Empowerment Technologies
Developing an ICT Project for Social Change
Rich Multimedia Content in Projects for Social Change
When visiting websites, what grabs your attention? Often, our eyes are directed with moving images, text, and other
interactive elements. For a website to be popular, it must provide content appropriate and relevant to its purpose,
(e.g.sales).
Text-based content
While words communicate essential messages and concepts with a purpose of engaging your audience, it is therefore
visible that the use of correct punctuation, grammar and colloquialisms are relevant especially in delivering an advocacy.
Without possessing exceptional writing skills, people would not bother to come back looking at your material. Words
also help position you as an authority or thought leader. How and when you use those words matter. When you
communicate further and the more intelligent the way message is delivered, the more likely it is that your audience will
be persuaded and supportive of your advocacy.
Rich Media Content
Rich content refers to everything besides text (although the book is sometimes integrated into it). It includes auditory
and visual elements like jingles, music beds, videos, still images, and interactive. Rich content is often the first thing that
people notice. People in social media, for example, are more likely to stop scrolling when they see an eye-catching
picture than they are for even a compelling or controversial headline. While the headline is essential, it will never have
the same impact that of a picture or a video.
Types of Multimedia Content
1. Videos – It is a digital moving visual image generated through video hosting sites (e.g. YouTube, Vimeo)
2. Sound, Music, or Audio – Sound is perhaps the most sensuous element of multimedia. It is a meaningful “speech” in
any language from a whisper to a scream or simple background music can always change the mood.
3. Online Games – Most of the developers of online games has created “Browser-based games” today where you do not
need to download and install in your PC and it is playable online via browser (e.g. EverWing).
4. Online Tests – These are online survey forms that automatically tabulate and calculate results when it is done
(e.g.Proprofs).
5. Courseware – It is an alternative tool to educate learners through online coaching.
6. Podcasts – It is a series of digital audio files that is available on the internet for downloading to desktops or mobile
device (E.g. TED Talks).
7. Vodcasts – It is a series of videos streamed online that is available on the internet for downloading to mobile devices.
Hybrid Content
The worlds of text-based and rich content collide often. Therefore, there is not one that is more important than the
other. Even when you get that person to stop scrolling with a picture, you still need to have something to say to them
once they do.Things like games and quizzes are examples of rich content that also relies on words to be effective.
Powerful headlines or captions also augment the effectiveness of visual content by motivating viewers to take things a
step or two further. The meat of your message is likely going to be in words, but those words will almost always need to
mesh with rich content to be genuinely compelling.
How to create a website through a free webhosting platform?
As technology advances, it enables us to achieve more and more tasks without even realizing how complex they are.
Creating a website by yourself is one of these wonders that has become a reality. Thanks to the evolution of website
builders, everyone can design a website and craft an impressive online presence for themselves.
1. How to design a website
Whatever it is, your website should meet one main goal. All elements of your site should serve that overarching purpose.
For example, if your site’s purpose is to provide information on a social issue, you can utilize different techniques to
support your effort, such as displaying images of that specific issue, writing blog articles and incorporating videos that
would support your advocacy. Keep in mind that your visitors - as well as Google’s bots - want to understand what your
business is all about in the blink of an eye. Having multiple main objectives is likely to result in confusion, which can in
turn increase the chances of your visitors leaving your page prematurely.
2. Choose your website builder
Now that you have identified your goal, it is time to pick the right tool to reach it. A website builder (also called a Content
Management System or CMS) is a platform on which you can create, personalize, and publish a website.
3. Define your layout
It takes only 50 milliseconds for visitors to form an opinion about a website. Therefore, the visual structure of your pages
- or in other words, your website layout - is so crucial to get right. You can pick a template on which to base your layout.
Templates are websites with pre-designed layouts, created by professional designers. To make a template your own, you
can fully customize all its elements. Remove, add, or change details like text, images, and color. You can pick between a
multi-page template and a single-page one. If your website includes a hefty amount of content, you will probably opt for
a multi-page site. In this case, you will include a classic website menu from which your visitors can navigate your site.
However, if you have less textual content to display, you may want to go for a one-page website. This trendy option is a
popular choice for landing pages, event websites and other shortform content sites.
4. Claim your domain name
To put it in simple terms, your domain name is your address on the internet. It is what your visitors will see in the bar of
their browser, right after the “www.” Registering your domain name is critical for your online success. Websites with a
customized domain are automatically perceived by internet users as more professional and trustworthy. When chosen
wisely, a domain name also helps search engines (e.g. Google and Bing) to understand what your website is about. In
turn, this could positively impact your SEO. Finally, having your own domain name is the first step in acquiring your
custom email address. To make it memorable, it must be:
Short: The longer it is, the higher the chances of visitors misspelling it.
Simple: Avoid symbols, special characters, and numbers.
