeting has a top table. On a platform. You are with the foot-soldiers in the well of the hall, waiting your turn, theatre-style, to put you hand up. There may be free wifi (as last night) ... but that usually connects you to people outside the hall, not inside.
The panel then each do five or ten minute pieces ... some well-prepared, others (by admission) off the cuff.
Fortunately the content yesterday was fascinating. We hear from Johnny Chatteron how a Support the Monks in Burma Facebook group rapidly grew to 300,000, has been used to support protect events around the world, and prompted extensive media coverage. It it providing a tremendous news feed from inside the country.
Gemma Tumelty, president of the National Union of Students, explains how a campaign on Facebook forced the banking giant HSBC to back down on graduate overdraft fees. She also used Facebook to campaign successfully for her re-election.
Kevin Anderson, head of blogging at The Guardian, gave an insider's explanation of how individual bloggers can make an impact on traditional media, exposing human rights abuses. He cited the example of camera phone images of police brutality in Egypt posted to YouTube.
A strong theme throughout was that Facebook was a terrific way to bring people together because friends introduced friends to groups - and people trusted each other. I think some Facebook functions could provide reminders on how to run engaging - rather than just interesting - events.
First, badges with space for your interests. That's like profiles.
Then group hosts to make introductions to new-comers.
The space itself can be equitable - perhaps groups on tables. That's like discussion groups.
Activity could be a mix of set pieces - postings to the wall - and the forums.
None of this is novel. For example, David Gurteen does it very well in his knowledge cafes, and provides a set of tips for participatory events.
I think that the idea behind the Amnesty event was that the bloggers among us would spread the word about Unsubscribe ... and I think we'll see more of this "blogger outreach" among campaigning organisations. I wanted to ask whether Amnesty would be borrowing techniques from social marketers who employ specialist firms to scan the blogosphere for conversations and influencers. I confess that after a bit of half-hearted hand-raising I left early, missing out on the film.
As I left, the human touch, which is what Amnesty is all about, re-emerged. One of the organisers followed me out, asked what I had wanted to say, and even recorded it. Maybe it was played back.
I left feeling Amnesty is an organisation with a compelling cause and content (of course), run by passionate people, but on this occasion anyway locked into an old-style architecture for promoting its message. A bit like Web 1.0 really.
I'll return to Amnesty's excellent online presence later - it is stunning.
Previously:
Free conference on new media and society: old-style event Tips for participatory conferences - first, think social Talking social media at an unsocial event and other events posts
At the recent conference on Futures for Civil Society I was able to capture two different (though not necessarily conflicting) viewpoints on the rather fuzzy space where we hope things will be done by individuals and organisations for the common good.
The first was from Geoff Mulgan, who is chairing a commission of inquiry into the Future of Civil Society, and other from Kierra Box, founder of Hands Up!
Geoff is a former Director of Policy at 10 Downing Street, now director of the Young Foundation.
Kierra has a modest web site, and a passion for helping other young people do things which make a difference, by following their enthusiasms, networking with others, and having fun.
In the videos I shot, Geoff talked about the strategic issues and the ways that childhood, the world of work, and media have changed. He felt that the issue of how to develop greater social civility would be a major concern ... being respectful of others, recognising their needs, being empathetic. Click To Play Also at blip.tv Kierra wanted to see more direct action: not just signing a petition, making a donation, but finding others who want to do something to make a difference. She was highly sceptical of compulsory volunteering, which she found people talking about, and many of the formal government consultations. "Patronising people who can't wait to get away from their work at 5 o'clock" sticks in my mind, but listen for yourself.
I got the feeling from both Geoff and Kierra, in very different ways, that simply more of the same from voluntary organisations wasn't going to be enough to promote a more beneficial civil society.
(What is civil society? The commission suggests three aspects: associational life, the 'good' society, and arenas for public deliberation. I like the way Common Purpose puts it in in their charter, without saying "civil society". I suppose I should know, because it's my blog title, but that's because it started at a workshop of that name. I increasingly wonder how useful the term is ... but that's a longer post).
I was glad that most of the conference was taken up with conversations around tables, rather than Powerpoint presentations. It was organised by Third Sector Foresight and the Carnegie UK Trust, who are running the inquiry.
