CAMBRIDGE L!VE

Antony Carpen

Cambridge L!VE

Bringing the City together

Own blog posts

“Cambridge can become a more exciting place to live and work. But there are significant barriers.•People living lives disconnected from each other•Organisations existing and working in different silos•The City not making use of the energy and talent within it.

I want to change this”

Scoping the issues

– There is no comprehensive community boards of interest along the lines those such as Brixton’s Urban75, in Cambridge

– There is a large science community in Cambridge, but relatively low engagement of scientists in politics and public administration given its importance to the UK economy

– Levels of local political engagement are low. Given the big changes happening to Cambridge over next couple of decades, it is important that people are able to influence how these changes impact on their communities.

Scoping the opportunities

– There is an opportunity to use social media to increase people’s participation in local community events & activities

– There is an opportunity to use social media to interact with and help hold local elected representatives to account

– There is an opportunity to develop a comprehensive community-based social media portal along the lines of those featured at @UKGovCamp in Cambridge

– There is an opportunity to use social media to engage the large science community in Cambridge in local and national political issues

– There is an opportunity for small firms to use social media to engage with and listen to their customers

What does success look like?

Vision- A city where people are able to contribute their time and talents towards making it a better place to live and work in- A city with vibrant groups, communities and networks that are open, transparent and accessible to those that want to take part- A city supported by a widely-and regularly-used community portal/s that is/are easy to use and accessible to the community- A city that can break the traditional ‘town-gown’ divide – where residents can feel comfortable at university-organised events, & staff & students feel comfortable at local events.- A city that supports, scrutinises and/or holds its leaders accountable for the actions they take out on our behalf

What does success look like?

Outcomes- Increased use of social media by local people to improve life in the City - Stronger bonds within and between communities in the City- Increased knowledge and awareness of events and activities going on in and around the city- A vibrant local politics scene with greater participation from all groups – esp scientists & engineers- Stronger links between businesses & voluntary groups- A significant increase in the number of, and in the attendance of “offline” events – ostensibly around local issues but this can be driven by the users.

How to measure success?

These could include:- Social media analytics – hits, likes, mentions etc- Individual feedback- Take up by local people & organisations- Number of volunteers who want to get on board- Voter turnout and number of consultation responses- Increase in membership of local networks and campaigning groups- Local and online media coverage

What is already out there?

There is a list of Cambridge bloggers http://cambridgeblogs.com/doku.php though neither I nor Puffles feature on them!

Anecdotally, Twitter take-up has been slow – Facebook looking more popular given the number of ‘likes’ a number of different groups have received..

There are two generic discussion boards that cover Cambridge – one based through the local newspaper and another a more community-based one. However, both seem to be based on software/models that look quite dated.

What is already out there?

There are a number of community-based websites in and around Cambridge. These include:http://www.wereallneighbours.co.uk/ (listing projects at http://www.wereallneighbours.co.uk/projects/list.php?active=y ) – community boardshttp://www.cambridgecvs.org.uk/ - local CVShttp://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Home/Messageboards/ - local newspaper boardshttp://www.colc.co.uk/about/about.html - Local online community boardhttp://www.cambridgeshire.net/About.aspx - County-wide community forumhttp://www.cambridgecab.org.uk/About_Us/About_us.htm - Cambridge CAB - potential hub to work from http://www.transitioncambridge.org/thewiki/ttwiki/pmwiki.php?n=TT.GetInvolved – Cambridge Transition Town (response to peak oil)

There are also a number of business-related networks

http://www.cambridgenetwork.co.uk/aboutus/ - local business-related forumhttp://www.jcicambridge.com/ - local branch of “Junior Chambers” network of young professionalshttp://www.cambridgeshirechamber.co.uk/default.asp - county chamber of commercehttp://www.research-horizons.cam.ac.uk/infocus/-p-the-business-of-social-networking--p-.aspx and http://www.research-horizons.cam.ac.uk/contact.aspx - Cambridge university research in business field.http://www.enterprise.cam.ac.uk/people.php - Cambridge University Enterprise

What is not out there?

My anecdotal web searches have found that the none of the “contacts” or “media” pages have links to macro/micro blogging sites, nor social media sites such as Facebook or LinkedIn.

This is not to say that they are not using social media sites – they are. http://cambridgetechnopole.blogspot.com/ and http://www.cabume.co.uk/ are two examples. The problem is that these sites - & their twitter accounts - were not easy to find.

