Using Comics to Educate on Privacy
Every now and then, a job lands in your lap that is an absolute joy to work on. Such was the case when I landed a contract with the Office of the Chief Information and Privacy Officer for Ontario. They were launching an initiative to educate government employees on the importance of privacy and how to be more vigilant with the information they are responsible for. Typically that would mean a booklet of some form, a series of brochures and fliers. You know; the sort of thing that either sits in an untouched pile in the HR dept, or that lands on a desk only to land moments later in the trash, or shoved into a file folder never to see the light of day again.
Mark Robinson and his team decided to take a different approach to gain the attention of their audience and hold it. Rather than lecture on the specific points, they took a storytelling approach, creating a series of film noir vignettes. Through the drama of Stan Slade: Privacy Investigator, they would be able to cut through the normal information clutter and drive their point home.
These dramas were a series of short videos that would reside on the provinces intranet, however to compliment that for their printed materials, they wished to use comics. And that’s where I came in, providing a half dozen short strips. Initially these were to run in a printed newsletter, but over the course of the project, the imagery from the strips was integrated into the videos themselves as both an intro and during the credits.
The strips were released in tandem with the videos, between September and December of last year over the province’s intranet. From what I understand, the project has had great success, with other provinces and institutions looking to use the materials in their own efforts at educating on privacy.
February 28th, 2007 at 1:10 pm
Sounds like a rewarding project, Rob. I’d love to see the cartoons!