Ask Premier Ed
Earlier this summer fusedlogic launched a social media website called “dearmrpremier.ca” in an attempt to enable an open and direct line of communications with Premier Ed Stelmach and his office. The thought is, Albertans could respectfully ask a question directly of Premier Stelmach and he could select one or more questions to respond to personally with the understanding that he couldn’t possibly answer every single one. The catch is that this would all be open to comment and vote by the public.
We started this prototype process by inviting college students to participate and in fact a few did. Because of ongoing discussions, we haven’t put any resources behind marketing the project, as we were waiting for a more opportune time to move forward. After the soft launch on Twitter we were notified in less than an hour that Premier Stelmach’s staff were actively searching for answers as to who was behind the site. After it was determined through our communications that our intent was not malicious we had asked if there may be an opportunity to discuss the future of the site and the potential of having Premier Stelmach’s direct participation. Those meetings have not as of yet happened.
In the meantime, so that Albertans have a better understanding of the differences in functionality and approach between dearpremier.ca and Ask Premier Ed we’ve prepared a brief comparison of models below.
| Dear Mr Premier | Ask Premier Ed | |
| Channels of Communication | Open post, can be shared on Facebook/Twitter | Twitter, YouTube, Online Form |
| Timeline | Launched March 15, 2009 | Launched November 25, 2009 |
| Openness | All posts are visible, moderation happens after | Moderation happens behind the scenes |
| Likelihood of a Response | Only upon a certain level of public involvement | For a chosen post, guaranteed |
| Discussion Around Ideas | Complete open citizen participation through comments or followup questions | No discussion functionality available |
| Importance Determined By | Public voting | The Premier’s office |
| Design | Simplicity | Integrated with other government resources |
Further Examples of Communication Models:
Open for Questions (Official WhiteHouse.gov page)
Prime Minister Harper’s Facebook Page
The Great (Edmonton) Airport Debate
The debate between closing and maintaining the Edmonton City Centre Airport (YXD) has heated up as of late. With City Councilors set to make a decision on July 8, opinion is still widely divided between the two view points.
With that in mind, fusedlogic will be hosting the “Great Airport Debate” at our studio in Sherwood Park. We currently have Mack Male (creator of notmyairport.ca) and Dave MacLean (creator of saveourairport.ca) lined up to continue a discussion they began last week, but were unable to continue due to time restraints. Well, we don’t have any of those here. As well, we may be adding a few more guests to sit on the discussion panel – we’ll update this post as soon as any are confirmed. Read more
The Alberta “statusphere”
The “statusphere is re-defining authority.” – Brian Solis, next09
Many have walked into the Alberta legislature and stood in awe of the building, the staircases and marble columns. I feel a little sense of majesty every time I go there. However, I must admit, to never having the pleasure of being in the Premier’s office. From the pictures, I think it sends a message of “old world” power and respect.
Interestingly, as soon as, Premier Stelmach’s staff send out a status update on the web, we welcome him and his team into another office of power and respect. The Premier has entered our virtual office within the social web.
Now one might suggest that the playing field is level in that case, but I wouldn’t. Actually, I firmly believe the playing field remains seriously tilted in the citizen’s favor. In recent weeks this “tilt” has applied considerable pressure on the government. Starting 19 days ago with Paula Simons (@Paulatics) of the Edmonton Journal writing a hard-hitting article on the use of a Northumberland, England picture in the Alberta Brand project. That article was referred to by Jeremy Fritsche (@jeremyfritsche) who tweeted the following which alerted the Alberta Twitter community.
jeremyfritsche Authenticity should be the key to a good brand – where is Alberta’s? http://tinyurl.com/c6ery7 #albertabrand #YEG #ABLeg
Of course, applied pressure is not unique to social media. The example above of citizens within mass media exercising their right to “free speech,” has also been a key. The difference here is that the social web amplifies the conversation around each issue. The social web enables many more people to organize, voice their opinion and share it in near real-time.
The Premier, despite having this pressure applied to him and that of his government, has a tremendous opportunity. I believe the majority of hyper-connected Albertans would embrace Premier Stelmach reacting personally online and thereby increasing access. Further value could be generated by directly sharing ideas, building relationships, learning and inspiring Albertans personally with every tweet. The following tweet doesn’t quite qualify in that regard.
@premierstelmach Photos of Premier Stelmach enjoying pulled pork sandwiches on the Leg grounds — http://twurl.nl/v47jwv #ableg
And citizen’s counter the above with Tweets with sentiment similar to below.
dblacombe @premierstelmach does no one monitor this account “Steady Eddie”? You should take a page from @g_campbell who actually speaks here!
