NASBLOG

OR State Marine Board on YouTube & iFish

Kudos to the Oregon State Marine Board.  They posted a couple of their public service announcements on YouTube.  One of them, Cooler Design (above), got picked up by iFish.net.

California DMV Uses Social Media to Reach Teen Drivers

Gloria Sandivol with California Department of Boating & Waterways passed along a link to the Sierra Sun News article, State DMV reaches out to YouTube-MySpace youths.

The article talks about the California Department of Motor Vehicles' effort to reach out to teens with social media sites such as YouTube and MySpace.

From the article:

The DMV hopes the Internet sites will be used as a complement to the California Drivers Handbook, used for decades to teach the rules of the road.

“YouTube gets millions of viewers each day and the DMV saw this as an excellent tool to reach out to the masses,” DMV Director George Valverde said. “Each video clip teaches a very important aspect of driving.”

The DMV’s page on MySpace lacks a bit in the design department and could do more to integrate the DMV's other efforts on YouTube. Note to Director Valverde:  you can embed those videos, not just have a link to them. Just like this:

I really like the videos the DMV has on “the top 10 reasons for failing a drive test.” These include issues such as unsafe lane changes, illegal left turn, improper speed and poor scanning.

The CaliforniaDMV channel has 55 video clips ranging from one to five minutes. In addition to teens watching them online, I think the videos could be integrated into a classroom-based driver's education course.

What is your state or organization doing to use social media to reach out to teens and other boaters through the web?

Welcome to NASBLOG

Welcome to NASBLOG, the weblog for the National Association of State Boating Law Administrators.  Here, I'll be blogging about news and items of interest to those in the recreational boating safety community.  I'll keep you posted on the grants we're working on, committee activities, research, meetings and more.