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I attended the Australian Science Communicator's new media forum last night, participating on the panel as a Gov 2.0 Advocate, along with a distinguished group of science communicators and academics.
One view expressed on the panel was that while scientists should communicate basic science to the public, the uninformed masses should not be involved in reviewing or doing science.
This reflects views heard in other professions over the last ten years - that bloggers should not do journalism or critique journalists and that the public should be kept at arms length in government policy development as they don't know enough to provide a valid contribution (explaining why some resist the use of consultations and policy co-design is rarely used across Australian governments).
This viewpoint by intelligent and highly skilled professionals is not, in my view, surprising. Anyone who has dedicated years of their life, slogging through universities degrees, post-graduate studies and climbing the job ladder knows they have earnt the right to do what they do. Anyone who hasn't put in those hard yards is often viewed with suspicion, even disdain.
This is partly a recognition that there's 'secret knowledge' and expertise required to undertake some of this work, however it can also be partially ego-driven - experts often define themselves by their expertise as it feeds their sense of value.
The changes in the last ten years have permitted many who don't have formal learning or specific career experience to learn about and contribute in fields such as science, journalism and policy creation. This can threaten some experts (who are often quite public about the divide between professional and citizen activities)
However for many others it presents opportunities to broaden their reach, tap into wider collective expertise and to build knowledge and understanding. This in turn can lead to greater influence and better outcomes - even greater funding or profits or positive social change. Greater understanding can also reduce the fear of 'otherness' and concerns and suspicions around elitism - which have dogged certain groups, such as scientists, in recent years.
Even more than this, people who are not acknowledged as experts often can provide a different view of challenges and different approaches to solving problems that sometimes experts, who can become locked into a particular professional worldview, or lack relevant broader experience, cannot see. This can lead to breakthroughs or new realizations.
Regardless of whether individuals support or oppose this trend of 'encroachment' of 'amateurs' into formerly elite fields, the trend is real - isn't it better to harness it rather than resist it?
After all history has demonstrated the fate of organisations and individuals who resisted social trends. They generally are not with us anymore, or exist in much diminished and niche forms.
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Only professional scientists can do science, only professional journalists can do journalism, only professional policy makers can create good policy - not anymore | Tweet |
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Stop talking about engagement and get on with it | Tweet |
Yesterday I spend a little time getting involved in the ACT Government Twitter Cabinet. The focus was on Canberra beyond 2013. Lots of ideas and views exchanged. Through sheer serendipity one of my views on life struck a note with our Chief Minister, Katy Gallagher. So the next Twitter Cabinet will involve school kids.
The idea has also been picked up and supported by a few other MLA's.
Make sense strategically = building capability by the way. Which, in my view, is precisely what organisations should being doing internally.
So why am I sharing this with you?
What this practical and timely real world example illustrates that we really can just 'get on with engagement' - as opposed to talking about it. Effectively that is what the technology does. Let people get on with engaging.
And there is no reason why that same approach can't apply just as much within organisations. Regardless of size.
Monday, November 28, 2011
ACT government Virtual Community Cabinet on again today at 12.30pm - follow the liveblog | Tweet |
This is the third VCC held by the ACT government and has the theme "The Canberra you want to live in past 2013".
I'm collecting the public discussion via the liveblog below (and by RSS) - which means you can also watch the discussion here. or watch and participate on Twitter, using the hashtag #actvcc.
Note you will require a Twitter account to participate and your comments are published publicly.
Friday, November 25, 2011
This week's social media score - Public: 3 Organisations: 0 | Tweet |
This has been an insightful week for organisations using, or considering using, social media with three successive events demonstrating how far power has shifted to the public and illustrating how Australians companies are struggling to engage effectively online.
First up was Qantas with its poorly timed "Qantas luxury" promotion. Qantas launched the Twitter competition by inviting the public to tweet their idea of travel luxury using the hashtag #qantasluxury.
However Qantas appears to not have recognized that the tens of thousands of negative comments levied against the organisation since their shutdown represented a deep seated frustration and disillusionment with the company. Even though Qantas had hired four additional staff focused on monitoring social media the week before.
Within minutes of Qantas's tweet announcing the competition the public hijacked the hashtag and turned it against the company, using it to vent their concerns and frustrations at the airline.
This was picked up by traditional media and covered widely, turning a small ($1,500 in prizes) competition into what was called a national PR disaster for Qantas.
Next was Nissan, whose online competition, managed through their Facebook page, went pear-shaped when the winner of the competition turned out to be good friends with one of Nissan's staff running their social media presence.
While the competition was totally above board, with the winner selected objectively by finding the most car graphics on websites, unfortunately the winner's friendship with the Nissan staff member made it appear otherwise.
Nissan themselves were very upfront about it - indicating that while they congratulated the winner they'd have preferred if he hadn't won, but he'd done so fair and square without breaching any competition terms.
In this situation Nissan's approach did a lot to mute the concern, however it demonstrated the issue of friendship networks. If you're a staff member operating social media channels for an organisation it is highly likely you have many friends online. So what do you tell when a new company competition launches? You let your friends know online so they can spread the word and increase the competition's reach. Entirely above board, however risking a backfire if your friends can gain advantage by being first into a competition.
Third, and most significant, has been the social media backlash against the Kyle and Jackie O show following the comments of Kyle Sandilands regarding the deputy editor of news.com.au after her article about the reaction to Kyle and Jackie's TV special (which rated extremely poorly).
The backlash, much of it under the hashtag #vilekyle, has led to around a dozen companies deciding to withdraw their advertising from 2DayFM and sponsorship from the Kyle and Jackie O show - even the Federal government has now withdrawn all advertising from any show hosted by Kyle Sandilands.
Over 15,000 people have signed an online petition calling for advertisers to drop support for Sandilands and a number of people (myself included) have called for Southern Cross Austereo to let Sandilands go. Whether they will or not remains to be seen, however the loss of significant sponsors and advertisers will place significant pressure on the company to reconsider Sandiland's contract and on air presence.
All three examples above this week demonstrate different risks in social media.
Qantas failed to monitor and accurately assess the public view, selecting the wrong social media approach to attempt to rebuild its brand. Nissan made an easy misstep, selecting a competition mechanism that raised the risk of someone close to a staff member winning a prize, however by handling the situation in a proactive and robust way minimized the damage and emerged largely unscathed despite initial public concerns.
The Sandilands incident (which remains ongoing) demonstrates how public outrage can translate into the need for rapid organisational action, both through advertiser withdrawal and the attempts by Sandilands and Austereo to apologies for his behaviour (albeit fairly weak apologies that have not satisfied many online). In this case even though Sandiland's comments were made on radio, not on social media, the backlash occurred online and neither Kyle nor Jackie O, nor their employer Southern Cross Austereo, were prepared to engage with the public online response, whereas many of the sponsors and advertisers did, helping to minimize damage to their own brands.
