WordPress to power new Press Assoc network?

The Press Association is the engine which powers the UK news machine. In effect it’s a cooperative owned by the UK’s regional and national newspapers. It has noticed that, as funds get tighter, its members have stopped reporting on local democracy – council meetings and the like. And it’s working on a proposal to fill that gap in the information provision market by providing the content itself, free of charge online… if the public purse cares to pay them £15-18 million to do so.
It’s a very interesting notion, and – considering the potential public benefit – a not inconceivable price-tag. But the line in Robert Andrews’s piece at PaidContent which really caught my eye was this:

It will probably be delivered initially through a WordPress (blog) site, but it will be delivered with RSS feeds spinning off it and not as a primary site of interest.” Johnston showed a mock-up of PA content in a blog wearing an out-of-the-box default WordPress theme.

In fact, it’s a concept I’ve proven myself. A couple of years ago, I did some work with a small business information consultancy to move their (relatively tiny-scale) news publishing mechanism over to WordPress. Stories were being written in an existing workflow management app: but when it came to distributing these stories, we simply dropped them into a WordPress build – and let WP’s remarkably flexible RSS functionality do the rest. Stories were tagged according to subject area and clients; feeds were generated; and content got syndicated to wherever it needed to be, in an easily-republishable format. There was no front-end website at all: just the feeds coming off it.
So yes, I can heartily endorse this proposal. If it’s an open-access site, requiring easy authoring and easy syndication, WordPress should be perfect. And since it already does all the feed stuff, out-of-the-box, the project could be up and running as quickly as the reporters can be recruited.
But still, it’s a startling moment to be receiving the endorsement from the biggest player in UK news distribution. And it’s yet another reason, as if we needed it, for anyone working in news to look at what WordPress could do for them. If we could get every government press office on WordPress, for a start…

New site for National Student Forum

studentforum
Today sees the launch of the latest little site we’ve built on behalf of – or more accurately, in collaboration with – BIS, the Department for Business Innovation and Skills. It’s a pretty straightforward WordPress build for something called the National Student Forum: a panel representing HE students’ interests, whose latest annual report was published this morning.
It started out as a fairly simple project, to do the ‘commentable document’ thing around the new Annual Report. But it soon became obvious that, for various practical and structural reasons, the only sensible thing to do was to remake the Forum’s entire site. (Er, all half a dozen pages of it.) And although it’s still a fairly small site, it’s been built with future flexibility in mind, should it ever be needed.
I’ve put a lot of work into the visual aspects this time: it’s a big, bold design drawing heavily on the style of the printed publication. There’s a cute little routine which allows you to specify the header image for a given page. We’re using Scribd.com to host the PDF files, allowing us to embed them back into our pages with Flash; but I’ve used a bit of Javascript to hold it all back until it’s required. The site will use comment threading, which isn’t (yet?) the norm: I’ll be watching to see if the users are comfortable with it. And all turned round in less than a week. A fun job.

Credit where it's due

biscredit
The BIS All-Stars have produced something relatively small-scale in support of their new consultation on credit and store cards: but it works remarkably well.
Working with plain English consultancy Simply Understand, they’ve boiled the classic 80-odd-page goverment consultation document down to just 10 (and done a nice design job on it too). But then they’ve gone a step further, and reduced it to a simple web poll asking which of five issues is most important to you. There’s a short explanatory paragraph on each, hidden by Javascript thus forcing you to interact with it immediately. Concise, straightforward text which gets you clicking from the off… and makes you think a bit, but not too much. Modest in its ambitions, and all the more successful for it.
And then, when you’ve cast your vote, it offers you the option to send a pre-constructed tweet out on Twitter (as well as a few other sociable options)… which is how I heard of it, so at the very least, it’s worked on one person. Not rocket science by any means, but a wonderful little touch I wish I’d thought of.
Oh, and it all slots perfectly into their existing website. Another good reason to be using WordPress.
It’s not the only thing BIS have put out today… more later.

FCO's modest redesign

newfco
The Foreign Office relaunched its corporate website over the weekend – always a brave move. You’re met by a very striking news-y homepage, with large-format high-impact (and high maintenance) imagery: it works very well indeed, but is the sort of homepage which takes a lot of editorial effort, and presumably a photo budget of some sort. There are several RSS icons dotted around the place; blog and Twitter areas on the homepage; and if you dig a little deeper, a press office blog (of sorts). It’s a homepage which clearly knows its purpose. And that’s a good thing.
Design-wise, the header feels modest and contemporary. But I’d have concerns about the presentation of text lower down the page. Whilst I’m sure a lot of the issues – inconsistent spacing, curious alignment, empty links – can probably be put down to teething troubles, I’m forced to look back to the Blogs site which started fairly messy, and hasn’t ever improved. Stephen Hale promises a new look to that site too; I sincerely hope so.
The press office ‘blog’ is a very interesting addition: running since June, it actually uses an account at Tumblr.com as its CMS, with the material being pulled into FCO chrome (presumably) via RSS feed. It’s publish-only, so no comments; and if you want anything beyond the last few items, it sends you off to Tumblr. Now don’t get me wrong, there’s lots to like about Tumblr, a lighter-than-lightweight ‘blogging’ solution. But I don’t feel comfortable about a major department of state using it. And I wonder if they’d be doing that if their main blogging platform wasn’t a better one.
You’ll be wondering about cost, no doubt. ‘None of this work cost any extra money,’ says Stephen, ‘we’ve done it in house.’ And whilst that doesn’t mean it’s free, at least it means (one assumes) they’ve avoided the worst excesses of some previous site rebuilds.
Is it better than what went before? Yes, I think so. It feels like a much smaller, slightly better organised site. But as I said last time, we expect a lot from FCO – with a famously digitally-savvy Foreign Secretary, a communications remit and a significant budget. I still think they can do more, and do it better. We await their new appointment with interest.

