USING SOCIAL MEDIA TO IMPROVE LIVES OF

POORER IN COMMUNITIESwith examples from BROSDI

byKaramagi Ednah

Executive Director, BROSDI

• A little on “Social Media” & “BROSDI”

• Approach from the angle: “if we were asked to use social media to implement/design a project, this are points we would take seriously into consideration”

• Share examples of “how we are using social media”

• Sharing some success stories from BROSDI

Presentation Trend …

Explaining BROSDI …

• Who? What? Is BROSDI?BusogaRuralOpen Source & Development Initiative

• Focus Areas• Target rural household communities• We use ICT• Knowledge sharing &information

management• Empower target group• Adopt the OSDI approach

• BROSDI works closely with : -• Government• Civil society• Private sector

• Programs• Education, Health and Agriculture

What is “Social Media”?

• Social Media includes web-based and mobile based technologies which are used to turn communication into interactive dialogue between organizations, communities, and individuals

... Wikipedia

• Social media can include text, audio, video, images, podcasts, and other multimedia communications. Common examples are: -• Blogs• You tube• Facebook, Linked In• Twitter• D groups and more…

For the case of using Social Media, it can be used in two main stages: -

• Direct stage• Use social media applications directly e.g.

blogging directly

• Secondary stage• First use one method then social media as the

second stage e.g. capture an activity, edit it then upload to You Tube

• First use more than one method then use social media as the third party e.g. mobilize and conduct a farmers forum, document the knowledge shared using text, voice and audio, transform these into an article using a computer, then upload on your Facebook page

Using Social Media …

Points we would take into consideration when using social

media for rural projects …

• Take the “listening chair” and not the “instructing chair”

• Be well equipped with the a variety of social media options

• Do not drown in the Social Media Pool

• Presence of content

• Be flexible• Use other applications and at some point

incorporate social media• Slowly but surely let go of an application that is not

reaping results

• Need access to the internet

• Need electricity• For the computers• To charge the gadgets• Late night working• For other related activities e.g. typing the articles, editing the

photos before upload

• Train the group and give extra to one most educated and/or interested member: -• who will step in your shoes when you go• To use added applications like Skype for future

communication. Use mobile phone for this

• Do not impose methods RATHER teach them the method and let their minds flow

• Be patient … very patient

• Believe in yourself , be positive & confident, respond positively to negative reactions

• Effective & Efficient internal communication

Examples of Social Media BROSDI uses…

1. For administration purposes• Yammer, • Pbworks• Google Docs• Skype and Yahoo Chat• Mikogo• Team viewer • Facebook

• as a stress suppressant• For added team building and

strengthnening

2. For collecting information• Google • Skype (more of clarification of

content)

• Over 95% of our content in the Agriculture project is collected from Monthly Farmers Forums

• All our health generated content is from the students and responding volunteers

• All the education generated content is from the orphan children themselves

3. For disseminating content• Blogs

• Blogging e.g. Wordpress• Micro blogging e.g. Twitter• Video blogging e.g. U Tube, Vimeo• Audio blogging e.g. Podbean

• Online photo albums• Picasa • Flick R• Facebook

Some Success Stories to Share …

• Enid and her tomatoes• Erina Kabatereine and her chickens• Alice Nangonzi with her house and

plantation• Grace planting simsim and sunflower in

Tororo• Cissy from Luweero rearing turkeys• Chairperson in Butalejja with planting

bananas• Presidential gift from Kabale• Sneak view on our blogs …

For more stories, visit our Success Story Blog at http://successtories.wordpress.com

The agricultural bloghttp://celac.wordpress.com

The health bloghttp://yohaap.wordpress.com

The education bloghttp://childrensclub.wordpress.comhttp://networking4orphansrights.com

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