Talented Young People is one year old!

This week marks the first birthday of Talented Young People. We started with a bang last year on fireworks night and haven’t looked back since. With no government, grant or corporate funding Talented Young people has grown like wildfire thanks to the support of you guys our viewers and our users.

We started off only attracting one hundred people a week to the site but now thanks to support from organisations like the BBC we now receive 2,000 unique viewers a week and in one year have helped close to 50,000 young people get that step closer to their dream.

In a world where the internet has been used for so many unlawful or just unpleasant acts like spreading viruses, spamming your inbox or committing identity fraud I think it is important that we get more websites online that want to help people. At the end of the day you aren’t going to stop people from using the Internet we are never going to win that battle but if we can create more websites that are there to help people we are going to make going on the Internet a safer and more helpful experience. The Internet needs to be used as a tool to educate, motivate and inspire young people.

A vast majority of young people now use the Internet and big corporate companies know this so they are using the Internet to target this important audience. This is another reason why it is so important that there are websites on the Internet, which aren’t driven by corporate greed, and that put young people first and whose sole purpose is to help young people.

The one thing that any website or online entity that is designed to help young people has to remember is that although many young people use and have access to the internet there is a large population of young people that don’t have the internet at home and it is often these that need help and need to be reached the most. Just because the Internet is popular with young people it doesn’t mean always that it is the only way or the right way to help young people.

The one thing though with the Internet that amazes me is the amount of people that have visited www.talentedyoungpeople.com who have been helped, inspired or motivated by what they have read. With any website the amount of people hat get in touch with the people who run the website is a very small percentage of the total number of people who visit the site this is why sometimes you never know how many people you have truly helped. I just think that it’s great that at any time of the day and in any part of the globe somebody could be logging on to the website and without me ever knowing could be using the information and the motivational words to achieve their dreams. Whenever I get up in the morning I could have already helped 100 people whilst I was asleep which I think is an amazing thing and the true power of the Internet. Some people are afraid to wont ask people for help and this is why I think the internet is such a great tool as it provides a degree of anonymity for the user to seek help and advice without having to go and ask someone or for those that live in rural areas where it may be a long drive to find an expert to speak to.

I have big hopes for Talented Young People in the next year which have been helped by the change in command at the top with new Prime Minister Gordon Brown. In many of his speeches he has talked about wanting to create a country with young people who have aspirations and that are encouraged to follow their dreams and find their talents. He has also talked about bringing back the old school mottos which I think is a good thing and one day I would love to see our motto “envisage it, believe it, achieve it!” used in schools across the country. It is good to have a prime minister who has the same visions as we do as an organisation. Never has there been a more important or better time for the Talented Young People organisation to exist in.

So here’s to a brilliant first year at www.talentedyoungpeople.com and I for one can’t wait to see some of the exciting things we have planned for the new year.

Adam Sibley
Founder of the Talented Young People organisation
www.talentedyoungpeople.com
"Envisage it, Believe it, Achieve it!"

http://www.talentedyoungpeople.blogspot.com