Sheenagh Reynolds of Local DirectGov explains more about the day.

Sheenagh Reynolds from Local Directgov welcomes #RU11 attendees to the ‘Really Useful’ event – 1st July 2011 from Liz Azyan on Vimeo.

You can see and comment on the challenges that Sheenagh describes or find out more about the event here.

Local by Social completed its tour across the UK last week, heading to Blackburn for our final edition of the series in the North West. Blackburn with Darwen Council played host at no less than the home of Blackburn Rovers, Ewood Park. The theme this time round was transparency and engagement and, as with all Local by Social events, the day brought together a wide range of experts and enthusiasts from across the fields of innovation, public service and volunteering.

Councillor Kate Hollern kicked things off, stating that “social media has made Blackburn a more engaging council, it’s amazing the amount of ideas that come through from our citizens.” Followed by Tom Stannard, Director of Policy and Communications, who explained that Blackburn is a place of innovation and joined-up working, emphasising that the day was about experimenting and exploring some new questions. It seems to be paying off, as yesterday the council was awarded LGC Council of the Year!

Ingrid Koehler, Improvement Strategist from the LGID, explained the context of these events, particularly referencing the events theme around transparency, and the importance of making data meaningful. (You can hear more from Ingrid in our quick wrap up chat at the bottom of the blog).

Tim Cheetham, provided an insightful presentation, asking not only what role open data played in his work as a local politician, but also how open data could be useful to the citizens he represents. We managed to grab a quick chat over lunch – it’s only five minutes long and well worth a listen:

Dominic Campbell from FutureGov wrapped the preliminaries up by putting all this progress into context and sharing innovative examples of gov 2.0 in action, including a top tweeting Mayor and making gov 2.0 meaningful.

Our speed talks followed, with people from inside and outside government speaking about their involvement in exciting engagement and transparency projects:

• Amanda Coleman and Kevin Hoy from Greater Manchester Police shared with us their experiences on the #gmp24 project – an idea (from the Chief Executive no less) to tweet every action that the police took in 24 hours. The results were remarkable, pushing their followers up to 18,000, achieved nationwide press coverage and inspired the equally remarkable #Walsall24, in which Walsall Council tweeted their actions over a day (which you can read about more here).
• Tanya Ashworth, Communications officer from Preston City Council spoke about their nifty use of social media inside the Council on a day-to-day basis, from opening the conversation on Facebook to using tools such as Ustream to broadcast council meetings. It was impressive to see a council taking a sensible ‘use what’s out there’ approach that is beginning to transform their relationship with the citizens of Preston.
• Up next, Mike Rawlins from Talk About Local, who gave a down-to-earth talk about the benefits and limitations of social media practice. You can watch his full presentation, and his write up of his Local by Social experience here.
• Joseph Stashko continued the local theme, filling attendees in on Blog Preston and its future as one of the winning projects of the NESTA Neighbourhood Challange, as part of Prescap. A refreshing insight that balanced stories and journalistic pieces alongside content that is simply useful for the local community (wifi hotspots being a popular post), with a commitment to deliver material in partnership with the community, you can watch his presentation in full here.
• Andrew Wilson completed the talks by telling us all about Who Owns My Neigbourhood? a service that helps local people take responsibility for the land, buildings and activities where they live and work. The site enables people find out who owns what and how buildings and spaces could be better used for the benefit of the community.

With the talks triggering questions and potential answers, we asked participants to get thinking about what they would like to change for Blackburn’s communities and council. Participants scribbled their bright ideas on post its (perhaps the most we’ve seen in the entire series!) and the Local by Social team scrambled the ideas into ten or so themes for groups to form around.

Teams set, we all got to work to take a bright idea into a project full of potential, wrapping up with a show and tell at the end of the day to share progress. Projects spanned the board, impressively covering citizen engagement and organisation transparency from lots of different angles, which nicely reflected the diversity of attendees. Over ten projects were presented, and here’s just a few to give you an idea of the work created that afternoon – if we haven’t yet received your project presentation feel free to send through and we’ll make sure we share it with the Local by Social community to help make it happen…

FOI Exchanger

Ever wanted to find out about something in your organisation but worried about your position? The FOI Exchanger aims to allow people ‘swap’ requests, remaining anonymous…

Cut the Crap

Potholes, dustbins, dog poop… classic examples of the problems councils deal with on a day to day basis. How can we tackle the problems in a better way, as well as go some way to stop them happening in the first place?

Print10

An idea from Tanya, a communications officer at Preston City Council. The funding for the council newspaper has been completely cut, leaving many concerned about those who might not be able to reach the information online. Print10 is a project that aims to help communities distribute the magazine in partnership with the council…

The final edition in this series of Local by Social events will be taking place in the North West on the 18th March, and the theme will be Transparency and Engagement. Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council will be hosting the event at the Blackburn Rovers’ stadium, Ewood Park.