None of these events impacted the government or public service - and in fact there's never been a significant social media disaster due to online engagement by public servants or agencies in Australia (I don't include media attacks on public servants such as by News Ltd on Greg Jericho) - however they all have lessons for government agencies to learn.
It is important to recognize that being absent or unresponsive online and in social media is no protection against public outrage (as the Sandilands incident shows), and failing to monitor online sentiment is a recipe for PR disaster (as Qantas demonstrated). However if organisations act with good faith, communicate and engage actively (as Nissan and several advertisers from the Sandilands issue did), they can minimize the impact of social media gaffes and build strong online relationships with their customers.
Thursday, November 24, 2011
In traditional organisations, innovation often appears to happens at the wrong end of a gun | Tweet |
When I think back over the most well known innovation successes over the last few years, and I am not specifically referring to the public sector, an aspect that springs out at me is how often these innovations occurred during a major crisis or due to a funding crunch.
In other words, these innovations frequently happened when organisations were placed at the wrong end of a gun.
It appears to me that often these innovations only occurred, or were allowed to see the light of day, because the pressure put on organisations by environmental or internal changes altered the perceived risk of innovating to be less than the perceived risk of not innovating - "the ship is sinking anyway, so we might as well try something different.
This raises several major concerns for me. Firstly that some organisations are incredibly resistant to innovation and can place themselves, or their management, into unviable situations by not beginning to innovate soon enough.
Secondly if the leadership of an organisation can see this conservative at work but wish to see innovation occur they may draw the conclusion that they need to place the organisation in significant distress - cutting budgets or hoping for (stimulating?) an external crisis that threatens its future viability.
This places enormous stress on individuals, with all kinds of negative consequences.
Isn't it better for organisations to proactively institutionalize innovation and change processes? Become capable and willing to change before a crisis occurs? To make innovation a key strategy for organisational adaptation rather than a last resort when system failures are already well underway?
This would involve changing the view of innovation to be an activity that is rewarded as a behaviour and activity, rather than being one that is punished, except at the organisation's "death's door".
A few organisations have successfully integrated innovation into their DNA as a core driver of their success. I hope more do so in the future and, at a larger scale, more societies as well.
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Pfft - who needs to understand social media to be a social media advisor | Tweet |
Over the last year I've observed a couple of good and bad trends in governments around Australia.
The first - the good trend - is towards the recognition that social media is a valid and significant channel for government communication and engagement. This has led to the creation of a new type of role, the 'social media advisor', separate to online communications functions (which primarily concern themselves with traditional website production and content management).
The creation of these social media roles recognises there is a difference in the skillsets needed to manage one or more static and internally owned websites, compared with curating and co-ordinating a range of fast-changing external and internal engagement channels.
However alongside this needed job specialisation is another disturbing trend which causes me significant concern.
A number of those being employed in these new social media advisor roles don't have the mix of skills required to hit the ground running. I've heard of people with little or no experience with professional use of social media being employed as social media advisors simply on the basis of their personal use of these channel and therefore presumed competence.
I don't blame the people who take on these jobs and then work hard to learn the skills they need, it is a great opportunity working in a leading edge field. However the approach raises issues for me as to whether those hiring social media advisors are as yet clear on the skills needed to perform the role - or are clear on what their organisations need to fulfil these roles most effectively.
While agencies are generally sincerely committed to the integration of social media into their engagement mix, there are few employment consultants who can help them quantify their needs, identify suitable candidates and assist them in hiring the most effective people for these jobs.
My concern is that agencies, despite the best of intentions, may end up taking more significant risks, may lose internal momentum or even face social media stumbles - as has been the case in the private sector when social media roles first began to appear.
So how do we as public servants help address potential skills gaps and the resulting risks?
I would recommend that agencies talk to each other, share their goals and discuss the skillsets they need for these roles, they should bring in appropriate interviewers to help screen applicants and begin developing a career path for social media practitioners - with roles for rookies and experienced people.
They should also directly and indirectly lobby employment agencies to upskill to understand their social media needs and build their ability to identify appropriately skilled people for social media roles.
Most of all, they should get their new social media staff across all the great work done in other agencies and in the private sector, across all the governance and advice now available and encourage them to network with their peers across government (including attending the various community events such as Gov 2.0 lunches and BarCamps).
Hopefully what I am seeing is simply part of the growth pains for social media as agencies integrate it into their DNA.
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Don't forget to register for the Gov 2.0 lunch in Canberra on Friday | Tweet |
The event will feature a presentation from Dominic Campbell, a leading UK digital government specialist and social innovator with a background in government policy, communications and technology-led change.
Learn more and register here.
Should Australia's political parties have open government and Gov 2.0 policies? (NZ Labour does) | Tweet |
The policy focuses on transparency of political offices as the core principle, but also commits the party to producing a comprehensive "Open Government Charter‟, based on a set of principles developed by NZ Labour MPs in consultation with members of the public.
- Online engagement by public servants should be enabled and encouraged. Robust professional engagement with the public benefits government agencies, public servants’ own professional development, and the New Zealand public.
- Public servants should be able to use social media in their professional role, and the government should provide protection and guidance/advice around how to do so effectively.
- Explore ways to expand the use that government makes of the Internet in engaging the public to feed into policy discussion and government direction.
- Develop a trial of online voting in local government and general elections.
- Publish the Hansard in a standard, open, parsable, format, so that it can easily be re-used and republished by anybody for any purpose
Monday, November 21, 2011
Brisbane City Council launches open data datastore | Tweet |
While not the first council in Australia to do this (with Mosman City Council leading the pack), Brisbane is the first large metropolitan council in Australia to do so to my knowledge, joining a range of cities across North America and Europe.
Brisbane has launched the datastore with the Hack:Brisbane competition and is hosting an upcoming Hackfest next Saturday to stimulate usage of their information.
Hopefully other major cities across Australia will look at what Brisbane is doing and consider its value in their own jurisdictions.
Monday, October 24, 2011
Cannot defame with a hyperlink - Canadian Supreme Court ruling | Tweet |
In the spirit of actually being in Canada, I learnt last Thursday that in a groundbreaking case the Canadian Supreme Court has supported two lower courts in ruling unanimously that hyperlinking to defamatory information is not the same as defaming someone, unless the information is replicated in the link or on the hyperlinker's site or page.
Learn more about the ruling (in a case originally brought in a British Columbia court by a Vancouver business person and political volunteer against a local website) in this BBC article, Canada Supreme Court: hyperlinks cannot libel. Yes there is a certain irony about reporting in Vancouver on a Vancouver case by referring to a British website - however I read the original story in a local (paper) newspaper.
This ruling may have flow-on influence to Australian courts, who do take some note of rulings in other Westminster jurisdictions, particularly in Common Law areas where precedents are important in clarifying grey areas in law.
The Canadian ruling, where the Court considered hyperlinks as "content neutral" (as hyperlinkers have no control over the content they link to), may even extend further to cases where links point to prohibited, but not necessarily illegal content, such as some Refused Classification (RC) content under Australia's classification for content deemed offensive but not necessarily illegal under Australian law.