Professional: Your domain name should incorporate your business name, to avoid confusion.
Evocative: Include a hint of what you do into your domain name, by looking for words that are related to your business.
5. Gather your content
This includes your images, slogans, videos, texts and more. Use your own original materials as much as you can to ensure
you are offering valuable and branded content. Whenever you are not creating unique content, make sure to acquire
your resources through legal ways. While plenty of content is great, remember to always put quality over quantity.
People read 25% slower on a screen and are therefore less patient. In an era of decreasing attention spans, the best way
to catch your visitors’ attention is to only showcase your best content.
6. Put usability first
A beautiful website is great, but far from enough. If you want your visitors to spend time on your pages, enjoy your
content and, eventually, engage with it, you need to facilitate their navigation. This is what user experience (UX) is all
about. From balance to symmetry, discover how the 7 fundamental principles of design can be applied to websites.
(Remember your Module 3 lesson on the previous quarter?)
7. Make it accessible to everyone
These days, a truly professional website should be accessible to everyone. Web accessibility ensures that all people,
regardless of their abilities, can comfortably experience and interact with your website. This includes people with vision
impairment, temporary injuries, hearing loss and more
8. Engage with your visitors
Websites are more than just static items meant for browsing. These days, visitors expect to engage with you through
your site. Adding the right promotional tools will help you convert visitors into customers, and from customers into loyal
clients. Here are the features you should consider incorporating into your site: Live Chat, Social Media, Newsletter, and
forms.
9. Optimize for Mobile
Smaller screens do not equal smaller impact. With such an increase in smartphone and tablet usage, it is crucial that you
ensure a seamless browsing experience across all devices. What is more, since Google implemented mobile-first
indexing, optimizing the mobile version of your site has become even more important if you want to up your chances of
ranking on page one of search results.
10. Ask for feedback
Whether you are creating an online portfolio, blog, or any other type of website, it's time to take a step back and ask
someone you trust to provide you with honest feedback. Be receptive to their critique and remember that you may not
always like what you hear. To ensure a flawless result, ask a friend or colleague to check the following elements: is the
text proofread? Are the pages easy to navigate? Is the mobile version optimized? Are all the links working?
11. Publish – and get back to it
A site that looks like it has been lying dormant for too long is uninviting and can also seem unreliable. Regularly updating
your website shows that you are present, active, and up to date with what is happening in your industry.
Interactive Multimedia and ICT as Platform for change
The availability of multimedia tools and applications allowed people access to information either online or offline. On
this lesson, we will learn the interactive multimedia and the application of its content. This includes the procedure on
how to insert videos from YouTube.com on your Blog post or website. We will also tackle the impact of ICT to the
Filipinos and how it helped them to improved their communication especially when they needed it the most.
INTERACTIVE MULTIMEDIA
Interactive multimedia is any computer- delivered electronic system that allows the user to control, combine, and
manipulate different types of media, such as text, sound, video, computer graphics, and animation.
The existence of ICT tools made an enormous impact to the society. It is a good tool to use to promote a social change
that can be achieved through a mass participation of an advocacy using different types of media.
Throughout recent history, the Philippines has been one of a few nations that demonstrates unity for a call to action or
social change. These campaigns for social change would have not been successful if it were not for ICT
ICT AS PLATFORM FOR CHANGE EDSA
(PEOPLE POWER REVOLUTION)
A major protest that took place along EDSA from February 22 to 25, 1986 involving 2 million Filipinos from different
sectors
EDSA DOS EDSA Dos
Also known as 2001 EDSA Revolution – Happened during Jan 17-21, 2001 – It was fueled after 11 prosecutors of then
President Joseph Estrada walked out of the impeachment trial. As a result, the people in EDSA grew over the course of a
few days through text brigades
YOLANDA PEOPLE FINDER
Recent storms in the Philippines gave birth to the People Finder database powered by Google. During typhoon Yolanda,
the People Finder was a vital tool for people across the globe to track the situation of their relatives. This proved to be
successful and is now adapted by more organizations to help people track relatives during calamities
MILLION PEOPLE MARCH
Million People March – a series of protests that mainly took place in Luneta Park from Aug 22 to 26, 2013. There were
several demonstrations that happened around the key cities in the Philippines and some locations overseas. It was to
condemn the misuse of the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF).
Though dubbed as the Million People March, the number of total attendees was only around 400,000. The organizers
and promoters of the protest used Facebook and Change.org as their mediums.
ICT AS MEDIUM FOR ADVOCACY
What is advocacy
Advocacy is a process of supporting and enabling people to express their views and concerns, access information and
services, defend and promote their rights and responsibilities
CHANGE.ORG Change.org
is dubbed as the “world’s platform for change” where anyone from online community can create a petition and ask
others to sign it It gives access to more people by allowing the online community to affix their digital signatures on a
petition. Its mission is to help people from around the world create the change they want to see. Sample petitions raised
were: economic problems, criminal injustice, abuse of human rights, lack of education, environmental concerns, animal
abuse, human health concerns and world hunger.