The agenda has now been published and as you can see (below) the line-up includes a range of speakers chosen to stimulate your thinking about how we can use social media and the internet to increase transparency and engagement in local government across the North West of England.

The day will include the opportunity to work in groups and design solutions to challenges presented by the topic of the day. Groups will create presentations that showcase these solutions and our panel of expert judges will select a winning idea at the end of the day.

You are welcome to attend if you are interested in the topic. We already have a number of people from the public, voluntary and social innovation sectors signed up. Local residents and community groups are particularly welcome to come along because you, after all, are what it is all about.

Local by Social North West Edition: Transparency and Engagement

Friday 18^th March
Ewood Park, Blackburn

09.00 – 09.30: Registration and coffee

09.30 – 09.40: Welcome – Cllr Kate Hollern, Leader, Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council

09.40 – 09.50: Blackburn’s Transparency agenda – Tom Stannard, Director of Policy and Communications, Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council

09.50 – 10.05: Introduction to Local by Social – Ingrid Koehler, Improvement Strategist, LGID

10.05 – 10.10: Questions and comments

10.10 – 10.25: Coffee break

10.25 – 10.40: The Financial Tip of the Information Iceberg – Cllr Tim Cheetham, Cabinet Spokesperson for Corporate Services, Barnsley Council

10.40 – 10.55: Gov 2.0 – Dominic Campbell, FutureGov

10.55 – 11.00 Questions and comments

11.00 – 11.50: Quick fire presentation speakers

• Amanda Coleman, Acting Director, Corporate Communications, Greater Manchester Police and Kevin Hoy, Web Strategy Manager, Greater Manchester Police
• Tanya Ashworth / Carl Holloway, Senior Communications Officer, Preston City Council
• Mike Rawlins, Talk About Local
• Joseph Stashko, Prescap (NESTA Neighbourhood Challenge Winner)

11.50 – 12.15: Generating and filtering workshop ideas

12.15 – 1.15: Lunch

1.15 – 3.15: Afternoon workshop groups
3.15 – 4.00: Workshop group feedback
4.00 – 4.10: Judging
4.10 – 4.30: Announcements and closing remarks

To get your free ticket, please click here.

Last week we headed up North to Sunderland for the third installment of Local by Social. This time round Sunderland Council and Southwick community primary school played hosts, looking to the web in helping to tackle local child poverty. The event brought together a diverse range of specialists and enthusiasts looking to pitch in, from technology specialists to child poverty campaigners, head teachers to local entrepreneurs, spending two days thinking creatively and shaping new projects specifically for the local area and its children.

In true Local by Social style, we kicked things off with talks from a cross-section of the audience, setting the scene and thinking about where the web could take us. Highlights included opening remarks from local councillor Dave Allen, lead on all things ICT in Sunderland, and his colleague Tom Baker, Head of ICT. Both stressed the importance of technology, and in particular the web, in social and economic development in Sunderland, highlighting large local initiatives such as Software City.

Southwick School headteacher Trish Stoker, host of the event, spoke about how the school was the centre of a tight community where the web had helped strengthen “a sense of belonging for everyone.” Firing the audience up for the challenge, Trish made it clear that the local Southwick community “are proud of our heritage, but we are forward thinking and ready for the future for our children.”

I managed to grab a quick chat with Trish after her talk:

Jeremiah Alexandra

Ingrid Koehler was up next speaking about building networks in local government (including the soon to be launched Knowledge Hub) describing the day as part of a movement, not a moment. Dominic Campbell from FutureGov continued, giving examples of gov 2.0 in action and how it is giving us the opportunity to transform both our local communities and local leaders.

This was followed by a succession of quick fire talks from people in Sunderland doing really useful things with the web, including Jeremiah Alexandra from Ideonic, who spoke about the possibilities of using platforms as games to connect people, particularly children and young people, followed Saul Cozens from Technophobia who reminded us that this is not about technology, or app building it’s about creating the ability to share in order to learn – from both good practices and mistakes. Mahmoud Elsaid founder of Lamasa Tech rounded the morning off, talking to us about making community communication more effective, particular noting multi touch technologies and interactive post it walls.

The afternoon saw on final talk from NESTA’s Carla Ross, who spoke about their Reboot Britain programme and how they are working on piloting, developing and building projects locally to try and transform public services, giving particular mention to those projects focused on keeping children safe by creating stronger relationships supported by technology, including FutureGov’s Safeguarding 2.0 app and Swindon’s LIFE project.

