austraLasia #2460

Change is on the way

ROME: 13th July 2009 -- It's subtle at the moment, but change is on the way for the Congregation's website www.sdb.org.  By the end of the year, hopefully in time for the major celebration of 18th December, the actual date of the Founding of the Congregation in terms of its first gathering, first set of minutes and declaration of intent 150 years ago.
    At the moment nothing looks different; you have already had a chance to vote on some prospective home page designs, but of course they were static images of what the real thing will look like.  The real thing will be highly interactive.
    One important element of this interactivity is already underway, subtly!  If you click on the 'Don Bosco Blog' image in the left-hand column on the home page, it takes you to a blog being run in Spanish for the America South Cone Region.  In fact it is being run by that region but is based on our server here. We hold admin rights to it, but they can also fully control the blog.
    Now, note the URL: say.sdb.org/blogs/blog2.  In other words we have created a subdomain which will contain much of the interactive material for the new sdb.org, including the existing 'Agora' and other developments to come, possibly involving Google Wave in due course.
    Change 'blog2' to 'blog6'.  Voilà!  That's what it COULD look like.  In fact, then, such a blog already exists, but it's not currently active - it could be activated in a matter of minutes, but as I said in a recent post, I would prefer that several people from the region say they are willing to manage it.  If we work on the same basis as we have done in South America, we have enabled each of the Communications Delegates in the provinces belonging to that region; they have the right to make a post and they also control the publication of comments.  The world can comment, but a comment has to be moderated before publishing. That decision is left in the hands of responsible people.....and who more responsible than a social communications delegate!
    Now change it to blog7!  See?  The possibilities are endless.  We can offer a blog opportunity to all Salesian Regions and we could offer it similarly to key groups.  But of course, just as you can lead the horse to water but not make him drink, you can lead people to the point where interactivity is possible - but they may still need to accustom themselves to what's on offer, to use it. At least, that's what we are discovering from our early experiments in the field.
    Any comments are welcome.

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Title: australasia 2460
Subject and key words: SDB General change to web site.
Date (year): 2009
ID: 2000-2099|2460