Hotfoot from ScotWeb2 – a get-together of those with an interest in the public sector and the internet. Organised by Alex Stobart, a recovering civil servant, 

The highlights, apart from my workshop on making the most of content, were talks by James Munro of PatientOpinon and Simon Dickson of Puffbox.

James’s described how his site offered patient feedback on NHS services. He demonstrated that inviting the public into the conversation, even with negative comments, led to positive outcomes. He also demonstrated PatientOpinon’s automated tagging system for comment, which was one of my “wow” moments of the year.  

Simon Dickson caused everyone’s ears to wring with his revelation that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office website cost £19.2m, with the CMS alone costing £1.47m.  Staggered by this he set up a business that builds websites using WordPress, which costs zilch.

This event was a great start to the coming debate over how public sector websites embrace the future.

It is “an informal, bar camp style event allowing participants to listen, network and share experiences with those who have designed and are managing Web 2 services. Speakers and workshop leaders from Health, Business, Web design, Colleges and Universities, Social Enterprises, Social Media, Journalism, Government and Civic Society”.

The event is being organised by Alex Stobbart of the Scottish Government (née Executive). Alex is an evangelist for the opportunities offered by the web. He is a giant floating brain who has recruited a coven of like-minded individuals within the SG who meet at the dead of night in cowled hoods, exchanging arcane passwords and sharing forbidden knowledge about tags, tweets and user content…

Actually we made that bit up – we got carried away with the fact the event is on samhainn. But Alex is an evangelist and does lead a high-powered group of colleagues who are keen to embrace the openness that the new web offers. Having worked closely on Scottish Government projects, we at w00tonomy have met many civil servants who “get it” and cheer Alex’s efforts to mobilise them.

However, ScotWeb2 is a separate project for Alex and BT are backing it. Tickets are available from Eventbrite.

The speakers include Simon Dickson: an e-government consultant and “Whitehall’s first full-time website specialist back in 1995″; Iain Henderson from personal data protector MyDex; Ross Ferguson from Dog Digital; and w00tonomy’s endlessly self-promoting Stewart Kirkpatrick, who will talk about how to optimise content to get messages across.