Constituting the Orkney ICT Forum

There will be a public meeting 

at 17:45 on Tuesday 15 May 2012, 

at The Orkney Club

to consider adopting a constitution and electing a committee for the Orkney ICT Forum.  

A steering group involving Steven Heddle, David Aim, Roderick McLeod, Sweyn Hunter and a few others have co-ordinated the drafting of a proposed constitution for the Forum, reflecting the original aims of the mailing list of the same name (established many years ago) and expanding the scope and membership to include those offering web, ICT, social media and communications services in the public, private and third sectors. The aims and objectives in the proposed constitution seek to increase levels of digital participation in service delivery in Orkney, and to provide a context for professional development of those offering this type of service (whether employed, or operating their own business).

It is hoped that, after several years of hibernation, the Orkney ICT Forum will awake and be constituted as an organisation. For those without very long memories, the Forum was established as a free mailing list by Steven Heddle when he worked for Orkney Enterprise as an advisor on broadband and web technologies to local businesses. The forum was administered by Steven and Sweyn Hunter, and used to organise (very infrequent) evening events for those involved in offering ICT services in the public, private and third sectors - most of these events focussed on the provision and improvement of broadband to Orkney communities.

The idea of holding a govcamp event in Orkney arose in early 2012, and Sweyn & Steven decided to use the Forum as the "badge" for the event. Arrangements for IslandGovCamp have now got to the stage that funding and sponsorship look like real possibilities, and so it has become necessary to constitute the Forum as an organisation.

Anyone interested in being involved as office-bearer, committee member or ordinary member will be made very welcome. An email will be sent to all who were on the mailing list in 2005, and the meeting will be promoted on BBC Radio Orkney, on twitter and on Facebook (as well as on this blog). The proposed constitution is available for comment elsewhere on this site.


There are already a people willing to be nominated as Chair, Treasurer and Secretary, but if others are keen that would be fine - we would hope to form a Committee which represents as broad a spectrum as possible of web developers, ICT professionals, and communications people (including journalists and others using social media in their work), and we'd hope to involve people active in these fields from all islands and parishes where there is interest. Please help spread the word to anyone actively working in Orkney in the areas of web, ICT, social media or communications services.

If you have comments on this matter (or are interested in being involved, but cannot attend at the time above) please leave a comment on this post 
(or tweet @sweynh or email sweyn dot hunter at hotmail dot com )