Archive for the 'ZenGuide Projects' Category

I’m pleased to report that my article about Blogging for the Finance Sector is being included as a chapter in The Handbook of Internal Communication, edited by Marc Wright of simply-communicate.com, which will be published by Gower on 6 June 2008.

The article is a case study of THFC Space, the online discussion space which I created and currently edit in my day job at The Housing Finance Corporation. The site uses blogging software (Wordpress) and is members only space for senior housing finance professionals to discuss finance related issues relevant to the social housing sector. Wordpress is well-suited to being styled and designed as an online magazine with the opportunity for reader comments while allowing multi-media items to be uploaded easily.

Do check out the article and if you know of any other finance related blogs, please add a comment here with a link.

My colleague Angie and I have been working with the Friends of the Dulwich Picture Gallery in South London on pro-bono basis to develop a multi-media online arts magazine, Dulwich OnView, which is launching this week. The process and objectives make a useful case study for anyone looking to set up an online community project on a limited budget.

Beginnings

The Friends is a volunteer group that supports the work of the Dulwich Picture Gallery by raising funds through events like summer parties, talks, films and other charitable fund-raising activities. Ingrid Beazley, their energetic and dynamic Chair, has been keen to use social media to promote the Friends and engage more with the local South East London community for some time now. We first talked about developing an interactive online presence in mid-2006 but what was needed was a strong volunteer team to help us run the project and for awhile, this key ingredient seemed elusive.

A great volunteer team

Then during last year, along came Catherine Fraher, who has a background in marketing and has worked with eBay. Taking time out following her new baby, Catherine has been thrown into the Friends e-world, first setting up a Friends photo group on Flickr and now taking on the role of co-editor for the new online magazine. At around the same time, a number of very talented and lively people began to offer help and suddenly, we had a great volunteer team - writers Anna Sayburn, Angela Corrias, Sally-Ann Johnson and Patrick Fraher; IT specialist Stephen Hendon and photographer Rebecca Portsmouth as well as my colleague at ZenGuide, web-content writer Angie Macdonald. The volunteer team is the real key to the magazine’s success - we have to work together well, approach the project in a professional way even though it’s just something we are doing for fun in our spare time, deliver our contributions on time and give each other the help and back-up that is needed in such a big project. And we really are doing all that with such ease and enthusiasm - it’s really fantastic!

A blog-based central hub

Given that this is a community project, my brief was to use free or low-cost applications that are freely available on the web. As the central hub of the multimedia magazine, we needed a platform that would fit well aesthetically with a world class art museum. I chose Wordpress.com for its ease of use and wide range of functions. Also the platform’s own branding is minimised - unlike Blogger which makes it clear you are on a blogspot.com site with its masthead across each blog. A survey has also reported that a large proportion of Blogger sites are spam blogs.

Blogging technology is easy to use and just the right platform for an online magazine. The free service does not allow you to re-design the layout in any sophisticated way but for our purposes the basic reverse date order presentation works well enough so that the latest articles appear at the top of the front page. The volunteer team will be able to upload their own articles with some basic training. Easy intergration with the photosharing site on Flickr.com means that the magazine can be quickly brightened with a lot of great images.

Other free / low-cost applications

For audio podcasting, I chose Gabcast.com which gives you a local UK telephone number to dial into from an ordinary phone. You record your podcast by leaving a voicemail message and press 1 to publish it. It automatically uploads the mp3 file and publishes a post on the magazine. It is free up to 200 MB and then there is a small monthly fee. There’s no messing around with sound editing equipment and FTP transfer software. But you can’t edit or add music tracks/ sound effects and you have to record your podcast in one continuous take - which can be a bit nerve-wracking!

We will be adding videos via our on Dulwich OnView YouTube channel in due course, which is a free application. In the meantime, we have collected videos about or filmed at Dulwich Picture Gallery using VodPod.com, which is another freebie - you can see the collection in the sidebar on the magazine site.

The Flickr pool is free - it collects together photos submitted to the pool by any user. However, Catherine has set up a Pro account for the photos that the team themselves want to upload for the magazine and that is a premium account at around £12 a year (US $25).

Some caution

Before you rush out and sign up to any old free application for your community project, a word of caution. You need to check out each applications functions and design options. The old adage is true that you get what you pay for. There are numerous free applications but some are easier to use than others - or have more suitable functionality to your project, or have fewer ads, or have a better look for your brand, or integrate better with other applications etc etc.

Also if you are likely to be particular about look, layout and the details of design, going for something free may not be the right way forward. And if you have high demands for functionality and specific things you want your multi-media to do, the free stuff is bound to limit and restrict your vision.

