Category: social media
When SiliconCaribe writes about T&T lagging behind on e-services, I have to chuckle. I recall teaching my own father prior to 2005 how to use email - and he used email to try to contact various government entities. It didn't work out so well. After his death in 2005, I tried doing the same and came up with almost exactly the same results: crickets.
Where email addresses appear on government sites, they need to be not only checked but responded to. This has been lacking, though I have no evidence as of this year that demonstrates this particular problem. I will be delving into that as the year progresses.
But there does seem to be some form of a silver lining. As poorly done, poorly updated and as poorly communicative as many of the government sites are - the politicians found Facebook. Some even seem to read what others write, breaking the cycle of using social media for broadcast alone. See General Election Social Media Usage: The Missing Link.
More importantly, there seem to be more serious discussions about Trinidad and Tobago happening on Facebook - where people are kludging around the government's lack of responsiveness on websites and trying to get their say in.
Is it getting better? Maybe. But are e-Services getting better? I think it might be a good start to find what e-Services are actually available. In that there seems to be... nothing. Maybe they should start with a place for whistleblowers to submit information.
I wrote about this in a more general way over at KnowProSE.com, but I think it would be a good localized experiment for people of Trinidad and Tobago to see how much influence they have globally. Where Facebook seems to be the uniform social network of the day, it often astounds me how often good things posted by Trinidadians and Tobagonians aren't actually shared on Facebook as much as they are liked.
And for a nation so proud of its own, that seems a bit peculiar. We celebrated a World Cup team whose only goal in the last World Cup was on itself with rampant festivity and yet people don't dare click the 'Share' button on Facebook.
So here's what is going on. Fast Company, the magazine, has an Influence Project underway. Bloggers, users of social networks and anyone can take part - and the results are to be published in the November issue of Fast Company. And influence is almost always about who shares what one says.
Thus the challenge: Media houses, individuals and anyone else from Trinidad and Tobago should get on and check their influence - like this. And the interesting part of influence is that it requires people to work together in spreading a message.
So spread it. See how influential you are and by extension how influential your fellow citizens are.
Or don't for fear of finding out how socially significant you are. The gauntlet, tossed. :-)
This general election has seen the most social media usage in the history of Trinidad and Tobago. On Facebook, I've been getting more friend requests from politicians than pretty women - a horrible thought in my book with aged politicians wanting to be my friend for political expediency. Ahh, the trials and tribulations of being on Facebook...
Humor aside, there has been a lot of web advertising and social media advertising. There has been a lot of discussion by people regarding the candidates and issues, from Twitter to Facebook to the larger thing called the internet. And, for the most part, it's good. In fact it can be downright entertaining at times.
But something is missing.
Interaction.
It isn't as if the politicians themselves are reading these sites, what is being said and who is saying it - I'm fairly certain that some assistant, far removed from the actual politician, is the one parading as the politician on the Internet. So the politicians are simply using social media as a method of broadcasting instead of using the tool for interacting with people. To them, it seems, social media is exactly like the cars with loudspeakers they have playing jingles at a few thousand decibels.
And that is probably one of the largest problems with politicians in general and specifically in Trinidad and Tobago - they give the illusion of being close to the people when in fact they are as distant as they ever were.
They want your vote and are willing to have one of their lackeys broadcast at you. But interact? Oh, no. They might have to respond. And they are scared of that... and maybe they're scared of the people they say they want to represent unless they alone have the microphone.
Two newspaper articles cover the same thing:
While it is unclear why a mother would leave a child in a running vehicle for any length of time, the word did apparently get out through a Blackberry. How Facebook was specifically involved remains unclear.
The discrepancy in the reporting between the Trinidad Express and Trinidad Guardian is worth exploring.
While assisting someone with some information, I came across this data regarding Facebook usage in Trinidad and Tobago. Apparently, there are 266,920 Facebook users in Trinidad and Tobago - a figure which puts Trinidad and Tobago at number 77 of the global ranking.
Given that Alexa reports that the top visited site in Trinidad and Tobago is Facebook - higher than even Google and other search engines - it can be said that the users online on Facebook, numbering 266,920 users, are the core active users of the Internet in Trinidad and Tobago.
But what does that really mean? What sort of use do you think Facebook has within Trinidad and Tobago? Is it just a replacement for Solitaire in offices, or is there something more important going on?
(Seriously, I'd like to know what you think).
The most visited site from Trinidad and Tobago remains Facebook - and now the first documented Facebook related assault has come:
...Court prosecutor Sgt Dianne Boxhill told the magistrate the alleged incident occurred after “a message” was posted on Internet social network, Facebook. According to the prosecutor, the accused confronted Arneaud on Charlotte Street, and she was allegedly stabbed about the body with a knife...
Not that Facebook has much to do with the stabbing other than a form of communication. Even so, when people can communicate more frequently the only control over what is communicated belongs to those communicating.
