Fortunately I rarely experience terrible customer service. But this weekend, I had one of those incidents where someone whose job it is to provide service chose instead to throw out subtle insults and avoid trying to understand or address a problem for which they are responsible. So I thought it’d be a good topic toRead… Read more »
It would have been easy to blog about the Conservative British Government’s appalling choice to muse openly about shutting down social media sites or deny access to certain users in response to the riots… but enough people have commented on how colossally dumb this is (not to mention hypocritical given that only last year BritainRead… Read more »
I recently attended a webinar hosted by GSA’s Web Manager University who is hosting a series of New Media Talks. I attended a talk by Charles Birnbaum, who is responsible for Business Development and Partnerships at FourSquare.com. on the use of FourSquare in government. He was accompanied by Jill James, social media lead at theRead… Read more »
Just a quick pimp of some of the great events we’ve got lined up in September through the Public Sector Web Network: Tuesday 6th: Digital Engagement Workshop – Wales. Find out more. Monday 12th: Digital Engagement Workshop – Birmingham. Find out more. Thursday 22nd: Social Media for Emergency Planning & Resilience – Leeds. Find outRead… Read more »
Really pleased to be able to publish this post from Cisco’s Jeremy Crump on the use of Twitter by the police, with specific reference to the recent disturbances in London, Birmingham and other cities. The widespread use of social media has been a significant feature of the riots in England over the last week. LootersRead… Read more »
This comment, posted four months ago to my blog by Jesse G. in response to this post on GCPEDIA, remains one of the favorite comments posted to my blog ever. This is a public servant who understands the future and is trying to live it. I’ve literally had this comment sitting in my inbox becauseRead… Read more »
The ridiculous proposition from the UK government overnight that access to social media for those participating in social unrest (and, yes, blatant criminality) beggars belief. The problems currently in the UK are, undoubtedly, symptomatic of a wide and deep set of infernally complex circumstances in that nation for which the seeds were sewn many yearsRead… Read more »
The Washington City Paper profiles Dan Stessel, chief spokesman for the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (DC) and the driving force behind the agency’s new social media strategy. Stessel came to WMATA in May and started tweeting almost immediately. Riders, who had been used to automated service alerts on Twitter and not much else, tookRead… Read more »
Last week, I had the opportunity to present for the Maryland Association of Counties (MACO) summer meeting along with Baltimore County Executive Kevin Kamenetz. Earlier this year, he announced that Baltimore County would be launching 23 technology initiatives and he shared a bit about their social media efforts to communicate more effectively with citizens onRead… Read more »
One little enhancement I’ve made recently to my social media training and crisis communications platform, the Social Simulator, is a domain-specific URL shortener. The idea is, since we’re simulating Twitter and now Facebook in a private environment, we really ought to offer simulation participants the ability to post short, trackable URLs like they would onRead… Read more »