Currently it is an offense to link to RC-rated content, or even to know what is rated RC - which poses a challenge for all individuals and organisations who may not realize that content they are linking to is prohibited in Australia. There has been at least one case where an Australian government agency has inadvertently linked to RC content (in a published user submission to a consultation) - which was certainly not the agency's fault.
Also as the destination content of links can change rapidly, or even appear different to users from different IP addresses, there is an ongoing risk under current Australian regulation that individuals or organisations might in good faith link to valuable relevant content which is later changed. I have seen this happen myself in a book on kids' websites with links where after publication several kids' sites were sold to adult content organisations who changed the content significantly. This could affect both defamation and RC related situations.
While I am drawing a bit of a long bow from a Canadian Supreme Court ruling to other manifestations of hyperlink-related law in Australia, it is an area that requires ongoing careful consideration and adaptation to reflect what is sound and practicable, not simply what may be popular or reflect an ideal state without recourse to technical facts.
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Traditional media insiders are the least qualified to comment on the future of traditional media | Tweet |
With the release of News Ltd's Future of journalism 'discussion' I've submitted a 'Your view' to the site which may, or may not, be published at some point in the future.
On the basis that traditional media is no longer the gatekeeper for participation in public debate I have posted my submission below.
I see a lot of the debate over traditional media relevancy and business models being very 'fiddling on the edges' stuff, attempting to use technical or legal barriers (such as copyright) to preserve an industrial era view of media which media consumers, now also media producers, are rejecting in droves.
Today any individual or organisation can create and maintain its own media platform capable of reaching 95% of Australians, and over 2 billion people worldwide.
The Internet, by merely existing, allows entrepreneurs and agile organisations to question all previous assumptions about the collection, collation, filtering, distribution and monetization of content. As a global playing field, the importance of geographic boundaries has been further diminished.
Being agile, efficient and effective is no longer sufficient. Organisations must be prepared to destroy and reconstruct themselves under entirely different models to remain competitive and relevant.
The jury is still very much out as to whether traditional newspapers, radio and television media organisations will be able to do this before they see a substantial amount of their profitability dry up.
My submission:
It is no surprise that people who work in traditional media, who have a financial and emotional stake in its future, are supportive of their organisation’s future (provided they are agile, efficient and effective).
I can see expert blacksmiths believing the same with the arrival of mass-produced cars and metalwork.
However what those beholden to traditional media cannot see is the viewpoint from the outside world.
Yes access to information is a requirement for liberal democracies. Yes quality news is a tool used to stabilize societies and promote understanding.
However there is no law of nature that states that profitability must be at the root of quality news coverage and reporting. Nor is there a causal link between professional journalism and professional news reporting – journalists, as humans, are as prone to reflecting their own biases as others and, even when trained to be objective, are at the mercy of sub-editors (where they still exist), editors and the overall political ambitions of for-profit media concerns.
Now I am not saying that government-run media (with no profit objective) is the answer. These systems bring their own control and bias issues, they still need cash and still have oversight from humans who may be influenced by political views.
Nor am I saying that for-profit, or even not-for-profit independent media outlets do not have a future. They do.
However the vast expansion in expressive capability that has been realized through the Internet has offered a second model to news gathering and reporting that will seriously challenge the biases of distribution systems with tacked on news collection and reporting facilities.
There is no reason to assume that industrial news services will continue to be the leading players in the media market – certainly the impact of the web on other industrial era centralised industries has been profound. When the means of production and distribution are diversified, some necessary changes and adaptation is required.
However those who have financial and emotional connection to the old models, while the most prolific commenters on new models, are not the gatekeepers to these new media forms, nor are they objective and impartial observers, able to assess the changes without bias.
I would challenge News Ltd and all other industrial-era news industry players to look outside themselves and their orbits (bloggers who are, in effect, news people) to the broader changes occurring in society.
We need to consider new models – perhaps the disaggregation of news collection and distribution, creating an open market for people to write news, have it submitted to, paid for and distributed by strong distribution channels, or for citizens (who are now all journalists, so we can drop the ‘citizen journalist’ tag) to be paid based on views, likes and reputation when submitting their work to an open news distribution platform.
News is no longer the news, access to distribution is the news and there is a pressing need to experiment with new approaches to opening up news distribution rather than locking it down into professional guild-like channels.
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Social media is now normal - so why do government agencies persist in treating it as an edge case? | Tweet |
As this article in Fast Company illustrates, social media is now normal, an integrated set of tools for ongoing human interaction.
We've known for several years that Australians are enormous users of social media, with Nielsen research indicating that the average Australian Internet user (and 95% of us are users based on Sensis figures) spends upwards of 7 hours per month actively using one of a range of online social networks - and this doesn't include the full range of online participation possible via forums, blogs and comments.
We've also known for several years that the community's number one preferred channel for engaging with government is via the Internet. AGIMO's research in this area has seen a steady (and predictable) upwards trend in the desire for greater online contact over the last 4-5 years.
So why do government agencies, by and large, still treat social media engagement as a fringe case, with access to these channels often restricted to a few people in the communications area and senior executives often still wary or debating how to monitor or support online contact (while enthusiastically supporting their phone-based contact centres)?
It has been interesting to watch agencies attempt to shoehorn social media and online engagement into the traditional models they are used to - one-to-one communication, with the timing and extent carefully controlled by the agency itself (and look how positively the community has regarded this form of engagement with government over the last ten years). Clearly control is an issue, as is budget and the exact context and content of messages.
However the world has moved on and agencies have to recognize and adapt, not merely tweak the corners or treat social media engagement as an edge case, for use by small groups under tightly controlled 'laboratory' conditions.
It is evident overseas how other western governments are beginning to accept these channels as core - with, perhaps surprisingly, the US armed forces serving as a good object example of how every soldier, sailor, pilot and support crew member is now regarded as a public engagement officer.
By taking the step to recognize this, then putting appropriate policies in place, the US armed forces have done an excellent job of managing the landscape changes, steps that Australian governments have, for the most part, been very slow to accept.
Today every government agency, at every level of government, needs to start by accepting that their staff, for the most part, are active online participants in their personal lives. They need to acknowledge that online channels are increasingly the source of public views and policy ideas from the community and must be accessible for staff to mine for intelligence, use to identify interesting and influential people and viewpoints and to engage actively in "robust policy conversations" (to quote APSC guidance on the topic).
Agencies need to recognize that social media and online channels are integral to their public reputation and the reputation of the Ministers and governments they serve. A view, complaint or compliment placed in a social network is equally valid to one made directly to an agency via their 'controlled' communications channels - and may be significantly more influential (or damaging) due to its public reach.
Certainly there are risks in online engagement - as there are in all communications to and with the outside world. However failure to engage online also bears risks, often much greater, of being seen to be irrelevant and ineffective, reducing the credibility of agencies and the Ministers they are required to serve. Failure to engage actively online can damage recruitment, procurement, policy development and program or service delivery outcomes in measurable and unmeasurable ways.
