Picking up on the [Google] chatter gives us another powerful story

As if to reinforce the point of my last blog [Citizen journalists, their audience and us], I came by the emotive story of asylum seekers Samia and Farid Boumerdassi on Tuesday by being a member of a Google chat group - for a housing estate in Wrexham of all things, and with just 30 members.

As I write this we think the couple and their three children - aged six, 10 and 11 - have been deported after they were taken to Tinsley House Immigration Removal Centre, near Gatwick Airport.

They were woken at their Caia Park home in a night-time raid by Border Agency officials on Monday.

I picked up on the story on Tuesday in my daily email from the chat group [the email gives an overview of that day's web chat]. I forwarded the tip to colleagues and, to cut a long story short, we heard that the Boumerdassis were a well loved family on the estate who took part in community life and that a candle-lit vigil was being held for them.

We even got to chat with Mr Boumerdassi in Tinsley House last night [listen again 2hours 12mins into BBC Radio Wales' Good Evening Wales programme].

And so another story made it on to bbc.co.uk, radio and Wales Today TV news simply by being a member and contributor to another online social media site.

PS. Don't be a lurker on such chat groups, you've got to participate in the conversation and be part of the group. You have to give - don't just take!

Citizen journalists, their audiences and us

What I find most interesting about the evolution of citizen journalism is that participants no longer feel that they need us - the media - to share their story with an audience.

They can get their photos online quicker themselves, empowered by social media websites that allow for instant uploading.

True, more and more these days the BBC and the likes are inundated with texts, emails and photos when a big drama unfolds - but I'm thinking here about local incidents that won't make it on to a news bulletin or in a national 'paper.

The person who took this photo [above] of a fire last night on my patch in NE Wales wasn't necessarily thinking about the local media - their audience is not our audience. Very often they're thinking only about sharing their experience with family and friends, people in their email address book and friends on Facebook. And why should they think any differently?

The issue the struggling local and regional press have to work out is how best to exploit this. We're making a good go at it online via our BBC Local site; we're trying to be a guide to the region, a trusted source to information.

We're not trying to jealously guard our audience and keep them within our site. We're saying look, this incident happened [links to fire service press release], this is our take on it [links to our story], and this is what one person saw [links to photo sharing website].

Lets be honest, that's the way our audience move about the web - and they digest media in similar ways off line too. They're not confined to getting the story from one place.

Their understanding is coloured and made all the more richer by getting different perspectives from different sources. I'm saying we should be THE trusted source and the gateway to all that information.

Enforced jollity

My experience of this was at last weekend's bash with friends at Beaufort Park Hotel. We were having a great time until the moody DJ got all upset when the various works dos around the room were less than enthusiastic when it came to playing one of his party games.

It was like something from Phoenix Nights. Shabba!

Out with the neighbours

It's the annual big bash this weekend [for residents on our street] - and goes against today's reports that the UK's sense of community is crumbling.

We seem to be doing OK; a group of 30-50-somethings married with families. I know you can't pick your neighbours - maybe we're lucky - but I think living in a cul-de-sac is one of the main reasons we've all come to know each other [you couldn't be anonymous or inconspicuous if you tried!].