out on the Facebook group, South East Climbers. Catherine Gallagher – a regular face out on the Southern Sandstone – set up the group to arrange meets and general chats. “Yes, it'd be a shame to see the traditional climbing clubs and meet ups die,” she says, “but everything changes, and social media groups like this one are just an informal way of doing the same but with more fl exibility.” But even she agrees that the one gap that social media can’t fi ll is training: “The only downside is that it makes it more diffi cult for newbies to get started without going on a course. Which is good news for instructors though!” Another benefi t of a club is being able to commit and take the risk to book accommodation. Malcolm Streeton is from the Wessex Mountaineering Club, which has been around for over 50 years,
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page on Facebook doesn’t get as much use, but it’s a way to communicate with the wider community. With over 3,000 followers on Twitter, it’s kept very simple: keeping people up to date with things like how to book a hut, meets, guidebook launches and how to join. The Alpine Club has 832 followers on their Facebook page and 26,301 followers on Twitter. Laetitia Sterling from the club says “Primarily, we use Facebook to notify people of events. For Twitter, we’ll tweet any news we pick up to do with mountains, mountaineers, big climbs, conditions, etc. But we keep the Facebook notices and tweets to a limit: we don't want information overload. Right now, we don’t use Facebook like the Climbers’ Club with regular discussions. That all depends on the members – they may move that way one day.”
and currently has about 130 members. He thinks that there is more to being a club that a Facebook group can offer: “It’s defi nitely getting harder to get new, younger active members to join, but we are still succeeding. We recognise that for the club to have a role, it has to do more than just provide a means of contact, since Facebook does that for free. One of the key benefi ts is being able to make the commitment to book accommodation a long time in advance and take the fi nancial risk if we don’t fi ll all the places. We do need to offer more, though, and training is one area we are increasing, helped by BMC grants.” What about the bigger clubs? Iain Mackenzie set up the social media for the Climbers’ Club: its Facebook public page (245 members), private page (256 members) and Twitter account (3,248 followers). He thinks the Climbers’ Club will always have meets, so its role will not change, but: “The way in which it engages with its members is changing. It’s historically veered away from Facebook and Twitter – there was a lot of negativity and concern over privacy – but the way it now works is putting a lot of those fears to bed and people are seeing the benefi t of it, although there are still the doubters.”
So how has the Facebook page changed the interaction of people in the club? “People are using the private section of Facebook, where lots of internal connections and communication take place. The public
At the other end of the spectrum are the climbing walls – who do attract the younger climbers. They tend not to join clubs, but form their own informal groups to climb with. Fred Stone manages The Arch Bouldering Wall in London: “The Arch has been on Facebook since before we even opened the fi rst site in London Bridge. At that time it was just a way of spreading the word to people who hadn't heard about us, partly as we had no advertising budget or any real idea of how to go about promoting the business. Over time, though, I think our idea of how to use social media has changed quite a lot. We now use Facebook, Twitter and Instagram primarily as a sort of hub to keep in touch with existing customers and friends, and give them somewhere to communicate. I see a lot of people organising impromptu visits through Twitter and Facebook, mainly through posts of the "fancy a climb this evening?" kind, but occasionally also by setting up groups on Facebook or What's App. I think this form of extra sociability in real life aided by the online world is really encouraging, especially as indoor bouldering is the kind of climbing that least requires any partners. “Yet, as useful as it is, I don't think social media is essential to us. A climbing wall is so much more friendly than a fi tness gym, so everything it needs is already there in a way. For example, we often get asked about running outdoor climbing trips by beginners,
Facebook has 1.23 billion users, with 45-54 year olds the fastest growing demographic. 189 million of Facebook's users are mobile only and Velocity Digital reports that 25% of Facebook users don't even look at their privacy settings. In a recent BMC survey, 97% of young people said Facebook was their primary source of information about climbing and walking.
Twitter has 500 million accounts. Their fastest growing demographic are the 55-64 year olds.
Meetup helps groups of people plan meetings and form offl ine clubs.
YouTube reaches more 18-34s than any TV network.
Source:
www.huffi
ngtonpost.com and BMC Young People’s Survey
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but personally I prefer to see these things happening more naturally through friendships that begin at the wall, leading to a little group trip maybe up to the Peak or Southern Sandstone. I think these road trips, where you inevitably get lost and share in some sense of adventure among friends, are such an integral part of the climbing experience that I wouldn't want to substitute them with anything too sanitised.”
“It's the same with social media,” he mused, “It can't replace the real thing, only facilitate it.”
Katy Dartford is a BMC member and freelance journalist based in Chamonix.
SUMMIT#73 | SPRING 2014 | 87 SUMMIT#73 S RING 2 4
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