Getting creative

But the talks just marked the start of things to come. After a spot of lunch, the crowd were asked to put their thinking caps on and propose ideas as to how the web could help meet some of the challenges outlined in the morning’s sessions, with a particular focus on the ideas put forward by the community at a recent ideas swapping session held by the school. Emma from Funky group talked through this Local by Social warm up event as part of the school’s ‘big conversation’, where parents were invited to tell Emma what technology and websites they and their children already used as well as what else they would find useful. You can hear more about how the Local by Social warm up event below when I stopped for a chat with Emma, who highlighted the importance of getting to know a community before trying to improve or build anything new.

These suggestions from the community were combined with more bright ideas from Local by Socialites, resulting in a shortlist of project themes that our groups formed around and spent a busy afternoon developing – wrapping up with a show and tell at the end of the day to share progress. And here are the results!

• Community knowledge: a popular idea from the community was a simple place online where residents could share knowledge of local events, as well as a place to offer support in organising them as well as a easy place to ask for help. It was made clear that lots of good stuff goes on but there was room for the web to make things more inclusive and accessible.

• Catch the Light: the Southwick community primary school holds a two week festival each year, where students and their families create lanterns together and end the event with a procession through the local area. A popular event, the catch the light team have spotted an opportunity to go beyond the boundaries of Southwick, using the web to enable nearby communities to hold their own festivals – using social networks to let people know what’s going on and how they can get involved and support their community.

• AnonyBus: this idea wants to make the progress made in the community more visible. Both a website and, literally, a bus, the Anonybus will collect community concerns and map online problems that have been reported, if they are being acted upon and when situations have been resolved using a simple taffic light system. The group emphasised the importance of involving  young people as well, creating another way for them to feel like they belong to a local area.

• School Attendance: during the warm up event, school attendance was marked out as the key issue when it came to children and the local area. The group, which included local residents, emphasised that there was no quick fix as often serious problems with attendance is not just due to the individual child  but deep seated social issues that often run through families. They therefore suggested something simple, such as a virtual marble jar, rewarding good behaviour and turning attendance for the child into a game through an app that could be done part of a toolkit that staff could use.

• iWant: a site that will allow children and young people to get in touch to talk about what they like in their area and what they think might be missing, for instance highlighting that lots happens in the summer but what about winter? iWant would allow them to see what local services can and could provide. The tool would also ask for suggestions and allow voting on community projects and activities, providing a mechanism to allow the council to spend money on what the young people really want from their area.

• Kickstarter fundraiser: how do residents go about securing funding in a simple, easy and quick way to carry out their own community projects? Application forms are often considered too complicated, so this idea aims to make the process simpler and allow people to share their experiences of securing funding through facilitating a mentor programme, with the site perhaps even including a jargon buster to help make funding applications easy.

• Family trees: picking up on the theme of the local area being proud of their heritage, this idea aims to link up local history, education and environment. By using QR technology, Family Trees want to add a digital layer to trees within the school, allowing the children to learn more about past generations. This would then also be linked to local software Raise a Tree, providing a virtual family tree as well. The team suggested the children planning the environment to increase a sense of ownership, as well as adding their own and their family’s memories to the trees.

• Transport: this group explored what the local community could achieve by coming together to provide transport for each other, particularly looking around community schemes, or creating a place online where residents could help each other, especially around community events. The team suggested local businesses being able to help provide funding, as well as receiving local discounts as reward along the lines of the very popular Groupon website.

What next?

An inspiring first day ended buzzing with community pride and optimism. All project ideas showed real promise, strengthened by the fact those in the community had asked to help with the specific areas we worked on. Ideas were taken forward into day two, where local developers and digital creatives helped to turn the ideas into a reality. More on that soon…

If you’d like to come along to our final Local by Social event, the North West edition, you can grab one of the last few tickets here. We hope to see you there!

Photos from Janet E Davies, Local by Social participant

Local by Social is all about taking community ideas and supporting them with digital technologies.  The ideas can be simple or complex – but they’re about bringing people together from communities, public services and those with technology backgrounds to make stuff happen.

We’ve already been laying the groundwork with the Southwick – the host community in Sunderland. Last week residents, council officers, parents and school staff came together to think about how technology could be used to improve their lives and the lives of others in the Southwick neighbourhood. (And we think the ideas are applicable elsewhere, too – with a bit of local spin.)

The great news is that although Southwick faces many challenges, ‘digital divide’ is not a major issue. Many families have PCs or laptops at home, and rates of broadband take-up, Facebook and mobile phone usage are high. Residents were most interested in exploring how digital technology can be harnessed for local benefit.  And they came up with some cracking ideas, that we’ll be working to put into practice.

An action packed Friday

The Local by Social team (Local Government Improvement and Development supported by FutureGov) will be running an action packed Friday developing ideas  to be taken forward by SuperMondays an IT community network in the North East and Sunderland City Council who will get things developed and implemented. You can still sign up here. The Local by Social team will also be helping these ideas filter into the national developer network.

