Re:B.C. government hit tweet limit amid wildfire evacuations
by bobthepanda on Thursday July 13, 2023 @10:37AM
(#36709835)
Computers lack a protocol that drowns out anything and freezes your computer for broadcast alerts.
The online strategy so far, has to be where the people are, so most governments have multiple social media accounts, like Facebook and Twitter, and also websites and RSS. I’ve also seen, depending on the government, Instagram, TikTok, WhatsApp, etc.
Re:B.C. government hit tweet limit amid wildfire evacuations
by davvolun on Thursday July 13, 2023 @10:51AM
(#36710097)
And, if I may, I think the point is that is all well and good, but for reliability's sake, a publicly, not privately, controlled alternative to any of the above (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, WhatsApp, etc.) should be carefully considered. Mastodon is perfectly set up to be a valuable ADDITIONAL option for local governments using Twitter -- that doesn't mean "stop posting to Twitter," it means "also post to Mastodon" and be certain that, whatever shortcomings that may have, it's not entirely susceptible to the whims of a billionaire. Similarly, are Facebook posts by local government failing to reach users because of some change Zuck made to The Algorithm? Maybe we need to start looking into effective alternatives. If not, then we don't.
Re:B.C. government hit tweet limit amid wildfire evacuations
by bobthepanda on Thursday July 13, 2023 @11:38AM
(#36710959)
Those self-owned things, the website and RSS, already exist; all governments I’ve interacted with have one, and the subject of the article is no exception: https://news.gov.bc.ca/connect
The reality is that when it comes to spreading info to citizens you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink.
So, the requirements are more than a website, but also not a private 3rd party platform w/o service guarantees, and preferably something that doesn't have municipality, department or agency rolling their own solutions, duplicating effort, etc.
In the US the traditional systems are Emergency Alert & WEA but those don't encompass all the public awareness & notification needs that drive organizations to use something like Twitter. I'm not sure if the right answer is to expand those or creating something similar for scenarios currently outside their scope, but we could do worse than starting the conversation with that question.