Digging through Web 2.0 for Feelings and Facts and Fraternity

My last few posts used slacktivism to make a point about online activism, but the lesson that I have taken from my blogging and wanted to pass on to others is that Web 2.0 tools can be used to tell the story of a cause not just the facts. The story of a cause goes to the heart or the meaning of a cause and why someone should join, not merely the facts of the issue.

The World Wide Web may have started transmitting only data, but it has evolved into something more and is continuing to evolve.

Change-agent organizations need to understand and adapt these new means of connection, communication and collaboration. It is a balance between pulling on people's feelings and getting them to be part of some larger cause and providing the facts so that they can make up their own minds and find new means of working together.

From the New York Times TECHNOLOGY / INTERNET | August 24, 2009 By ALEX WRIGHT

Mining the Web for Feelings, Not Facts

The universe of reviews, ratings and recommendations online open a tantalizing window on the collective consciousness.

“Social media used to be this cute project for 25-year-old consultants,” said Margaret Francis, vice president for product at Scout Labs in San Francisco. Now, she said, top executives “are recognizing it as an incredibly rich vein of market intelligence.”

Here are two TED Talks featuring Clay Shirky, who in the first TED Talk looks at how the end of top-down control of news is changing the nature of politics, Iranian protestors streaming news to the world, showing how Facebook, Twitter and TXTs help citizens in repressive regimes to report on real news by bypassing censors (if all too briefly).

The second TED Talk examines how the Internet and Web 2.0 can enhance collaboration.

Appealing to the Slacktivists

In the last post of this blog I made a defense of slacktivists in general, though I ended up agreeing with so many points made by Evgeny Morozov that slacktivists will still not be able to hold their own convention. This post will also be in support of slacktivists, but this time as an essential audience for change-agent organizations.

My last post took the perspective of one who fits into the slacktivist demographic, though I believe that the demographic is more diverse than appreciated. This time I am going to consider the issue from organizations that need large numbers to directly support their efforts through activism and funding, or to support larger scale efforts to initiate change through other government and social organizations. The Millennium Development Goals involve both approaches in bringing them to fruition.

There are numerous organizations struggling to meet the challenges of implementing the objectives of each of the Millennium Development Goals. These organizations often involve professionals on-the-ground seeking to increase awareness and derive support from a larger and usually less expert base. There is also an overall effort to get developed countries to meet their promise of fully funding the Millennium Development Goals. The Stand Up and Take Action event is an example.

The first set and the second set of activism are natural allies. For the organizations seeking to implement each of the particular objectives of the Millennium Development Goals, the struggle to push the larger agenda is no doubt important, but I cannot see it as a defining goal. Whether or not a certain number of people stand up on October 16th, those organizations working in Africa to eradicate typhoid or to provide universal education in India will still be at work. However, for those working in the second category for global political change, which is what we are talking about, having the first group of on-the-ground change-agents is not enough to positively influence the fundamental source of change in the leading developed countries, the mainstream voting majority. This majority cannot be defined by political affiliation alone because no one makes up a super majority. It does have one general defining aspect and that is, for the most part, for most of the time, non-activist.

Here again, I agree with Evgeny Morozov.

Of course, the ideal case here is when one's participation in digital activism doesn't subtract from -- and instead enhances -- one's eagerness to participate in real-life campaigns.

Now that gives change-agent organization two tasks. One to make sure the the true-hearted and dedicated activists don't lose heart and become part of the Facebook generation wasting their time on Mafia wars.

However, it's also quite possible that a significant portion of the activist population would be morally content with the "slacktivist" option alone, preferring not to get too close to more dangerous activities that are likely to get them in trouble with authorities.

I seriously doubt that anybody who was was of the meddle to protest would not because the Internet just made it too easy. The harder task is getting the uninvolved masses on board.

What we are dealing with from the perspective of social or change-agent organizations promoting their cause is social marketing, and as with social-entrepreneurship it takes a degree of business acumen.

It was dealing with issues of marketing, communications and networking the helped to lead me to the Millennium Development Goals. In a previous post on the blog I looked into the book GROUNDSWELL by Charlene Li & Josh Bernoff which makes the case that either Your Marketing Is Riding The Wave or Its Under Water.

More importantly for this post it provides taxonomy for Web 2.0 usage on the Internet. This I submit is also the different levels of slacktivists.

1. “creators”, who blog on their own web pages,
2. “critics” who post comments,
3. “joiners” who sign up for online communities,
4. “spectators” who read and watch, and finally
5. the unengaged “inactives”

The general understanding of slacktivisits seems to fit under numbers levels 3 and 4, only a small step above the bottom rung of inactives. I still put online creators and critics as being in the slacktivist pool, realizing fully as I have said that writing a blog does not equate in any way from on-the-ground action of groups like Oxfam UK, ONE, Millennium Promise or other similar organizations. Web 2.0 could hopefully help change-agent organizations recruit the unengaged "inactives" and move each rung of the Web 2.0 ladder up, but it is as likely to be other slacktivists higher up on the rungs.

