Snow. I’m not sure if you noticed it this week. It was hard to avoid, because it brought the capital to a standstill and meant many of us worked from home. On Monday I did manage to get into work, though I left for home early having watched increasing reports with some alarm. However, unlike previous snow-shows, these reports didn’t come via the radio or television. The came through web 2.0.
On Sunday night, Twitter tag #uksnow started the snow-ball rolling. Soon people were posting ratings and postcodes alongside the tag, the result being this wonderful animation on where the snow feel and how strong.
As I write this on Friday, UKSNOW has dominated the tags on Twitter, facebook, flickr, delicious and just about everything else. We’ve used Web 2.0 to report the snow like never before.
However, while there has been so much media buzz about the reporting of the snow and the chaos it has caused, no one seems to have put the two together.
Last year, Dave Fleet blogged around using twitter as a “Hyper Local Emergency Tool” and since then I’ve blogged aroundother hyper-local ideas for web 2.0.
In a time when we clearly need to look at prioritising resources and sharing information and where community engagement and empowerment are so important, Local Authorities could be looking at contingency plans which involve volunteer groups, community activists and council officers, all linked together through web 2.0 Additionally, web 2.0 plans could support the many peopel who couldn’t get into work. Certainly, I used Twitter, Facebook, ftp, email and Skype alongside the more traditional mobile phone to ensure that I was really as much in the office as ever.
It is clear that when the flakes come down, we all head for our computers and connected devices. Maybe we could harness this action into something that would mean that next time we have #uksnow or indeed any #ukemergency we are ready and working together, not just to report it, but to overcome it too. Who says Web2.0 is about handing over control?
Any thoughts on whther local authorities are already doing this or, if not, how we can get the ball rolling, let me know. Maybe this would be a good one for a Wiki?
