According to the Local Guides Connect 101 meetup, it’s a good opportunity for me and Thailand Local Guides Community key members/moderators Khun Bank @AsaniV , Khun Wanna @Wanna , Joseph @JosephDewey plus new guests who just joined @Rotsarin and Khun Aey Jiravadee to sit and share experiences about using Google Maps and Local Guides Program. We’re really happy to catch up and see each other again as it’s been a long long time since our last meet.
Apart from experience sharing, I also introduced the Local Guides Connect, online community for Local Guides around the world about how to access and add posts to all members. Then, I showed the Local Guides Official meetup page and demonstrated how to host meetups as many people might not be familiar with this. There are 3 main steps to host the meetups: PLAN, SHARE and MEET - all of them are straightforward and easy to follow. More details about how to organize meetups >> here
I personally think that Thais not using LGC (Local Guide Connect) because of the barrier language. This is a Chicken and Egg issue… There’s no user so they don’t use it, but what if someone want to be pioneer? They need to start it in English and ooohhh If I can’t communicate in English then I can’t use it right?
It could be better if we can build local community on LGC with local language. At least that what’s happened on Facebook Groups, and honestly this metup happen because of that. Not LGC.
@AsaniV As discussed earlier, this is a good point. LGC has been created to be a central webpage for knowledge and information sharing among Local Guides around the world but personally it might not be effective for Thais as there are lots of online community sites to read here in Thailand and most of Thai people are not familiar in communicating/writing English to each other. I considered that the latter reason will be the case for that.
For the meetup, I think the goal of Local Guides Program is to allow people/users to use Google Maps for good like map editing, place adding, sharing photos, etc. as well as encourage them to use the LGC for sharing information and get together in communities. The LGC can be a choice for us to find some useful information and share to fellow Thai Local Guides. If we already had our own community, for example, in Facebook Group, just go for it or any platform that suits us the most as behaviors of Local Guides are varied from countries to countries so that we can engage with most community members about new events and meet ups.
@SunPanupong And thanks for the detailed discussion today! It helped me to realize how much it would be really beneficial if Connect had more Thai-specific resources.
Nice name @SunPanupong Mini 101 meetup & it seems like you guys have spent some quality time together. Best of luck for the implementation of a Thai Language board, you have my vote bro
