Bob Ross - what can he teach us about broadband?

Among the many words of praise for the late Steve Jobs was this quote from one blogger: “What Steve Jobs did with Apple stopped me from looking at a computer as a tool and began making me think of it as a paintbrush to make my mark on the world with.”

The true genius of Steve Jobs was that he recognised the vast majority of the public are not interested in technology  – they are interested in the Stuff they can do with it – particularly when that Stuff is game-changing.

It’s a message that is vital to the success of one of the few areas of major public investment in these difficult times.

With millions being invested in next generation broadband through projects like BDUK, there is an imperative to ensure that businesses “get” broadband in the same way the public “got” the iphone, itunes or the ipad.

There sometimes seems to be an assumption with superfast broadband that “if we build it they will come”. However, the evidence is, they won’t – not without a reason.

Disappointment

BT has expressed disappointment at the low levels of take-up of its next-generation fibre-to-the-cabinet (FTTC) technology in some areas, despite intensive (and expensive) investment in infrastructure and marketing.

The over-riding reason for this is pretty simple – most people aren’t interested in higher broadband speeds, they are interested in Stuff.

We recently ran a seminar in collaboration with The Open Innovation Project in which we looked at the role of innovation in broadband demand stimulation.

Innovation is absolutely central to engaging the public and businesses with broadband – and it is innovation of the kind Steve Jobs understood.

Innovation is not speed, it is not the ability to do the same stuff you always do faster – its the ability to do new stuff that you desperately want to do but can’t do without superfast broadband.

I can send email with standard broadband, I can watch movies online with standard broadband, I can share files, make Skype calls, work remotely and use social media with standard broadband.

Apart from the 10% or so of the population (lets call them geeks) that just have to have the latest technology or already use bandwidth intensive applications – as long as I can do these things, I’ve got no need to pay more to do them faster.

I will have a need when I see Stuff that I want to do but can’t do without superfast broadband.

The Joy of Painting

Jobs got this – the iphone wasn’t a better mobile phone, it was a pocket-sized entertainment, business, social and communication tool.

It’s a challenge for broadband demand stimulation that what it is that selling  is effectively just an infrastructure enabler. That’s not very sexy.  What it needs to do is identify, and encourage, innovation in what can be done with broadband – and in the understanding of what can be done.

Apple wasn’t always innovative in the technology it produced, but it was always innovative in the way it saw -and sold – the potential of that technology to let people do Stuff. Big Stuff.

Jobs’ genius was to recognise that innovation is not always about new technology, but often simply about making technology do Stuff that was new, relevant and exciting – and then making sure people knew about it.

Just as Jobs made people see the computer as a “paintbrush” rather than a technical tool, the responsibility of broadband demand stimulation is to make people see superfast broadband as the “paint” that allows them to create new ways of working, and living.

But it is the creation that interests us – the act of painting not the tools we use. Tell people how good paint is and they won’t buy, show them the joy of painting and they will.

Better connection up here than in my hotel. Hmm..

I’ve just got back from a week away in beautiful Snowdonia (no, that’s not my 4×4) and found myself reminded yet again that the best things in life are free – fresh air, mountain scenery, wi-fi.

And like all the best things, you don’t always appreciate them till they are gone. Getting away from it all is great, as long as “all” doesn’t include the ability to communicate.

Yet again, I was struck by the fact that so many leisure businesses fail to understand that free access to good quality wi-fi is as fundamental to their customers’ needs as toilet facilities.

Spending a penny

You don’t ask me to type in a 14 digit codeword, set up an account and pay a premium rate before I can take a wizz, so don’t ask me to do it to access wi-fi. That’s if you have wi-fi in the first place.

So much of what we do on holiday – from deciding where to go to booking a ticket to keeping up with gossip at home – is done online that to have no, or restricted, access to the internet has a huge impact on the quality of your stay.

The place we stayed was fine – but I’ll never go there again. Don’t give me a trouser press but no free internet access and a terrible connection speed.

When I find I have faster access to the internet on my smartphone at the top of Wales’s highest mountain than I do in my hotel, it’s time to find a new hotel.

