Citizen OS has launched the first version of a new feature designed to make it easier for users to engage diverse audiences and gather ideas for their civil society initiatives.
The new idea gathering feature enables better engagement.
This addition enhances the platform’s ability to connect people across locations and time zones, fostering more meaningful and inclusive dialogue and decision-making.
The idea gathering feature supports a wide range of needs, from gathering ideas for public space improvements and policy changes to planning strategies or democracy festivals. Users can post, discuss, and like ideas, while admins manage engagement, set up the vote, and report on actions taken as a result.
The new feature
The idea gathering feature enables users to:
- Post ideas
- Read and reply to each other’s ideas
- Like and save ideas to personal favourites
- Admins can add ideas to folders to aid in analysing and sorting the gathered input
- Start a voting phase for selected ideas
This new feature adds another possible phase to your participation process on the platform. You can now start by gathering ideas, then, if desired, move on to a pro-con discussion phase and/or a voting phase, all within the same Citizen OS ‘topic’. Finally, once the discussions and decision-making are complete, you can report on the actions taken in your topic’s ‘Action’ phase.
Designed for collective decision-making and community engagement
“The idea gathering feature supports a wide range of needs, from gathering ideas for public space improvements and policy changes to planning strategies or democracy festivals. Users can post, discuss, and like ideas, while admins manage engagement, set up the vote, and report on actions taken as a result,” explained Ilmar Türk, Chief Technical Officer.
“These features make the platform ideal for engaging communities in a dynamic, multi-way dialogue, going beyond simple surveys or one-way communications,” Türk added.
The Citizen OS participation platform is undergoing a redesign which first launched in the Spring, improving the look and feel of the product. You can read a short summary about the revamp here. Further improvements to the idea gathering feature, such as the ability to add images and export ideas for analysis, will follow in the coming months.
Improvements in progress
Citizen OS is a non-profit organisation on a mission to bring more inclusive decision-making to the world. As the platform is secure, free, and open source, we are thankful for your support in testing, suggesting additional developments, and contributing to building an even better product to empower democratic participation.
If you share this mission, here are some concrete ways you can join us in this effort:
- Send us feedback! When you use our platform, we’d love to hear any suggestions for improvement. Simply click the platform’s ‘Help’ button to drop us a message or email us at support@citizenos.com. Whether it’s short or long, positive or critical, we’ll be glad to hear from you.
- Help co-create our platform. Are you part of a group or organisation that needs a participation platform and has a few hours to spare in the coming months? Come test out new features and share your ideas! Our recent partners have found it both fun and helpful in thinking through their participation projects. Drop an email to support@citizenos.com to find out more.
