Providing parents with information about new technology
By Jacquie Disney and Maggie Holgate, Parents Information Network
Parents Information Network (PIN) is an independent organisation for parents
who want to enter the information age with their children. It gives support
and advice to parents about technology, so it is appropriate that PIN itself
should be exploring new technology in the form of the Internet. Jacquie
Disney and Maggie Holgate explain how PIN is going about it.
For PIN, a Web site is a way to reach a wider audience, both in terms
of parents, who make up the membership of the organisation, and in terms
of making wider contacts and reinforcing the organisation's profile. By
being on the Web we have a showcase for everyone who visits our site. This
means we can offer the full range of information services provided by PIN
and we can also draw attention to issues which are of significance to parents
and everyone interested in the home computer market.
We are currently putting the finishing touches to the PIN Web site and,
alongside this, a PIN area on the online service AOL. This has been a fairly
demanding exercise. We have spent time working out exactly what we want
our online presence to achieve and we have planned the material we are putting
up very carefully. It seemed important to us to provide mechanisms for online
questions and feedback as we feel an effective Web site needs to establish
a sense of community where people can receive support but also provide it.
We have put a lot of effort into getting these aspects right. In the end,
because we want what we do to be good, it has taken us a little longer to
get the Web site off the ground than we first anticipated.
The Internet has also had an effect on the internal workings of our organisation.
PIN has a number of geographically dispersed, part-time workers. Email and
conferencing enable the whole team to keep in close touch and work collaboratively.
This does not mean we never meet face-to-face but when we are all off doing
different things in different places, it certainly makes the process of
communicating quicker and easier.
PIN is an organisation expressly concerned with people who don't feel particularly
knowledgeable or confident about technology, so conventional methods of
communication will still remain very important to us, but we hope that the
Internet will enable us to reach a new audience and open up a new dimension
to our work. It's still early days yet for PIN and the Internet but we are
very positive about its potential.
Jacquie Disney and Maggie Holgate
Parents Information Network PINLIFT@aol.com
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