Project Update, 17 September 2009

[David Barrie]

Just to bring you up to date on what's going on:

1) I have had meetings/conversations since the event in July with
various stake/shareholders in digital engagement in Wales, including
the Welsh Assembly, OFCOM Wales and the George Ewart Centre for
Storytelling at the University of Glamorgan. An Action Plan on Digital
Engagement in Wales has just started to be written and will be
available for consultation in QTR1 of next year.

2) The British Council have asked me to come forward with a plan for
an event for Friday, October 9th, to co-incide with a separate strand
of work under the banner of their OPEN Cities programme - of which
Digital Butetown is a part of. This is a photographic exhibition
currently located in a Library in Cardiff City Centre. More here. We
are discussing the sense and sensibility of this bearing in mind
geographies.

3) I had a good meeting with the head-teacher of Fitzalan High School
yesterday. The issue came up of MSN and Facebook being a space for
cyber-bullying and that social media activism needed to be aware of
this as a constraint to development of projects with institutions with
a duty of public care. Fitzalan wants to positively continue its
collaboration with us - but we need to remain aware of this
constraint.

4) I am due to give a talk on our first sketches of an initiative to
BBC Wales on September 30. This is for information purposes only but
is also aware that there have been reports in the local and
professional media that the BBC plan to work with one of our project
sponsors - igloo Regeneration - to develop a production village for
BBC Wales drama production close to Butetown - perhaps a first stage
in a larger media content cluster.

5) Gavin Porter - a member of this group - is interested in developing
a larger initiative that makes use of the BBC's Digital Archive and
fits in to their larger strategy of making the archive available to
the public and using it as a force for culture-led regeneration. He
has outlined some initial thoughts in an earlier posting to this
group. But I do wonder whether a platform/engine for the future growth
of this initiative is as a component part of a larger effort that
doens't just link to local government but also to local media services
and delivery. In this context, it's interesting that Channel 4
Television and its 4IP initiative is due to present its work and
interests at an event in Cardiff on October 15th - I have uploaded an
invite to this group.

6) I am due to present the project to a local community Forum next
month.

7) Tom Beardshaw, Carl Morris and me had a conversation last week
about a next stage public workshop. I will upload a summary of Tom's
thoughts to the group in a short while for comment.

D

[David Barrie]

Sorry, links that should have appeared in the text:

British Council OPEN Cities Faces photographic website:
http://opencities.britishcouncil.org/web/index.php?faces_en

News stories on BBC Wales' creation of a new production village in an
area adjacent to Butetown:

Wales Online:
http://www.walesonline.co.uk/business-in-wales/business-news/2009/05/20/bbc-tipped-to-move-welsh-headquarters-to-bay-91466-23666055/
Broadcast: http://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/news/bbc-wales-the-next-salford/5003833.article
Building Design: http://www.bdonline.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=426&storycode=3148484&c=1

D