It’s been a while since the livestream, so it’s probably time for another one.
My original idea was to make this a sort of virtual meetup where everyone gets to chat about whatever is on their mind (related to online science communication) but I don’t think it’s going to work. There’s a weird imbalance when it’s one person on screen, and while I’m happy to facilitate a community chat, that only works if everyone else is on board. From conversations I’ve had before and after the last livestream, I got the impression that you expected it to be conventional, where the person on screen is leading the discussion. So that’s what we’ll do!
The next livestream/chat will be on May 7 at 6PM UK time (1PM EST)
This is a Bank Holiday in the UK (and Ireland?) but a workday for most other places, so I hope that works. Americans, you can tune in on your lunch break. Australians, you don’t need sleep, right?
I will try to schedule a YouTube event again, but this is where it went so horribly wrong last time. (The scheduled video refused to sync so I had to create a whole new video at the very last moment so the link that everyone had was wrong.) To be absolutely sure that you’re in the right place, just click this link (to the list of all my YouTube videos) at the agreed time and the live video will be the most recent one there.
This chat will have the topic Social Media for Science Communication and I will go over a few of the things you need to consider when setting up or managing a social media account for the purpose of science communication. For example:
- When to start a new social media account for a project
- How often should you update?
- What do you want to achieve with a social media account for your scicomm work?
- How do you measure success? (It’s not just numbers!)
- The importance of being consistent
- Who looks at science content on social media, and how do they find you?
- Personal accounts or themed accounts?
This is not going to be a discussion about whether you should or shouldn’t be on social media. That’s been done and I don’t have time for it. Instead, this is very much a practical chat for people who already decided that they do want to share science on social media. That being said, we will definitely talk about which platforms are better for your projects, and whether you should be on all platforms or just one or two, and how to balance science and personal posts.
I will lead the discussion based on my own experience managing and growing various social media accounts for businesses, charities and independent projects. Part of the inspiration for this topic came from my own recent preparations for launching the new MusiSci Instagram account. But I also want to incorporate any questions you might have about running social media for science communication projects, so please comment below and ask away. I will answer your questions on the livestream on May 7, and post them online after that. Finally, you can also ask questions during the livestream, via Twitter and YouTube.
See you there!
Photo by William Iven on Unsplash
