Google Wave – the future?
Posted on 09. Sep, 2009 by Mike Georgeson in Fun stuff, Tech news
It could well be…
Just thinking about how Google Wave could help communications and came up with a scenario for local Governement. Wave is apparently launching later this month and if all the hype is to be believed, I can see it helping to shift the way we communicate to a higher level. As always, we may not all use Google Wave, but if it is successful then the functionality will be seen across many areas of the interent in a very short time.
The scenario:
You are invited to attend an online consultation about the local Council’s plans to build a major new housing development, which will provide affordable housing. The meeting is going to be relatively short, about 45 minutes.
You start by viewing a short video about the development proposal and you look at interactive maps of the plans. You read associated snippets of documents. Then as the online consultation really gets underway, you join in discussions in realtime, along with other citizens, councillors, council officers and the developers.
During the discussions further snippets of document, images and video are added by the participants relating to the points that are discussed. The facilitators focus the discussions on key themes. The discussions are fairly open and the facilitators invite you to take part in opinion polls as the discussions progress.
The facilitator brings the meeting to a close and thanks the participants for taking part. After the meeting you replay some of the discussions that took place and read through some of the threads that you missed during the meeting. A couple of days later the Council post a formal response to all the points which couldn’t be addressed in the meeting, in context within the original discussions.
Well I might be naive in thinking this type of consultation might actually happen, but it could signal a new way of open and transparent Government. Plus it could be a facilitators nightmare! But I can dream a little.
