As I move through the processes of bringing new Web 2.0 functions into production and of educating the County’s leaders on what this technology can do for them, I keep going back to our survey and compiling the results to address the next topic. At our May department head meeting I presented information about Social Networking and Microblogging. From our survey, 36.62% of County employees see a use for Facebook or other such social media sites in their departments operations. Currently we have a County Facebook page and our Drug and Alcohol department has a Facebook page for their Youth Advisory Board. The top uses that employees recognized for Facebook were sharing information with the public, networking with peers, and receiving feedback from the public. The result for uses of Twitter within departments was lower than that of Facebook at 24.28%. We have two Twitter pages currently, Courts and the County, and are working on additional implementations in Emergency Preparedness and Vector Control. I am excited about the Vector Control implementation. Our goal with this is to have people sign up that are interested in receiving information about spraying that is going on County wide. We can provide them information about where and what is being sprayed in a timely manner.
I am continuing to work on the Web 2.0/Gov 2.0 lunch-n-learn. Thank you to all that have provided me feedback and materials. I hope to have it to a solid draft status at the beginning of the week, at which time I will share it with all of you for feedback.
This week, I am also working on completing our Digital Counties Survey response for the Center of Digital Government. I was pleased to see that there were questions related to Web 2.0 on the survey this year. Hopefully we will do well.
Bill, thanks for sharing these results!
awesome dude. thanks for sharing.
Sweet. Thanks for the post.
We have not done an official survey, but the results would more than likely be similar to yours. They see a need for a Facebook site, but not sure about Twitter at this point. For myself, I’m more concerned with how long the latest fad will last, such as twitter. Is it here to stay?
April, look at the cultural trends, not the tool. Very basic, from portals>blogs>social sites. Twitter may or may not stay, but social is a big shift that govies need to be in on.
I would agree with Adriel. Twitter itself may be relatively short-lived, but the idea behind is the trend in web technologies. The nice thing is that recreating a Twitter-esk technology would not be that difficult if it is something your users like, but does not survive. A lot of systems have the ability to produce text message updates. My brother is running the Cleveland Marathon this weekend and I was able to register on a page that will provide me updates on his progress based on an RF device on his shoes. Most of our use of Twitter at this point is one way communication, similar to this.
I’ve heard compelling arguments that Twitter is poised to be more long-lived than Facebook:
Epicenter The Business of Tech Facebook Privacy Changes Hint at a Brave New, Twitter-Like, World
Why Facebook Shut Down the Only Useful App it Ever Had
In the long run, open always beats closed.