Government and Social Media -- Who Is Using It?

Ideen has been exploring the social networking phenomenon that closes gaps and opens doors when it comes to sharing information online. Recently, we've come across a website -- http://govsm.com/w/Federal_Agencies -- that provides a lengthy list of federal agencies that use popular social networking tools, such as Twitter, Facebook, RSS, and Flickr.

The list includes 142 organizations. Of these, we find that:

• 86 use Facebook
• 101 use Twitter
• 68 use YouTube
• 102 use RSS
• 34 use Flickr
• 25 use other social media, such as UStream

The 24 largest and perhpas best-known organizations -- e.g., The White House, the Commerce Department, the US Treasury -- appear to make the most use of the social networking tools. Lesser-known organizations -- e.g., the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, the Administration of the Aging -- appear to use them less. Is there a connection here? Is it resource deriven, or is something else at work?

We imagine that these descriptive statistics don't tell us the whole story. How do we know if the organizations that appear to use the tools most are actually the most savvy in their use of the tools? Social media tools are prized for being user friendly, simple to set up, and beneficial in their respective ways. So, why might different departments and agencies that are capable using social networking tools elect to use only certain ones? Ideen will be further researching this topic to identify trends in the government sector.