So agencies are really reaching a crunch point for their reputation and relevancy. Do they choose to continue to treat social media as an 'edge' activity, carefully quarantined from their everyday business, and risk becoming edge organisations?
Or do they choose to state a commitment to the use of social media and other online channels as a core aspect of their interactions with the outside world, and with their staff, then move to implement these commitments (taking the precautions necessary to make the change a pragmatic and well managed process rather than a headlong rush to catchup and survive).
This decision (integrate or quarantine) should be on the agenda at the highest levels of all government agencies in Australia today as it will soon begin to shape career prospects and even the long-term effectiveness of public organisations.
The changing face of media, communications, politics and agency engagement | Tweet |
I've just read the latest speech by Annabel Crabbe on the changing face of the media and politics and thought it worth highlighting as, to my knowledge, it is the first serious piece by an Australian professional journalist in recognizing the changing face of journalism, politics and communication (including by government agencies).
Her views embody much of what I have believed over the last fifteen years and spoken personally about at conferences and in my blog over the last five years - the traditional view of journalism and politics is being washed away, being replaced with a far more equitable, if less controllable, environment.
Give Annabel's article a read at The Drum, An audience, an audience, my kingdom for an audience.
Monday, October 17, 2011
Friday, October 14, 2011
Treating bloggers right | Tweet |
I was reading an excellent example of this the other week, from The Bloggess, where a PR agency not only approached with an inappropriately targeted form letter, which indicated the agency hadn't even read her blog, but responded to her (relatively) polite reply with an annoyed response.
The situation really escalated, however, when a VP in the PR agency, in an internal email, called her a "F**king bitch" (without the asterisks). This email was accidentally (by the VP) also CCed to The Bloggess.
The Bloggess took a deep breath, and responded politely, however then received a torrent of abuse from the PR agency.
At this point she published the entire exchange on her blog - in a post that has already received 1,240 comments, has been shared on Facebook 8,397 times and via Twitter 5,328 times.
Her comments have also been shared widely and her post read by many of her 164,000 Twitter followers.
The Bloggess's post is a good read - particularly for government agencies and their PR representatives - on how to behave appropriately when engaging bloggers, and the potential fallout when they don't.
I'm also keeping a link handy to 'Here's a picture of Wil Wheaton collating papers' for those PR and advertising agencies who send me form emails asking me to post about their product or brand promotions on my blog (and yes there's been a few in the last six months - all Australian agencies).
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Allowing your customers to codesign your services | Tweet |
However what is often forgotten is that it's not about handing over the design process, it is about sharing it as a codesign process - combining the brain power of a few internal or contracted specialist designers who don't necessarily use your products or services with the brain power of thousands of non-specialists who use or interact with your products and services, often on a regular basis.
A good example of this process was recently discussed in Inc., where Fiat crowd sourced the design of its 2009 concept car, the Fiat Mio.
The main part of this process was conducted in Spanish (as Fiat is Brazilian based), and while I watched it occur at the time, there was only a limited subset of the conversation in English.
However Fiat ended up involving people from 160 countries - taking on board over 10,000 suggestions. The website about the making of the car provides more information on how Fiat went about integrating these suggestions.
The concept car won widespread critical acclaim.
This isn't the only approach possible, and the article in Inc, Letting Your Customers Design Your Products, describes five different types of crowd sourcing:
- Crowdfunding: Sites such as Kickstarter that allow an individual or enterprise to receive funding.
- Distributed knowledge: The aggregation of data and information from a variety of sources.
- Cloud labor: Leveraging a virtual labor pool.
- Collective creativity: Tapping "creative" communities for user-generated art, media or content.
- Open innovation: The use of outside resources to generate new ideas and company processes.
Wednesday, October 05, 2011
RightClick presentation | Tweet |
We're all internet organisations now | Tweet |
The distinction, real world versus online (businesses or organisations - take your pick), was made using fairly clear lines. Whether the organisation had physical shopfronts or offices you could walk into. Whether they made and products that sat on a shelf, or were comprised of zeros and ones. Whether their workers sat in the same buildings, or were spread across the world, kept connected via the internet.
People in 'real world' organisations considered themselves as serious workers, producing real things for real people and could look down on 'virtual organisations' as producing little of substance or longevity, being fad chasers who would not survive.
Equally those working in online organisations considered themselves as more agile, adaptable, collaborative and smarter than those in 'traditional organisations' and saw themselves as the inheriting the world from the dinosaurs.
As someone who has worked on both sides of the fence I've seen many subconscious prejudices play out, leading to poor investment decisions, marketing strategies ignoring major channels and structural decisions that did not take into account the full range of cost-effective options.
However over the last few years I have noticed a major shift in attitudes amongst both groups. A new respect of why there are differences in how organisations operate based on the products they happen to make.
At the same time digital technologies have become essential for all organisations, the internet a vital backbone for connecting their brains with their hands and legs, for informing decisions and communicating with customers.
In essence, in a variety of ways, all organisations are now internet organisations - supported and empowered by the world's data networks.
Where organisations still produce physical products and services, these are designed, produced, marketed, distributed and sold with heavy reliance on digital solutions.
Where the currency of organisations is information, this is also collected, analysed and distributed electronically.
What this means for government is that Departments are also now internet organisations. We have internalised the use of email, online research and consultation and the use of digital technologies to organise and instruct our staff and produce and distribute our products and services.
This has happened to such an extent that few government agencies could continue to perform efficiently if you removed their internet connections and email links from the world. A weakness? Perhaps, but also a strength.
So if you ever have anyone telling you that online organisations don't produce anything of value, aren't 'real', won't scale and will die out, tell them to think about how their organisation would cope if it lost its virtual presence and digital links.
It's about time we began embracing and leveraging this for organisational advantage.
We need to kill any of the remaining 'us vs them' thinking and ensure that all our top management embrace, understand and can most effectively use digital technologies to maximise our productivity and efficiency.
We're all internet organisations now.
Friday, September 30, 2011
Happy belated 20th birthday Mr Web Browser | Tweet |
While I realise this post is a month late, I thought it would still be worth wishing the web browser 'Happy Birthday' and commenting on the impact that web browser software has had over the last twenty years.
If you go back twenty years (and two months), the internet was primarily a text based knowledge storage and communication medium.
While it was already global - just - the number of users could be counted in the thousands and were primarily researchers and academics at universities, with a few large companies and individuals thrown in.
With the introduction of WorldWideWeb (which became open source code in 1993), the internet was capable of becoming a visual medium, displaying text in stylesheets, images, sounds and even movies (it even built in a spellchecker and a WYSIWYG web page editing tool).
Today, the web is the largest media distribution channel on the planet, used by 2 billion people directly, and indirectly by almost the entire population of the planet. It supports the largest video library in the world (YouTube), the largest and fastest updating encyclopedia (Wikipedia) and the dominant social networks used by well over a billion people to remain connected to each other, despite distance and time.