Here are just some of the cool ideas we’ll be working on…

Family Trees: Southwick Community Primary School is currently working on a tree planting scheme for the school, ‘Family Trees’ will add an exciting digital layer to the scheme. Each tree will display a QR code/SMS shortcode, which will link to a mobile web application containing a particular family history. Families will research and build their own family history pages. Trees may also represent famous local landmarks, buildings, events and stories.

Catch the Light: Southwick is well known for it’s ‘Catch the Light’ lantern festival, which has run since 2003. Over a 2 week period, large intricate candle-lit lanterns are designed and made by the local community. How can we use technology to extend and share the creativity, skill and passion of the community for this unique event? Is there a wider market for these amazing lanterns, an online business which can be developed?

Activities for children and young people: Many would like to see more activities organised for under-8s, more art, dance and creative classes for all ages, outdoor activities and activities that families can enjoy together. Cost of participation can be a problem. How can we use social media to enable parents and children to research, organise and formalise demand for new activities? Can we connect demand for activities with local corporate sponsors? Can we utilise the real-time or near real-time features of social media to enable more flexibility in sign up, payment and participation?

Is there a way to combine a search for city wide activities with detailed public transport data, to create a personalised schedule with point to point location, transport, time and total cost information?

Fundraising Guru: Community fundraising can be a complicated business with many rules and regulations, permits and permissions required. One of the grandparents at Southwick Community Primary is an experienced and highly successful fundraiser and as such often receives request for help and advice from those starting out.

Can we use technology to help share this knowledge and experience – build a smart online tool which supports and guides a first time fundraiser through the process?

Community concerns: How can someone report a sensitive issue of concern to the correct agency or perhaps to multiple agencies simultaneously? Is it possible to protect the user’s anonymity and create an audit trail, logging issues to ensure an independent record is kept? Should you include location information? Can you make it easy to use, multi-platform, secure and trusted?

And there will be loads of opportunities on the day to add your ideas, too.  Or share your comments and ideas here in the comments section.

There are still a few places left for Friday – so you can still sign up for a FREE ticket.  Sign up here.

Photo credit: Sunderland New Year Lanterns by ttfnrb on Flickr

Lives are messy.  Lives are full of complex relationships and difficult circumstances.  All families are chaotic. I mean, I guess they are.  Mine is.

Certainly some of the most intractable problems that we face in the public sector are caused by we frail humans and our silly, sometimes tragic ways. If we were all alike in our unhappiness, then problems might be much simpler to solve.  And these problems are compounded by dis-organisation, lack of information, a failure to communicate and layers of people who need to know or act, but don’t.

Social media doesn’t solve this.  But social media and digital technologies do enable connections to be made more easily and information to be shared quickly and easily.  Information that can range from a feeling to a picture to case information to reminders of how to access services.

The next Local by Social is going to be delivered through the lens of child poverty. Initially, we were reluctant to say this – maybe child poverty sounds stigmatising or patronising? A bit of a downer?  But really this is about life chances, opportunity and making a difference. This is about starting with the problem and not just championing a solution that you hope will fit.  This is the most exciting and innovative edge of how social tech can be used to transform not just services but people’s lives.  It won’t be easy and it won’t be fast, but this is what public service is about.  This is a chance to be a part of one of the most exciting, purposeful events you’ll ever attend.

On the first day,  4 March -  we have an absolutely amazing line up. We’ll hear from innovators, Sunderland’s political leadership will share how they’ve been leading on digital and from Carla Ross from NESTA’s ReBoot Britain programme where a series of programmes are trying to tackle some really complex issues in people’s lives.  (See here for full agenda). We’ll hear from people at the leading edge of digital innovation in gaming and touch screens  and then we’ll work together to see how some of these lessons can be applied to a particular neighbourhood in Sunderland.  And the people who live there will be working with us as citizen innovators.   This is a huge opportunity to see in a very practical way how digital tech can reach into the heart of public service and to be a part of spreading these lessons more widely.

On Day 2 we’ll be working with developers, citizens and public sector practitioner to design  and build things which can be used not just in that neighbourhood in the North East, but maybe in a neighbourhood near you.  Neighbourhoods are both happy and unhappy in their own unique ways, but we’ll be sharing lessons about ways of thinking about addressing  these issues which are the same everywhere.

You can attend either or both days, and of course, the tickets are free.  Sign up here.

