Anyone heard of this? STF doesn't appear on the list.
http://lno-unconference2010.eventbrite.com/
London Neighbourhoods Online Unconference, 2010
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jasonwebber
- Posts: 12
- Joined: 2 Feb 2009 15:43
- Location: sydenham
Re: London Neighbourhoods Online Unconference, 2010
Me, because I haven't replied ... <stirring intray>
Admin
Admin
Re: London Neighbourhoods Online Unconference, 2010
I went to another event they held last week, and was encouraged to register for this ... but it looks as if I did not react in time. In the meantime, at doubtless excessive length, my thoughts on the event I did go to below ...
Last week I went to a free event organized by Networked Neighbourhoods - http://networkedneighbourhoods.com/ - called 'Community Organising: what contribution local online?' with the following preamble in its publicity:
To return to the actual event - it was mainly about ‘civil social networks ’ – which means us, dear Sydenham Town Forum reader. There’s a list of a wider category of neighbourhood sites here from an organization represented by one of the attendees http://openlylocal.com/hyperlocal_sites, and although we’re not on it, I assume this is because Admin hasn’t submitted it. Nor is SE23.com, but Brockley Central and EDF are – and a whole lot of rather less vibrant sites which probably don't count as 'civil social networks' according to the Networked Neighbourhood's categories .
The lead speaker was someone over from the US who is clearly a name in the area – Steven Clift – see http://www.stevenclift.com/. Lots of interesting stuff about setting up hyperlocal sites, which is what they seem to be called over there, and getting the governance right, for example moderation standards. I'm not sure if this had too much to add to the lively discussions of moderation on this site, restating as he did that you can’t have pre-moderation, and that their value is as a place where unlike minds meet. On the other hand, he didn't like aliases, since they encouraged people to be offensive, placing an unfair burden on the moderator. But from something another contributor said, it sounds as if in the UK there are certain groups who are professionally barred from contributing to such sites, so have to use an alias, so I don’t think this can change. But respect please for moderators dealing with trolls.
But what are such sites for? For Steven Clift, they are for local democracy rather than providing direct services – the example he gave was paying taxes on line. If you read the quote from the meeting’s organizers above, however, the question was more ‘how can they be used?’ I don’t actually object to policy makers having such an agenda, in the same way I have no blanket objection to a print newspaper existing partly to enrich the proprietor / shareholders. Just as long as they work. However, I think there was a general problem with the discussion, which was that it missed the motivation for successful local sites – which is to be interesting: for readers, contributors and administrators. I found a presentation on the Network Neighbourhoods site from Mark Collins, the person who runs EDF offering as a ‘factoid’ “It’s a hobby”. Exactly.
At one point I floated favourite idea of mine for marking local issues on a map, and having windows pop up taking you to a page with run downs on the background and what the current situation was. One of the speakers said this made him wince, I think because of the danger of stigmatizing an area. I can understand this, but I think the citizen led web genie is out of the bottle, even if this particular manifestation hasn't yet appeared. In fact, the objection was similar to some I have been told of to the LoveLewisham site – that having pictures on line of fly-tipping and graffiti may reinforce negative impressions of an area. Indeed, but such delicacy might get in the way of doing anything about it, and it has to be better for a local authority to be on top of the problem, and seen to be, rather than seeming to wish a problem away. That my idea should make the speaker wince suggests a policy-maker view of the world, which doesn't quite get what citizen-led sites are about.
Another new bit of jargon I learned was ‘co-production’ – which means getting things done by a Council and citizens working together. It’s a nice idea and it could be what’s needed with the scale of cuts to local government budgets we face. In this context, it surely means using sites such as ours for putting across Council messages, rather than say Lewisham Life and other parts of the Council comms budget. If so, I suspect it will require some cultural shifts, with local government initially approaching it as they would existing social enterprises and charities they fund to deliver services more cheaply and flexibly than can be done by full time council staff. However, 'citizen led' means they will be dealing with rather different beasts, which don’t actually need the Council’s money – and in any case the Council will have less money to offer. So Councils will be dealing with a new and quite difficult negotiating partner; difficult not because they want to be – though Councils may often see it that way – but because they can’t be asked to sign some service level agreement.
At this point my crystal ball seems to be getting cloudier, because what happens will depend so much on the individuals involved. However, I think commercial considerations will come into it, because the more seriously sites such as ours are used, the more organisation and financial strength they will need. I suspect many will feel very uncomfortable with this view – but they should not be alarmed; the nature of a citizen-led site is such that a crass, insensitive commercialisation would kill them, so the ones that are run by people who know what they are doing are unlikely to fall into this trap. Many commercial interests will find it as hard to adjust to citizen-led site as Councils, and want to be able to moderate out any negative comment, but marketing companies are on the case – try googling 'hyperlocal marketing' for a flavour of this future. As citizens, I think we need to be ready, and Councils and policy-makers need to be ready too. As citizens, we have our commercial interests – how we make a living, how we spend our income - so we should be able to understand.