Much of this is due to the innovations embodied in that first web browser - the browser that literally founded the world wide web.
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| Source: The brewing browser brouhaha Sydney Morning Herald 29/09/2011 |
Internet Explorer, from Microsoft retains the single largest market share, a reported 43% share - well down from the 90% plus they claimed back in 2005 (when IE6 dominated).
IE's share is split across four versions of the browser, each with very different capabilities - for July 2011 from net applications this was divided into IE6 (9.22%), IE7 (6.25%), IE8 (29.23%) and IE9 (6.8%).
Similarly, Firefox's share across versions has increased as their development pace has accelerated - for September 2011 from StatCounter this was divided into mainly Firefox 3.6 or lower (9.44%), Firefox 4 (2.10%), Firefox 5 (10.09%) and Firefox 6 (5.73%).
Today's diversity of web browsers is both an opportunity and a challenge for organisations. It provides an ecosystem rich in innovation and increasingly compliant with industry standards, however requires organisations to constantly reassess whether they are still designing for the right standard, or equipping their staff appropriately to access the range of web content they need in their jobs.
On the whole I think it is good to see this competition, although I appreciate the incremental cost of web design it brings - compatibility adds at least 10% of costs to web projects and can add more than 20% if designing for 10 year old web browsers, such as IE6.
The web browser has changed the world, largely for the better. It has opens up global publishing and distribution to billions and generated enormous efficiencies in sharing information (many of which remain to be realised as laws and processes catch up with the changed environment).
And yet, if the web browser was a person, it would not yet (quite) be legally allowed to drink in the USA.
I wonder what the next twenty years will bring.
Thursday, September 29, 2011
The role of social media during the Arab Spring | Tweet |
The paper provides strong evidence that social media was one of the key causes of these revolutions due to its ability to place a human face on political oppression and had a critical role in mobilising dissidents to organise protests, criticise their governments, and spread ideas about democracy.
The report claims that social media had a central role in shaping political debates, for example,
Our evidence shows that social media was used heavily to conduct political conversations by a key demographic group in the revolution – young, urban, relatively well educated individuals, many of whom were women.
Both before and during the revolutions, these individuals used Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube to put pressure on their governments. In some cases, they used new technologies in creative ways such as in Tunisia where democracy advocates embarrassed President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali by streaming video of his wife using a government jet to make expensive shopping trips to Europe.The report also provides evidence that online conversations about liberty, democracy and revolution on Twitter often immediately preceded large protests. This supports the use of social media as a civic organising tool.
Governments that attempted to shut down the internet, or specific social media services, were clearly also of the view that these were key channels for public dissidence outside their direct control, unlike government-run or influenced newspapers, radio stations and television channels.
Finally, the paper demonstrates how social media was used to open up internal discussions to the world, helping spread democratic ideas across borders, providing global support networks for local dissidents and informing the media, which then fuelled awareness, interest, engagement and support for the Arab Spring through media reports.
The paper is an excellent read and quantifies a number of the effects of social media during the Arab Spring, which could be used by political 'dissidents' in other countries to help influence local debate.
Note that like all research, it is a little of a two-edged sword, as the paper could also be used by governments seeking to minimise debate to pre-empt online dissidence by establishing frameworks that can be extended to allow strict control of online discussion.
These frameworks include national firewalls, broad-based and readily expandable online censorship regimes, internet kill switches and approaches that place the control of national internet infrastructure into government-controlled monopolies.
Often justified as beneficial initiatives designed to protect people from international cyberattacks, online fraud or inappropriate online content (which they may also do), these frameworks, if implemented without appropriate legal and privacy checks and balances, can be repurposed to restrict citizen access and quash undesired public debate, exclude certain individuals or organisations from participating online or even identify specific troublemakers for incarceration or worse.
I have embedded the document below for easy reading, or it can be downloaded in PDF format here, Opening closed regimes.
Opening closed regimes - What was the role of social media during the Arab Spring?
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Who controls what online? | Tweet |
It provides an interesting perspective on which major companies provide which services and collect various types of data.
Take a look over at the Web 2.0 Summit map (the movements view is very cool - click on the service icons above the menu).
Thanks @dasharp for bringing it to my attention.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Identifying the existence and impact of transformational leadership in the Australian public sector | Tweet |
It is a fascinating read (particularly from pages 68-80 and 113-185 including the conclusion from pp160), and provides insights into challenges the public sector has experienced in encouraging new approaches to public sector management, innovation, appropriate risk-taking, in modernising systems and processes and in embedding Government 2.0 as business-as-usual.
I commend Derek's paper, Identifying the existence and impact of transformational leadership in the Australian public sector as an excellent and thought-provoking read.
Monday, September 26, 2011
Are Australia's emergency services ready to engage with social media? BushfireConnect unsuccessful in government grant bid | Tweet |
I've been told that the reason the grant was rejected was that, "as the VIC Emergency Services do not yet have a Social Media Policy, they did not 'feel comfortable with' being seen to 'endorse' Emergency Management Social Media projects by providing them with grants."
All three social media projects vying for a grant were rejected.
Reportedly, they are still working to get their heads around the use of social media in emergency management.
I wonder how many other social media initiatives across Australia have been knocked back due to government officials (at any level) not yet having their heads around the area as yet.
BushfireConnect was established in May 2010 and has been run by volunteers with no formal support from government.
They are currently seeking volunteers to help manage the service once the official bushfire season starts on 1 October.
As they said about the grant result,
We could probably spend hours chewing the fat on the why and the how, but this is the landscape we're all working in. In the mean time, the fire season is starting as early as September this year, so we have stuff to do :) Hopefully we can get sufficient traction this season so that we cannot be ignored in the future.To learn more, watch the video below of Maurits van der Vlugt, one of the founders, speaking about Bushfire Connect and emergency management assisted by social media at Ignite Sydney 6.
Below this are Maurits's slides from an earlier conference (which seem to be very similar to those used for Ignite).
Saturday, September 24, 2011
TedXCanberra 2011 liveblog | Tweet |
It is also being livestreamed via the website, tedxcanberra.org and can be followed on Twitter at the hashtag #TEDxCanberra.
What's TEDx? A global phenomenon that you can learn more about here.
Friday, September 23, 2011
46 countries commit to the international Open Government Partnership | Tweet |
The concept was announced a few months ago and countries have been rapidly signing up to the commitments required to demonstrate their willingness to take action to improve transparency and accountability in government.
As their website states,
Participating countries in the Open Government Partnership pledge to deliver country action plans that elaborate concrete commitments on open government. In each country, these commitments are developed through a multi-stakeholder process, with the active engagement of citizens and civil society.
The launch of the Partnership occurred a few days ago, on 20 September in New York. 46 countries signed up (about 24 percent of all countries), including about half of the G20, a number of Asia-Pacific nations and a number of European states.