Time and again I come across restaurants that either have no wi-fi access, or lock it down with a price to log in. It seems almost unbelievable that there are still hotels that don’t have free access to wi-fi.

If you are in the business of accommodating people – whether that’s in your rooms, your tables or your conference facilities – wi-fi should just be there. Like running water, lightbulbs, chairs, toilet paper..

Internet access is a fundamental, basic requirement not a premium add-on. If you don’t get that, don’t be surprised if you don’t get customers.

We’re even more delighted that this has come about because BCC actually did something many councils talk about but rarely do in such a meaningful way – consulting with industry.

Conversation starter

Last year, BCC announced that it was going to take opinion from Bristol’s digital community on the re-development of the council’s website.

Naturally, we were interested and attended a round-table discussion on the project, after which I wrote a blog piece picking up on the fact that I felt the engagement was missing a trick.

I was delighted – and the cynic in me a little surprised – when I received a reply from the council’s communications and marketing director Peter Holt opening up a dialogue about the subject we’d raised.

Benchmark

The discussions that followed led to our engaging with the procurement process for approved suppliers to work on the project – at the end of which we’re extremely pleased to have been selected.

It’s been a refreshing process to go through – and a rare one in procurement – where a public sector body has gone to industry happy to say it doesn’t have all the answers and asking them to contribute ideas to a project rather than presenting them with tender documentation for a fait accompli.

Having gone through the process with BCC, I’m convinced this approach has led to a much more carefully thought out and strategised web project than would have been the case if consultation had not occurred on the same level.

It’s a very exciting project to be involved in, and hopefully one that will set the benchmark for similar projects across the UK.

It was an interesting and complex development, requiring some innovative approaches to integrating with existing auction platforms as well as complex planning to ensure the site worked seamlessly with the bidding processes of one of busiest auction room complexes in the country.

As part of the process, we created an online application which allowed Arthur Johnson to simply integrate their site with the bidding platform they have been using to manage their online catalogue.

Our solution greatly simplified the processes involved allowing user-friendly management of their online auction presence.

Record Sales

Our work with Arthur Johnson has already attracted interest from one of the UK’s largest auction software companies.

The site was also planned to improve the user experience of the thousands of auction goers who visit it each week – with intuitive information architecture, improved search facility, personalised auction alerts and clear user interface.

Within a week of the launch of the new site, Arthur Johnson & Sons saw record online sales and passed the 50% mark for bids coming from their online users for the first time.

There’s a lot of interesting stuff in there, including new thinking (for the government at least) on cloud computing.

But the part that caught our eye was the section on procurement and open standards.

In a nutshell, government procurement processes are so byzantine and the projects they implement so large that contracts inevitably go to a very small group of multinational IT giants.

There are two problems with this:

• those giants can pick their own – ridiculously high – costs
• they frequently do an appalling job

Which all means that for ICT suppliers like ourselves, we are constantly banging on a closed door. Not upset for us? Ok, well for you it means you fork out millions of pounds more than you need to in tax to pay for often inefficient, proprietary ICT systems.

So, as part of its drive to improve public sector efficiency the government is now saying that open standards (non-proprietary) software is the way to go, and that big projects (over £100m) should be split down into smaller pieces and worked on by more than one company.

Which should hopefully mean, more opportunities for small, efficient ICT companies and less waste.

We’ll watch this space with interest – and in the hope that this very laudable policy is extended into local government as well, where the issue of lumbering ICT giants with very small brains and even smaller turning circles is just as bad. Roll on the meteorite!

Social Media  can be an extremely effective tool for empowering and giving a  voice to communities, but its use needs to be carefully planned and managed.

On the positive side, Social Media is in widespread use, and has low barriers to entry in terms of cost and technical difficulty.

On the negative side, without being part of a wider engagement strategy it can exclude important sections of the community and can become directionless,  with no real ROI.

Although Social Media is about learning by doing, often the lack of basic IT skills and experience with using Social Media platforms can prevent valuable members of a community from being included in a wider online consultation and engagement.