_________

Friday 4^th March, Southwick Community Primary School, Sunderland

9.30 – 10.00: Registration and coffee

1000 – 10.10: Sunderland’s Vision for Digital Inclusion – Cllr Florence Anderson, Deputy Leader of Sunderland City Council and Child Poverty Champion

10.10 – 10.20: Sunderland’s approach to Digital Inclusion – Tom Baker, Head of Communications and Corporate Information and Communication Technology, Sunderland City Council (TBC)

10.20 – 10.30: Hopes for the day – Trish Stoker, Head Teacher of Southwick Community Primary School (TBC)

1030 – 10.45: Introduction to Local by Social and LG Groups’ Knowledge Hub -Ingrid Koehler, Improvement Strategist, Local Government Improvement and Development (LGID)

10.45 – 10.55: Gov 2.0 – Carrie Bishop, FutureGov

Questions and comments

11.05 – 11.20: Coffee break

11.20 – 11.35: Reboot Britain – Carla Ross, Innovation Programmes Manager, National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts (NESTA)

Questions and comments

11.45 – 12.15: Generating and filtering ideas for afternoon workshops

12.15 – 1.00: Lunch

1.00 – 2.15: Afternoon speakers

• Herb Kim, Chief Executive of Codeworks, which facilitates connection and collaboration between digital innovators within North East England and throughout the world.
• Jeremiah Alexander, Ideas Architect/Director of Ideonic, an ideas-driven serious games studio based in Newcastle.
• Mahmoud Elsaid, Managing Director of LamasaTech, which develops multi-touch technologies such as interactive walls.

2.15 – 2.30: Introduction to afternoon workshop sessions

2.30 – 3.30: Afternoon workshops

3.30 – 4.15: Workshop feedback

4.15 – 4.25: Review of workshop presentations

4.25 – 4.30: Closing Remarks

Penshaw Monument by jonoy24/7 on Flickr

*Book your place now Local by Social: North East Edition*

Last month we announced Local by Social is coming to the North East and North West in March. With just under three weeks to go until the first event in Sunderland we are pleased to be able to tell you who will be speaking at the event.

Sunderland City Council will play host to Local by Social: North East Edition over two days on Friday 4^th and Saturday 5^th March. The venue for both days is Southwick Community Primary School.

Local by Social events bring local government practitioners, social innovators and the voluntary sector together to share innovation and explore how technology can be used to improve local public services.

Each event has its own theme. At Sunderland we will be looking at how social media, apps and other new technology can be used to tackle social exclusion and promote opportunity. In particular we want you to ‘think family’ and consider how technology can support families as well as individuals.

We’ve lined up a range of expert and engaging speakers with experience in the field of technology and promoting opportunity. Speakers confirmed for Friday 4^th March include:

• Councillor Florence Anderson, Deputy Leader of Sunderland City Council and Chair of Sunderland Child Poverty Action Group
• Carla Ross, Innovation Programmes Manager at NESTA. Carla heads up the Reboot Britain programme, which is looking at the challenges we face as a country and the new possibilities that a networked, digital world offers to overcome them.
• Herb Kim, Chief Executive of Codeworks, which facilitates connection and collaboration between digital innovators within North East England and throughout the world. Herb was recently featured in the MediaGuardian 100  2010, an annual guide to the most powerful people in media.

An agenda for Friday is set out at the bottom of this post.

Friday will also offer the chance to explore how technology can be used to make a practical difference to local communities. Working together in groups, we will focus on identifying ideas for using technology in innovative ways.

For those of you who can make the second leg of Local by Social: North East Edition on Saturday 5^th March, we will be hosting a development or hack day. We will be looking at how we can build practical solutions based on the ideas from Friday.

And remember, you don’t have to be a techie to benefit from Local by Social. As with previous events, we will be bringing along technical people to help you understand how the technology works.

Registration for Local by Social is FREE. To book your place, click on the link below:

Local by Social: North East Edition

Please note: although Local by Social: North East Edition takes place over two days, you are free to choose which of the days you attend. For example, should you wish to attend the Saturday but not the Friday, please select a Saturday ticket only.

Agenda for Local by Social North East edition

Day One – Friday 4^th March, Southwick Community Primary School, Sunderland

9.30 – 10.00: Registration and coffee

1000 – 10.10: Sunderland’s Vision for Digital Inclusion – Cllr David Allen, Portfolio Holder for Resources, Sunderland City Council

10.10 – 10.20: Sunderland’s approach to Digital Inclusion – Tom Baker, Head of ICT

10.20 – 10.30: Hopes for the day – Trish Stoker, Head Teacher of Southwick Community Primary School (TBC)

1030 – 10.45: Introduction to Local by Social and LG Groups’ Knowledge Hub -Ingrid Koehler, Improvement Strategist, Local Government Improvement and Development (LGID)

10.45 – 10.55: Gov 2.0 – Carrie Bishop, FutureGov

Questions and comments

11.05 – 11.20: Coffee break

11.20 – 11.35: Reboot Britain – Carla Ross, Innovation Programmes Manager, National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts (NESTA)

Questions and comments

11.45 – 12.15: Generating and filtering ideas for afternoon workshops

12.15 – 1.00: Lunch

1.00 – 2.15: Afternoon speakers

• Herb Kim, Chief Executive of Codeworks, which facilitates connection and collaboration between digital innovators within North East England and throughout the world.
• Jeremiah Alexander, Ideas Architect/Director of Ideonic, an ideas-driven serious games studio based in Newcastle.
• Mahmoud Elsaid, Managing Director of LamasaTech, which develops multi-touch technologies such as interactive walls.