The inquiry web site promises reports from the workshops they have been running around the country, and an analysis of these and other research should be available this month.
Click To Play Last week I was at an excellent knowledge cafe about video run by David Gurteen, where Brad Meyer, of I-T-L, was telling us about his work. He had used video to bring together two groups of people who otherwise had difficulty communicating.
I was fortunate enough to be sitting at the table with Brad, and since I had my camera with me, I wanted to capture something from him directly. But the session was about how the introduction of video cameras to a situation made a difference to the dynamics of communication. So why just talk about it ... why not do it?
I handed the camera to Jason Bates, of Beaufortes, who was sitting with us. I didn't give Jason any warning, but I think we ended up with a better interview than I could have done - plus some observations on how the experiment had changed the nature of the conversation. At Brad's suggestion, I also used a very simple technique to get Jason's persmission to use the clip. Watch the end and you'll see.
PR blogger Simon Collister writes to ask if I might mention the NKM Forum 07 running in June, where I will be able to find "what lies beyond the revolution in social media and what it means for business". Five per cent off if put a forum badge on my blog.
I'm dithering whether to spring the £245 fee, available to freelancers, and his note nudges me back to the site. Simon is moving to London to join Edelman, and is helping to promote the forum with great enthusiasm. As Simon says, the three keynote speakers are impressive:
Jason Calacanis - "Entrepreneur In Action” at Sequoia Capital, Silicon Valley’s leading venture capital firm;
Dan "We, the media" Gillmor - director of the Center for Citizen Media at the University of California, Berkeley and also at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University Law School;
Jyri Engestrom - co-founder of jaiku.com, a mobile docial software startup. He is also Founder and Vice-Chairman of Aula Network, a non-profit organisation to advance the vision of a creative society.
I respond with some doubts on the rather conventional format. Yet another event (like that at the RSA) about the conversational benefits of new media delivered mainly from the platform.
I'm torn about whether to attend, and write to say:
Yes, interesting speakers, but yet another event about new ways of communicating that is keynote - panel - Q and A? Sigh:-)
However, Simon has an answer:
Ah yes.... but this event has a live back-channel running through the day which will allow delegates to interact with panelists and join the event 'conversation' - so will be thoroughly interactive.... has that helped sway you ;)
What I’m particularly frisky about is the bootstrap effect - we’ve built a bit of a relationship online, then we enrich that relationship offline and face to face, then when we go back online it’s all been taken forward and we do more new and interesting things together… and so on… and so on… and so on….
... with a list of the events (including NKMForum) that he'll at over the coming weeks, courtesy of a press pass or fee to blog about them. I did that with the e-democracy '06 conference but have been slipping recently. Looks as if I'll just have to find fee for NKMForum 07 or feel out of it.
Anyway, Lloyd's post makes me wonder whether there is an "I'll be there if you will" web tool by which people could signify on their blogs or elsewhere their bootstrapping intentions. Sort of Meetup meets Pledgebank. That way we could get a bit of buzz going beforehand, make sure we meet at the event, carry on afterwards. Then we could say something like, bad format, but we bootstrapped our way out of it. That must be worth 10 per cent off.
While I was attending and presenting at the UK nonprofits technology conference Pathways to success yesterday, the UK government announced the invitation to bid for a £1.2 million programme to help third sector organisations innovate by exchanging experience online and off. This further fuelled coffee-time conversations about what might be needed to support any technology-related change. General conclusion: culture shift before tech adoption ... so keep it simple, small steps, focussed on real needs.
The conference was organised by the ICT Hub, which is one of six hubs funded by government under the ChangeUp programme. Others cover finance, governance, performance, volunteering, and workforce.
There were great workshops in the morning, and as the day went on I rather regretted agreeing to keynote after lunch on the role of social media. As I said in my presentation, I much prefer workshops, and chatting in groups, to from-the-podium presentation. More in line with the conversational benefits of social media too.
Anyway, you can see the presentation here, and come the time I enjoyed giving it. I'm not entirely sure how it went down with the audience, because there was such a wide range of experience in the room - some people familiar with blogs, wikis, social networks and so on, and others much less aware.