Don't stab your Facebook friends. Or enemies, for that matter.
I'd heard some rumblings beforehand about Criminals Soon To Be Posted On Facebook but didn't write of it because I don't like to write about rumors. But there it is, voiced by Acting Police Commissioner James Philbert on Tuesday. I'd tried to change a few minds on it but didn't get a chance to talk to anyone who was actually making decisions - so I'll outline why I think it is good and bad.
First, the good:
- Facebook is the most visited site from Trinidad and Tobago, so posting such information there is better than nothing on the Internet.
Now the bad:
- As the Guardian article I linked to indicates, Facebook is a 'privately-owned, social-networking Web site'. It's also what we social media pros call a walled garden. And because it is a walled garden, its efficacy for disseminating information is decreased by the walls of the garden.
So, what did I suggest? I suggested a Flickr Professional account (at $25 US per year) that would allow, with proper tagging, such criminals to have their photos up and also be found through mainstream search engines. Coupled with a rather simple implementation of a content management system, such as used here at KnowTnT.com, this could be a powerful tool for fighting crime. No, I wasn't looking for business. They could do it themselves, I'd just like to see it done right.
That said, it is good to see that social media is being seen as a tool for fighting crime in Trinidad and Tobago. I just wish that they chose a more effective path. And they can still do it. The option is always there.
Edmund Gall has been asking some good questions and making good observations regarding media and social media in Trinidad and Tobago - 'Can The Dinosaurs of T&T Media Accept Change?' and 'Can The Media Do No Wrong?' are worth reading. I agree with his observations for the most part because his observations are based on facts. And while I didn't have comment for his articles, I do have some things I want to add into the mix.
With a torrent of threads within Social Media itself regarding the reporter who was recently banned from Trinidad and Tobago Parliament, it seems as good a time as any to point out a few things.
Oddly, when people are discussing the ban of the reporter, they forget that the Media Association of Trinidad and Tobago recently demanded an apology of Minister Kennedy Swaratsingh - and why. That situation, barely covered here, became an issue because members of Parliament were avoiding the media.
They also seem to forget that there was a big uproar by the media about the potential licensing of journalists within CARICOM. CARICOM's response was that it was not discussing the licensing of journalists. I expect that, as a member of the Media Association of Trinidad and Tobago, people were dismayed at my lack of stance on the topic while it was a topic.
Now I'll mix these together.
{Read more}
Ms Kiran Maharaj, President of the T&T Publishers and Broadcasters Association (TTPBA) issued a call to T&T’s media professionals to unite to guarantee the industry’s survival in the face of advancing technology (e.g. social media). This was made during her feature address at the TTPBA’s 6th Annual Dinner and Awards Ceremony for Media Excellence (see story “Unity the key to survival” by Sean Nero, Trinidad Guardian, 16 Nov 2009).
Good on Ms Maharaj to raise the issue at this forum. From what I've heard, most of the existing media leadership have no clue what social media is and how significant an impact it will have on their businesses. Or how to make effective use of new technology at all.
The most interesting discussion would probably be on the topic of copyright. In the online world, Creative Commons licensing is preferred, as the intention is to share and grow knowledge; in the offline world of traditional media, more restrictive licensing is preferred, as the intention is to sell information to grow income. It will conflict - the US music industry's RIAA is an example of how to mess up your approach to new technology (search Google for thousands of articles on this, such as this EFF report). If they intend to maintain shareholder value, TTPBA members may wish to start chatting with knowledgeable reps from the local advertising industry and perhaps the TTCS to understand their options. And try to survey young people in T&T, nuh - if you're intending to sell papers beyond 2020, find out what teens think about that model of distribution. {Read more}
Today, I popped over to Lawrence of Arabia in Gulf City - I'd written about the customer service there before. I ordered my two gyros and the woman behind the counter recognized me from that day that I wrote about. Another woman at the register smiled and extended her hand - telling me she was the owner. I said hello, and we got to talking.
She'd read what I had written. That, in and of itself, is pretty cool considering how young KnowTnT.com is. We're less than a month old! But what's even more cool is how she found out.
She told me that she'd visited the bank, and the person she was dealing with at the bank had asked her if she was the owner of Lawrence of Arabia. She said yes, and the person at the bank whipped out a mobile phone and showed her what I'd written.
Just like that. In a developed nation, that wouldn't have seen like such a big deal - but here in Trinidad and Tobago, it blew my mind. It also blew my mind because good news travelled fast.
I don't know how the bank employee found out about the site, and I'm grateful that they did and thought it was worth mentioning to others. But I'm even more happy that websites of people outside of the traditional media are being watched by people and being used for discussion in the real world.
It's always good to feel useful. Thanks to all you readers who make this sort of thing possible - and worthwhile. We'll keep it coming. Keep reading.
And feel free to join in and write with us!
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