[Ed Hammond]

Well, I've joined, but what will this offer that the forum doesn't?

I DON'T WANT PEOPLE USING LINKEDIN RATHER THAN THE FORUM!!

[Matthew Garrard]

Ed surely you're not afraid of a little bit of competition? This forum has not been as functional since the CfPS' website was overhauled, if Linedin offers that little bit more that was taken away...

[Dave Mckenna]

There is an interesting general point about the best platform for shared discussion - many now use the communities of practice site set up by IDeA http://www.communities.idea.gov.uk/welcome.do although this is specifically local government - I notice london scrutiny officers have a group on there for example.

There is a lot out there that does a lot more than this disucssion board.

Might be a piece of work for CfPS to explore other options (I think Ning might be one)and see if there is something that offers more than this format. Might be worth checking with Dave Briggs (Learning Pool) or Ingrid Koehler (IDeA) on this (Dave used to be a scrutiny officer)

In the mean time I'm sticking here tho.....

[Matt Clack]

The London Scrutiny Network have indeed recently set up a Community of Practice, but not in competition with this forum! Our 'CoP' is designed to centrally store agendas & papers for meetings (rather than circulating large emails to a distribution list which is always outdated), and to discuss documents through the 'wiki' function, allowing anyone involved to edit content. The CoP does involve a forum section but this is used to further any discussion held at network meetings, with relevant forum posts here on the CfPS site being linked to.

I do find the CoP approach to be a useful single point for our network, but think the CfPS forum is still the best site at present for discussing The Big Scrutiny Issues (and to hear about Ed's favourite pieces of legislation). Haven't tried Linkedin yet, only just getting round to the 140 characters of scrutiny goodness on Twitter!

[Reece Bowman]

Ed,

Linkedin is more about us networking as a group of professionals alongside other professionals in different fields and in different sectors. I think the benefits of this are fairly apparent.

It has absolutely no bearing whatsoever on the CfPS forum - the two aren't mutually exclusive.

Reece

[Howard Boots]

First can I make it perfectly clear that I have little idea about Linkedin and even less experience of it. My only concern is that anything that might dilute the influence of the Centre for Public Scrutiny on the national scene is not to the benefit of scrutiny as a whole.

Irrespective of whatever new organisations or communication systems are created, they should not be allowed to be regarded as a substitute for the CfPS which is the only body that should speak collectively for scrutiny .

[Peter Marrington]

I've joined but on reflection I think we should stick with CfPS.