.... the point being that if were No 2.0 then you probably wouldn't get on with social media. One chief exec who was present responded by saying that she want to be Yes 2.0, but the climate in which she and her organisation operated meant she has to compete for funding, keep tight control on operation, doesn't have any slack, and has to satisfy a not-Web 2.0 set of interests. It provided a very honest reality check.
I had based some of my presentation on the excellent Third Sector Foresight report on how nonpropfits can best use social media and social networking, which was helpfully available on people's seats. At the end of the conference I was able to bring together report author Megan Griffith with Head of the ICT hub, Nicola Thompson, and Paul Webster, who works on ICT support at the National Association for Voluntary and Community Action.
I asked them how - from different local, national and future perspectives - they saw nonprofit use of social media. They all reckoned there was great potential, but as Megan in particular emphasised the challenges will come as senior staff in organisations consider how far they want to control messages centrally, and how collaborative they can be in a competitive environment. Nicola and Paul said that many organisation were still struggling with the basics - though they could make progress once this was fixed and they saw the benefits. Click the thumbnail to play in Quicktime, or here at Google video.
This led me to think more about the proposed Innovation Exchange, which ties in with the Government's desire to see third sector organisations delivering more public services, set out last December in a Cabinet Office action plan. The invitation to tender summarises the requirement:
The innovation exchange will pilot new approaches to fostering, exchanging and replicating third sector innovation, ensuring that public services benefit from the approaches they pioneer. The innovation exchange will seek to connect innovators to one another, to those who might benefit from their work, including public service, commissioners and third sector organisation, and others who might invest in their work.
It goes on to explain:
The innovation exchange will be set the following objectives: (i) Enable third sector innovators to identify possible collaborators, build networks and come together to engage in collaborative development work. (ii) Bring together third sector innovators and those who might benefit from their work to develop and prototype innovations. (iii) Support the best innovations to develop their work and to grow or to spread their innovations to other areas and organisations. (iv) Help third sector innovators to access the investments they need to support their work. (v) Develop learning on how to achieve(i) to (iv) and help generate a momentum for enhancing the role of third sector organisations as catalysts in public service improvement.
It looks as if, for the Innovation Exchange to succeed on and offline, it will have to overcome exactly those cultural barriers I heard much about in conversations at the conference. It assumes that third sector innovators are naturally keen to collaborate - and move from No 2.0 into Yes 2.0. I'm sceptical. Individuals - like the chief exec who spoke - may well be, but the current third sector climate is against them. Prior-to-contract issue for the Cabinet Office: what innovative changes might be needed in funding and other procedures to help create a more innovative environment.
(P.S. - nothing's perfect. Who wants to develop a consortium bid?)
The RSA is looking to explore the political culture and norms that the internet has been instrumental in fostering, both in relation to centralised democratic politics, and more diffuse social and civic networks, including blogging.
Our view in essence is that the high hopes of the 90s for e-democracy and new forms of on-line consultation and community mobilisation have not been met. Rather than fostering new forms of constructive engagement, dialogue and 'pro-social' community action, the type of politics most favoured by the internet seems to be conversations between fellow believers, anti-establishment cynicism and single issue mobilisation. Too many attempts by public authorities to use the web simply involved putting existing information and processes on-line.
The communication model has been vertical and mainly downward. But we think the emergence of web 2.0 offers an opportunity to revive the idealism of a decade ago. While internet 1.0 continued to reinforce an 'us' versus 'them' divide between citizens and power, we can envisage web 2.0 encouraging a rich and constructive 'us and us' dialogue in which citizens deliberate, innovate and act together.
I have signed up with the promise of these speakers:
Professor Cass Sunstein, Karl N. Llewellyn Dist. Service Prof. of Jurisprudence, Law School, Dept. of Political Science and the College, University of Chicago
Tom Steinberg, Founder and Director, mySociety and former policty analyst
Andrew Chadwick, Senior Lecturer in Political Science, Royal Holloway, University of London
I'm sure these speakers will have lots to tell us, of great value. But I am also sure that there will be even more wisdom in the several hundred people attending, and I suspect we will be rather inhibited in contributing beyond the usual question and answer sessions, and coffee-break networking.
