Using social media in learning

A question was asked in the social media community of practice (various levels of authentication required) about using web 2.0 technology to support learning. I couldn’t help myself… Blogging Using blogs to record and share learning is a really nice…

Transformed by You evaluation

I wrote about the Transformed by You project, run jointly between Kent and Medway Councils, here. By all accounts it was a great event, and thanks to the great social reporting efforts of David Wilcox, we can all get a…

Connected Generation 2010

Connected Generation 2010 is, in the words of chief cheerleader Tim Davies: …a one-day conference exploring youth engagement and technology in 2010. Based on feedback from participants at recent training events, and on the positive response to the Beyond Twitter…

Using the places database

I was asked recently by a colleague for some information about the names and locations of local authorities in this country. I was able to respond quickly and usefully thanks to the places database, which sits on the website of…

Great blogging on #localgovweb

Two great blog posts recently on the ever thorny issue of local government websites. Firstly, Al Smith recounts his experience managing the refresh of Newcastle City Council‘s site. A remarkably honest and open appraisal of how it all went, and…

Transformed by you

Simon Wakeman has blogged about the upcoming Transformed by You event in Medway, jointly organised by Medway Council and Kent County Council. It’s a cross between LocalGovCamp and SIcamp, and looks like it will be a really cool day. Not…

LocalGovCamp London

Thursday’s LocalGovCamp in London was superbly organised by Anke Holst and her team. I was involved in one session, which was to by about internet culture and whether that’s the interesting thing local government ought to be taking on board,…

LocalGovCamp for project managers

A localgovcamp event for project and programme managers is taking place at Cheltenham Borough Council on April 27th, organised by Jon Hyde. You can find out all you need to know on the event Ning site, or on the Community…

Learning Pool in Devon

Right folks, here’s what is happening on Thursday. At 11am a networking meeting will kick off at Buckerell Lodge in Exeter. You’ll get to listen to me talk about my latest obsessions in social media and Mary will natter about…

See, local gov *can* do Facebook

One of the highlights of last Wednesday’s LGComms event was hearing about Coventry City Council‘s Facebook page. If you click to see the larger image, you’ll notice that the page has 11,321 fans (as at the time of writing). 11,321!…

JFDI vs Being Boring

Light blogging recently, I’ve been gadding about talking at a load of events – which is fun and rewarding in its own way, but doesn’t really help with getting any work done, nor with writing here. Last Wednesday I was…

On leadership

Light blogging recently, mainly because I’ve been busy talking to people and haven’t had much spare time to write here. Apologies. One of those talky things was at the Cllr 10 event, organised by the Local Government Innovation Unit, expertly…

Moronic reporting of non issues

Take a look at this story, excitingly titled on the BBC News site “Council Twitter users face rebuke“. Councillors in Cornwall could face being reported to the authority’s standards committee for using social networking sites. The trouble is, no they’re…

More ukgc10 stuff

Thanks to Graham for putting together this Wordle produced from the text of all the tweets at Saturday’s govcamp. I like that ‘people’ is the second biggest word, and that ‘good’ is nicely central. He has also made this spreadsheet…

Whither government 2.0?

Government 2.0 seems to be a well established meme in many parts of the world, but doesn’t seem to have taken root at all in the UK. I can understand why people might think that is a Good Thing –…