Posts Tagged ‘social media’
-
Robot enters House of Commons to Show MPs what Young People Care About
As MPs go back to work at Parliament today, v’s new research has shown that just 10% of young people believe politicians are best able to change the country. The data collected through Voicebox shows that young people are caring, considerate, articulate and passionate. We hope our interactive robot in the Houses of Commons is an innovative way to make MPs sit up and take notice.
At a time when only 3% of young people have ever contacted their MP, the robot – nicknamed Voicebot - is a very modern twist on writing a letter to your MP. Until Thursday, young people can visit a website, put in what they care about and the robot will write it out, stroke by stroke, word by word, directly to the politicians.
Voicebot has been collecting comments from 1000s of young people.
The study and robot come at a time when respect among the public for the political classes is at an all time low. A study published earlier this year by Hansard Society indicates that currently only 24% of 18 to 24 year olds are certain to vote in the next general election - the lowest of all groups by a long way. And, contrary to some images, young people are the least likely of all age groups to be politically active - just 4%.
The full results of the Voicebox are also being fed into even more detailed work with the think tank Demos, looking at young people and their relationship with power and politics. This project, titled An Anatomy of Youth will review: young people’s portrayal in media, their presence in recent policy debates and existing information on young people’s behaviours and their attitudes.
Voicebot is part of v’s proactive research campaign called Voicebox, with over 5,000 people having taken part so far. The project is live and constantly evolving. The more young people that participate the more accurate picture we’ll create of young Britons today. Over the coming months, Voicebox will continue to collect and share data about lifestyles, attitudes and behaviours of young Britons. In an age when young people are using social media more and more, Voicebox uses new and interactive social media to engage young people.
Want to find out more about the data we’re collecting? Have a look at the results here.
-
Promoting a Creative Generation
Today marks the start of Promoting a Creative Generation, a two-day conference in Göteborg looking at the role of children and young people in the new culture and media landscape.
Taking place within the context of the European Year of Creativity and Innovation and hosted under the Swedish Presidency of the European Union, 350 experts and participants will discuss the creativity and cultural habits of children and young people.
Gunnar Seijbold/ Regeringskansliet.
Swedish Minister for Culture Lena Adelsohn Liljeroth says, “this conference is to learn more about both the possibilities and problems of the new culture and media landscape that our children and young people encounter. The digital cultural platforms create new and often difficult issues that, despite their different starting points, are clearly related. And it is almost always young people who are affected”.Keynote speakers include Renad Qubbaj from the Tamer Institute for Community Education in Ramallah and Professor Bamford, Director of Cultural Programmes for Creativity, Culture and Education (CCE), London.
The conference programme focuses on different aspects of daily life for children and young people, recognising that, today, children and young people are to a great extent not only consumers but also producers in the new media landscape. Sessions will look at how to strengthen children and young people’s right to culture, how traditional cultural institutions can find ways to remain attractive and accessible for the new generation, promote the exchange of experience and knowledge on how public investments can help to ensure that children and young people’s right to culture in all forms is guaranteed and will also include participants trying out the younger generation’s world of digital communication.
The opening and closing sessions can be watched via webcast
In the UK, very similar questions are being raised by The New Deal of the Mind coalition, chaired by the journalist and former political editor of the New Statesman, Martin Bright. The New Deal of the Mind is a grouping of like-minded individuals who believe we must not let the recession crush creativity and innovation. Learning the lessons of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s 1930s New Deal, the coalition believes the creative and digital industries can help provide a route through the recession for young people and others. Check out their latest report, ‘Do It Yourself: Cultural and Creative Self-Employed in Hard Times’, exploring self employment options in the cultural and creative sector.
Of course this blog celebrates how creativity and innovation are changing youth volunteering, but revolutionising how young people can share their time and talents with others is becoming of much broader concern, across many sectors.
Any thoughts on these issues?
-
Everyone working together
Here at v, we’ve been asking ourselves how we can do more to harness the power of social media and give young volunteers the tools they need to do our marketing and organising for us. (After all, we know they’ll do a better job than us.)
At our recent Generation Digital Conference, William Owen, strategy director at our digital agency Made by Many, shared the things we’ve learned, from letting go of centralised control (easier said than done: “the social web is disruptive, but some members of the SMT are still resisting”) to using existing APIs and building our own.
The presentation also includes case studies from Amnesty UK’s Protect the Human site, and generated lots of interest at the conference, so I thought I’d share it here.
Vinspired: Everyone Working TogetherView more presentations from William Owen. -
Volunteer Trends: May 2009
Just a quick update: I wrote about the Volunteer Trends presentation created by Mickey Gomez of the Howard County Volunteer Centre a while ago. He’s now updated it with some more information. Here’s his May 2009 presentation. It has a lot of useful stats regarding the increasing use of social media around the world, and how volunteering organisations are, and can, tap into them to increase their reach.
Volunteer Trends & Online EngagementView more presentations from M. Gomez.
Loading ...
Nice piece, yourself.
Comments