Knowing how to work around some of the limitations and restrictions of free applications can help. There is obviously only so much you can do with clever work-arounds but it can contribute to a quality user experience for your visitors.

Please do come and check out the magazine at www.dulwichonview.org.uk.

The ZenGuide Network has a new member - window display company PLANarama, with whom we’ve been working to develop and write their blog magazine. The design of PLANarama’s website and blog was developed by their designer Guy Boyle and we’ve been creating the content for the blog, working closeley with Managing Director Neil Ellis and his team of visual merchandising experts. We’re pleased to add PLANarama’s blog to our ZenGuide Network, which is a compilation of business blogs produced by our clients, associates and colleagues.

Our role is to bring out the stories behind PLANarama’s window displays, drawing out from their creators the inspiration and challenges that went into the making of the windows. It’s been fascinating learning about the skilled techniques that go into the design and building of the flagship windows for stores like Jaeger on Oxford Street. And it’s also been eye-opening to think about the work and project management that goes into rolling out of multiple windows across the country for a chain store like Carphone Warehouse - it’s a mini-military operation in itself, as project manager, Sabina Roberts explains in the article Christmas Warehouse on the PLANarama blog.

Neil Ellis and his team talk each week on the PLANarama blog about the secrets of creating great window displays. Neil, in particular, shares his in-depth experience of creating visual merchandising for London’s top retail stores like Ted Baker, Cartier and Marks and Spencers. For us, writing the blog has made us look at shop windows with new eyes, stopping to look at the detail of each display and stepping back to view the overall effect, asking ourselves what the intention of the creator was and noticing the themes and cohesion in the design. It’s like going to an art gallery and appreciating a sculpture or a painting or other great work of art - only we’re out on the street and trying not to get in the way of passers-by. We hope that when you read the blog posts, you’ll enjoy the behind-the-scenes look into a hidden high street art and perhaps pause awhile the next time you walk down your local shopping street and stroll through the mall.

Photo: thanks to PLANarama.com

I am pleased to announce that ZenGuide and Chanda Communications are working with haute couture designer Roubi L’Roubi to create an online magazine, roubiMAGAZINE.com, to showcase the creative and cultural activities, events and personalities that are coming together as part of the Roubi network.

Our first articles for the magazine look behind the scenes at the music and talented individuals involved in the Tune Your Harps concert coming up on Monday 13 November at Claridges. We also interview the conductor Laurence Cummings and violinist Adrian Butterfield.

The concert is organised by the London Handel Society as a fundraiser for its 2008 Festival. There will be a champagne reception and dinner as well. Roubi has designed clothes for musicians and singers and is very much involved in this event on Monday. As he told my colleague Silvia Cambie for her article on the event:

He believes that working with musicians helps to elevate fashion to another level. “Fashion is just another form of art, very much like classical music,” he says. “Highly skilled musicians are the haute couture of music.”

I hope very much you’ll enjoy roubiMAGAZINE.com - and also be able to come and enjoy the music and champagne on Monday.

Following the main conference at the London College of Communication (LCC) on Social Media and Photography , there was a good Q&A session. Many of the questions related to photography but it’s the ones relating to social media that I’ve been reflecting on since Saturday.

A professional photographer expressed distrust of social media and also an anxiety about the way free photographs uploaded online by amateurs is threatening people like him who earn much of their living from stock photography. Craig Smith is one of the lecturers at LCC and also a professional photographer. His response was that there will always be competition and that one way to deal with this particular threat is to engage with it and find a way to use it to your competitive advantage.

I agree with Craig and in fact, had a similar discussion with haute couture designer Roubi L’ Roubi about the issue of copying and competition.

One of my clients is photographer Steven Lee who has recently started a blog as a way to share his passion for photography and also to share the process of his recently published photography book. He gives tips on photography as well as writing about photo shoots he has done, focusing on particular challenges during the shoot or his impressions of the event or person he was covering. He also uploads his own photos to illustrate a particular technique or to give a taste of the photo shoot. Yes, there is a risk that his uploaded photos may be nicked and reproduced elsewhere. But the overall effect is to show his work and expertise to his clients and potential clients - as well as giving them a sense of what kind of person he is.

We like to do business with people that we can trust. In our home life, we try to find plumbers or gardeners through word of mouth - we ask our neighbours and friends. In business, we ask for references and recommendations when looking to employ staff or engage contractors.

As someone working in the creative industries, you can show potential clients that you are good at what you do, that you’re reliable, understand their needs, creative, have expert skills and knowleged through online media such as a blog, podcasts, videocasts or photo galleries. By giving away a few free goodies like free photos, you may gain even more in the long term.