Last week I went to a free event organized by Networked Neighbourhoods - http://networkedneighbourhoods.com/ - called 'Community Organising: what contribution local online?' with the following preamble in its publicity:
It sounded like an interesting meeting, and it was – although somebody mentioned to me that most of the other people there knew each other, and afterward I wondered if for them it was just going over the same old stuff. Also, eventually I came to feel the discussion was missing the commercial aspects; it was almost as if those there did not see business as part of civic life. Or maybe that was another conference, for which I'd have had to pay to attend.What are the policy and practice implications of stimulating local online activity? What are the winning arguments for policy makers to support active citizens and community development workers in getting local sites set up and buzzing? And what would practitioners have to do to make stuff happen?
To return to the actual event - it was mainly about ‘civil social networks ’ – which means us, dear Sydenham Town Forum reader. There’s a list of a wider category of neighbourhood sites here from an organization represented by one of the attendees http://openlylocal.com/hyperlocal_sites, and although we’re not on it, I assume this is because Admin hasn’t submitted it. Nor is SE23.com, but Brockley Central and EDF are – and a whole lot of rather less vibrant sites which probably don't count as 'civil social networks' according to the Networked Neighbourhood's categories .
The lead speaker was someone over from the US who is clearly a name in the area – Steven Clift – see http://www.stevenclift.com/. Lots of interesting stuff about setting up hyperlocal sites, which is what they seem to be called over there, and getting the governance right, for example moderation standards. I'm not sure if this had too much to add to the lively discussions of moderation on this site, restating as he did that you can’t have pre-moderation, and that their value is as a place where unlike minds meet. On the other hand, he didn't like aliases, since they encouraged people to be offensive, placing an unfair burden on the moderator. But from something another contributor said, it sounds as if in the UK there are certain groups who are professionally barred from contributing to such sites, so have to use an alias, so I don’t think this can change. But respect please for moderators dealing with trolls.
But what are such sites for? For Steven Clift, they are for local democracy rather than providing direct services – the example he gave was paying taxes on line. If you read the quote from the meeting’s organizers above, however, the question was more ‘how can they be used?’ I don’t actually object to policy makers having such an agenda, in the same way I have no blanket objection to a print newspaper existing partly to enrich the proprietor / shareholders. Just as long as they work. However, I think there was a general problem with the discussion, which was that it missed the motivation for successful local sites – which is to be interesting: for readers, contributors and administrators. I found a presentation on the Network Neighbourhoods site from Mark Collins, the person who runs EDF offering as a ‘factoid’ “It’s a hobby”. Exactly.
At one point I floated favourite idea of mine for marking local issues on a map, and having windows pop up taking you to a page with run downs on the background and what the current situation was. One of the speakers said this made him wince, I think because of the danger of stigmatizing an area. I can understand this, but I think the citizen led web genie is out of the bottle, even if this particular manifestation hasn't yet appeared. In fact, the objection was similar to some I have been told of to the LoveLewisham site – that having pictures on line of fly-tipping and graffiti may reinforce negative impressions of an area. Indeed, but such delicacy might get in the way of doing anything about it, and it has to be better for a local authority to be on top of the problem, and seen to be, rather than seeming to wish a problem away. That my idea should make the speaker wince suggests a policy-maker view of the world, which doesn't quite get what citizen-led sites are about.
Another new bit of jargon I learned was ‘co-production’ – which means getting things done by a Council and citizens working together. It’s a nice idea and it could be what’s needed with the scale of cuts to local government budgets we face. In this context, it surely means using sites such as ours for putting across Council messages, rather than say Lewisham Life and other parts of the Council comms budget. If so, I suspect it will require some cultural shifts, with local government initially approaching it as they would existing social enterprises and charities they fund to deliver services more cheaply and flexibly than can be done by full time council staff. However, 'citizen led' means they will be dealing with rather different beasts, which don’t actually need the Council’s money – and in any case the Council will have less money to offer. So Councils will be dealing with a new and quite difficult negotiating partner; difficult not because they want to be – though Councils may often see it that way – but because they can’t be asked to sign some service level agreement.
At this point my crystal ball seems to be getting cloudier, because what happens will depend so much on the individuals involved. However, I think commercial considerations will come into it, because the more seriously sites such as ours are used, the more organisation and financial strength they will need. I suspect many will feel very uncomfortable with this view – but they should not be alarmed; the nature of a citizen-led site is such that a crass, insensitive commercialisation would kill them, so the ones that are run by people who know what they are doing are unlikely to fall into this trap. Many commercial interests will find it as hard to adjust to citizen-led site as Councils, and want to be able to moderate out any negative comment, but marketing companies are on the case – try googling 'hyperlocal marketing' for a flavour of this future. As citizens, I think we need to be ready, and Councils and policy-makers need to be ready too. As citizens, we have our commercial interests – how we make a living, how we spend our income - so we should be able to understand.