Here's a list of the launch members:
Steering committee
- Brazil (G20)
- Indonesia (G20)
- Mexico (G20)
- Norway
- Philippines
- South Africa (G20)
- United Kingdom (G20)
- United States (G20)
Participants
- Albania
- Azerbaijan
- Bulgaria
- Canada (G20)
- Chile
- Colombia
- Croatia
- Czech Republic
- Dominican Republic
- El Salvador
- Estonia
- Georgia
- Ghana
- Guatemala
- Honduras
- Israel
- Italy (G20)
- Jordan
- Kenya
- Korea (G20)
- Latvia
- Liberia
- Lithuania
- Macedonia
- Malta
- Moldova
- Mongolia
- Montenegro
- Netherlands
- Peru
- Romania
- Slovak Republic
- Spain
- Sweden
- Tanzania
- Ukraine
- Uruguay
What are the top things we can do to improve government websites? | Tweet |
The US has launched an interesting discussion asking citizens how they think the Federal government can improve government websites.
Run using Ideascale, an online idea management system, the National Dialogue on improving Federal websites is running for two weeks and involves both ideas submission and voting as well as live online discussions(or dialogue-a-thons) on specific website related topics.
I'd love to see this type of initiative organised in Australia, however in the interim it is worth looking at the ideas raised in the US, beginning with the use of Plain language on government websites, Creating content around topics/customers - not agencies, make usability testing and 508 testing (accessibility) required PRIOR to launch, Make Government Website Mobile Accessible and Commit to best practices (using modern web techniques).
If Australian government agencies applied these five top ideas to their own web development (or even applied standards from some of the excellent web links and comments for several of the ideas) we could see a very different level of engagement, potential cut the number of phone calls and ministerials, address hidden issues with incomplete forms and avoid agency embarrassment (when organisations publicly identify government websites that fail basic accessibility or mobile access requirements).
Of course this requires adequately funding and resourcing web teams to carry out these tasks - however this can be offset through mandating external developers to meet government's basic accessibility and content requirements and through using low-cost modern content management frameworks which support significantly greater functionality and require less customisation than the old backroom systems still in place at many agencies.
Even more valuable would be for the Australian government to similarly ask citizens what they thought should be improved about government sites.
I do wonder why Australia appears more fearful or risk-averse to asking citizens these types of questions and building an evidence base on which it can then assess actions. Or maybe it isn't risk-aversion and is simply due to cost (though the service the US uses costs only US$999 per year - and there's even a free version) or due to lack of resources or even interest.
However if the US government, where the political process is on the nose, unemployment is high, the economy is distressed and web budgets are in decline, can ask this question, surely Australia is in a much better position to do so.
To go a little further, to offset the perceptual risk that citizens may expect government agencies to act on specific improvement requests, the consultation could be shaped as an information gathering exercise, where the outcomes will be made available to various agencies to act or not act as they can within their budgets and resourcing.
Or maybe individual agencies can ask the question as part of their website surveys (if they hold them - as I've done regularly in past positions) and share this information across the APS.
What do you think?
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Toughen up - we need online anonymity | Tweet |
Rather than posting in my blog today, I am breaking one of the rules of blogging (always pull people back to your own blog) by pointing people to an opinion piece in Mumbrella that I wrote recently after reading a couple of other opinion pieces attacking the basis for allowing anonymous commentary online.
Toughen up - we need online anonymity
Please comment in Mumbrella (anonymously if you prefer) to continue the discussion.
Note that I wasn't paid for my opinion :)
Monday, September 19, 2011
Twitter tactics - demystifying Twitter | Tweet |
Earlier tonight I gave a presentation at Parliament House about the workings and uses for Twitter in government.
I've shared the presentation below.
Friday, September 16, 2011
Emergency brings out ESA on Twitter in Canberra - too late? | Tweet |
Like most in the digital age (who weren't close enough to hear explosions), I learnt about it by reading news online, and hopped straight on Twitter to find the latest updates.
I was very glad (and surprised) to find that the ACT Government's Emergency Services Department had a twitter account. They had been providing official advice for the last half an hour from @ACT_ESA. I've added it to my list of government twitter accounts (yes I was unaware of it before).
I was not happy to see that while they'd been on Twitter since May, they'd not told anyone about the account and had only tweeted twice previously, saying 'coming soon' on both occasions.
Their Twitter was not listed or referenced on their website or on any official ACT government emergency documentation. It was not listed on act.gov.au, canberraconnect.act.gov.au or referenced in any of the official emergency announcements from the ACT government as a source of current information.
The account only had 156 followers (around 7am this morning) as a result - actually surprisingly high considering!
Tweets were not being coordinated with the information on the ESA website to direct people to the latest (prose) news. It only takes 10 seconds to tweet: "New update on our website at www.esa.act.gov.au #canberra #emergency #act"
On the plus side they have taken a leaf out of the work done by QLD Police Media, by starting to tweet mythbusters and use hashtags, such as: Myth buster - there is no report that the fire close to gas tanks #Mitchell
They are also now responding directly to people spreading incorrect information.
UPDATE 7.34am: @ACT_ESA have increased their following from 156 to 583 followers in the last 30 minutes (while I wrote this post).
UPDATE 7:47am: @ACT_ESA now at 769 followers. Still not mentioned in any official websites.
UPDATE 8:04am: @ACT_ESA now at 859 followers.
UPDATE 8:28am: @ACT_ESA now at 966 followers.
UPDATE 8:57am: @ACT_ESA now at 1,049 followers.
UPDATE 9:44am: @ACT_ESA now at 1,135 followers.
UPDATE 8:32pm: @ACT_ESA now at 1,401 followers
This is serious business. If governments across Australia are serious about supporting citizens in crisis, they need to get serious about social media.
They needs to integrate social media into their emergency planning, build channels online and tell people where to find them when they are needed.
They need to coordinate these channels effectively, managing them as they manage other emergency channels (though maybe not like the SMS channel, where the ABC reported that spelling mistakes in the text message had made some people wrongly believe it was a hoax - UPDATE: Image of the message here and at right).A public service that no-one knows about is worthless. An emergency service that is not in place and trialled before the emergency is not as useful as one that is pre-prepared.
Governments also need to learn how to use these channels effectively. In this case (EDIT: at 7:00am) the account has not yet used a hashtag (even the standard ones for the ACT, #Canberra and #ACT). It had tweeted 'at' others, but not retweeted others.
It is not as though Twitter is new - it has been around for five years. Isn't that ample time for a government agency to learn the basics of how to use a tool to the benefit of citizens?
More news on the fire is available here.
Please heed messages from the emergency services and police, stay aware of the bus and school closures and don't go sightseeing. The most recent information is being published on ESA's website (though not being retweeted by their account at this time).
On Twitter, @ACT_ESA, ACTPol_Traffic, CanberraTimes and 666Canberra are worth following.
Thursday, September 15, 2011
"Last in first out" - is this a risk for social media expertise and channel use in government? | Tweet |
I've seen (and spoken with colleagues about) a number of austerity measures taken in government agencies around Australia over the last few months.
