On Wednesday I was in San Jose, Calif., for the Netsquared conference, a TechSoup initiative to “remix the Web for social change.” Most of the attendees work for or with nonprofit organizations, but there’s a lot of insight and information here of use to journalists and news organizations. You can check out the Twitter stream at #N2Y4.
I just live-tweeted a workshop session run by media entrepreneur and consultant Susan Mernit and activist, organizer, and journalist Kwan Booth on using social media for social change. This was a practical, tips-focused session, where even a Twitter veteran like me picked up some useful new tricks.
Here are a few things I learned today from Mernit, Booth and the session attendees:
Google Maps Twitter Mashup. An attendee from IJCentral, which produced a documentary on the International Criminal Court, mentioned that they’ve created a mashup of Google Maps and Twittervision showing who’s tweeting about their work.
SocialToo. Mernit gladly pays $20 per year for this premium service that offers daily analysis of your followers and their activity, as well as other personalized Twitter statistics.
Topify. An attendee recommended this service to integrate Twitter with e-mail. I haven’t tried it, but I visited the site and think it’s worth looking into.
Demographic surprises. I’ve heard many college teachers dismiss the relevance of Twitter because their students haven’t seemed to use it or be interested in it. But Booth teaches online skills to youth in the primarily African American, lower income neighborhood of West Oakland, Calif., and said that many young people are avid Twitter users. That’s not enough information to draw conclusions, but I think it warrants further investigation.
Booth also noted that mobile media is the way to reach lower-income or no-broadband communities, and that Twitter can be an inexpensive tool to support mobile outreach efforts.
