Friday, October 31, 2008

The changing face of NMSAC

I've been reading a wonderful new book, groundswell; winning in a world transformed by social technologies. It's really opening my eyes to how methodical you need to be when implementing a web 2.0 or social networking environment, I highly recommend it.

You should also head over to An Unofficial Coast Guard Blog, they've been on the tip of the spear, so to speak, in pushing these concepts in the CG.

As to our attempts here in the NMSAC, we're taking a little more of a slow bell. First off, as I said in our first post, we're governed by a set of regulations (41 CFR Parts 101-6 and 102-3) born out of the Federal Advisory Committee Act of 1972. You can check out GSA's really informative site on the FACA here.

In any event, while the spirit of the regulations lend themselves to harnessing the the web 2.0 paradigm, I've had to take a careful approach and fully engage our crack FACA legal minds to make sure we don't stray too far out of the box. The reality is that NMSAC is breaking the trail in regards to FACA and web 2.0, we want to do it right.

I'm also grappling with something I'm not sure is being highlighted in everyone else's foray into the web 2.0 waters; currently my key demographics are folks who are, generationaly speaking, behind the times. They've learned to leverage (or ignore) web 1.0, I don't think they fully understand or want to understand this next evolution. Is it worth our while to run full steam ahead on Wikis, forums, tweets, social networking, etc... when the vast majority of our audience won't use it? Any one else experience that?

2 comments:

lthomas11 said...

Ryan, this is a great blog, and I think everyone will applaud the changing face of NMSAC. I think blog readers will also appreciate the effort it takes to stay within your charter and FACA regulatory requirements and also meet the realities of social networking. I am going to post the link to this blog (wish me luck, feel free to lend assistance) on two Homeport communities, maritime security training and TWIC best practices.

Laurie Thomas
University of Findlay

Ryan Owens said...

Laurie,

Thanks! Spread the word, the new Administrtion has embraced Social Media and it's going to only get more transparent from here!