A multi-agency engagement approach

The Somerset Coastal Change Pathfinder Project (SCCP) is a multi-agency body tasked with consulting coastal communities on the future of the coastline.

As part of our work with SCCP, we have been running social media engagement workshops – bringing in interested groups and members of the public in the communities affected by coastal change.

The philosophy behind the workshops is to educate and enthuse local people in engaging with the project via social media.

The keys to making this work include:

• Its about engagement, not social media – not everyone who want to get involved in the consultation will know, or want to know, about social media. It’s important that the workshop is sold and promoted as a platform-neutral engagement opportunity. Members of the public can engage in consultation any way they want to, but it’s good to let them know how useful social media is as an engagement tool, and to help them use in case they want to learn how.
• Creating a shared learning environment – rather than just showing people “how its done” you allow them to work together to solve problems and find solutions.
• Identifying levels of engagement – make sure you understand where individuals are in terms of their understanding of social media and allow those who know more to help those who know less.
• Keep the project at the heart of the workshop – any training or practical examples should be focused directly on engagement with the project. Let delegates actually have their voice heard as they learn.
• Make it goal-focussed – if you are showing people how to use Flickr, for instance, teach them by allowing them to create – for example in this case – a gallery of images of coastal change in  particular part of the coast which will feed directly into the consultation programme. By creating something that is directly relevant to the consultation, you are doing more than just teaching skills you are beginning the engagement process.
• Evaluate and follow up the session to help drive future engagement with the community project.

You need to bring not only expertise in the technology involved, but also in the project issues and in the local community. The best workshops are those where the delegates feel empowered and because they will know their own community better and the project issues, they should be  the  real experts in driving forward the social media.

It is important to remember it isn’t about the technology, but about the conversation. People need to be shown how to use the technology initially, but then they should forget about it and think about the engagement. Just like we don’t think about the fact we are using a telephone when we call someone up,  or even the mechanisms of using e-mail.  True engagement through social media begins when it is just about the engagement, not the social media platform.

How You Can Help

If you are able to make a donation to help the home in their work I’d be very grateful.

As BCDH say “All donations are put to good use at the Home, whether it is pocket change or a lump sum.”

£5 will run a heat lamp for a sick animal for two weeks

£7 will buy kongs and activity balls to keep the dogs minds busy

£10 gives exercise equipment for a ferret or hamster

£12 will buy cream to stop white cats and dogs getting sunburn

£25 will provide a bed to keep an elderly dog warm or microchip a new animal

£40 will neuter or castrate a cat

£60 will neuter or castrate a dog

£150 will provide shelter in the exercise paddocks

My Training

Training has been going well, although training over the winter has been hard work.

With less than 2 weeks until the run I went on an 8 mile run on Sunday:

View Larger Map

I use an iPhone running/training app called Cyclemeter for tracking my runs, and used it to generate the map route above. It’s useful to track your progress, and keep track of your runs. It’s also handy for accurately find out the length of your regular runs.

It’s a really good app, and it uses the iPhone’s GPS so the distance and speed calculations are really accurate compared to iPhone/iPod running apps like Nike+.

Note: All of the images in this post are available at a larger size, simply click on the image to view.

Getting Started: Uploading

Once you have set your account up (which I’m not going to go into here) you will undoubtedly want to add some photographs.

The first step is to upload some images. When logged in you can access the upload page by following the menus in the header:

You > Upload Photos and Video

You will then be met with the “Upload to Flickr” page. Click on “Choose photos and videos” to have the file selection window opened.

Once you have navigated to the files on your computer you can select multiple files to upload in one go, by selecting all with “Ctrl+A” or clicking on the first, then hold down “Shift” while you click on the last in your folder. You can also select files individually by holding “Ctrl” while you click.

When you are done click “Open”, to see your files added into Flickr’s nifty Flash uploader:

Finally, click “Upload Photos and Videos” button to get the upload going. Presuming you wish for the wider world to view your images you can leave the “Set privacy” on “Public”.

