Yes, it’s finally arrived. DVD’s have been dispatched to the core group.

The video is a record of part of the January event in Manchester. We’ll be using it to promote the project to new stakeholders. (Meetings have already been arranged, but we’re keeping quiet until real results start to come through).

If you can’t see the video below, try going directly to the host site.

 Just click on the ‘>’ play button above to start the video.

(Sorry about the frame above. It’s out of our hands. Gets much better when you play the video). ;O)

If you want a copy of the DVD itself, get in touch with ‘reachout@REMOVETHISbritishcouncil.org’.

Hope you all like it!

As the event was drawing to a close, Pukul and I decided to shoot a quick video clip where we briefly discussed his views on the weeks activities.

Unfortunately the film crew had left, so we had to make do with my stills camera. Apologies for the slightly scratchy sound.

If you can’t see the video below, click here.

Pukul says there’ll be another live web chat here on Tuesday 30 January at 1300GMT. Hope to see you all then!

Peter takes the participants through the process of ‘building’ objects within the virtual world.

Below are a couple of participant examples:

Not bad going for a few minutes work!

Below is an example of real ‘virtuoso’ building within the Second Life environment. It’s called ‘The making of Suzanne Vega’s Second Life Guitar’. If you can’t see the video below, click here.

What is Web 1.0 & 2.0?

Web 1.0:

• Separate, corporate, monolithic web sites

Web 2.0:

• Citizen Voice - Blogs
• Community Intelligence - Comments, reviews, rating, tagging, wiki
• Network as Platform - Applications may use many sites: YouTube, Google, Digg
• Richer, free, adaptable tools - Open source, try-it-out, plug-together software, richer visually

In short, make use of the tools out there! Nowadays, it’s not necessary to build applications and sites from ‘the ground up’. For example, a free blog might upload / embed free video on free video on YouTube.

Another  characteristic of Web 2.0 is licensing. Check out the variety of new content licensing arrangements on the Creative Commons web site.

OneWorld see a major strength of Web 2.0 as shifting information flows. In effect, reversing traditional flows, now facilitating:

People -> Media -> Government communication structures far more easily.

Consider blogs. Often chronological series of postings, but can be adapted for many users, fully fledged web sites, and many, many features. Applications include Reporting on Events, Personal Testimonies, Inter-Team Communications.

Consider wiki’s as a means to collobaratively work together on projects. Very often, this can be as simple as a group of people working on a single document at different times. The world’s biggest wiki is actually an encyclopaedia, ‘Wikipedia’. 

The participants are looking at how they might use blogs and other tools for the music festival project:

• Using the web for people to select the bands who will play
• Announcements
• Use of MySpace or Facebook for festival communication
• Text messaging direct from bands themselves
• Rich audio visual elements
• Printable invitiations
• Live coverage of the festival on a blog
• Online surveys to guide festival content
• A wiki for facilitating project organisation

Participants are now experimenting with the OneClimate platform to familiarise themselves with what Web 2.0 means in practical terms. In this short video, Peter is demonstrating a piece of ‘mashup’ functionality.

Ken is describing RSS feeds, Feed readers, and Podcasts. He goes onto talk about Global Voices, a web site dedicated to aggregating blog posts from around the world.

In order to make searching of content easier, Ken is describing ‘tagging’. This is where content is given meaning by users themselves, rather than the creators themselves. Emphasis can be given to the most popular content on a site using ‘Tag Clouds’.

Good free software and applications includes Blogger, PBWiki, Flickr, GMAIL, MySpace, YouTube.

Once a site is going, Ken advises keeping track of how a site is used. Google Analytics is a good example of a free method to track how a site is being used.

And, now it’s lunch!

Peter is playing a short documentary on the ‘Mobile for Good’ OneWorld project:

If you can’t see this in your browser, click here.

Mobile for Good (M4G) is a social franchise project designed to use mobile phone technology to help alleviate poverty and improve the lives of people in the developing world. It delivers vital health, employment and community content via SMS on mobile phones in order to inform and empower disadvantaged individuals and help bridge the ‘digital divide’ – the widening technology gulf which exists between rich and poor countries.

The project started in 2005, and is began financially breaking even in the first quarter of 2006.

Adam has explained to the group how commercial organisations develop their product concept templates.

Here’s an example he gives for ‘Dove Cream bar’, a moisturising soap.

Click on the image to expand for detail.

The group are being asked to develop their product ideas along these lines. Later today, they will each present their product concept to a panel of judges.

Amongst others, Amna prepared a short presentation based on their groups’ ‘Rock the borders’ concept.

Yesterday, groups were asked complete the following task based on their learning:

RingWell, a mobile phone company, needs YOUR help!

RingWell has realised that it is not selling many mobiles to older parents (45-60 years old). In fact, not many companies do. Ringwell wants to move into this new market before the competition.

In your group, discuss older parents to discover some insights into their behaviour and (non-)use of mobile phones. Then, develop your product idea and explain the benefit to the customer.

The key process followed by groups was:

• Insight
• Product idea
• Customer benefit

Nader Houella makes a pitch on behalf of the group:

Again, just a quick test. Better quality content coming shortly!

OK, the video professionals are arriving on Tuesday evening, but here’s a very quick (albeit dodgy) test I just shot of the group at work, with a stills camera.