lkthrock | Government 2.0 Club

[Auditorium] Running a Federal Blog

Posted on 02. Apr, 2009 by lkthrock.

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[Auditorium] Running a Federal Blog with Jeffrey Levy of EPA

EPA launched a blog called Greenversations on Earthday in 2008.

Had some people from State come to consult on best practices (State’s blog is DipNote)

Focus on Mission, Mission, Mission

Why communicate?

What do they need to know?

What do you need to know?

Wanted to get people jazzed about the environment.

Why blog?

Put a human face on the agency (aka the big black box).
Share personal stories of environmental thinking (e.g. buying a car, gardening).
Share the breadth of government work (dye’s used to color your sheets to pesticides on the food we eat - all regulated by EPA).
Speak in a new way (the way that isn’t a press release or a planned speech).
Supplement, not replace , other channels .

On Comments:
Simple, clear comment policy
- Be civil (don’t attack or use vulgar language)
- Don’t spam
- Stay on topic
Comment policy is linked on the blog. Comment section says “Read the Comment Policy, Leave a Comment”
Comments are usually approved in a day

EPA’s experience: 11 months, 6000 comments, 10 nasty ones (most came in the first month)

Nervous management? Point to other agencies that are doing it.

People seem to respond to the idea that an agency is blogging - a cool lightbulb effect.

Three regular features every week:

Question of the week (Monday)
- Gets the most comments: usually 50 or more (e.g. do you bike to work? do you buy bottled water? cloth vs. disposable diapers, etc.)
- Some have received hundreds of responses
- Advertised to 55,000 news release recipients

Science Wednesday (wants to promote that EPA is, in fact, a science agency)
- Run by research/development office

Bilingual Thursday (
- English/Spanish were in the same post, now split
- Managed by our Hispanic Liason w/three writers

EPA has been astonished with the articulateness and thoughtfulness of comments.

Q: What is response policy?

A: Encourage bloggers to respond, don’t require them to. No complaints to date on what’s happening with EPA’s comments.

Original goal/intention was 3 posts a week. Since onset, it has defied expectations and posts are daily.

Q: Process of launching the blog?

A: Strong requirement that everything reside on EPA.gov, so launched an experiment on an HTML site that couldn’t accept comments. Then set up a TypePad account (flowoftheriver.gov). Made case for a real blogging platform (requirements). Started using WordPress hosted internally (LAMP server that hosts blog and wiki) and then had the conversation with State Department to understand their best practices. Within EPA, individuals interested in blogging needed to get their managers approval and they had an intro conversation with Jeffrey. Created a blogger guide: www.scribd.com/levyj413.

Q: How do you work through approvals with very scientific posts/comments?

A: Your role is whether it’s vulgar, etc. not the scientific discussion.

Q: Did launching your successful blog make people want their own?

A: Yes, but that has been balanced by commitment or quantity of content realization. We can give them their own categories pretty easily. Logistically it’s easier for them to do it through Greenversations.

Q: How do you get bloggers?

A: We have a good communicators network. Asked them to nominate people to be bloggers. They went out and found good people for us. We’re always asking people. next step is blogger outreach for guest bloggers. Jeffrey also finds people on Twitter - people passionate and consistent on Twitter.

Gratuitous plug - www.epa.gov/earthday - submit photos and videos in various categories. Starting April 1st, will feature content that catches EPA’s eye.

Q: Do you have blogs internally on your Intranet?
A: One or two.

Audience suggestion: Set up a google doc or wiki and Tweet that “we’re looking for guest bloggers.” Very fast as a way of generating a guest blogger list. Example: http://www.isteconnects.org/2009/03/13/calling-all-twitter-users-going-to-necc-2009/

With regards to records management, it’s not FOIA-able because it’s online (so already available). Storage is not an issue because it’s very small as far as data size goes.

We don’t allow people to promote products. Too hard to discern between honest third-party recommendation and company promoting.

We don’t have a blogger core yet, will be open to teleconference, live Twitter chats when that is assembled.
Use Vocus, www.vocus.com, to identify bloggers.

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[Room 120] Survey: Expectations of the Government

Posted on 28. Mar, 2009 by lkthrock.

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[120] Survey: Expectations of the Government - USA.gov - Jed@capturagroup.com

Survey Oct. 22 - Jan 5, 2009 on preferences and expectation of social media with regards to accessing government online.

385 completed survey 78.8% completion rate

People are interested in interacting with govet through social media.

Credibility of gov information is critical for respondents.

Facebook is the preferred social media tool among respondents.

People interested in having conversations with the government.

People use search engines to find information more than any other tool.

Top ways citizens want to interact:

Emergency alerts
Voting and election information
Way to contact elected officials
Government forms
My rights as a citizen

60% interested in government information on non-government sites (e.g. wikipedia).

People expressed interest in rating government publications and information.

Presentation will be posted to Slide Share.

Tweet stream: http://tinyurl.com/cp34q8

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[Room 120] Brainstorm - Bridging the Web 2.0 Generation Gap

Posted on 28. Mar, 2009 by lkthrock.

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[Room 120] Brainstorm on Bridging the Web 2.0 Generation Gap with Doug Black @dlblack and @JessieX and @krazykriz

Andrew’s blog (@krazykriz) http://generationshift.blogspot.com - he’ll post his presentations there and they are also below.

@dlblack - Is there a generation Gap with Web 2.0 tools adoption? If so, what do we do about it?

