Mayor Gavin Newsom announced Tuesday that San Francisco’s 311 call center for municipal services can now be accessed via Twitter. “Instead of making a phone call,” a release said, “members of the public can send a tweet to alert the city about a pothole, or simply find out about the city’s green initiatives.”
You can simply follow SF311 via the Twitter site or your favorite Twitter client. Oddly, however, the mayor’s announcement directs Twitter users to go to this page and click the “Follow SF311” button — which takes you to another Twitter page, which says:
“An application would like to connect to your account. The application Follow SF311 by City and County of San Francisco would like the ability to access and update your data on Twitter.”
Huh? Why would I give the city of San Francisco permission to “access and update” my Twitter account? The FAQ for this service says:
“Why do I have to go to your signup page? Can I just follow you on Twitter? In order to communicate on Twitter using direct messages, both users must be following each other and the signup page makes the two-way connection. When you click on ‘Follow 311,’ you will be taken to a Twitter page to enter your Twitter ID and password. You will only need to do this once and we never have access to your account/password at any time.”
The answer seems contradictory to the information on the site that users are taken to after clicking the “Follow SF311” button. And it doesn’t make sense to me that I’d have to enter my Twitter ID and password to establish a two-way connection.
If the San Francisco city government wants to be able to direct message any of its Twitter followers to respond to requests, it should say so. It simply has to auto-follow everyone who follows its account, rather than add hurdles to the following process. The follow-back process can be automated.
The government’s current process will not prevent Twitter spammers from following SF311, so it seems to be a counterproductive obstacle to the engagement they seek.
(Thanks to George Kelly for the tip.)
