The State of Web 2.0 and Emerging Social Media: Citizen Engagement

vs. Citizen EnragementDr. Alan R. Shark

Executive Director, Public Technology Instituteand

Assistant Professor, Rutgers University School of Public Affairs & Administration

Available Resources

Driving Forces.

Empowerment

Transparency

Citizen Engagement

Web 2.0 Technologies

Citizen Enragement

Citizen Engagement

Source: engagepittsburgh.org

Once upon time Sunshine laws was all the rage…….

Personal

• Inefficient

Impersonal

• Efficient

Efficient

• Personal

An Evolving Process……….

Post Transact React Interact

From Transparency to Engagement

Thesaurus : Engagement

Occupied InvolvedBookedSet-asideEmployedConnectedBusyAbsorbed

InvolvedConnected

How (or how) do we Measure?Governments Ask

1. Amount of garbage picked up

2. Response time of emergency services

3. Number of restaurants inspected

4. Number of potholes repaired

5. Waiting time for call to be answered

6. Email response time

Citizens Ask

1. Actual trash removed from street or ally

2. Were qualified people dispatched to the scene, where they taken to the right facility?

3. Who passed/failed (online)?

4. Smoothness of ride

5. Actual results

6. Actual results Source: National Center for Civic Innovation

People want measured results – public managers want performance dashboards

City of Phoenix

Managing Expectations – Rebuilding Trust

• “And in both the content and delivery of public services the next stage of the web will transform the ability of citizens to tailor the services they need to their requirements, to feedback constantly on their success, to interact with the professionals who deliver them and to put the citizen not the public servant in control.” - former Prime Minister Gordon Brown, March 2010

Social Media

Web 2.0 Tools

Social Network Wiki Mashup RSS Feed Listserv - Alerts Blog – Micro Blog Mapping

Online Survey Photo Sharing Webcast – Webcam Video Blog/Vlog – Video Sharing Podcast - Vodcast Virtual World - Games Search Engine Utility

While there is no set definition for Web 2.0, there are a number of descriptors –interactive, social, dynamic, user-centered, collaborative, and interoperable.

Gartner use three anchor points: a set of technologies withcommunity and social dimensions that enable new business models.

Mixed Tools / Portal

Situation Awareness– How to prepare/prevent– What happened & who is

impacted?– Where is the damage?– When will services be restored?

Expert Knowledge & Advice– Risk identification– Mitigation strategies– Health warnings– Vulnerable populations

News & Emerging Information– Local news reports– Photos of damage– Traffic impact– Eyewitness accounts– Articles & analysis

Recovery Assistance– Shelter location– Government assistance– Community support– Volunteer networks– Help needed

The Current Environment

There were 1,000 Internet devices in 1984, 1,000,000 in 1992, and 1,000,000,000 in 2008.

The number of text messages sent and received everyday exceeds the population of the planet. 93% of all adults own a cell phone. Nokia manufactures 13 cell phones per second.

ABC, NBC and CBS, around for a combined 200 years, collectively get 10 million unique visitors each month. MySpace, YouTube and Facebook get 250 million unique visitors each month. None existed six years ago.

In 2008, MySpace had 200 million users. If it were a country, it would be the 5th largest in the world.

The Current Environment

Newspaper circulation is down 7 million over last 25 years. But in last five years, unique readers of online newspapers are up 30 million.

31 billion searches on Google per month.

More video uploaded to YouTube in last two months than if ABC, NBC, and CBS had been airing content 24/7/365 since 1948.

Wikipedia launched in 2001. Now features 13 million articles in more than 200 languages.

90% of 200 billion emails sent everyday are spam.

Web 2.0 Site Activity

Further breakdown indicates that:

104.1 million visited Facebook; 77.8 million visited YouTube; 55.6 million visited MySpace; 37.8 million visited Digg; 25.9 million visited Flickr; 19.4 million visited Twitter

More than 300 million people visited Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, YouTube, Flickr, Digg and Delicious in April 2009. Each visitor was counted once, in spite of repeat visits.

