I'm currently up in Glasgow at the Civicus Youth Assembly, just about to start at the Civicus World Assembly and I've not yet seen much use of digital technologies to share ideas and media, and to build conversations between participants. We've finally just got use of wireless internet here today (after two days of the Youth Assembly disconnected) – and there is a larger 'Net Cafe' space opening up tomorrow when the 900-strong full World Assembly really gets going – and I'm hoping there might be some suggested use of social media.
However, in case there isn't, I've decided to experment with how social media use can be catalysed. Can social bookmarking, photo sharing and back-channels work effectively at non-techie conferences? What is needed to make them work? Is there value in making it work?
I'm starting off by seeking to encourage use of two tags for agregating links and content:
Youth Assembly: civicusya2007
World Assembly: civicuswa2007
The two key places I'm thinking content may emerge are del.icio.us (here and here) or Flickr (here and here) – but then with the international nature of the delegates I'm concious there may well (indeed will be) complete alternate social media communities which delegates from different countries are used to…
I've put together two quick summary documents on tagging / social bookmarking that might help kick start things (if I can find somewhere to get them printed).
Social Bookmarking (2 page HowTo): http://www.practicalparticipation.co.uk/files/Social%20Bookmarking%20the%20World%20Assembly.pdf
Tagging the assembly: (1 page summary) http://www.practicalparticipation.co.uk/files/Tagging%20the%20Civicus%20Assemblies.pdf
Laptop battery and hostel wifi permitting I'll try and post a few updates soon on how the experiment goes….