Phlogs - the next step for User Generated Content

If you haven’t heard of it yet a “PHLOG” is a new idea from ipadio which allows the live streaming of any telephone call, from anywhere in the World, live to the internet. So one telephone call can appear:

1. Inside your own website; 2. On fundraising websites such as BeMyCharity; 3. Inside your Facebook pages; 4. In Twitter; 5. The voice can be converted to text making it friendly to search engines and accessible; 6. As a text feed like an Instant Message board

This simple idea can change the way you engage with people and allow supporters to interact directly via the web – another way to post User Generated Content. As Ben Brabyn from BeMyCharity (BMC) commented:

“With the inspiration to look beyond just online sponsorship forms, charities can make their fundraising events truly interactive.”

An example is Amanda Wilkie, a Mum who did The Playtex MoonWalk 2009. She started collecting sponsorship using BMC and used Twitter to spread the word and ask people to sponsor her. She has written a blog about the experience: http://bmy.typepad.com/

Then she decided to “phlog” the whole walk for her supporters to listen to her real-time:

“I will be recording messages and taking photos throughout my journey and thanks to this amazing technology and my new iphone they will post, LIVE, to my web page which will then link to Twitter! Most exciting of all...with each message, I can add my location and ipadio can 'geolocate' me and then put a virtual pin on my map, so you can see my progression throughout the whole 26.2 mile journey!”

Amanda then recorded 23 short phlogs and images of her event which you can listen to at www.bmycharity.com/amandawilkie

An interesting concept and there must be dozens of applications.. phlog a travelog, protest or a concert, use it for reportage of a meeting or a conference and post to twitter and feed it to you various sites as audio and text . You can provide customer service, post phone "podcasts" even run a radio station from the phone. It is an even more accessible way to create content than the web:

“Any organisation large or small that has stakeholders that they need to reach can make use of ipadio to deliver their message. ipadio are working with disability charities whose service users find it difficult to attend conferences or get their voice heard because of mobility issues.. you only need a phone and a passcode and you can start broadcasting from anywhere.”

To see how others are using ipadio visit www.ipadio.com/charity  or click direct to the “channels” below to listen to broadcasts:

The Red Cross from the Indonesian Earthquake:
http://www.redcross.org.uk/standard.asp?id=98445

The Time to Get Equal Campaign from Scope:
http://www.timetogetequal.org.uk/phlogs