2.15 – 2.30: Introduction to afternoon workshop sessions

2.30 – 3.30: Afternoon workshops

3.30 – 4.15: Workshop feedback

4.15 – 4.25: Review of workshop presentations

4.25 – 4.30: Closing Remarks

Day Two – Saturday 5^th March, Southwick Community Primary School, Sunderland

On Day two we’ll be working with developers, citizens and public sector practitioner to design and build things which can be used not just in that neighbourhood in the North East, but maybe in a neighbourhood near you.  Neighbourhoods are both happy and unhappy in their own unique ways, but we’ll be sharing lessons about ways of thinking about addressing these issues which are the same everywhere.

1000 – 1030: Registration and coffee

1030 – 1100: Introductions and summary of Day 1

1100 – 1245: Group work

1245 – 1300: Progress update and opportunity to swap groups/share skills

1300 – 1330: Lunch

1330 – 1500: Group work

1500 – 1600: Presentations

You can get a better idea of how Day two will work by reading our blog from Local by Social: South West earlier this year.

Early stages of the Allotmentville project: LbyS Hack Day Pics by London looks, on Flickr

“Wake up it’s a beautiful morning, feel the sun shining for your eyes”. Attendees at Day 2 of Local of Social: South West were greeted by these words as the Watershed Media Centre rocked (or should that be gently swayed?) to the sounds of one-hit-wonders the Boo Radleys on our Local By Social Spotify playlist.

Whether or not attendees truly felt it was a beautiful morning is no doubt a point of contention. From looking around the room it was fairly evident that some groups had continued to explore ideas from Day 1 in a more informal setting on Friday night. Nonetheless, people were keen to get started.

The purpose of the day was to work together to hack the apps that came out of Friday’s ideas sessions. Although didn’t have enough time to actually fully build the apps, the expectation was that we would have a clear idea of what we would look to build in future.

Starting out

The day started with a re-cap of Friday’s developments. Representatives from Friday’s workshop groups presented a summary of their project proposals, which members of the room then joined for the day (you can read about them in more detail in our write up of day one). These were:

• Democracy Bot

A system for making it easier to report issues to councils and for the council to effectively and transparently follow them up.

• Parking King App

An app to make it easier to find a parking space. Key features include ‘Can I park here?’, which would tell the users when it was safe to park on a side road, and real-time information on the number of spaces in multi-storey car parks.

• On The Beach App

An app to provide surfers and other beach users with reliable and up-to-date information on beach conditions.

• Volunteering App

This app is designed to provide members of the public with easy to access information on opportunities to volunteer in their local area. By working with volunteering organisations the team not only hope to obtain up-to-date data on opportunities, but also to connect volunteers to areas where there is greatest demand for their skills.

• Allotment Surplus

A system for making it easy for allotment  holders to give their surplus food to a good home!

Developing ideas

Tim Davies (far right of picture) shows attendees how to work with Open Data: Local by Social: South West by clarke_francis, on Flickr

In groups, teams discussed the issues they were interested in and what form a solution these issues could take. Discussions focused on:

Identifying the key issues

• What is the main challenge or issue you are trying to tackle?
• How do you know the issue is important to people – what is the demand?

Exploring possible solutions

• Does anything already exist? If so, what’s missing or what can be improved?
• What (existing or new) data do you need to develop a solution?
• What barriers to collecting data exist?
• What technology will you use to build your solution?
• How would you encourage people to use your solution?

Sharing expertise

As groups started to develop their proposals they were supported by experts on new technology and open data.

Consultant and Researcher Tim Davies, who also spoke on Friday, demonstrated his Open Data cook book, showing attendees simple yet effective ways of gathering and re-using publicly available data.

Tim’s support was complemented by Service Designer Ian Drysdale. Ian listened to group discussions and encouraged attendees to fully consider the needs the needs and preferences of those who will use the service.

Half-time report

Just before lunch, each team fed back to the wider group on the progress they had made in developing their proposals. This provided a chance for people to ask questions and offer help to anyone who needed it.

Developing and refining solutions

Democracy Bot takes shape, one Post-It note at at time: Local by Social: South West by clarke_francis, on Flickr

After enjoying a tasty buffet lunch it was straight back to group work. Attendees spent the afternoon working out what features their apps would have, how they would work and how they would encourage people to use them.

