Popular social media
With some 750 million active users, Facebook https://www.facebook.com is possibly the best known social network. Facebook's statistics report that 50 per cent of active users log on to Facebook in any given day. The average user is connected to 80 community pages, groups and events, and creates 90 pieces of content each month. More than 30 billion pieces of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photo albums, etc.) are shared each month. The increasing influence of mobile technology is reflected in the more than 250 million active users currently accessing Facebook through mobile devices.
Twitter https://twitter.com is a micro blogging service that allows people and organisations to send and read messages (called "tweets") up to a maximum of 140 characters. The 140 character limit encourages brevity, and tweets frequently contain links to websites for more information. Twitter is estimated to have 190 million users who generate 65 million tweets a day. Despite this volume, it is possible to create networks of people and organisations and follow discussions on particular topics: for example a search for "disability" will find relevant people and organisations.
YouTube https://www.youtube.com is a video-sharing website and a powerful medium for communicating information. For example, this collection of videos on disability https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3C560064A6A35BB6 illustrates how discussion can create a community around a particular topic. Many public bodies now use YouTube to disseminate information. For example: Cambridgeshire County Council's channel https://www.youtube.com/user/CambsCountyCouncil carries service users' and carers' stories about self directed support and personal budgets. Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC) posted a video of the Disabled People at the Forefront of Resistance event held in London in February 2011. This provided a wider audience for the event.
Flickr https://www.flickr.com/ is primarily for sharing still images (although it does support videos of up to 90 seconds). Users may add their images to groups on particular topics and in this way create communities. For example, the Global Friendship Project for Disabilities Rights pools images and fosters discussion on rights for disabled people https://www.flickr.com/groups/globalfriendshipproject/.
IRISS shares images on topics related to social care https://www.flickr.com/photos/openlx.
Broken of Britain shared powerful images through Flickr to promote their campaign about the welfare reforms https://www.flickr.com/photos/eoghan_mac/4418871163/.
Location-based social networking tools such as Foursquare invite people to share information about where they are (café, restaurant, shop, library etc).
Speaking at a Local by Social South West event in January 2011, Rich Watts Director Essex Coalition of Disabled People suggested that service users (and citizens more generally) could use this kind of tool to create a repository of all the services, products and resources in a local community, attaching data such as prices, opening times, comments on quality, location.
The job of the local authority in this world then becomes one of catalysing people to share and contribute, and aggregating and sharing this huge wealth of data that has already been created. There is also a role to ensure that there are suitable platforms available for anyone and everyone to be able to access it.