What is striking – in particular with the business and enterprise forums. In particular, I am surprised that the list of contacts at Cambridge University do not have social media profiles listed at http://www.enterprise.cam.ac.uk/people.php

Connection/Awareness/Engagement

Disengaged Unaware Aware Engaged Active

Switched off

Infrequent access

Daily but not continual access e.g. work/college

Continual access at home & work

Continual connection on the move (iPhone/ laptop)

“Victor Meldrew”

Very busy professionals to high web users following particular people/ celebrities

Student activists

Paid activists

Local activists who are not online

Regular bloggers who engage with their audience

People who read about issues in mainstream websites

People who follow new media sites but choose not to interact

People who respond infrequently on established media sites

Social media users in community activism field field

People who respond frequently in interactive sites

Infrequent bloggers/ article writers

“Entertainment media watchers”

Affluent but disinterested

People who read about issues “old” media

People who write (not email) into newspapers regularly

Advocates

Level of individuals’ community engagement

Audience segmentationUniversity students 18-25

Assume all connected, but differences on levels of engagement. Also a possible separation btw Anglia and Cambridge University students in terms of family and geographical background.

School/College/sixth form students 14-20

Younger and more locally-based (and more likely to have stronger local ties) but also maybe looking further a field. Local Professionals

Middle-income to affluent workers. Aware but not engaged, low users of council-run public services

Full-time office-based

Low to middle-income workers. Low awareness, low engagement but families likely to be users of council-run public services – e.g. buses and schools.

Healthcare and education

Low to middle income workers. A minority likely to be migrant workers – esp in healthcare so may not have voting rights but likely to be users of public services. UK workers increased likelihood of being trade union members

Part-time workers

Likely to be working to supplement income – especially those with children of school age. Low awareness & engagement

Part-time workers

Likely to be working to supplement income – especially those with children of school age. Low awareness & engagementUnemployed/benefits’ dependent

Levels of connection & engagement low & low?

Middle-to-affluent parents

Levels of connection likely to be high – esp former professionals. Awareness reasonable – access to networks

Poorer-to-middle parents

Levels of connection & engagement = ?

Pensioners

Levels of connection variable, but levels of awareness and engagement reasonable to high – especially those who actively volunteer. Manual workers

Levels of connection likely to be high. Unknown on levels of engagement even though Govt regulations likely to affect their work

Cambridge in silos

Looking back on my childhood in Cambridge, the presence of silos seems to be a recurring theme. As I started looking into these silos – even after the growth of the internet and social media later on, it seems that the silos are still in place. Can we use social media to break the silos and unleash the full potential of our city?

Business Public SectorUniversity Voluntary and Community/Civil Society Sector

Local politics

I hope that a project like “Cambridge L!VE” can act as a catalyst and facilitator, rather than driver. People are the drivers behind breaking the silos.

I hope that CambridgeL!VE can people the tools and the knowledge to break the silos.

We have silos – this is not good

It appears that we may have a number of silos where individuals, firms and organisations communicate within, but not necessarily between them at a hyper-local level.

Business Public SectorUniversity Voluntary and Community/Civil Society Sector

Local politics

High level strategic links – for example at what was “local strategic partnership” level

Links between university and skills & capital-intensive business

Public sector a core funder and supporter of the VCS/CCS

Local politicians pay a close interest in voluntary and community groups

Strong links between politicians & university political societies

Business sponsorship of individual local charities

How to break the silos

Trying to break the silos is incredibly difficult. Changes to public administration made by central government brought into being “Local Strategic Partnerships” which brought together the heads of large organisations and representatives of key partnerships.

While senior managers may spend lots of time in meetings, most other people do not. Therefore trying to use a “meetings-based format” for people who, for example are out and about regularly may not be the most suitable model.

What social media can do is enable people make those links with other people and become aware of issues they care about/may affect them that they would otherwise miss out on commenting on. The best examples of this are housing and planning issues.

Breaking the silos

The nature of social media use is that it is very informal and fluid, rather than formal and structured. This potentially is what may make it work for a wider group of people & make it easier for organisations to engage with people.

Business Public SectorUniversity Voluntary and Community/Civil Society Sector

Local politics

High level strategic links – for example at what was “local strategic partnership” level

Developed “operational level” links between organisations and people that are “off the radar” of the strategy people.

Micro-grassroots links – very informal local level and small-scale.

What next?These slides cover some initial thoughts.Over the next few weeks I will be outlining some of the things that I would like to do, along with some of the things that I have already done locally to help achieve this vision.

I’m not looking at creating another network. I’m looking to bring together the groups and networks that are already there, making use of the tools, people and resources that are already in place or active. If you are interested in where this is going, please let me know.