Show and tell

Ian Drysdale uses storyboarding to explain how the Allotmentville project will work: Local by Social: South West by clarke_francis, on Flickr

Esko Reinikakinen answers questions on how Democracy Bot will work, Local by Social: South West by clarke_francis, on Flickr

The day ended with each group reporting back on the progress they had made in developing their projects.

The day produced two strong project proposals. Democracy Bot developed comprehensive plans for an issue reporting system. The team identified innovative technology such as Natural Language Processing which could be used to improve how issues are recorded and responded to.

The Democracy Bot team are determined to take the project forward. Already they’ve set-up a Democracy Bot website and will be holding a development swarm at City Camp Brighton on 4-5 March.

Another strong proposal came from the Allotment Surplus team. Their project, now renamed Allotmentville (Farmville, Allotment – geddit??), proposed a social space for allotment holders to blog about what they’re growing and share their food surplus with other users.

Other groups used the day to learn more about how to use services and technologies that already exist and think through how they might in future make creative use of them.

We’ll keep you posted on how our project teams get on. Please get in touch if you have news on any of the projects developed at Local by Social: South West Edition.

Learning from the day

Pre-event support

Local by Social attracted attendees from a wide range of backgrounds. As a result not everyone was entirely familiar with the technology and services we used on the hack day. In future, we could help people by providing useful information on this in advance, so attendees are more confident about making use of technology.

Ask the experts

On day 2, attendees particularly valued learning from Tim and Ian the practical skills needed to confidently make use of open data and web technologies. However the event would definitely have benefited from having more developers on board to provide technical support, advise on what services already exist and ensure more time could be spent on developing new ideas.

If all this sounds like your kind of thing you might want to sign up for our upcoming Local by Social events. Next month we’re holding our North West and North East editions – you can find out more and book your free place here.

Stephen Hilton from Connect Bristol kicked things off ably supported by Councillor Babara Janke who did an excellent job of setting the tone for the day. Both emphasised how proud Bristol is of its digital heritage and how the council recognises the huge impact the web could have on their communities if used the right way. As Stephen explains:

I think the web is a revolutionary thing, not just for Bristol but for the world… It was very important for me to host this event in the main council office as I believe we need to bring apps right to the heart of local government. At the moment potential is limited by understanding rather than the technology – it’s about a new mindset and creating new relationships between councils and communities by using all the resources available.

Ingrid Koehler and Brendan Harris from the Local Government Improvement and Development introduced both the thinking behind Local by Social and the soon to be launched Knowledge Hub – a place for those in local government to share good practice and ask new questions (you can view their full presentation here). Following from this Carrie Bishop from FutureGov rounded up the preliminaries giving her view on the bigger picture on why all his stuff matters, providing examples that are helping to change the way local services are designed and delivered. Specific projects name checked included FutureGov’s Safeguarding 2.0 project, as well as new venture Simpl, a social innovation marketplace that makes it easier for councils to be introduced, and implement innovative ideas.

Emer Coleman, Director of Digital Projects from the Greater London Authority’s presentation opened for the line up of guest speakers, framing the possibilities and challenges around open data by telling the story of the London data store so far:

This provided the perfect setting to hear about specific examples for how apps can have impact. Particularly interesting was the emerging theme around apps can begin to help make government and public services more human and the relationship more personal:

Rich Watts explored the potential of location based social media such as foursquare in improving social care. You can read his presentation, and write up of his overall Local by Social experience here. He noted that service users don’t have the information they need to be able to successfully navigate the social care system to make use of the resources. Could the web, or specifically a tool like foursquare help? Rich put forward some examples of how he sees social media could become a tool to build a rich real time resource around social care, from opening times for day centres to the prices of residential homes.

Clare Reddington from iShed brought to life how social media can be used in developing our relationships with our local areas by sharing with us an incredible amount of projects the company have supported to use the web to tie together people, places and interests. Clare focused on the playful entrepreneurial uses of data that can help enrich communities such as Mobile Pie’s Blossom Bristol and Mudlark’s Chromaroma.

Mike McCarthy from Hills Are Evil explained how their app, developed in Bristol, hopes to create a tool that can extend individuals independence by creating a dynamic map overlay that gives people with restricted mobility (cyclists, the elderly, wheelchair users) the chance to identify the most appropriate route between two places.

Tim Davies provided an opportunity to take a step back and rethink apps altogether, giving the audience food for thought around the need for ‘data education’. Tim’s Open Data cook book might be just the way to do this, providing a place where people who might not be quite so at home with data to have a play and see what works for them.  The two main themes that come to light through all the talks were accessibility and making government human, and Tim’s presentation demonstrated a practical way data could achieve this.

Local by Social – Rethinking apps

View more presentations from Tim Davies.

