23rd December 2015
As Fablevision Studios prove, social enterprises and media companies make good partnerships, and as I highlighted in my previous blog post, given the massive social impact media has, it seems somewhat logical to use the huge reach that media provides us to foster social change.
Media also works extremely well on a local level too, serving the more niche needs of communities to highlight parochial issues and draw people’s attention to the goings on in their own backyards. Ayrshire Community Media is one such organisation which seeks to do just that.
Robert Jacobs, the Managing Director of Ayrshire Community Media, is the guest on this week’s podcast. His journey into social enterprise, and the passion he has for helping his local community are amongst the most infectious I have encountered yet.
South Ayrshire is ranked as one of the most deprived areas in Scotland according to the 2013 Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation. One of the key aims of Ayrshire Community Media is to encourage innovation, entrepreneurship and social capital, thus helping people in some of these areas lift themselves out of poverty through the use of creativity and the sheer transformative power that media offers individuals.
Enabling and enhancing such skills is not difficult, as most of the population already carry media creation and consumption devices in their pockets. However, with proper training, media companies can demonstrate to communities that they can not only tell their stories and share information about their lives and the lives of those around them, but that such skills can help build social capital, ultimately growing residents’ confidence and creativity, and helping to improve their communities.
I hope you enjoy the interview.
Links
Ayrshire Community Media on Twitter
Ayrshire Community Media on Facebook
Ayrshire Community Media website
Ayrshire Community Media on YouTube
Over to You
If you know of any other grassroots community media projects I’d love to hear about them. Let us know in the comments below!