NOTE: This information is now out of date. Click here for the March 2017 update.

Ever wonder how Greenbelters communicate these days? Thankfully people are still talking over beers at the New Deal Cafe, over the fence and on the phone – the old-school communications that will always be popular here.  But increasingly, Greenbelters are relying on online or social communications, so here’s an overview of how and where that happens.

On Facebook

Greenbelters is a Facebook group with 1,309 members as of this writing. It’s lively and informative and generally civilized and respectful, though around election time things can get contentious.  Members who’d rather NOT see political arguments in their Facebook feedback can simply “block” the offending commenters – a terrific option I’ve been known to use myself.  On Facebook members publish updates and comments to the group without moderation.

Now if for whatever reason you’re not a fan of Facebook, you can simply create an account with minimal information about yourself and then “lurk” or read the group discussions while rarely or never updating your own account.  I know lots of people who lurk on Facebook, usually for following family members.

In a quick search I found all sorts of special-interest Greenbelt Facebook groups, both open and closed, including the Tennis Association, the Community Garden Club, Makerspace, the Greenman Festival, the New Deal Cafe and the large Online Yard Sale and Classifieds group for Greenbelt.

Yahoo Groups

Good old Yahoo groups are still alive and well in Greenbelt, with two of them to choose from.  Greenbelt Community has 290 members, sees 35-100 messages posted per month, and is described this way on the group’s home page:

This group is for all members of the Greenbelt community to use for posting community events, meetings, and news. It may be used by individuals, families, or groups that live, work, or go to school in greater Greenbelt including PTA groups, neighborhood watch groups, and groups that support the many facets of “community” in Greenbelt. It may be used to organize playgroups for young children, solicit volunteers for special events, drum up support for attendance at a community meeting, or advertise civic events such as local festivals. Persons of all political leanings and personal philosophies are welcome to join, but please leave the heated political debates for other forums!

See, no politics!  People wishing to join must be approved (to prove they’re indeed Greenbelters and not spammers) but after that, they post emails to the group without moderation.

Much larger is the Greenbelters Yahoo Group with 1,237 members currently and 180-240 messages per month (recently).  Here’s how group owner Andy Carruthers describes the group:

Since “Greenbelters” is the primary e-mail forum for Greenbelt, and includes members with many different attitudes, values and backgrounds, please work hard to keep it a positive and welcoming place. That said, independent or minority views are typically welcome here, and spirited, courteous dissent of all kinds is often celebrated.

Again prospective members must apply, but unlike the Greenbelt Community group, in this group every message is moderated and approved (or not) by the owner.

In the spring of 2013 Greenbelt Gardeners was launched and now has 73 members.  Recently it’s been used for about 14 messages a month, all on the topic of gardening.  After members are approved (by yours truly, the owner), all emails to the group are unmoderated – meaning, without interference by me.  The group has been used to give away plants, to ask for free plants, to ask for and receive advice, and to publicize gardening-related activities.

I’m sure there are other special-interest Yahoo groups in Greenbelt – maybe too numerous to mention.  Then there’s the Greenbelt Community Garden Club, members of which garden at our three community gardens.  They follow their own path and use Google Groups as their email-group service, not Yahoo.

What else?

Let me know and I’ll add to this list.

Why Facebook Pages Fail, and How the City and Organizations Can Reach Us

I’m always on the look-out for event info to add to this blog’s weekly round-up of what’s happening in Greenbelt, but some events never make it onto my radar screen. In analyzing why that happens, I’ve noticed a big problem with the Facebook pages that the city in particular is using to get the word out. Bottom line – it doesn’t get it word out, at least anymore. These days, updates posted to Facebook pages are distributed to roughly 1-5 percent of the page’s followers (people who “like” it) unless the page owner pays Facebook big bucks for the privilege of reaching its followers.

The city of Greenbelt has several Facebook pages – for the Public Works, Rec Department, the Fitness/Aquatic Center –  but updates to those pages aren’t making it onto our own Facebook news feeds. One fix is something Luisa Robles at Public Works is doing – posting the updates onto the Greenbelters Facebook Group, where we actually see them.  She may be posting to Yahoo, too, but the point is, Greenbelt, please use some other method coz your Facebook page ain’t working anymore.

Same goes for the other Greenbelt pages I’ve found: for the Museum, the Pumpkin Festival, the Community Foundation, the Farmers Market and the Co-op, some of which I believe are already posting their items using other social media avenues in addition to their own page.

Fortunately, Facebook hasn’t yet ruined the effectiveness of its groups, and members of them actually receive updates posted to them.

GHI doesn’t use Facebook but communicates monthly in print and weekly via e-newsletter, both terrific. It would be nice if its major events were also posted to Facebook and Yahoo groups, and maybe I should include them in this blog’s weekly Going out in Greenbelt update, too.

If you know of other examples of successful or not-so-successful communications in Greenbelt, tell us about it in a comment.