Image: Jon Hickman. http://www.flickr.com/photos/jonhickman/sets/72157623837016447/
MA Social Media students from Birmingham City University Media Suite delivered an extremely high quality event on 28th April, based around how officers from West Midlands Police do, and can communicate and engage via social networks with citizens in the digital age.
With presentations and debates hosted by students, the event also highlighted how social networks and digital communications from Western and Eastern cultures are used to both good and bad effect, giving the students a prime opportunity to showcase their research, experience and professional practice to a broad audience, including senior police officers, photographers, council representatives, local government officials and members of the public.
The event itself saw audiences engage with presentations from students Paul Hadley and Jennifer Yang, with Jigar Patel chairing the “Terrorist or Photographer” panel debate, the main feature. With the assistance of BCU technical team and Aquila TV, a live video link to student Leland Strott in Baltimore was executed faultlessly, enabling the audience to ask questions and receive answers immediately following Strott’s pre-recorded video presentation.
Using digital multimedia technology to increase audience participation, the 46 invited guests attending were joined by 386 visitors via a live video stream and immediate commentary, where Twitter and ‘live blog’ information was spreading the messages from the conference across the globe.
The visitor statistics collected by students show that the online audience reached digital participants not only in the West Midlands and UK, but also in Japan, Australia, USA, all parts of Europe, Asia and pockets of the Middle East.
Featured guest presentations were also delivered by Nick Booth, a local social media specialist and founder of Podnosh Ltd; Will Perrin, former Cabinet Office advisor and leader of Talk About Local; and Jon Hale, regional director of Gov Delivery, digital communications specialists for local governments.
The “Terrorist or Photographer” debate featured open questions and discussions from the audience and internet social networking sites, with representatives from West Midlands Police and the photography and media industries. Panel guests for the debate were Chief Inspector Mark Payne, Detective Chief Inspector Ian Grundy (Terrorist Intelligence Unit), Karen Strunks (professional photographer) and Christian Payne (social technologist and mobile media creator).
Some of the comments after the event from the physical and digital audience include “awesome”, “fantastic content and intelligent debate”, “totally engaging” and “fascinating’.
MA Social Media course leader Dave Harte and lecturer Jon Hickman described the event as “a really excellent event” and “superb”.
More information, video recordings, presentations and photographs are all available at http://eventwith.me/authority2
Recent Comments