Signing an Online Petition
1. Visit Change.org.
2. If this is your first time to use Change.org, click Sign up or log in with Facebook. Otherwise, just input your log-in
details.
3. You can then start your own petition, but for now, click on any petition you want under trending petitions.
4. Read the petition description to see if this petition matters to you. If it is, sign the petition by filling up the information
on the right side of the screen.
5. Share the Petition on Facebook to promote it
DIGITAL CITZENSHIP
Digital Citizenship is referring to the utilization of information technology (IT) in order to engage in society, politics, and
government. K. Mossberger, et al. define digital citizens as "those who use the Internet regularly and effectively
Development of ICT Project for Social Change
ICT Project Creation Process An ICT Project for Social Change is only a small part of a scheme of an organization with a
common interest. The main purpose of an ICT project in the bigger picture is to offer a facility for easy dissemination of
information, a platform for volunteers and the leaders of the organization. Establishing the ICT project is a collaborative
effort. It is not only for technical members involved, but also for the management and leaders of the organization that
will facilitate the appropriateness of the output in the overall purpose of the project.
Because of this, the ICT development team should ensure perfect harmony by considering all stakeholders’ requirements
and including them in the outcome of the project. The group should devise a careful and specific plan that will address
the objective or goal of the project so that everything needed is included in the project. The complexity of elements to
be included should be minimized while keeping in mind the logical arrangement and completeness of functions of the
product. In order to create an ICT project, one must have the knowledge about the process involved in generating the so-
called project. The process that an ICT project goes through include the following:
1. Planning Phase – From the word itself, this phase involves conceptualizing the project, determining the goals, and
analyzing the information available.
2. Analysis and Requirement Definition Phase – This phase focuses on analyzing the function, project requirements,
target users, and impact of proposed project.
3. Design Phase – describes the architectural phase of an ICT project. The desired features and operation in detail,
process diagrams, and documentation are contained within this stage.
4. Testing Phase – This phase involves testing the results or the performance of every phase before it.
5. Release and Promotion Phase – encompasses the actual roll out and release of the project to be used by the users.
6. Maintenance Phase – This phase comprises the correction, modification, and updating for improvement of the
project. Responding to user feedback is also a part of this maintenance.
Demographics
Demographics is described as factual information that is gathered from users of the ICT application. The information can
be categorized into different labels such as age, gender, income, religion, and profession. Demographics is used to learn
the characteristics of the target audience and the key features that the designer or publisher of the application can
capitalize on to effectively design the application.
Here is one example of a scenario to illustrate the relationship between the key features of an application and the target
audience. A student most probably will have no salary; thus, mobile phone companies will offer a cheaper mobile phone
to them. People who work for different companies, on the other hand, get a monthly salary, and can thus afford more
powerful and expensive mobile phones. Mobile phone companies will then be interested in the demographic
information of income.
Psychographics
Psychographic information is described as noncountable information from people such as interests, opinions, and
insights. Furthermore, psychographics can describe and capitalize on the interest of the subject by observing certain
information. For example, a student is more interested in applications that offer information related to different school
subjects. A businessman would likely be 12 interested in applications that are associated with foreign currency exchange
rates or stock market prices.
To determine the psychographics of the target group, various activities can be done. First, the behavior of the target
community can be observed, such as the topics that they discuss and the images or the posts they share. Another is by
conducting interviews. Different questions can be formulated, which may lead to the information that you seek. The
feedback of the interviewee can dictate the psychographics of the group. Another method is by using written surveys.
Similar to oral surveys, written surveys used organized questions wherein the answers of the respondents are written on
paper. However, using written surveys can protect the identity of the respondent; thus, the percentage of the sincerity of
the answers is high. Last, focused discussion can be done to solicit the psychographics of a certain group. In a focused
discussion, insights and opinions are delivered in a manner that is similar to brainstorming.
Writing a Project Proposal
Part of project planning is writing a project proposal which is a detailed description of the series of activities involved in
the project. The following are the essential parts of a project proposal:
1. Project Information / Description – This section is meant to provide an overall picture of the project that can be seen
at glance as well as convey important project details. It may include the following:
a. Project Title: (PROJECT TITLE);
b. Type of Project: (education-training/ health-medical mission/ art exhibit, etc.);
c. Project Proponent/s: (Name of organization/ name of the people involves);
d. Project Beneficiaries: (Urban poor, women, youth, etc.);
e. Date of Implementation/ Duration: (Start date/ number of implementation days);
f. Budget Requirement: (overall amount of budget requirement); g. Project Contacts: (List of individuals involved with the
project.)
