As public engagement projects go, nanotechnology or otherwise, this seems like one of the more peculiar ones I’ve come across. There’s a live webinar on Sept. 20, 2012 being organized by the US National Nanotechnology Coordination Office (NNCO). They’re not ready to accept registrations yet (with less than two weeks before the event?). Here are details from the Sept. 7, 2012 news item on Nanowerk,
Serving as the primary mechanism for public engagement, Nano.gov was redesigned in April 2011. The NNCO is seeking public comment and recommendations on potential updates to, improvements on, and opportunities for public engagement through Nano.gov. The webinar will be streamed live online with an NNCO moderator, four expert panelists, and you—the audience and members of the public.
… You, as a viewer and Nano.gov user, can help improve Nano.gov by addressing the following questions:
1) How is Nano.gov useful to you and your stakeholders/colleagues/peers?
2) What do you like on Nano.gov? Which pages are most useful to you? Why?
3) What would you like to see improved? Are there pages you don’t understand? Confusing information? Poor layout? Difficult to use?
4) Are there pages that you feel are missing from Nano.gov? What other types of pages would you like to see? What information would you like to find on Nano.gov that isn’t currently there?
5) Are there similar websites that present information in a way that you find more useful, exciting, attractive or user-friendly?
After brief comments by the panelists, we will be [sic] the public Q&A segment of the webinar. The NNCO will begin accepting questions and comments via email (webinar@nnco.nano.gov) and Twitter (@NNInanonews) 24 hours prior to the event, until the close of the webinar at 1pm on September 20. These will be read and addressed during the live event. The NNCO reserves the right to group similar questions and to answer only those questions and comments germane to the topic.
There is more information here about the event including a description of the panellists.
What I find most peculiar about this project is that it’s really a usability exercise and they’re trying to engage the ‘public’ in their website design and content issues. I guess my reaction is a consequence of developing a Pavlovian response to seeing the terms ‘public engagement’ and ‘nanotechnology’ together and expecting the questions to focus on nanotechnology issues.
My one and only suggestion regarding the site is that they redesign the navigation so it more closely resembles other websites. I almost missed the additional information about the website because the navigation buttons are huge and stacked vertically on the home page rather than horizontally as they are on most websites.