Once all of the files are uploaded you will be greeted with “Finished!”:

Next you will want to add titles, descriptions and tags to the photos, so follow the link to “add a description”.

Tags are a useful way of keywording your photographs, as Flickr says “Tags are like keywords or labels that you add to a photo to make it easier to find later”. People searching Flickr for certain types of photos will be met with your images if your tags are relevant to their search results. You can leave a space between tags, and add as many as you like.

You may also wish to add them to a set as a way of grouping them (more on this below).

Sets, groups, galleries and collections explained

Flickr has various ways of organising photos, using sets, collections, galleries and groups. This nomenclature can be confusing, until you understand what the intended use of each is.

Sets

Sets are just that, a set of photos. These might be a set on a certain topic, or you might simply want to pull together some photographs into one place, such as “The Seaside”, or “New Years Eve”, to link people to or to feed into a slideshow.

Sets are often used when you wish to make a slideshow, as they are an efficient way of pulling together a number of photographs to be displayed together.

Collections

A collection is like a set, but as well as a way of grouping individual photos, you can also group sets. It is a useful way of creating a looser collection of images, such as “December 2010″ which may contain your sets “Family 2010″, “Christmas 2010″ and “New Years Eve”, as well as some individual stragglers that don’t current belong in a set.

Galleries

Galleries are a way of grouping or sharing other peoples photos, as opposed to your own. You act as the curator, bringing together photos into a themed gallery, from your friends’ or fellow photographers’ images.

Galleries support up to 18 public photos or videos.

For an example of a gallery have a look at “Broken wings and flying things” curated by helveticaneue.

Groups

Groups are way of collecting together with other photographers, and creating collections of photographs. You can set a group up and invite people to it, or join an existing group.

Groups are a useful way of sharing photographs, ideas and techniques with other people. Images can be added to a group’s pool, moderated, and discussed. They are a useful social tool, and used widely by those most active on Flickr.

Sets: Adding and removing photos

Once you have created some sets, and uploaded some photographs, you can add and remove photos from sets at any time by visiting:

Organize & Create > Your Sets or by clicking the “Sets” tab when you are in the Organize view.

You will then be met with your available sets (at the top) and your available photographs (along the bottom).

You are able to add photographs to a set by dragging them from the bottom (your available photographs) and dropping them in the set you want the photo to appear in.

You are also able to open individual sets and view the photos in them by double clicking on the set. You will then be able to edit that set’s title, description and photos. In the same way you can drag photos from the bottom to add them into the set, as well as see the existing photographs in that set.

If you want to remove a photo from a set simply drag it from that set and drop it into the bar at the bottom of the page. This bar will now say “Drop a photo or video here to remove it from the set”. This action will not delete the photograph, just stop it from appearing in that set.

Once you have made the appropriate changes to the set’s title, description and photographs make sure you save the changes by pressing “Save” on the left-hand bar.

What others see

One slightly confusing aspect of Flickr is understanding what other people will see when they look at your profile or your photographs or sets.

This is confusing when you are logged in as you will see a range of additional links, buttons and tools to edit your content, which other people won’t see.

If you want to check what others will see try logging out and having a look again at your profile. The link you will need is the one which you are taken to when viewing “Your Photostream”, or clicking on your profile photograph, the link will be of the form http://www.flickr.com/photos/12345678@N01/. This is also the link you can give to people to view your profile. Or, if you’ve created your own Flickr address your URL maybe http://www.flickr.com/photos/custom_username.

When logged in you are able to visit this link to pretty much see what others will see; uploaded photographs on the left, with most recent on the top, and sets and collections on the right.

We don’t just want to excite you about the opportunities new technologies can present, but we help you to plan and use the tools that will make a real difference to how you engage with your clients/customers/communities and ultimately help you to achieve your marketing goals.

Our training is based on evidenced research, benchmark studies and client feedback.