Turning ideas into action

After a quick bite to eat, participants were asked to scribble down apps they wish existed that could benefit the Bristol community. The ideas wall was quickly covered with suggestions ranging from library services to nautical information (arrr!). The room broke up into small groups to work up these ideas further. It was during this time we had a quick chat with those working inside local government to see what all these thoughts, projects and aspirations meant to them. Councillor Jon Rodgers, a local Bristol politician, was a particular highlight:

“I’m a really strong believer of open government and actually getting information out there – if you try and keep things covered up it actually undermines democracy and undermines the way people feel about themselves and their communities. There are risks and people in local government are anxious…. my feeling is that we should embrace the incorrect – it’s not possible to think that we in local government can be correct all the time…. we should be open to comments, suggestions and criticisms at all times.”

You can listen to the interview in full below, where Cllr Rogers talks about life as a local politician and what being open meant to him, repeating his excellent comment from the question and answer session about the need for local government to learn from its mistakes. To hear this from someone who is on the hard edge of local democracy working to make politics more human was truly inspirational and will hopefully encourage others to follow in his steps:

Likewise, Louise Kidney, officer at Blackburn and Darwen Council (who coincidentally will be hosting a Local by Social event this March – see what we did there?) provided some excellent points about what this all means when working in a council. She mentioned how events such as the Local by Social series helped provide a safe space for those in local government to explore, ask questions and be encouraged to experiment with the data and the web. She also reiterated the need for local government to strengthen its capacity when it comes to being able to take risks. Again, a unique insight and well worth a listen:

As things came to a close, each group reported back their app idea to the room, with ideas benefiting from the rich feedback available from the diverse expertise and perspectives from the participants in the room. To finish the day off, our judging panel decided on the top three main app ideas to bring forward for the second half of Local by Social South West:

Allotment Surplus

A system for making it easy for allotment  holders to give their surplus food to a good home! The group explained that whilst it was sometimes possible to pass surplus food to charities, the process could be fiddly and time consuming. The allotment surplus system would make it easy for allotment holders to advertise their surplus food to people who want to eat it. The project team also envisaged a strong social element, with allotment holders earning prestige based on what they have grown and shared.

Democracy Bot

This project is designed to improve the system for reporting issues to the council. The project team identified two key problems. Firstly, current systems for reporting do not always sufficiently capture ‘community intelligence’. Instead, official channels may be used by the ‘vocal minority’. Secondly, issues reported are not always followed up effectively, particularly when the issue falls between more than one team or department. Democracy Bot would provide a means for council officers and the public to report issues using a range of technology, from text messages to Twitter. The system would then record and categorise the issue and assign responsibility for following it up. Members of the public as well as officers and councillors could log in and view the status of reported issues.

On The Beach

This app is designed to provide surfers and other beach users with reliable and up-to-date information on beach conditions. The app would pull in data from a variety of sources, such as tidal predictions and weather forecasting. The project team spent time discussing issues with obtaining data, as tidal data is not currently freely available to the public.

We left day one enthused and inspired, with some neat ideas to work with on day two’s hack day. Want to know what happened? Check back here very soon!

Angel of the North 3 by howzey, on Flickr

Following hot on the heels of last week’s Local by Social: South West Edition in Bristol, we’re excited to announce the latest round of Local by Social events.

March will be a busy month for Local by Social, with two new events taking place in the North East and North West.

On Friday 4^th and Saturday 5^th March, Sunderland City Council will host Local by Social: North East Edition at Southwick Community Primary School. Then, on Friday 18^th March, Local by Social: North West Edition will be hosted by Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council at Ewood Park.

Local by Social is all about using web technology to improve local communities. Each event is based around a specific theme.  At Sunderland we’ll be looking at how social media, apps and other web technology can be used to promote opportunity and tackle social exclusion.  Transparency and engagement will be the theme at Blackburn, with a focus on how open data and social media can increase levels of transparency and involvement in local decision-making.

Both events will feature a combination of interactive sessions with engaging speakers and group workshop sessions. At these workshops you’ll have the chance to work together to develop practical ideas for using new technology to make a positive difference to your local community.

The second day of Local by Social: North East Edition will run as a hack day and focus on developing your ideas into practical project proposals. We’ll enlist the skills of designers and technology experts to help make your ideas a reality.

Please note: although Local by Social: North East Edition takes place over two days, you are free to choose which of the days you attend. For example, should you wish to attend the Saturday but not the Friday, please select a Saturday ticket only.

Local by Social brings togther individuals and organisations from a wide range of backgrounds. Council officers, councillors, local residents, community organisers,  social innovators, and application developers are very welcome to attend.

Registration for Local by Social is FREE and tickets are now available for both events:

Local by Social: North East Edition

Local by Social: North West Edition

Over the next couple of weeks we will be announcing our speaker line-up and other details right here on the Local by Social blog.  You can also sign up to our Local by Social mailing list by adding your details here.