The significant problems we have cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them. – Albert Einstein
Prediction: Albertans updating their status online on Twitter and else where will continue to influence public opinion, and ultimately government. Hyper-connected Albertans are learning to inspire action.
Due to this combined pressure from all sides on the government regarding a number of issues, such as the new Alberta Brand and the continued dust raised over Bill 44. Don’t be surprised if there’s a “cabinet shuffle” after the current session ends.
In effect, one might say that with every tweet, the “statusphere” is playing a key role in re-defining Alberta’s authority.
ChangeCamp Edmonton
A coin was dropped into a pond of thought this evening and the ripples have begun to work their way outward. As a result I believe Albertans in and around the Greater Edmonton Region are going to be in for a treat when everything is all said and done.
Tonight was the first ever ChangeCamp Edmonton meeting where some like minded citizens came together to discuss government and citizen engagement under the umbrella of ChangeCamp.ca (Edmonton wiki is here and the Google Group is here.)
The group included the following folks on Twitter: @Imparo, @ChrisLaBossiere, @JillLaBossiere, @jdarrah, @davecournoyer, @mastermaq, @paulney, @eadnams, @dibegin and myself @fusedlogic
The Steering Committee adopted as a starting point – this question.
“How can we re-imagine government and citizenship in the age of participation?”
What was clear from tonight’s discussion in my mind is that there are definitely people out there who think that the gap between government and the average citizen is wide and consists of too many barriers for real substantive change, meaningful discussion and innovation.
There are pictures and more info to check out @mastermaq’s post on tonight’s meeting as well.
By the way, tomorrow I’m presenting at IDEAfest – 10:05am Room B, Tory Basement 95, University of Alberta Campus and will be giving away cash during my presentation entitled “How YOU can use social media to change the world.” This will be a live “social” experiment that I invite you to be a part of…
See you there,
Walter
March Social Web Meetup
Monday’s Social Web Meetup had a lot going on and we had more than 30 people out. We started out with Victor Rubba of CrazedCoders talking about the application they’re developing for the iPhone. They’re taking an established social networking app and adapting it to the iPhone as well as creating a standalone program you can run on your desktop.
It’s not ready for public consumption yet, and the iPhone app will be available through iTunes.
The program seems to be an internal social media tool and with project management elements. It will be interesting to see the final product. I think it’s something that could be quite useful for most companies.
Edmonton social media community expanding
We started out our discussion about social media in Edmonton by watching a CTV story about Twitter, with several Edmontonians featuring prominently in the story.
Media interest in Twitter has grown substantially in Alberta, particularly in Edmonton lately. Many media organizations have jumped on board and are now experimenting with the medium.
With this media interest there has been curiosity among its viewers and consumers, and according to Mack Male, the number of Twitter users in Edmonton has grown by 50 per cent over the last month. Nice!
Social media community changing?
Edmonton has a vibrant social media community and we’re quite friendly. There was a question whether this will change as time goes on and the community grows. One thought was that instead of meeting as one large group as often happens, people will begin to gather in smaller groups.
There were some comments about people joining Twitter and billing themselves as social media experts or social media gurus. Typical hype. Kind of hard to bill yourself as a social media expert when you’ve been on Twitter for a week, nobody’s following you and you’ve Tweeted a couple dozen times.
One person who could legitimately bill himself as a social media expert in Alberta is Walter Schwabe (@fusedlogic). There aren’t many in Alberta, but the number is growing across Canada. Mack Male’s another one here in Edmonton.
Mainstream media and social media
My favourite part of the discussion was also one of the more contentious ones. Recently mainstream media organizations have been going through a lot of difficulty due to the recession. There seems to be some glee in social media circles about their difficulties.
Mainstream media in Alberta is beginning to join the social media community, and Edmonton’s media especially. It’s obvious they’re quite new to the medium and are having a few growing pains. Who hasn’t though? I’m willing to give anyone new to Twitter the benefit of the doubt, except for spammers or the instant social media experts.
My only observation is that Alberta media organizations seem to have jumped into the game without much of a social media strategy. I could be wrong. I they think they could use an effective social media strategy to cut their learning curve and increase their social media impact.
Continuing the discussion about social media
We again made our way to Brewster’s Pub in Oliver Square for drinks and discussion. I had reserved for 15 people but we had many more people than that. Not bad for a Monday night!
We were lucky to have Alberta MLA Doug Griffiths join us at Brewster’s. He’s also on Twitter as @GriffMLA. The Alberta government has made a strong push to get involved with social media. It was good to hear Doug’s perspective on it. He said he’s had lots of good feedback on the Alberta government’s social media efforts. On a side note, I thought it was interesting that he was on the CBC show The Week the Women Went.
