Crowdsourcing Big Society in South Holland

I’ve written a couple of times about the WordPress based ideas crowdsourcing tool we’ve been working on at Kind of Digital, which is called CiviCrowd. We’re delighted that it’s now being used out in the open by South Holland District Council, to find the ideas people have to improve their local community.

Ideas are entered by users using a simple online form, moderated, and then when published others can comment on them, rate them and share them on their own networks.

Part of the driver for this project is that all councillors in South Holland now have a designated ward budget to spend on local projects. This site is seen as being a key way of getting people to share those ideas in a simple and straightforward way.

There are already a bunch of ideas on the site, and that’s before it has been promoted in the Council newsletter and the local paper – that should be happening in the next couple of weeks.

If there’s anyone else out there that could use a site like this – you know where I am!

Quick update

Apologies for the lack of updates here. I’ve been very busy with work, and travelling about the place. Also been writing stuff for elsewhere, and it would appear I only have a finite number of words in my head at any one time.

I do have a couple of things to point people to though.

Firstly is the great content that is going up on the Public Sector Web Network site. Plenty of great stuff on channel shift as well as social media usage. Also don’t forget the conference in Scotland and the upcoming digital engagement workshop in Wales.

Second, I blogged recently about a WordPress based idea sourcing tool. This is called  CiviCrowd and there is a very simple site set up to explain it in slightly more detail now up. Our first project is also very nearly live, and next week I should be able to blog about it, and of course encourage you all to get involved.

Further to that, I am having some very interesting conversations with various councils about how the platform could be deployed to help increase citizen participation in local democratic activity. If this sort of thing might help your organisation, do get in touch.

Thirdly, there is still time to sign up for the digital engagement for community safety workshop I am helping Christine Graham to run in Peterborough on 18th July. More details and booking here.