NEWSFLASH: According to a report just out from Nielsen, we’re spending 82% more time on social networking sites than a year ago.

Web 2.0 Site Activity

94% of teens (ages 12-17) are online

45% percent of teens ages 12-14 and 55% percent ages 15-17 are content creators

60% of all teenagers have an online social networking profile.

According to research by Symantec, "porn", "sex" and "YouTube" were among the most popular search terms queried by kids, ages 18-and-under, in 2009.

Top 2009 Search Terms for Youth

Local Government Web 2.0 Usage

Local Government Champions

How Cities/Counties Use Web 2.0

75% of cities & counties are using or beginning to use RSS Feeds to provide news and updates to citizens. For a number of jurisdictions, RSS feeds were included as part of another application, such as a content management system (CMS). Almost ¾ (72%) are using or beginning to use Twitter to provide – or “push” – news to citizens (and the media), especially emergency and public safety alerts.

Almost ¾ (72%) are using or beginning to use Facebook to communicate with citizens, actually targeting groups like youth, seniors, visitors, neighborhood groups and library patrons.

How Cities/Counties Use Web 2.0

57% currently are using or implementing YouTube, primarily for promotion of events & programs to citizens & visitors, some for government access channels.

43% use blogs to target both citizens & internal staff– Broad public blogs - closely managed– Group blogs (arts, libraries) - more open– Some started & stopped - poor participation & perceived value

Wikis used internally (100%) for staff project management, information sharing, and collaboration

Only 2% are using Second Life

How Cities/Counties Use Web 2.0

Oversight – 44% PIO, 32% webmaster or IT staff, 28% departments

Use by Elected Officials – Some official – majority use on their own time – Top tools are Twitter, Facebook, chats, and community blogs

Participation – 47% usage small, 35% participation increasing

Policies – Range from “none, we just did it” to a formal review process and 11-page policy

Costs - Zero to minimal; staff time requirements minimal

How Cities/Counties Use Web 2.0

KEY ISSUES Consistency Quality and accuracy of information Legal concerns regarding public forums and public record retention Personal usage by employees Policy development

OBSTACLES Security Bandwidth Employee productivity Coordination Freedom of Information Act requirements Priority shift of agency/department from website to tweeting and fans

Social Network A website through which people share interests and activities, and build social networks

or social relations; consists of a representation of each user (often a profile), his/her social links, and a variety of additional services

Examples: Facebook, Bebo, MySpace, LinkedIn, Friendster, Ning, Nexo, Classmates, Habbo (teens), My Life, MyHeritage, Study VZ, Tagged - Wikipedia lists 177 major sites

Social Network / Microblog

Community Information Service built on the National Law Enforcement Telecommunications System (NLETS) platform – 99% uptime – integrates with Twitter

Social Network Coming Attractions

• Geotracking • Video(augmented reality)• Public Policy Debates• On-Line Voting• Smarter Phones/Mobile Computers• Beyond the traditional portal

Social Network Coming Attractions

• Video/Photo Sharing• Emergency information from citizens via smart

phones• Interactive data• Interactive maps• Webcasts• Mobile Apps

The Latest Transformative Device – the iPad

Mobility (iPhone Example)

Government Serving Citizens

High Speed Trains like High Speed Broadband?

Poor Tracks = Poor Speeds Good Tracks = Great Speed

USA Asia

Social Network Concerns

• How do we “Listen?”• How do we respond?• How do we weigh intensities of “feelings”• How (where) do we store data and video?• How do we react to inaccurate, misleading and false

information? • How do we react and or pro-act in an instantaneous

environment? • How do we manage expectations? Rage?

Social Network Concerns

• Does everything need to go to one place???

• Should we advocate having elected leaders have their own

social media presence?

• Where does policy, administration, politics converge?

Policy Considerations

• What is your policy on social media?– URL links?– privacy & disclosure?– citizen postings?– Cookies?– network security?– government employees (general)?– government issued laptops, PDAs, etc.– restrictions to usage & communications?– who is in charge of overall “communications”? – who monitors social media, frequency, content?

In the end its all about restoring trust!

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shark@pti.org