Tuesday, March 02, 2010

Social media nightmares

Inventorspot has compiled a list of ten of the top branded social media nightmares.

These are situations where organisations or their staff have been caught behaving badly, where social media campaigns went past the line of good taste or where organisations failed to get onto social media and were not able to become part of the discussion (to their detriment}.

It is an interesting list and shows some of the risks involved in social media - including the risk of not becoming involved.

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Monday, March 01, 2010

Australian Government endorses WCAG 2.0 - stipulates compliance by 2015

Finance Minister Lindsay Tanner and Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities Bill Shorten issued a joint media release last Tuesday 23 February confirming that the Australian Government had endorsed the W3C's latest accessibility standard, Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 (or WCAG 2.0).

The media release also indicated that the Minister and Parliamentary Secretary are stipulating that all (Australian) government websites adhere to these new standards by 2015. Given it took

The Government is preparing a National Transition Strategy for the move, however there's plenty of resources already available on the web about how to switch to WCAG 2.0 - as the new standard has been out for about 14 months.

I am hopeful that government professionals responsible for the design, technical and content changes and strategies will work together across agencies to build their knowledge and expertise on the topic - we are all in this together and there are a number of highly experienced accessibility experts dotted across the public sector.

Perhaps this is an opportunity for AGIMO to expand its Web Publishing Guide Blog to encourage cross-government professional discussion on the topic of accessibility and implementing WCAG 2.0.

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Sunday, February 28, 2010

How governments can use gameplay to educate and upskill a community

I'm a big fan for the use of gameplay to encourage people to explore concepts, test ideas, build skills and model behaviours while generating awareness - however it is a tool that I have not seen exploited anywhere near to the extent it could be in government or most commercial organisations in Australia (and yes I have some ideas....)

The World Bank is about to launch a very interesting online game, Urgent Evoke, that encourages people to 'make a different', solving real social problems around the world - in a simulated form.

To quote the game's blog:

This is not a simulation. You are about to tackle real problems.

Food security. Energy. Water security. Disaster relief. Poverty. Pandemic. Education. Global conflict. Human rights

Welcome to the Evoke Network. Welcome to your crash course in changing the world.

To understand how this game works and the value it provides, see the Episode 1 video below.

EVOKE trailer (a new online game) from Alchemy on Vimeo.


The game launches on 3 March (but is open for preregistration now) and will offer a series of challenges - the first involving an imminent famine in Japan. Missions and quests will be available to help solve these challenges and if it is like previous alternative reality online games of this type, players will be required to research, explore real (and fake) websites, video and other material, following trails of clues to find a solution.

People who complete all of the 10 challenges in 10 weeks will be able to claim the honour: Certified World Bank Institute Social Innovator – Class of 2010.

Top players will earn online mentorships with experienced social innovators and business leaders from around the world, and scholarships to share their vision for the future at the EVOKE Summit in Washington DC.

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Saturday, February 27, 2010

Victoria launches App my State competition with $100,000 in prizes

The Gov 2.0 genie is well and truly out of its bottle in Victoria, with the Victorian Government recently advocating that the majority of Victorian public sector information be released for reuse under Creative Commons licensing.

Their latest initiative is the App my State competition, which builds on the (currently running) Apps4NSW competition and last year's Gov 2.0 Taskforce Mash-up Australia competition.

Victoria's competition is a little different from the others in that it doesn't require entrants to use Victorian public sector data (although around 100 datasets have been released for use) - entrants can use national and other publicly available data, produce applications without using this data that are useful to Victorians or even simply submit ideas, which broadens the competition beyond programmers (a very good thing I believe).

Also, unlike Apps4NSW, all the entrants are published online - a very good thing and in keeping with the entire approach to government transparency.

The one limitation I'm a little disappointed about is that everyone submitting an entry must be Victorian - which limits the scope of sourcing innovative ideas from around Australia and even around the world. I don't believe past Victorians can enter either - which leaves me out.

Regardless of this, it is great to see the Victorians getting behind innovation and I wish them all the best in this competition. Maybe it will become an annual event...

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Wednesday, February 24, 2010

ASIO advertising jobs on Facebook - is your department using social media in recruitment?

I was checking my Department's week-old Drinking Nightmare Facebook Page from home the other day and noticed that besides it up popped an ad for ASIO, inviting me to learn more about being a Survelliance Officer.


This was the first time I'd seen ASIO advertising on Facebook - or for that matter any Australian government job ads on the site (though it's entirely possible there are many I have not seen).

It did give me a positive feeling that Australian government agencies are beginning to grasp some of the opportunities in tapping into social media communities for recruitment purposes.

Social media is a growing area for human resources professionals to use in recruiting and re-recruiting staff, as Michael Specht, possibly Australia's leading advocate in the area, would agree.

If you are interested in using social media in recruitment, but don't know much about it yet, this is a useful (free) eBook to start with: User’s Guide to Talent Recruitment through Social Media (PDF)

Recruitment 2.0 anyone?

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