The problem is that the RSA has a wonderful theatre-style Great Room (pictured) that is terrific for 'us' to 'them' lectures, but no good for more participatory events where everyone gets a say, perhaps with a mixture of presentation and open space or unconferencing. We'll be collected, barely connected and certainly not collective. Definitely not Web 2.0. The invitation says:
This conference will ask: How can new internet technology empower us to interact with each other in novel ways?
Daring thought: might the RSA modify its events format on special occasions, and "explore how new meetings technology can empower us to interact with each other in old ways (conversation)"? Any ideas?
Update: William Davies is promising an update on what he calls his bah humbug thesis ... may be Curmudgeon 2.0. The earlier version included:
My plea is simply that we should give serious and sustained thought to what types of cultural norms are going to be needed to make ours a civil and decent society which can respect the norms of public space, without being locked into private forms of entertainment and quasi-socialising.
One of the challenges of buzzy events is how to capture some of the conversation in a way that adds to the experience of those involved, rather than becoming a chore, and spreads the words. Matt O'Neill and I ran a workshop - well, more of a group conversation - at the recent NESTA Uploading Innovation conference, which was captured here on video by Lloyd Davis. No effort on our part ... but I didn't recall much immediately after. I wondered later if this might generally be a problem for unconferencing in some circumstances. My post led to some further discussion about expectations, preparation, even moving it all into Second Life.
Matt has just got in touch again to show me the results of a half day workshop that his outfit Activ-Media ran for the 'KIN' network, a 'subsidiary' of Warwick Business School. Participants split into four groups and addressed issues around building communities of practice, transferring tacit knowledge, the benefits of knowledge management, and the ways that people learn. You can see the results in Matt's blog post - Knowledge and Innovation Workshop: Outcomes.
However, Matt didn't leave the session with the equivalent of a set of bullet points on flip-charts - he asked the participants to produce a set of slides, with voice-over, which you can see here. Matt says it's an experiment to test his theory that if people produce something tangible together, that can be referred back to and shared with their peers, it's going to be a much better learning experience as well as a way of sharing the knowledge.
Update: Matt has more here from the Corporate Podcast Summit.
Unconferencing is term used mainly by techies to describe events where there are few presentations, many conversations, and lots of opportunities to move from group to group. If there is a free wifi connection and refreshments on tap, so much the better. It is low-cost, and relatively easy to organise if you can spread the word through e-mails, forums and blogs - hence the appeal to the geek community. It is good for people who are socially confident and favour informal learning ... but not for those who like structured presentations and a big package of stuff to take home.
But ... after all the buzz, what happens next? And does that matter? The question pops back into my mind after writing again about one of Policy Unplugged's buzzy events, this time at NESTA and focussed on innovation and collaboration.
It was a terrific mix of people ... and I think for those involved it was enough to hear some admirably brief presentations, join group discussions, and then socialise. It was free, with drinks at the end. So who could possibly complain?
However, I did hear a few people asking why NESTA was running the event, and what would come of it. I don't think there were any formal notes taken, and no feedback at the end. In this case it probably didn't matter, because staff were making the contacts they needed, and it will be very easy to follow up with other smaller get-togethers online or face-to-face.
Unconferencing can look to the more developed events methodology of Open Space for tips on how to add just enough structure. There's an explanation here, with pictures and video showing how Johnnie Moore did this at another Policy Unplugged event last year, and more here about working with PU to mix online and face-to-face.
The standard response from an Open Space facilitator to the question "what happens next" is likely to be - hmm, interesting issue, why not find some other people who want to talk about that. In addition, the event may well contain more structured opportunities to report back and develop ways forward.
All this is just thinking in progress, and a conversation with myself. Please join in by commenting below. My conclusion so far is that dissatisfactions may arise at unconferencing events if people can't answer the question "why are we here", and if those who want to take something forward find there is no space to do that.
People like Johnnie Moore, and Steve Moore - who facilitated at the NESTA event - make it look easy, and in my experience leave participants wanting more. Is that more Moore? Groan. I've just got a hunch that less experienced facilitators may start to give unconferencing a bad name. Want to share your experiences of conferences, Un or not?
If you do like more presentations, there's a different style of Policy Unplugged event at the RSA tomorrow. Oops, three posts on PU events. Need to turn to something different.
See also: Tips for participatory conferences - first, think social
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