We mentioned, a short time ago, about our plans to hold a regular surgery for voluntary and community groups, assisting and supporting them with all the gubbins that the Internet has to offer. Well, we now have a launch date, so put Sunday 23rd November in your diaries as the ‘We Share Stuff’ team will be at The Red Couch cafe, Erdington each Sunday morning from 11:00am to around 1:00pm. The surgery will be free to attend and the cafe itself serves a wide selection of drinks and snacks. So if you’re curious about the Internet, want to know how to get a voice online, or merely want to drop by for a chat, please do. The atmosphere is real friendly and we promise not to bombard anyone with jargon. It’s all about showing you how easy the Internet is becoming. If you want to let us know in advance of any particular things you may be interested in, or just to let us know you’re coming along, please add a comment to this blog post or give us a quick call. We look forward to seeing you there!

We Share Stuff is chuffed to announce that we will be running a free Internet surgery every Sunday morning at the Red Couch Cafe, Erdington. We have taken the blueprint established in the Custard Factory run by Birmingham blogger extraordinaire, Pete Ashton. We will be available to answer questions and support community groups, businesses and individuals on the wonderful world of the Internet. Blogging, websites, micro-sites, youtube, facebook et al.. they’re all up for discussion and how they can be used to increase activity, awareness and what not. The sessions will start off as a first come first served basis. The cafe serves a wide range of food and drink and is located on the High Street in Erdington.

Many thanks to Cafe manager, Taf, for letting us use the premesis. In fact, The Red Couch will probably be the first business to use the service after briefly experiencing what we have to offer, they’re keen to get a blog going and get involved…which is what it’s all about… The surgery plans to start early November, we will announce more details on here as and when we have them.

On Thursday 8th May, Stuart Parker and I (Kevin Rapley) met up at The Station in Sutton Coldfield to discuss some ideas that Stuart had on social media and how it could be used to create a social enterprise that will be centric to North Birmingham. The areas that were immediately in our thoughts are the Aston, Erdington, Castle Vale and possibly parts of Sutton Coldfield. Stuart is interested in targeting the unemployed and under privileged. Our goal is to teach these groups the benefits of social media and how it can be harnessed to give a voice to the community in a manner of different ways. Stuart brings with him a wealth of knowledge in adult IT teaching, including the unemployed, I will let him speak more about this.

As a web designer and developer, I am immersed in social media and building internet solutions on a daily basis. This blog will be used to document our development of a social enterprise for North Birmingham, including how we go about funding, developing a business plan, raising issues in the locale, growing the ideas and getting others involved in making this happen.

This is my first port of call. If you are passionate about building a stronger community in North Birmingham or are just interested in getting involved with what we are doing then we would love to hear from you. Stuart and I have got quite a task ahead of us with learning about the funding side, how to go about this and what the prerequisites are. Again, if you have any knowledge of building a social enterprise model we would be very interested in learning from you.

We hope that this blog will act not only as a diary of our progress, but also to increase awareness of our plans, recruit others that would like to get involved and also provide a resource for any other communities that wish to implement the social enterprise model in their area.