Yes, the threat of free stuff by hordes of amateurs is a potential threat. But, interestingly, I asked Steven that same question and he said to me, “No, it hasn’t affected my business at all. In fact, I think it’s good for professional photographers. Yes, everyone can now take pictures and show them off easily but these people aren’t my competition. It just means people are interested in photography more. If you’re a good professional photographer, there’s still a lot of work.” ”

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I really enjoyed the conference at the London College of Communication on Saturday around the theme of Social Media and Photography. It was well-attended by students and also a number of lecturers and professional photographers.

Here is a quick summary of my impressions of each session:

Lucy Soutter - opened with how she was enticed into social media by Facebook because the platform feels truly social, allowing you to see friends’ pictures and get a daily sense of what everyone you know is up to. She then discussed social media in the context of Gutenberg, communications and Marshall Mcluhan.

Alan Sekers - showed how Microsoft was developing PhotoSynth to create 3D renditions of the real world, using tagged photographs from Flickr.com. By searching all photos tagged Notre Dame on Flickr, for example, the developers could piece together different views of the world-famous site from different angles in order to create a 3D version online. Apparently, the BBC did a similar trial project but sent out one photographer to take photos of a manor house but it was evident that this very controlled project lacked the dynamism and life of the more collaborative world-wide multi-user project.

Paul Tebbs - examined the Flickr site of Miss Aniela, which starts off as a typical “what I did in my holidays” style site and has evolved to more self-conscious, arty type self-portraits. This started a debate of whether having 2 million visitors makes her work “art” and why there was no critical response on her site - and I think by “critical” they were referencing “critical art theory” rather than “yo, your site sucks” type of criticism.

Yang-May Ooi - I asked: in an online world where content is freely available and freely distributed, what value could be gained by creative artists and those working in the creative industries? I think that beyond financial value, there are other values that you can gain online if you can engage creatively using social media - these other values, like kudos, fun and creativity, can add to whatever work / product you are creating offline by increasing your exposure to a very wide audience, in particular, if you can bring people together through a sense of community and peer-to-peer engagement.

Roger Hargreaves - showed a selection of photos from Flickr as a curated exhibition of Americana. Those amateur photos blown up onto a huge screen looked like pictures in an art gallery and showed moments into American private lives. They had a haunting and strange beauty that drew you into these lives, part documentary/ photo-journalism and part intimate portraits. This prompted a debate on whether these photos could be art if they were not self-consciously referencing previous artists/ photographers before them.

Craig Smith - talked about the incident of the whale that came up the Thames earlier this year which was splashed across the BBC news pages online. The BBC, on their website, called for people to submit their photos of the whale and the public duly complied and flocked to the Thames in droves to take photos of the whale. Their presence along the river then became news in itself and the BBC then featured news items and photos of the people taking photos of the whale. His thesis was that photography is a social media in itself by being a media that can call people to action.

These notes are from memory and no doubt filtered through my non-academic appreciation of the issues. If any of the speakers happen to be reading this and would like to draw out in more detail the central theme of their talks, I would love it if you added a comment - or emailed me your remarks. In particular, if I’ve not quite summarised accurately what you said, please do let me know!

All in all, I found the day very interesting and it certainly made me think about the way I view images online and offline. It was also a privilege to have the chance to hear academics - students and lecturers - engage with each other at that thoughtful and intellectual level that is increasingly rare outside of colleges and universities.

Some photos from the day are on my ZenGuide Flickr account, for those delegates/ speakers who’d like to download them for their own albums. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get very close to the stage so the pics are not great and we didn’t manage to take pics of all the speakers as some of them found the flash photography distracting.

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I’ve been invited to speak on Saturday at the Social Media and Photography one-day conference at the London College of Communication (LCC), part of the University of Arts, London. My brief is to give an overview of social media for the students at LCC while other speakers will be looking more specifically at photography within social media, such as Flickr and Photosynth.

Here’s the summary:

“Forms of social media, in which the user is also the author, are transforming the role of photography in contemporary culture. On sites such as YouTube, Flickr, Picasa, Facebook, MySpace and Second World users generate and share content, eemingly side-stepping the influence of corporations, governments and editors&;though new forms of censorship are on the rise. What attitudes and assumptions are built into the structures of existing forms of social media? What can we learn about ourselves, our moment in history, and about photography (and video) from looking at social media more carefully?

Speakers will include Roger Hargreaves, Yang-May Ooi, Alan Sekers, Craig Smith, Lucy Soutter and Paul Tebbs.”

The conference is organised by my friend Lucy Soutter, an art photographer and a lecturer in photography at LCC, and the other speakers are her professor colleagues. I’m looking forward to hearing what they are going to talk about as it will be a great opportunity to learn from some academic experts.

In my session, I’m going to focus on what social media means for creative artists and those working in the creative industries, especially where a lot of content on the web is created for free and distributed for free.

