Introducing the newest resource online for police, law enforcement and other like-minded industries and their communities…
~ Inaugural chat ~
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 27, 2012 9PM EST
What is #copchat?
#copchat is a weekly conversation that will take place every Wednesday night starting at 9pm Eastern, on Twitter. Each week we’ll discuss different topics from the world of policing, law enforcement and other like-minded industries as it relates to the use of social media, Internet, communications, community building, operations and investigations.
So what will we talk about?
Each week we’ll be picking a different social media topic that relates to policing, law enforcement and related fields. Sometimes we’ll chat about pre-determined topics and others, it may just be a free for all. We’ll be including industry and social media experts. Other times we’ll be chatting about the business of policing and how the use of social media can help create efficiencies and effectiveness. One week we might chat about how to optimize your social media presence for community engagement, the next week we might chat about how an organization can pick its social media team.
It’s ‘on Twitter’. How does that work?
Whether you are a seasoned social media pro, or brand new to the world of RTs, likes, followers, friends and subscribers, you know that there are a lot of conversations happening at any one time on Twitter and it can sometimes seem a little over-whelming.
By adding the hashtag #copchat to our tweets, it becomes much easier for everyone to keep up with the conversation and follow along with what’s happening! Think of the #copchat hashtag as an ‘identifier’ that we add to our tweets so that we can all be on the same page and not miss any of the great information and content. Later, you can search the term #copchat, you can quickly and easily see all the tweets that are related to our discussion!
Without the #copchat hashtag included in the tweets, the conversation could be scattered all over the place, and you may miss a lot of the conversation or worse, really confuse your followers!
What about security?
We ask those involved in #copchat to be mindful that this is an open forum that anyone can see and take part in, including the public. No one should ever be discussing investigative techniques, active cases, matters before the courts or anything that may identify an officer, their family or compromise the safety of anyone. #copchat is open so that we can all learn from one another about the use of social media.
Can anyone join #copchat
Yes. #copchat is open for everyone. One of the major attractions of social media use by police, law enforcement and similar organizations is to engage better with the public and open the lines of communications. #copchat can provide a relaxed and less regimented place for the public and police to interact and share with one another. Remember what Peel said, “The people are the police and the police are the people.”
What’s the structure?
There will be a structure on most night’s, especially when there are guest host’s. Those night’s it will be guided by the moderator’s via questions posed to the guest for their input first and discussion from there.
Other nights, it will be a simple open opportunity for anyone to chime in with content that is important to them, a question they might want answered with crowd sourced expertise and opinion.
Either way, the structure will be announced prior to #copchat that evening through a blog post here and tweets which will promote the upcoming chat the following week.
How do I follow along?
The easiest way to follow along is to by using a third-party platform such as TweetDeck or Hootsuite which allows for search columns to be created. Create a column using #copchat so you can see all the conversation in one place. You might also want to create a column with the Twitter ID of the moderator’s and or guest host and of course your @mentions so you’ll never miss someone chatting with you!
TweetChat is another great option that helps you stay on top of the chat and makes posting a breeze. ( http://tweetchat.com/room/copchat )
Where did #copchat come from?
The idea originally came from the awesome Christa Miller who also is the brains behindCops2Point0 and ChristaMiller.com
Christa and I have been talking about doing this for about a year and finally, the talk has come to an end and the action begins!
Anything else?
Yes. Tuesday nights and again on Wednesday we’ll put up a blog post here to let you know the details of that weeks #copchat which will be teased at the end of the preceding weeks chat.
Come on out and join us one week from today. Wednesday, June 27th, 2012 at 9:00 pm EST.
Looking forward to it Tim and Christa. Is it loose and free for June 27 or do you have a topic in mind yet?
The first night is going to a free for all. The next 5 weeks after that are topics are set. We want to be able to talk about the chat process and get a feel for what people are looking for and what we can provide for the most value.
Tim, Christa – this is a great idea! And actually the time (Wed. 9p Eastern) is good for a Mountain time zone, full time LE PIO, working mom….etc. Unfortunately, for the first session, I might be on an airplane headed back to Boise, but I’m hoping for a timely lay-over 🙂 I think this will be really training and networking on an important topic – social media outreach for law enforcement – that’s always evolving. Thanks for your work on this!
Thanks Lynn. Hope you can make it, but completely understand if you can’t. Are you going to be returning from CopCom?
Tim — nice succinct rundown, you laid it out nicely! @KingstonPolice and @Lynn — so happy to see your interest, I do hope you can make it. And hey, even if you can’t, please review the logs from the chat and give us your feedback!