2. Project Background – explains what needs/ problems you are trying to solve, and why these needs/ problems are
worth solving. The project’s brief history, references, and other supporting documentation may also be provided here.
3. Project Objectives – The goals of the project should already be set from the beginning.
4. Desired Impact and Outcome of the Project – describes the long-term effect of the project and specific measures to
sustain it.
5. Risk Management Plan – it includes the risks and factors that may hamper or hinder the successful implementation of
the project activities and the achievement of project outputs. This also includes measures to mitigate the effects of
project risks encountered.
6. Project organization and Staffing – describes the people involved and their responsibilities in the project. The
following table may be used as a template for this part:
7. Work Plan - a detailed project schedule. It is a list of tasks that will be performed for the project. The work plan is a
means to expose the project’s risks which could be used to make reasonable estimates of the man hours required to
complete it. A milestone chart can also be used in this section to monitor work progress at any given time.
8. Budget Requirement – A detailed, line item budget that includes the cost needed for every part of the project. The
following table may be used to repeat budget requirement.
9. Other Relevant Information – includes any information that will support a request for funding such as brief
enumeration of stakeholders’ pledge and lined-up projects to complement the current.
10.Conclusion – a short summary that explains the potential value of the project.
11.Appendix – refers to additional charts, graphs, reports, etc. that we a re cited in the proposal, but were not
appropriate to be placed in the main body of the document.
Designing and Copywriting for ICT Projects
Upon the creation of content in an ICT application, there are various process that must be done before it is published or
uploaded. The most important process in post-development is quality check and error checking. The process of checking
ICT content for errors is called copywriting. To do copywriting and produce error-free outputs, be guided by these tips
and pointers.
Split paragraphs into shorter and fewer sentence. The text content should be concise and direct to the point. This will
help ensure that the text will be read by the audience. The purpose of short paragraphs for copywriting is the users’ ease
in reviewing and reading. For the developer, using fewer words means smaller chances of committing an error.
Split complex sentences into simpler ones. Similar to having shorter paragraphs and fewer sentences, avoiding complex
compound sentences will make the text more readable. Shorter sentences can easily be understood by the readers. For
copywriting processes, simple sentences are easier to check for errors.
Highlight keywords. This can greatly help the audience in browsing and skimming your ICT application. If key words are
easily identified, users can save time in finding information that they seek. In copywriting, key words set in bold font can
direct the copyreader to the essence of the sentence or paragraph.
Use subheadings to identify subsections of the application or Web site. Users can easily identify and search for
information by skimming subsections and subheadings. For copywriting, the arrangement of ideas can easily be
identified by following the subheadings.
Designing and Copywriting for ICT Projects
A number of humanitarian and social applications have been developed in different aspects of social development. Here
are some examples of using ICT for social change:
Philippines Say NO to Drugs – This is a nonprofit organization and an arm of the Dangerous Drugs Board under the Office
of the President of the Republic of the Philippines. ICT application was used by his organization primarily by setting up
information sources under the Web site of the Dangerous Drugs Board. Aside from its Web site, the organization uses 15
social media applications to deliver information to the public. The following campaigns and programs were publicized by
this:
o Barkada Kontra Droga (Peer Group against Drugs)
o National Youth Congress on Drug Abuse Prevention and Control
o Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) Program
o Kids Against Drugs Program
o Drug Abuse Prevention Program for the Transport Groups
o Nationwide Caravan of Youth Against Drugs
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) – This is a United Nations (UN) member organization dedicated to
the issues brought upon by drug trafficking and drug abuse. This organization uses ICT by devising a Web site to fulfill its
goals and purpose. Campaigns launched by this agency are the following:
o World Drug Campaign – This is the campaign done to save the youth from drug abuse and help them say no to drugs.
o International Anti-Corruption Campaign – This is one of the campaigns of UNODC in collaboration with the United
Nations Development Program (UNDP) to fight corruption and power abuse around the world.
o Blue Heart Campaign Against Human Trafficking – This is a campaign that aims to involve everyone to condemn human
trafficking around the world. Furthermore, the campaign encourages everyone to help victims of human trafficking.
National Citizens’ Movement for Free Elections (NAMFREL) – This is an election watchdog organization formed to
ensure peaceful and truthful elections. This agency conducts its own count of votes. In the national election in 2010,
NAMFREL was not credited to conduct campaign ―Bantay ng Bayan‖. ICT was used by NAMFREL through SMS and social
media, calling out volunteers to help in guarding the credibility of the election results.
Philippines Animal Welfare Society (PAWS) – This is a nonprofit organization dedicated to protecting the welfare of
animals. PAWS believes that peace in society starts with avoiding cruelty to animals. Furthermore, the Web site of PAWS
is used as a facility to disseminate on taking care of pets, as well as the laws that protect the welfare of animals.
