How to change long-established workflows, to get content from local organizations?
Submitted by Anna on Fri, 10/12/2007 - 05:02.
- Forums: Data Sources
I think this is actually a social engineering question.
In my county there are (seemingly) scores of small nonprofit groups, each of which puts out a periodic newsletter, typically as a PDF. If there was a way to get an RSS feed of each group's newsletter "produce", that'd go a long way toward filling a community site with fresh content, and (of course) it'd benefit the groups as well, to get a wider readership. But -
How do you get the ball rolling, to get them to change their newsletter-production workflow habits in such a way that you can get an RSS feed from them? (I'm assuming there's no way to extract one from the final PDF, and there's no real benefit to the first few groups to make the change).
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getting orgs to do
extra work is extremely difficult. i've found I have to make the effort usually to get the info from them. (one source told me the only way they send things out is FAX!!!! it was a government office, which is pretty ridiculous if you ask me.
i know drupal has a great aggregator module that pulls in RSS feeds and converts them to nodes. I think Lisa Williams at PlaceBlogger is using something like this.
That doesn't solve the fact that most of these orgs don't have RSS feeds, though.
I've toyed with the idea before of offering these groups Drupal sites with free hosting, etc. if I can then aggregate their info. I have made a website like that for a group before, but haven't gone too far with the idea because of a lack of time.
Anyone have thoughts on that as a solution, though? That is, offering these organizations free websites (on a common platform like Drupal even) so that we can more easily process / edit and release their information...
Thoughts?
How about trying it out, with one org?
and see how it goes...
I was able to get 1 local group to move to a (Wordpress) blog but they still create and publish most of their content as PDF so it's still inaccessible to me.
So make sure you don't configure their Drupal site to let them do that...
(how long does it take you to set up a typical Drupal site?)
Among the Knight News Challenge open applications, there was one for developing a Drupal module that sounded as though it might solve the PDF-RSS problem - unfortunately I didn't save its URL though.
free websites for orgs
It's funny, but I was thinking about this tonight (have had the idea for a long time) - being able to offer groups free websites/hosting in exchange for being able to aggregate the content they produce with the site/CMS. I'm sure many, many groups would want the experience/help for free...
Case in point, my buddy Al recently launched Elwood Panther's Boosters 'site'...Again, though, you really need time/resources to do it for a lot of groups. It's a goal to word toward, though, I think. (Anyone else?)
A typical Drupal base install can be done in about 2 hours or so - I've never rushed or timed it, but it can be done relatively easy. Still trying to finalize a great theme/template for the sites, although I think it's better to treat each one as an individual (especially the niche content websites...IndyMoms is using Drupal too, I guess...)
I didn't apply this time. Not sure why. I have some other things in the works, though.
I didn't read that application, but I'll let you know if I run into it on the Drupal site (there's a newspaper group I found there recently - people from Morris and other places there - lots of great Drupal examples...)
(Great, now I'm a Drupal evangelist too. ;)
Anyway, I would try to find out *why* they publish to PDF format - is it just because that's how they've always done it? Do they not know how to do it any other way? Offer free training to show them how to do it to the web - AND explain why it's better - visibility in search engines, etc.
Eventually, we'll have to have paid people to input and translate the stuff to electronic text just like the big boys (newspapers, etc.) That or pay the volunteers... Lots of stay at home mom and dads out there that could help do content (with qualifications) in exchange for payment... Until then the two routes are really do the translating/transcribing/tagging ourselves or convince/teach them to do it...
-kpaul