How we work:

• We keep our workshops small to allow for personalised and practical training
• We bring sector/industry knowledge and understanding to contextualise the training
• We use an e-adoption ladder to help you set goals and evaluate your progress
• We believe in a shared learning experience and make this integral to our training

While each workshop is tailored, this is a general framework we use for our workshop:

1.  Showing examples of social media in action that is relevant to you

Outcome: This gives delegates an understanding of how and why social media works and the relevance to them.

2. Planning your social media, to cover:

• Goals

• Target Audience

• User processes

• Social media tools/platforms

• Measures

• Resource allocation

The outcome is for delegates to create their own draft social media plan/strategy.

3. Social media tools/Platforms

We look at the different social media tools including Flickr, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter etc

To help delegates decide on which tools would work for their social media marketing strategy.

4.  Introduction to the Social Media tools

This involves practical training on using the tools.

5.  Resource allocation

How to evaluate the time value investment for implementing social media marketing.

We provide half day or full day workshops as well as 3 hour taster sessions.

Please get in touch with us if you require further information or wish to book a place/workshop.

Putting ideology to one side, Government has tried to argue that it’s time for business and the community to work together, the obvious area is where the public sector is withdrawing its investment.

The Regional Growth Fund has been set up to seek out and invest  in “private sector employment in regions where there is an imbalance with the public sector” and “to build up the private sector in the long term.”   For the RGF bid I was involved in that meant an opportunity for a solid public/private partnership with an “oven-ready” business model and vision to get investment.

To benefit from a substantial RGF grant, sustainability and providing wider benefits  such as job creation, new skills training and encouraging new business start up, were key words with real meaning rather than buzz words.

Local by Social seem to sing the same tune as RGF.   During this two day open forum, we were asked to consider how can technology solve everyday problems and develop ideas, there was even a cash prize for the best App idea.   Essentially we were asked to look at Apps in a different way ie consider the wider benefits to the community.

One example given was an app developed by local Bristol company Overlay Media.   The “Hills are Evil“  App has a very practical purpose, “the creation of a dynamic map overlay that provides people with restricted mobility, cyclists, skateboarders, the elderly, and people pushing pushchairs, the ability to identify the most appropriate route between two places.”  They’ve made this app “fun” by providing “a pain scale to make levels of steepness more meaningful to users, as the raw numbers of distance, ascent and descent are not conducive to the best user experience”.

Users can upload their accessibility issues, such as unexpected drop curbs, troublesome cobbles and steep hills “that kill” and this data can be used to improve people’s lives not just by taking the pain out of not being able to get to your destination, but also by feeding back to say those who make decisions about where to spend money on roads and pavements.  One Councillor said that money was already being spent on consultation with the public on accessibility issues, but with this app that could mean such consultations would not neccesarily be required.  A win win and cost saving.

Hills are Evil was commissioned by Media Sandbox – a project that invests in smaller and local creative technology companies to  develop inspirational ideas and projects that have an emphasis on community.  So I guess I’m getting around to the idea of Social Enterprise.  The reason Hills are Evil is so good is that innovation and “inspirational ideas” came from investment in the right people for the right reasons.  At the same time these savvy technological social entrepreneurs get their idea off the ground.

The ambition for Hills are Evil’s concept is to be as ubiquitous as Google Maps, yes this makes sense, but wouldn’t that start to attract the attention of  business investors?

Social by Local was missing something for me and that was any mention of Enterprise.  Businesses looking to adapt to the changing economic landscape and seek opportunities by working with the public sector can lead to benefits to the local community.   Local by Social was an ideal forum for this discussion, making us think of Apps and technology in a way that has wider benefit to society, I see also an opportunity for business as well, but there wasn’t many of us (business investors) there to share our ideas.

Businesses are often seen as totally separate to the local community by the public sector, even though we often live and work in the very same community.   Social by Local needs to engage with the local business community as should Local Government.   The RGF initiative kind of forced this into being by providing an investment opportunity aimed at businesses but wrapped up in the language of the public sector.  There needed to be public/private partnership to understand the application form at the very least!   We have firsthand experience of three local authorities that find engaging with the business community challenging, maybe this was why only 400 bids were submitted to the RGF fund, when 6000 were predicted.