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For those attending the conference, you can download the slides from my presentation Social Media: Free for All? - the password will be available at the conference.

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You might like to come along to a discussion panel at the City Womens Network (CWN) on “Social Media: Online Communities” on 18 October ( 18.30 - 20.30pm). I’m one of the speakers along with a number of other web, digital marketing and business PR experts.

Here’s the blurb:

Using social media to build an online community around your business can be an effective way to retain clients, bring in new ones and raise the profile of your enterprise. In this panel discussion, we explore practical steps you can take to create and manage an online community relevant for your business.
We are proud to have selected a panel of speakers:

Yang-May Ooi, founder of social media consultancy ZenGuide and experienced blogger, will talk about strategies to keep your visitors coming back to your site and to develop your brand’s presence online.

Giles Colborne, President of the UK Usability Professionals’ Association and Managing Director of cxpartners, will guide you through the roles and responsibilities in managing online communities.

Kristen Berg, marketing strategist, looks at some examples of how brands have used communities, the strategic role they play and the potential value to the company.

Silvia Cambié, Director of Chanda Communications and Chair of CWN’s Membership Committee, will be moderating the session.

Organised by the Membership Committee. For more information, contact the organiser, Silvia Cambié, on silvia[at]chandacom.com.

Venue information:
Hosted by CO3 Limited
First Floor, Downstream Building No. 1, London Bridge,
SE1 9BG London, GB
nearest tube is London Bridge.

Time: 18.30pm
Date: 18 October 2007

Members: £20
Non-members: £25 (men welcome as guests)

It would be great to see you there. If you’re coming, email me and I’ll let the organisers know.

Last week, I gave a presentation at the Copyright Licensing Agency’s annual open meeting about The Impact of Web 2.0 on copyright issues. It was a packed hall with over 180 people, many of them standing. The delegates ranged from authors and content producers to publishers and librarians and knowledge management professionals in education and business organisations. Althought I couldn’t make it for the whole of the round table discussion on digital information and copyright chaired by Chris Bryant, MP, I managed to catch the tail end of it. I also had the chance after the event to speak to a few of the delegates, including representatives from the BBC, a photographic rights agency, a publisher and a corporate knowledge management professional.

I’m jotting down here some of my impressions of the issues from the conference - these are no more than impressions and vignettes of the discussions as they were aired and raise more questions for debate rather than giving firm answers.

• The government is making funding available for schools to help students become more internet- and social media- literate but there are apparently delays due to concerns about schools using materials off the internet in breach of copyright. However, there are apparently special sites offering copyright-free material for schools and educational establishment for just this purpose. But, overall, can the government with all its unwieldy bureaucratic machinery be the right instrument for change is the fast moving area of online technology and networked communication and enterprise?

• Is digital rights management here to stay? Or will content producers like the BBC have to accept the fact that they will have to let go off their rights to a product some time after it’s been produced?

• At the moment, the likes of the BBC can still find a market to sell its high quality products like its natural world series etc due to the fact that pirated versions on the internet are of low quality. It is probably not long before the technology will be freely available to upload high quality pirated versions online. What then for the original content producers?

• Is there a future for book writers when digital readers become more widely available? At the moment, book lovers are still attached to the physical book but as the young techno-loving iPod wearing millenials and their children start to outnumber us oldies, will they adapt more enthusiastically to electronic book readers? If so, will that be an opportunity for “bijou” writers who don’t produce blockbusters to gain a wider readership through digital distribution because they won’t be at the mercy of the bookshops for distribution? Or will it be a threat because their work can now be easily copied and freely distributed illegally?

• Chris Bryant mentioned the estate of German playwright Bertolt Brecht. The estate were apparently restrictive for a long time in granting rights for Brecht’s works to be used, quoted, performed or edited. For example, his plays in their original would run for over 3.5 hours which is difficult to market to today’s theatre-going audiences. However, they have recently been more open in rights granting and the result has been that more Brecht plays are being performed and the increased exposure generally from the dissemination of his works through freer rights has resulted in greater revenue returns for the estate.

• The panellists in the main discussion all called for flexibility in managing copyright - yes, it is important to protect and value the products of creativity and hard work but in this digital age, it’s important to be flexible to enable the sharing of information and knowledge.

• I was struck by the comment of a university representative about the difficulties of printing off 50 copies of an online article to include in a student pack for discussion on one of the university’s courses. It’s ironic in that the founding principle of the World Wide Web was that the technology was meant to make information freely available for all…

What do you think? Have you had experiences around copyright issues and social media or online digital technologies? I’d love to hear your views - please add a comment or email me.

Photo: of Sony Digital Reader thanks to askdavetaylor.com

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