With various governments across the country looking to cut spending to balance budgets, or at least reduce debt levels, lower 2011-12 budgets require many agencies to look long and hard at what they can trim or where they can do more for less (without affecting services to the public).
I wonder whether digital channels and expertise has been firmly enough established in many agencies to survive any cuts. Will management focus on their established infrastructure, maintaining their legacy IT systems and 'tried and true' communications and service channels at the expense of newer and more cost-effective, but less mature digital, channels?
In other words will we see the "last in, first out" rule apply for social media channels and expertise in many agencies?
(this is slightly rhetorical as I'm already seeing this in action in a few places)
I hope agencies will use any budget tightening as an opportunity to look long and hard at their operational effectiveness and select the channels which deliver the most 'bang for the buck' and long-term sustainability and viability.
Of course even if this means cutting non-digital channels in preference to digital, there is still a loss of expertise and corporate knowledge - though potentially a more sustainable one into the future.
Do you see signs that budget pressures are impacting on your agency's online capability? (feel free to respond anonymously & keep the relevant public service code of conduct in mind)
Monday, September 12, 2011
When will we see true my.gov? | Tweet |
I've been watching, and participating, in some of the discussions around whether government agencies and entire governments should centralise or decentralise their web presence.
For some reason a number, such as the UK government, South Australia and the ACT, have decided that centralising all their websites into a single portal is the right approach, although I've seen little in way of clear benefits to citizens or government.
At the same time some agencies still follow a route of rolling out a new website for every initiative, program and event, leaving some agencies with hundreds of websites to manage.
Totalling the number of websites can be deceptive. With a single content management system at the back-end, single set of servers and bandwidth and nothing more than different design templates it is possible to release many websites with little additional cost impact. In this situation, whether the content is in one site or many, it requires almost the same effort to create and maintain.
I believe that the argument over one or many websites really misses the entire point of the exercise - to serve the public.
If we stop thinking about centralise/decentralise and begin thinking audience, how would we build and maintain the web presence, not web site(s), for a government or agency?
I've been thinking about this recently with a view to the capabilities that web 2.0 brings.
Rather than building websites around agencies, portfolios, topics or governments, why not simply provide a my.gov.au framework which can be customised to every individual citizen's needs and demographics?
Agencies could publish information in 'fragments' or 'parts' with appropriate metadata. This would allow my.gov.au to selective and display the content, services, social channels and news from government appropriate to an individual.
With this approach the entire equation is flipped. No longer are agencies or governments solely deciding what they want citizens to see. Instead citizens are presented with what they need, based on their age, gender, location, work status, interests, past behaviour and other characteristics.
Individual agencies would not need to each collect information about individuals to provide a custom online experience. They simply become content providers, with the central my.gov.au portal storing any personal information and pulling the right content (as tagged by agencies) without sharing the information with other agencies.
This approach could expand beyond a single government, integrating local planning alerts, state government services and other relevant content in a single seamless interface.
This would remove the need for citizens to go to multiple 'single sites' for different government levels. As the user is in control of my.gov.au there's no need for agencies at different levels to have their systems working together for content or sign-on - the my.gov.au framework would simply pull content and services into the common personalised interface for each person.
The system could also expand beyond government - integrating your banking and medical records and more into the same view. This would become a real killer application. See your bank and salary information as you figure out how much you need to pay government over the year ahead. Of course, none of the services viewed through the personalised page would 'talk' to each other, only to my.gov.au, preserving privacy and security.
The my.gov.au service wouldn't even have to be built and managed by governments - competing services could be developed commercially and compete - through enhancements and features - for the 'business' of citizens, all drawing on the same set of government content and data feeds.
So perhaps it is time for government to stop talking about 'one website to rule them all' and instead consider what we could achieve if we let our content out of its departmental and government 'wrappers'.
We could enable a true personalised my.gov.au service for every citizen, customised to their specific needs and wants, growing with them through various life events over a number of years.
And we could still aggregate the same content into our corporate sites, or a single portal if we chose, at no extra cost!
Saturday, September 10, 2011
GovCamp Australia liveblog | Tweet |
I've been pinged by Pia Waugh to liveblog today's GovCamp AU event.
What is a GovCamp? The official definition is: GovCamp is an event in the spirit of BarCamp for governments and other public institutions to share social and technology solutions to turn them into Government 2.0.
Note this won't be a full view on the day, as there are three rooms. I'll be presenting a couple of times as well. However I'll link to other posts as I can (and include the hashtag in my liveblog to provide a separate perspective).
The event is also being filmed, so there will be a record available online shortly afterward.
It can also be directly followed on Twitter at #govcampau
For other GovCamps around the world visit govcamp.org
Friday, September 09, 2011
My presentation for the AMI Government Marketing and Communications Conference | Tweet |
I am presenting from 3.20pm today, and my presentation is now available on slideshare, viewable as below.
Liveblog from AMI Marketing & Communications Conference - Day 2 | Tweet |
I've taken some time off this morning to put together some extra slides for my presentation, so are not yet in the room, however have a liveblog running to capture the tweeters who are...
My presentation is at 3.20pm today and will be on slideshare shortly afterwards.
Thursday, September 08, 2011
Liveblog from AMI Marketing & Communications Conference - Day 1 | Tweet |
Hi,
I'll be liveblogging parts of the AMI Marketing and Communications Conference today and tomorrow.
You can also follow the conference at the hashtag #amigov2011
Tuesday, September 06, 2011
Walkley PR Conference Liveblog | Tweet |
See below for the liveblog, or follow the event on Twitter under the tag #wpanc.
There is also a blog for the day at http://walkleypanc2011.posterous.com/ written and edited by a team made up of the Walkley Foundation's Kylie Johnson and Flynn Murphy, along with University of Canberra communication students, led by Grace Keyworth and Mel Evans.
South Australia Local Government Association releases social media issues paper for councils | Tweet |
To my knowledge both the Municipal Association of Victoria (MAV) (whose document appears to be inaccessible online at the moment) and the Local Government Association of South Australia have released social media guidance, with SA's A Social Media Issues Paper for SA Councils - Incorporating a Model Social Media Policy released last week.
Monday, September 05, 2011
What impact will cyborgs have on government? | Tweet |
The concept of humans as purely biological beings ended long ago, potentially 3,000 years ago, with the first documented prosthetic limb on an Egyptian Mummy.
However the widespread use of mechanical or electronic devices to aid or control certain human physiological processes didn't become commonplace until the last century, when progress in devices such as eye-glasses and contact lenses, prosthetic limbs and even artificial organs really took off.
In 1979 the CDC reported (PDF) that 51% of US adults wore corrective glasses. I could not find any more recent statistics, either for the US or Australia, however I doubt the figure has declined.
Add to this those using prosthetic limbs and orthotics (devices which apply external forces to the body for the purpose of support and alignment, reducing pain or enhancing mobility), hearing aids, dialysis, artificial organs and so on, and I estimate that a majority of the population of developed western countries are cyborgs, of one type or another.