Hansard Society event on Twitter in politics

What can you say about Twitter? They came in their dozens to the Hansard Society’s event at Portcullis House to find out from a panel consisting of blogger Iain Dale, MPs Jo Swinson and Kerry McCarthy, and Tweetminster founder Andrew Walker. I hadn’t expected to learn a lot: I’ve been using Twitter longer and more intensively than most people. But I still came away more than a little disappointed.
Yes, some/many people talk a lot of pointless nonsense. Yes, people send links to stuff. Yes, sometimes certain topics rise to prominence. Yes, you can build engagement with people. But if you’d spent the hour and a half just looking at the Twitter website, you’d have learned all that for yourself anyway. And since most people in the room were already Twitter users, they probably knew it before proceedings started.
The event just didn’t get to the heart of what made Twitter different. Most of the points were equally applicable to any other ‘social media’ channel. And regrettably, it felt like we were falling into the usual trap of seeing social media as new broadcast channels. Sure, there were brief mentions of debate (conclusion: it’s not very good at it) and short-form correspondence with constituents. But almost everything was in a context of getting your message out to an audience.
All of which misses what, for me, is by far Twitter’s strongest selling point: namely, the fact that your audience is listening to you because it wants to listen, wants to engage… and wants to help.
I longed to hear one of the panel talk about how their Twitter audience helps them be better at their work. Examples of where they’ve asked a question, and their followers have answered it. Or where they’ve said they’re about to go into a meeting with someone, and a follower suggests a Killer Question. Demonstrations of the power of the network. But none came. (It’s a pity, because I’ve heard Tom Watson talk most persuasively about precisely that.)
One of the reasons I love Twitter myself is that, when everything – and everyone – gets boiled down to 140 characters, there’s no room for airs and graces. It’s a level playing field, with world leaders’ great pronouncements streaming in alongside mundane updates about what my mates are having for breakfast. It’s a reminder that you’re nothing special – or rather, you’re just as special as everyone else.
You might have something to say to me, which might interest me; but equally, I’ve got something to say to you, which might interest you. We’re all in this together. And post-expenses scandal, in a profession which depends on connecting personally with an electorate at least once every five years, I’d have thought that was a timely reminder.
A good-natured, upbeat but ultimately insubstantial evening.

We care a lot

bigcaredebate
One of my bigger projects this year has been the website for the Care And Support green paper, aka The Big Care Debate. Basically, the country is in desperate need of a new funding model for long-term care of the elderly and disabled: and in July, three funding options were put forward for consideration. And we’ve been trying various things, online and offline, to engage people in the debate.
When the green paper was published, we did a Commentariat-style ‘commentable document’; there’s also an interactive on-screen questionnaire, with or without a ‘face morphing’ app which shows what you might look like when you’re old. (I can’t claim any credit for that last element btw.) Meanwhile, in the real world, there have been a series of ‘roadshows’ for public and stakeholders – as shown on the clickable homepage map. You’ll also note, if you click on places like Peterborough, Derby or Coventry, that the team have taken a digital camera with them, and are posting snaps on Flickr. Then there’s the Campaign Monitor email list, the Twitter account, the Facebook activity (official and unofficial)…
The response has been huge, and often angry. The site has received more than 3,500 user comments, the majority of which have been to a single page of the commentable document: there’s clearly been a concerted campaign among interest groups to make their opposition known. There’s also been a healthy volume of comments on the campaign’s blog, written – you’ll note – in the name of the lead official, rather than a politician (although that hasn’t stopped people constantly raising the issue of politicians’ expenses claims).
In truth, on occasions, it’s been too much. At one point, we feared the site had been hacked: in fact, we’d just hit the limit imposed by our hosting company on outgoing emails. (Turned out, it was too many people asking to receive email notification of follow-up comments.) If you don’t count Downing Street petitions, it must rank as one of the highest volumes of responses to a government consultation exercise.
Now let’s be honest: most of the feedback has not been complimentary. There are a lot of people who think the changes are designed to cut their current benefits; and anything the Government tries to do at the moment is being met with disillusionment, cynicism and antipathy. So is it a bad thing to have received so many defensive, angry, confrontational comments? Personally, I don’t think so. Negative feedback is still valid feedback. It highlights the areas where there have been problems, if only communication problems. And it gives you a mailing list of people you need to contact, to make your case.
We’re now into the final month of the consultation, which – for some people, I dare say – is a relief. By any volume metric, I’m confident the process will be counted a success. But of course, the only meaningful measure of success is whether or not it yields a workable proposal with general public approval. In the current political climate, I fear that may be too much to ask. Still, I hope the web element has done its bit.

