Connected generation:
young people, social media &
local authority comms.
Public Sector Forums Web 2.0 Conference
30th April 2009, Manchester
A version of my slides with extra annotation, specially for reading from the web.
The original presentation was given to an audience of UK local government web
and communications people - exploring the use of social media and web 2.0

A presentation by Tim Davies: www.timdavies.org.uk
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Survey: the stats...
2007 2008
At least Carrier Name Carrier Name Carrier Name Carrier Name
Th 04/17/2008 Th 04/17/2008 Th 04/17/2008 Th 04/17/2008
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60%
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Of young people
have profiles on
SNS Carrier Name Carrier Name Carrier Name Carrier Name Carrier Name Carrier Name
Th 04/17/2008 Th 04/17/2008 Th 04/17/2008 Th 04/17/2008 Th 04/17/2008 Th 04/17/2008
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Mobile access to SNS grew by 855% last year
Young people are spending up to 2-hours a day on SNS - and even up to 6-hours a today linked into SNS in
some form... (phone, school PC, laptops etc.)
Most young people have a profile on one of the ‘big three’ networks (above) - but they may also me members of
different niche social networking sites - or sites that have social networking features

Get more stats on young people’s social media usage from:
http://is.gd/uE8K

YorkBook Signed in as LGIUALS
A social network
site has a profile
Survey: understanding SNS
and a friends list.
Because of these -
everyone has a
unique personal
and social
experience of the
sites.
In addition, these
are rich media
sharing spaces,
with space for
comments on
everything.

YorkBook Signed in as James
Behind the scenes
Social Network
Sites provide their
Survey: understanding SNS
users with many
useful features -
including action
feeds of their
friends activities on
the network.
Most networks
have in-built
messaging that
some young people
will use more than
e-mail.
Users have control
over their privacy
settings - but the
controls can be
confusing.

Survey: what are young people doing online?
www.flickr.com/photos/28859335@N00/120018144 http://flickr.com/photos/morgantepsic/176795867/ http://flickr.com/photos/andreasnilsson1976/530776998/
Keeping in Making new
Sharing content
contact contacts
Informal
learning
Hanging out Exploring identity
http://flickr.com/photos/mshades/169570194/ http://flickr.com/photos/lewiselementary/152620388/
http://flickr.com/photos/loosepunctuation/959524837/

...the same, but different...
You may think you are sending information to
young people. But you are competing for
attention in media-rich lives.
Are you communicating through trusted,
meaningful sources? Or are you sitting
alongside the latest advert from the kebab
shop?
Are your communications embedded in social
contexts? Coming from someone I trust?
Is your communication interactive?

We need to shift from...
...having the council,
with it’s well defined
boundary, over
here...
...and citizens
living
networked
lives over

...to a networked world...
...where
communication
and services meet
people where
they are...
...and where
councils are
networked inside
and out.

Make sure you know who you are trying to reach:
Children Young People Young Adults
These groups are all at different life stages: at different stages
of emotional and social development. And they are users of
different services. Different communication approaches for
each group may be needed.
But they have one thing in common. They are not ‘citizens of
the future’. They are:
Citizens Now

Identify the right level of engagement...
Supporting Outreach
(that uses the information and engagement
channels you’ve established)
Facilitating Engagement
(making sure you can process feedback and engage in dialogue)
Providing Information
(accessible information that can be remixed)

Information
Are you providing
quality data on the
services young
people have a right
to?
Are you providing it both on
official sites - and in flexible
formats so it can be taken to
where young people are?

The Plings project is a DCSF funded pilot that
aggregates and publishes information about
positive activities for young people.
Through using standard formats it can add
value to local authority held data.

Plings outputs data in these formats.
You can read more about the project on it’s
blog at http://blogs.plings.net

But that’s only really interesting because it lets us turn those
formats into media and content which we can take to the
place where young people are...

Of course - it’s crucial to put young people’s safety first in
any youth engagement work. We’ve been working on that
that too with research & draft risk assessment frameworks...
(all available for you to pick up free online of course...)
http://blogs.plings.net
http://www.plings.net

Even if you’re not working with RSS,
XML, KML and what-not - there is a
lot you can do when publishing and
preparing information for the web to
make it more likely to reach young
people...

Think networks...
People trust information
from people they know.
How far can your
information spread?
How many different
media can it
hop across?
Can you let go of your information to
let it flow through the networks?

Carrier Name
Th 04/17/2008
3G
Get free information
and advice on
housing issues.
Think 140... Benefits, dispute
resolution. Support
for all ages. This
Saturday at...
You don’t have to
Soft Button Soft Button
be on Twitter.
But make it easy
for me to share
your information
there.

Think link...
http://sns-aids-comms.practicalparticipation.co.uk/
2009/02/10/online-social-networking-and-aids-
communication/
http://tinyurl.com/snsac
http://is.gd/jgBa
Does your URL do what it say’s on the tin?
Can I fit it in a tweet?
Does it break when I send it by e-mail?

Think sharability...
Exercise:
Try sharing a page from your council website on Facebook.
Is the image right? What about the default text?
Could you improve that a bit?

Engagement
Are you
creating the
channels for
feedback
from the
web to reach
the right
people in
your
organisation?

Outreach
Are you supporting
front-line staff with
youth work or
community development
skills to share your
content online?
Check the Youth Work and
Social Networking research
for more on online outreach:
http://blogs.nya.org.uk/ywsn/

Safety: thinking about safe and sound foundations
Keep a separate personal profile. Do not use personal
profiles for work;
Check your personal profile privacy settings carefully
Know when you can, and when you can’t use SNS for
work
Provide a way of checking that your work profile is
official
Record all contact with young people through SNS in
line with your existing policies
Know who to talk to and how to react if you have
any concerns about young people’s safetyrkers.
th wo
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These guidelines
elop
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We start rting from the technolo
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the guidelines, rather th

The future: a new toolbox

The future: a transformation in democracy

The future: a transformation in democracy

Design with young
people in mind

Design with young
people as partners

Design with young
people as partners
Don’t: Ask ‘what do you want on the website?’ as if there is
no brief at all. Forget that your skills as a professional webby/
communicator are key to the success of a project. Think that
you know what young people want.
Do: Work in partnership. Remember young people are
experts at what it’s like to be a young person in your area,
today. Consult on needs. Co-design. Paper prototype. Engage
young people as researchers and designers. Talk to you youth
engagement people & get their support.

Do: great things :)

So, to recap:
Support and enable
Outreach
Engagement
Information

And if you want, feel free to use any of the bits and
bobs I’ve been sharing from my research & work at:
http://www.timdavies.org.uk
and
http://www.youthworkonline.org.uk
tim@practicalparticipation.co.uk
@timdavies