We've long been doing this with mechanical devices - cars, bulletproof vests, jetpacks, binoculars and more. In the future this enhancement might be more firmly integrated into human physiology - glasses and contact lenses containing heads-up displays and power-assisted prosthetic limbs are already in use in prototype forms.
We've also been busy enhancing our mental and conversational powers, as Amber also discusses. Most adults in Australia carry an external memory and communication device with them most of the time - a mobile phone - that allows them to instantly connect and communicate with people around the world, store information and receive alerts when required or research in a global library for facts or views that they no longer store in 'meat' memory.
In this arena we've begun to see devices for direct control of external devices via mechanical telepathy - with products already in the market.
Thus far cyborgs have generally used devices to attempt to match the biological human norm, to see, hear, move and live as closely as possible to unenhanced humans.
However we are increasingly heading towards a world that will see more widespread use of devices to enhance our capabilities. Moving from breast implants to heads-up displays, nightvision, hearing amplifiers and devices that otherwise increase our versatility, physical strength, speed, precision or stamina. An early example is Aimee Mullins, a double leg amputee who has turned her legs into art and can change her height, speed and capabilities through her selection of prosthetic limbs (see the video below).
Another example is 'Eyeborg', Rob Spence, who lost an eye and replaced it with a wifi camera. Rob has now made a short documentary, in conjunction with the new game 'Deus Ex: Human Revolution' (which features a cyborg hero) asking the question of where human augmentation may lead (video below).
At some point, as highlighted in Rob's video, we may even begin to face the ethical question of people choosing to be enhanced to increase their capabilities. This could involve medical interventions, even limb replacement.
So where does this impact on government and the process of governing?
Government policies, legislation and enforcement mechanisms have been designed for people who fit a particular range of capabilities and characteristics.
If cybernetic enhancements expand an individual's capabilities outside of this range, some laws may struggle to address the needs or issues this may bring.
We've seen the same challenges as other technologies were introduced. Some technologies had no impact on our legal framework, others have forced us to rethink entire policies.
Human augmentation technology is likely to be similar. For example, someone with camera eyes - who can record everything they see - might inadvertently record inappropriate material, or film in restricted venues. Someone with a brain enhanced with a direct wi-fi connection to the internet may use that collective knowledge in closed examinations or any type of competitive challenge or job where access to knowledge provides advantage. Someone with enhanced leg or arm strength may have an advantage in any type of competitive or commercial activity involving bodily strength, speed or stamina.
As a society we will have to debate issues such as,
- should augmented humans be allowed to compete for the same jobs, sports or competitions as unaugmented humans?
- should we create new approaches, policies or laws to govern individuals who can run faster, jump higher, grip harder or think faster than 'normal' humans?
- at what level of augmentation would any changes kick in. With an artificial retina (with a heads-up display), with power-assisted limbs, with a direct neural interface to the internet?
However with the growing number and acceptance of cyborgs and the rate at which technology is advancing, we may not have that much time to reflect.
Note: Excluding the use of an external memory enhancement and communication tool, I don't yet qualify as a cyborg.
Booked into the CeBIT Gov 2.0 conference in October yet? | Tweet |
I'll be missing the Gov 2.0 conference that CeBIT is holding for the third time this October (25-26 October) due to my honeymoon. However I do recommend to others that they consider attending.
In my view this is the most mature Gov 2.0 conference in Australia and has managed to step beyond the '101' nature of most similar conferences.
For details visit www.gov2.com.au
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
What's in a name? | Tweet |
People invest an enormous amount of identity and personal energy into their own names.
Names are our unique identifiers, defining us as separate to others - even for people with common names.
So when organisations make rules about the names people can use online it can create signficant distress and dislocation for people.
It also raises questions over who can decide your identity. Can corporations deny people the use of their legal names online simply because they don't fit a narrow model of what the corporation regards as 'appropriate naming'?
A recent example I've been following is Stilgherrian's battle with Google over the use of his legal name for Google Plus. You can follow it at his blog (strong language) or read about it at The Register.
Stilgherrian changed his name over thirty years ago to a mononym - a single name. His passport and official records all reflect this and those of us who know Stilgherrian personally have never experienced any dislocation or issue with engaging with him as an individual with one name.
However Google's Plus service has defined rules for allowable names. Firstly it requires that you use your legal name (although Google is apparently not requiring evidence or checking with authorities in most cases to verify). Secondly, it requires that you have a first name and a last name and that there's no spaces or characters like an apostrophe in your name.
Now while this might fit a certain segment of the population, there's a number of people who have either only one name (as is common in a number of countries), have spaces in their names such as "Dick Van Dyke", or use apostrophes and other non-standard characters.
The net result is that Google is blocking people with names that don't match its view of what is a legal name - and requiring that people provide documented proof of their 'anomalous' legal names.
I have another friend who changed her legal name to a mononym (which includes an apostrophe) over ten years ago. About two weeks ago she announced that she was changing her name to add a 'first' name, so that she could use Facebook and other social media channels to communicate with people.
She had finally reached the point where her single name was excluding her from legitimate social interactions due to the naming policies of (mainly) US companies.
I have a real problem with this situation, for Stilgherrian, for my friend and for the millions of other people around the world who have names that don't fit Google or Facebook's views of a legal name.
Firstly, 'legal' names should be defined by governments, not corporations. Australia's governments, and many governments around the world, support a much wider variety of legal naming conventions than social networks appear to allow.
Secondly, isn't it discrimination when corporations deny you access to their service due to the format of your legal name? Denying a service to an individual just because their name is structured differently to their business rules might be legally actionable.
Finally, what right do corporations have to your legal name anyway - particularly if they make it public. Many people have good reasons for not revealing their legal name publicly. Those in witness protection programs, minors, people with embarrassing 'real' names and those who are widely publicly known by a name other than their legal name, are all candidates for using a different name to their legal name online for legitimate reasons.
It is fair to deny people access to online services, particularly when these services are in such widespread use, just because they can't publicly disclose their legal name?
All of the examples above relate to corporations. However there are examples which may also refer to government as well.
There have been calls from a number of quarters in various Australian government to restrict people to the use of their legal name when commenting online. The purported reason is that people are less likely to behave inappropriately if they can be held accountable for what they say. The subtext is that people become easier to monitor and track.
I am not a fan of this approach for governments either. Like above, there are legitimate reasons why people might choose to not use their legal name in online discussions.
It can also be very hard to identify many people from their legal name alone, given the number of duplicates that may exist. Any step taken to require legal name use would have to attach address and proof of identity in order to identify specific individuals. Even then, identity theft would lead to many misrepresented identities.
Also there are other ways authorities can identify individuals if there are legitimate reasons to do so (such as discussion of committing a crime) - using IP addresses and various analysis techniques.
What is useful for government, is being able to identify consistent identities online - whether individuals choose to use their legal names or not.
Consistent identities allow organisations to build user cases based on profiling views across different topics, supporting policy development and decision-making without compromising personal privacy or security and while allowing people to define themselves online as they choose.