Unique sceanrio in the govt: The Greatest Generation, Baby Boomers, Xers, Millenials (Gen Y)

@JesseX - Four architypes:

Prophet/Idealist - Dominant
- define inner world of values and culture
- baby Boomer (1943 - 1960)
- Hippies

Nomad/Reactive - Reccesive
- pragmatic check on idealist excesses
- Thirteenth/Gen X (1961 - 1981)
- Juvenile Delinquents

Hero/Civic - Dominant
- rebuild the outer world of technology and institution
- GI, (1901 - 1924)
- Millenial (1982 - 200?)
- Boy Scouts

Artist/Adaptive - recessive
- ameliorate Civic excess and omissions
- Silent (1925 - 1942)
- Homeland (?)

Gov20Camp - Generations and Social Media

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Other Business bridging the generat generation c

Generation C - consumer generating content - some one of any age that is actively using social media.

Stat: There are more boomers on the internet than milenials.

Important to understand online pursuits by generation.

USA Today article Boomers zero in on Social Media.

Boomers aren’t really going to retire - will take second careers to help others.

Gen Xers are right in the middle - those who feel like they didn’t have a voice.

Social media can help bridge the gap to government jobs (millenials)

Social media is not just for kids

Great need for training

Must be sensitive to people of all ages

Boomers need to create the culture now

Recruitment o f new

E-mail: transactional allows for control. Web 2.0 is much more horizontal.

Gen Xers (nomad architype) - hit childhood when children were a hassle. Millenials hit young adulthood in an opposite environment. Boomers are oriented towards turf.

This country needs practical Gen X leaders to serve as leadership.

Assume the monetary system that we know will not exist in short order.

2005 Census

Boomers - 64 million
Generation - 81 million
Millennial - 79 million

Social media bridges the gap because we don’t see ages.

Make it about the millennials, because Gen Xers will need to siphon between the two.

Craft your need in support of the rising generation.

Here’s a link to the Twitter stream from this session: http://tinyurl.com/c3ec23

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[Room 108] Twitter in Crisis Communications with the Air Force

Posted on 28. Mar, 2009 by lkthrock.

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Case Study: Witness reports crash of Air Force C-17. Within a minute the story was on CNN. Seventeen minutes later, the Air Force countered that it wasn’t true using Twitter. Fifty-five minutes later CNN retracted story.

Rumor control was phenomenal and empowering.

With the C-17 scenario, the Air Force had established a precedent for quick response . A couple days there was an F22 crash (which was true), so they had to balance the expectation/precedent for quick response with the time needed to inform families of those who lost their lives. To balance, the Air Force issued a statement indicating that they were aware of the situation and were insuring and validating information. As the story began to materialize on Facebook, they continued to communicate and ask for patience as they notified next of kin.

Citizen’s for a Free Tibet uses Twitter as the backbone/back channel of crisis communication.

Case Study: Twitter “Vote Report” - developed series of hashtags, 800 numbers, iPhones, androids, to aggregate data (full case study on Personal Democracy Forum - www.personaldemocracy.com) - software is from get hub.

Monitoring tools: http://search.twitter.com and www.tweetgrid.com

Discussion of concern over using Twitter as the sole channel for crisis communication. Twitter should be one channel.

SMS is the most reliable channel in a crisis. Frontline SMS mentioned.

Q: How do you handle the intentional “bad actors?”

A: Suggested that your community will drown them out.

Case Study: State Department - There was a rumor started on Twitter that the U.S. was harboring people in Madagascar last week. State decided that because the rumor was started on Twitter, they were going to combat it on Twitter and were successful.

Opinion: Distinguish between micro blogs in a private, contained, closed network and Twitter. Using a public service like Twitter opens up to to bad actors.

Private options:

Laconica - Open Source Twitter clone

IRC

WordPress

Mission is always first, the tool is what helps you accomplish mission.

Lots of debate on the use of Twitter at the RNC (specifically with regards to Activist communications). Thought on public versus private networks - private networks often get shut down by local governments in crisis situations.

A first responder commented that sometime the lack of information is critical to control. Not to be secretive about it, but to protect the scene (like an active shooter situation at a high school) and in order to deliver accurate information. Many times the real-time communication causes mass hysteria and panic. It’s not always about free and open information, sometimes it’s about accurate information.

Continue the discussion at Barcamp.org/CrisisCamp - Washington, DC - June 13-14

These are the notes for the session http://www.government20club.org/2009/03/room-108-using-twitter-in-crisis-management/

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[Room 108] Twitter in Crisis Communications

Posted on 28. Mar, 2009 by lkthrock.

0

[Room 108] Twitter in Crisis Communications with the Air Force

Case Study: Witness reports crash of Air Force C-17. Within a minute the story was on CNN. Seventeen minutes later, the Air Force countered that it wasn’t true using Twitter. Fifty-five minutes later CNN retracted story.

Rumor control was phenomenal and empowering.

Establish quick response for squashing a rumor. A couple days there was an F22 crash (that was true), so they had to balance the expectation/precedent for quick response with the time needed to info families.

in this case the Air Force issued a statement indicating that they were aware of the situation and were insuring and validating information. As the story began to materialize on Facebook, they cntinued to communicate and ask for patience as they notified next of kin.

Citizen’s for a Free Tibet uses Twitter as the backbone/back channel of crisis communication.