ICT and Social Media Update for Mumbles Labour February 2017

In the past couple of months there have been a number of developments o the ICT / Social Media Front.  The Mumbles Labour Facebook page has become a lot more active and is now acting as somewhere where people can find out information about candidates, meetings and local Labour news. I would like to encourage those member with Facebook, Twitter and other social media accounts to Retweet and share content from the FaceBook and other Mumbles Labour accounts as this is how we will share our news and message and not end up with our accounts acting as an echo chamber where we simply speak to each other.

Additional Mumbles Labour social media accounts have been developed such as Twitter via @Mumbleslabour1 and also a blog at http://mumbleslabour.blogspot.co.uk/ In relation to the the Twiiter account obviously it would be great if all those members who are on Twitter could give it a follow  and also the occasional #FF.  It would also be great if any member who wants to would submit content for the blog it is just another way we can get our message out there.  I notice that some local members are already signing up to Nextdoor which is the new replacement for Streetlife which I also know some members have used in the past. I think using Nextdoor for getting information out to local residents will be very useful  and the Tories at Newton are already using it but I think we need to be careful to being drawn in to public spats.

On February 8^th I met with Pete Anderson to discuss and explore the potential of using Vocaleyes for branch engagement at the TechHub located on Swansea High St. During the meeting Pete and I discussed organising a introductory session for interested branch members to both familiarise members with the vocaleyes platform but also start to explore developing a branch strategy for digital activism and engagement.  I would be interested to hear from those branch members who would be interested in attending this session and contributing to Mumbles Labour groups gigital engagement/ activism strategy. I propose we hold this session at Techhub as it has good presentation facilities and Wifi access. Mike Klein also did a presentation at the TechHub on digital activism which I have written up as a blog http://mumbleslabour.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/digital-activism-why-it-is-important.html

One point I would like to make in relation to our development of social media and digital communication it is not primarily to help as to communicate with each other better, although it can help with that.  Only a small percentage of local people are Labour members and only quite a small proportion of those attend meetings.  Digital media can offer us a platform for communicating with those members who don’t attend meetings for whatever reason  and also to engage with local residents who we are potential Labour voters. Digital activism is not a replacement for good old fashioned door knocking and face to face engagement  but I feel that if we don’t use it to augment more traditional approaches we will be missing an increasingly important method of canvasing.