Thoughts on MyConservatives

A bit pushed for time just now, but I wanted to jot down a few thoughts regarding the launch of the Conservatives’ new community platform, MyConservatives.com. I hope they make sense.

  • It’s built on an open-source platform – specifically Drupal. Almost certainly the right choice: after all, Drupal describes itself as ‘community plumbing’. For those who have never used it, Drupal is a startlingly powerful platform for all things social and online; but to me, that’s its downfall – I’ve always found it overwhelming.
  • It fell over on day one. Happens to us all.
  • Opening the system to allcomers, not just party members, is a brave move – but the right one, I think. (And is something I suggested Labour might do with Labourspace, back in March 2008.)
  • Having said that, the heavy Conservative branding – including the use of an Eric Pickles video on the homepage – will put a lot of people off. I don’t see people registering for this unless they’re at least passively Tory.
  • The ‘campaigns’ page – currently the heart of the site – has two key elements: ‘local campaigns’ and an events calendar. Neither are working well. When I put my postcode into the local search – even though I live in a Tory-LD marginal, high on the LDs’ list of target seats – it comes back: ‘Your local candidate doesn’t have a campaign team yet.‘ I’d have thought they’d pre-organise some of these key areas prior to launch. And there’s no encouragement for me to sign up to be notified if/when they do finally organise locally. The events listing is rather curious, initially showing me events from 2 to 10 Oct – not great when today’s the 13th.
  • I really like the way they’ve illustrated what a donation pays for:
    MyCon donate constituency
    It demonstrates that even a token donation can have a material effect…
  • … but I still think it’s an uphill struggle to get people to donate. We’re looking at a massive cultural change, at a time when public trust in politics really couldn’t be lower. I just can’t see it.
  • The sign-up form isn’t too intrusive, but it doesn’t tell me what my details will get used for. Inevitably I’m assuming it’ll go straight into their junk-mailing database – which is why I haven’t signed up myself, incidentally.
  • And whilst it may not be unique functionality – both Labour and the LibDems can rightly claim to have had a lot of the same tools for some considerable time – presentation and high-level commitment goes a long, long way. Even if it doesn’t really raise the bar, the perception is that it does.
  • I wonder what will happen to it after the election?

Tom, Tories and Timing

Tom Steinberg’s blog splutters back to life after more than two years asleep, to confirm reports that he will be advising the Conservatives on IT policy. ‘I’ve been asked to advise the Tories on IT policy,’ he writes, ‘and I’ve accepted.’
He’s clearly sensitive to the issues this raises as regards his ‘day job’ as director of MySociety. He immediately jumps in to stress MySociety is ‘non-partisan’, and that he himself has no interest in party politics. That’s all fair enough. But it’s inevitably going to make life difficult, on numerous levels. Take for example this paragraph on MySociety.org’s ‘About’ page:

No, we are not party political, and this project is neither left nor right wing. It is about building useful digital tools for anyone who wants to use them. And unlike most think tanks that say they’re non-partisan, we really are – none of that ‘It’s not official, but everybody knows they’re really close to party X’ nonsense here.

Now of course, MySociety isn’t just Tom – but he’s its public face, and a very visible face at that. Can we really read that paragraph today, in the same way that we would have read it last week?
Let me be absolutely clear. I completely understand why Tom has accepted this offer. Direct access to (future?) Ministers at a policy development level is invaluable. You can, of course, get a lot done through the civil service; but a change of Prime Minister brings with it the kinds of opportunities you can’t ignore. And I have no doubt that Tom has accepted this role because he sees it as the best way to get Good Things done.
But – why now? The exact circumstances of the announcement, at the Conservative Party Conference, can only serve to offend current good contacts within Labour… putting Tom in an awkward position, for the next six months at least, and (conceivably, I suppose) beyond – for no obvious benefit. And despite his protestations of non-partisanship, it will inevitably be portrayed in party-political terms: a defection by a former Labour advisor, one of Gordon Brown’s Everyday Heroes turning his back, etc.
MySociety’s Francis Irving asked on Twitter, ‘how is steiny helping tories with bills any different from helping labour with petitions?’ My response is that we still have some notional separation between politics and government, and the petitions system was built for the civil service, for The Government Of The Day. I would have fully expected Tom and MySociety to engage with a new Conservative government, if and when. But I’d have expected him to wait until they had actually become the Government.
Tom is a good guy. A great guy, actually. I hope he knows what he’s doing. And I hope it pays off in the end. In the meantime, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.