This week, one of my coworkers expressed his dismay with our IT department not leading the way for our organization to incorporate social networking technologies into our business operations. This dismay comes as a result of various other state agencies sharing how they have starting using these technologies to communicate with the general public and as a mechanism for public health and medical “intelligence”. Of course, Florida HATES to be a follower, so for other States to be using something that we are not has been getting under a lot of people’s skin.
In every conversation i’ve overheard or been involved in, there are so many ideas floating around for how these types of technolgies can be used in Florida AND which ones can be used. Some people have immediately began marketing products – like Twitter – with the only justification for using the project is that ”This will be GREAT!”.
I think there is sooooo much more that needs to be considered before organizations jump on the Web 2.0, particularly the social networking bandwagon. For example, the core question of “What is the intent” of this direction needs to be answered. If there isn’t a common understanding of why we would like to explore / use these tools, then they won’t be effective.