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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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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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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If you are a communications professional who chooses not to use social media, will you have a job in ten years?

I'm beginning to see more and more organisations and their various advertising and PR agencies look seriously at social media as a core communications channel for their campaigns and other customer, client and citizen engagement activities.

This is beginning to make me wonder how communications professionals who know little or nothing about social media will continue to be able to give good communications advice to their employers into the future.

If you don't use social media, how can you critically assess its comparative worth as a communications tool? How can you help your employer avoid and rebound from embarrassing social media mistakes?

Of course there's an argument that you needn't be hands-on with a medium to know a good strategy from a bad one, however this doesn't stand up. Today's communications professionals have grown up consuming traditional mass media from an early age - radio, television and print. While they mightn't be hands-on as in running a TV channel, radio station or newspaper, they have 20+ years experience, starting from early childhood, of normalising their use of these mediums.

This level of immersion, together with theoretical and practical experience, goes a long way to help long-time communications professionals make good decisions and critically assess communications options.

However if these communications professionals aren't using social media they aren't developing the same level of familiarity with new communications channels.

Where will this leave them in ten years time, when we have university educated communications professionals who have been using social media for up to fifteen years seeking more senior roles?

Some of today's experienced communicators will move far enough up the chain so that they can rely on their subordinates to exercise this judgement. Others will leave communications altogether for other pursuits. However most will potentially find themselves unable to function effectively as communications professionals - and may face more limited career options.

If you're a communications professional aged 40-50 and expect to be working when you're 50-60, it is probably worth considering whether you should step out of your media comfort zone and start building expertise in social media - by getting hands on.

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Using Twitter to correct and shape government news stories

The White House has begun using Twitter as a tool to correct journalistic mistakes and understand the reaction of journalists to news stories, as reported in the article, W.H. messaging in 140 characters.

Over the past few months, particularly during and following the change in Federal Liberal leadership, I've been finding some of the commentary published on Twitter by Australian journalist very useful in providing insight into how they plan to spin stories.

This tempo is likely to increase this year with the various elections that will be taking place.

Given there's now over 500 Australian journalists and news commentators using Twitter (according to the Earley Edition), I wonder how soon we'll see politicians and government departments using Twitter to release or correct news stories.

Then again, given some of the tweets from certain politicians, viewable over in TweetMP, maybe they are doing it already.

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