Common-Nature

I’m writing this post as a way to test Windows live writer for blog posting. It’s part of Windows live.

I’m not typically a fan of Microsoft products because they’re frankly never the best of breed……but simply ok or barely good enough. However, I’m quite impressed with live writer thus far. If MS had more products like this….well, I guess they’d be Apple.

I didn’t install any of the other stuff or sign up for a Windows Live ID. I just skipped all that stuff and went straight to the writer.

Things I like about it.

Allows for offline work, but allows you to see a preview of how your post will look.

Easy to add photos or maps….tags as well. Photo addition is frankly great. I just drag and drop a local photo and it puts it right into the blog post…interfaces with Wordpress perfectly to upload the image.

Category settings are integrated and easy. It knows what my blog post categories are.

In short, I think I’ll be using this critter alot to post to common-nature….and you should probably check it out too.

RSS feed readers: What they are and how you can use em.
Josh is doing a great job presenting and I’m busy writing this post via my Blackberry while he’s finishing up the presentation. Turn out is great. We’ve got about 40 here.

Some links to help you get blogging or using other social media:
Before you blog checklist

DMD presentation: The case for social media in government

I also came across Kevin O’keefe’s do’s and don’ts on company blogging, which provides a nice checklist to those getting ready to create a policy.

when to begin

David Thorne from the Missouri Dept. of Conservation gave a great talk using social media to reach the public. You can read more about his presentation on his site. More on his presentation later.

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I’m in break right now, but wanted to post a couple of important links related to talks at the MNR Conference.

One of them is The Center for Generational Studies. They have some good material for understanding how to relate to next generations in the workplace. Robert Wendover (from the Center) gave a great talk on generational differences in the workplace. Robert also put a special link on the Center’s site for the MNRC containing resources related to his talk.

Louv’s talk was also great (more to come later). In the meantime, check out the Children and Nature Network site.

tag: Richard Louv, Social Media, MNRC

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I’ve been conspicously absent from here the last 3 to 4 months, but am now getting back into things online. In a future post, I’ll be able to fill you on some of the things I’ve been up to.

Right now I’m posting from the Missouri Natural Resource Conference 2008 down in Tan-Tar-A. Their theme this year: Get Ready for Change: Ensuring Resource Sustainability in an iPod® World (so they’re already thinking about future trends).

The keynote speaker? Richard Louv

More about that later. In the meantime, here’s a great presentation with some great facts about changes in worldwide trends….something to get people thinking about how we can no longer remain doing the same old things to reach people.

While you can’t understand every point made in this slideshow, you can learn some interesting facts about where we’re all going with this fancy schmancy web 2.0 stuff

http://www.slideshare.net/montymetzger/power-of-social-media

It’s also a great introduction to slideshare, yet another social media application…this one dedicated to sharing slideshows.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t tend to get excited about slideshows. However, the interesting thing about slideshare is that when you get thousands of slideshows in one place and vote on them, some really great presentations float to the top.

I’ve already found some excellent presentations on AJAX, the purpose of design in web development, etc.

Check slideshare out and see what I mean.

tag: Richard Louv, Social Media

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My employer, the Missouri Dept. of Conservation, has dipped its foot in the water with a blog, Fresh Afield. Lorna Domke, the divisional chief for outreach and education, will be the initial writer and editor of the blog.

The primary thrust of the blog will be connect people of Missouri with the mission of the Department as well as raise awareness of the various resources we have when it comes to the great outdoors of Missouri.

The Pandemic Flu Leadership blog is holding a live blog today.

Throughout the day, the blog will have posts about the event to allow those not in attendance to be informed about what is being said by speakers, as well as questions, concerns and ideas being raised by participants. Our intention is to communicate an objective summary.

This is a good opportunity to see how well a blog use like this works for government.

tag: egovernment, blogging policy, flu, blogging

Sometimes you can run into problems with a government blog.
Health and Human Services got the idea (and even the initial execution) right. However, it sounds like they failed to follow through when it came to providing timely, helpful posts based on input to their blog. Even with the conflict, it seems that the HHS blog is doing a good job of providing direct communication between top HHS officials and the public.
It also looks like they’re dealing with some people wanting to cause their blog some grief.
tag: egovernment, blogging, flu

A noteworthy post by the Network of Public Sector Communicators; this entry provides an excellent checklist of how a government agency ought to approach blogging.

The standard points are made: be transparent, be timely, be open and honest. But it never hurts to show your boss yet another blog post telling you the same basic points. There are also some new points which I think are good. While this post targets public sector communicators in New Zealand, the points are valid for everyone.

tag: egovernment, state government, blogging

Ian Ketcheson was kind enough to recently visit my blog. He works for the Canadian government and researches things such as the impact of blogging on how government agencies communicate with the public.

In a relatively recent post, Ian examines what impact Facebook already is making on Canadian government. Here are some observations he’s made thus far:

• Most federal departments have approximately 50 to 150 employees who self-identify as employees.

• There are groups of employees for most government departments, and most of these groups contain the departmental logo and links to the website.

• One department has a network of over 700 employees online.

• Some statements on some groups could be seen as inappropriate.

If you searched through Facebook, what would you find? Is your agency already being represented in the blogosphere by your employees?

This is one of many posts Ian has on government and social media. I’m adding his site to my blogroll. His stuff is quite useful.

tag: egovernment, state government, blogging. Facebook