Have you ever wanted to be on TV? Well, this evening, hundreds of people were after Channel 4 News organised a Twitter Fringe event at the Labour Party Conference, entitled #twinge. I came in quite late, but from what I understand it was a panel of Labour MPs and Ministers, answering questions from the floor but also from the Twittersphere – and boy, did those questions come.
There were some really important points raised, both for and against the use of Twitter as an engagement tool. The debate was huge, so I won’t try to explain all the points here, but you can try and make sense of it by searching #twinge.
However, there were a few debates I got involved in:
1. Social Media Vs Traditional Media Vs Doorknocking
I think the consensus among the people I tweeted with was that ALL of these are important. My feeling remains that, in areas of extreme deprivation, face to face is still the way forward. As a community worker, I found actually meeting people was unbeatable at engaging people. However, I also think that’s changing. Furthermore, I think that there are huge numbers of people being missed because their Twitter door isn’t being knocked on – this needs addressing too!
2. The Voting Age
The idea that young people don’t tweet was seriously put to bed, when they, err, did. The bombardment of questions about the voting age, from Labour supporters and opponents, took up a large amount of my Twitterfall. It’s clear that events like #Twinge do get young people talking – one young person entered the debate, found out the issue and instantly commented – a view from a TWITTER engaged person rather than a POLITICALLY engaged person became politically active as a result of a twitter event.
3. The difficulties of Mass-Tweets
Twinge soon became full of spam-bots, trying to take advantage of the trending topic. This wasn’t a major issue, but the mass nature of the tweeting, soon became a problem. Not a problem for the debates as such, they continued, but for the panel nature of it. For example, a number of single-issue groups and traditional left-wing campaigners tried to sidetrack the event with questions about Labour policy. Their questions were ignored. Many more involved participants also posed questions – but I didn’t see many answers from the panel. The question for me, really, was did everyone have a voice? Sure, everyone could be heard…but where they being heard?
@Watfordgap summed it up. Everyone has a voice must be balanced by the right people listening. Having capacity to listen. And the capacity to change things. I added to this my concerns that many people, who have not though of the big picture, the governing issues, will feel aggrieved if their view isn’t actioned.
To summarise these points, I think local government and community organisations using twitter (or any social media) as a community consultation tool need to bare the following in mind:
- Are the people on Twitter who we are asking?
- If not, how can we reach the people not on Twitter? Is Twitter the best tool?
- Who will be responding – and will they respond quickly and “live” as twitter and social media demands
- How can they show that EVERY voice has been heard, and every voice CONSIDERED though all can’t be actioned?
- How will they cope if, as at #twinge, they get single issue groups or large barrages of questions
All in all, however, Twinge was a great “event”. It was fantastic to see the Labour grassroots and top brass alongside their opponents showing a real enthusiasm and determination and, dare I say it, real politics. This kind of debate can only move the agenda forward…but only with some real planning and though.
The final point I wanted to make was made for me by Paul Newport. He said: “Any MPs not on Twitter will end up being isolated from the electorate”. It was clear from the mass participation here that this is true. But a word of warning to those planning on slating MPs….it’s true of all businesses and public sector organisations as well. Twitter may or may not be the future…but social media is. Get on board, quickly.
