Queensland Police pins crims on Pinterest
Queensland Police have continued their pioneering use of social media with a new Pinterest board.
The board, “What The? Friday” is used to share the most bizarre behaviour of people on Queensland’s roads.
The organisation has been using Facebook for some time, where the “WT?F” weekly update was one of the most popular features on the social platform.
The QLD Police Pinterest account is intended to act as an archive for the WT?F content as well as becoming the online repository of the Queensland Police Museum, providing accessibility for its exhibits.
Queensland Police Service executive director, media and public affairs branch, Kym Charlton told Mumbrella: “WT?F has a number of purposes. It is not just to show people a glimpse of the sometimes absurd things our officers deal with, and to make the organisation a little more accessible (yes, police have a sense of humour!)”
“It is also our way of constantly reinforcing road safety messages in an accessible, sharable way. It is easy to become numb to the ‘don’t’ messages around road safety, but WT?F is a great way of prompting real debate amongst our followers on the issues around road safety (although the occasional animal sneaks in there, too).
“On a bigger picture, content that people want to share helps us to keep growing our audience (equivalent to one in every 15 Queenslanders follow us at the moment). In times of crisis (disasters, public safety incidents, child abduction alerts) the more people we can reach quickly who are used to sharing our content, the more effective we can be in doing our job. So there is actually a really pragmatic basis for the bit of fun that is WT?F.”
The force’s Facebook page has 301,000 fans. The Queensland Police force has been commended for its use of social media to coordinate rescue operations during the Brisbane floods, although also experienced some of the negative side of social media after the arrest of SMH journalist Ben Grubb for revealing a Facebook security loophole generated a mild controversy.
What could POSSIBLY go wrong…
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Good to see them using this as entertainment and clicks, How long until they set stuff up like they do for ‘COPS’ in the states?
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Seems to be moderately sensible use of social media. Or propaganda if you’re so inclined, I guess.
Notnilc – care to elaborate on what, aside from the usual social media pitfalls, this is veering towards?
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Yes, things may, and have gone wrong but the overall positive impact that the QPS has achieved by engaging with people far outweighs the inevitable hiccups. I’d much rather public facing organisations taking a personable tone and having a sense of humour than dry, bland broadcast style messages.
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The great thing about about what QPS are doing is the way they are breaking down the ‘us vs them’/’cops vs the average punter’ perception.
It’s difficult to argue with those images and it’s difficult to argue with a brand – even if it is the police – that is keeping you up to date and informed via social channels . Kudos to them for stepping out of the mould and using these channels in a way that works for their target audience.
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