This month’s Net2 Think Tank topic focused on user generated content. Have you used a campaign or a project to invite contributions? Do you have tips for successful invitations to create and share content with your organization or the community? Have you seen community members championing your work online with their own spin? We have a couple great responses to share this month to keep the conversation going!
Can User Generated Content Create Unique Community Opportunities?
Brigham at SocialChangeNews answers this question in one word: indubitably!
www.socialchangenews.com is the internets’ hub for news on social change that combines original user-created content (UCC) with the latest aggregated news on organizations, and individuals working to transform society. Since this directly relates to our project, we look forward to sharing and learning as much as we can for the next few weeks.
SocialChangeNews is now live in beta, and open to being a case study in this topic themselves! You can check it out for yourself at www.socialchangenews.com
Ana at JelloBrain has a terrific post discussing the relationship between user generated content and the organizations and infastructure on which that content is posted.
When a user surfs to a website and registers for an event, donates money, becomes a member or writes a blog, this information has become digitized. Capturing this information from hundreds of ‘viral’ users without human intervention or administration (the function of a good content management system), creates an enormous added capacity in the organization.
The current status quo for non-profit organizations is typically one where the information needed to do the work of an organization is kept in a separate database from the database recording user generated online interactions. Typically when a user interacts with a website and fills out a registration form, that information is sent to the organization via email, at which point it is manually input into the organization’s main constituent database. The only tool in the entire world that can perform that transition effectively is the human being.
There are two problems with that. The first is that human beings are (and should be) more expensive than mechanization, and the second is that human beings do their best work when they are creative.
As Ana says, “The solution is of course to integrate the two databases.” You can read the full post and connect with Ana to keep the discussion going on JelloBrain here.
What do you think?
You can still answer the Net2 Think Tank question in the comments here or connect with either of the contributors above.
Be sure to watch for the Net2 Think Tank question for next month! It will be posted in early September. (Hint: You’ll always be the first to hear about Net2 Think Tank topics by subscribing to Net2 News, the enewsletter with updates, jobs, and more!)
About Net2 Think Tank:
Net2 Think Tank is a monthly blogging event open to anyone and is a great way to participate in an exchange of ideas. We post a question or topic to the NetSquared community and participants submit responses either on their own blogs or on the NetSquared Community Blog. Tag your post with “net2thinktank” and email a link to us to be included. At the end of the month, the entries get pulled together in the Net2 Think Tank Round-Up.