This may fly in the face of our vision of social activists taking a stand like the revolutionaries in Les Miserables, but the concept of effective political change only coming from sit-ins and the risk of arrest, police brutality, or torture as opposed campaigning in the virtual space is to my mind false for liberal democratic countries. I do not believe that such actions alone will accomplish the Millennium Development Goals.

As I said in my last blog post, demonstrations and sit-ins can force the discussion into the open, but at some point the message needs to be taken up the the majority of voters in the democratic countries to put pressure on their governments to put pressure on other governments. It is the responsibility of organizations such as the Millennium End Poverty 2015 Campaign and anybody else supporting these goals to lead such as effort.

It is our responsibility as individuals participating in causes of our choosing to avoid become political commodities by understanding that you are commodified when you lose the ability to change things.

Navigating Our Lives, Our Economy, Our World with the Cellphone,

The cellphone has been a basic tool of micro-enterprise in numerous countries for sometime now. On a local level, it provides a relatively cheap means of communication, organization and control. Now it is beginning to create a new paradigm on a global scale. Two articles, again from the New York Times, provide a contrast between the potential of world connection and the realities of global markets, one although abstract is becoming a reality, the other a reality could change how we think about doing business.

SCIENCE | February 17, 2009 The Cellphone, Navigating Our Lives By JOHN MARKOFF
Cellphones have changed how we communicate with others, and now they are changing how we think about information.

The cellphone is the world’s most ubiquitous computer. The four billion cellphones in use around the globe carry personal information, provide access to the Web and are being used more and more to navigate the real world. And as cellphones change how we live, computer scientists say, they are also changing how we think about information.

With the dominance of the cellphone, a new metaphor is emerging for how we organize, find and use information. New in one sense, that is. It is also as ancient as humanity itself. That metaphor is the map. “The map underlies man’s ability to perceive,” said Richard Saul Wurman, a graphic designer who was a pioneer in the use of maps as a generalized way to search for information of all kinds before the emergence of the online world.

TECHNOLOGY | April 28, 2009 In China, Knockoff Cellphones Are a Hit By DAVID BARBOZA
An industry building look-alike mobile phones for as little as $35 is tickling China's pride in rebellious creativity.

“Five years ago, there were no counterfeit phones,” says Xiong Ting, a sales manager at Triquint Semiconductor, a maker of mobile phone parts, while visiting Shenzhen. “You needed a design house. You needed software guys. You needed hardware design. But now, a company with five guys can do it. Within 100 miles of here, you can find all your suppliers.”

Even Chinese mobile phone producers are losing market share to underground companies, which have a built-in cost advantage because they evade taxes, regulatory fees and safety checks.

There are environmental dangers posed by this black market technology, but their is also a sense of backroom disruptive innovation going on as well.

Some experts say they believe the shanzhai phenomena is about being creative, Chinese style.

“Chinese grass-roots companies are actually very innovative,” says Yu Zhou, a professor at Vassar College. “It’s not so much technology as how they form supply chains and how rapidly they react to new trends.”

Related Posts:

• Being There, Being Everywhere, Being Where It Counts
• Even In A Digital World It Takes Real Heart To Make Change
• Unplanned Obsolescence
• Innovation, Disruptive Milestones for the New Millennium
• Combining Efforts, Connecting People - Nokia and Pangea Day Work on a Paradigm Shift
• World changing paradigm shifts come from all directions

Being There, Being Everywhere, Being Where It Counts

Social media is a the same time both very personal and global in its reach. It provides an opportunity to reach millions, but can connect one-on-one regarding the challenges we face in the world. The two articles below demonstrate the span of influence of this medium, from the poetic to the political. The potential of this medium has not been even glimpsed to my mind. The financial potential is only the tip of the iceberg.

MAGAZINE | February 15, 2009 The Medium: Being There By VIRGINIA HEFFERNAN The subtle art of the Facebook update.

“Unlike ALL other walks of life, status updates are the appropriate places for spontaneous bursts of joy and being. You shouldn’t do it at work, you shouldn’t do it in the middle of a conversation, you shouldn’t do it on the street, you shouldn’t turn to a stranger on the bus, you shouldn’t leave it on someone’s cellphone. But on this grand constantly updating Christmas card that we are all free to access or withdraw from at any time, we FINALLY have a polite space for ‘My sponge smells like a hot dog.’ ”

MAGAZINE | January 25, 2009 Revolution, Facebook-Style

As the street protests went on, young Egyptians also were mobilizing and venting their anger over Gaza on what would, until recently, have seemed an unlikely venue: Facebook, the social-networking site. In most countries in the Arab world, Facebook is now one of the 10 most-visited Web sites, and in Egypt it ranks third, after Google and Yahoo. About one in nine Egyptians has Internet access, and around 9 percent of that group are on Facebook — a total of almost 800,000 members.

The Importance Getting a Single Message from a Social Media Network

I have been thinking about how organizations, and especially what I call change-agent organizations, can use Web 2.0 tools to get their message across with the greatest impact. This combines both marketing and organizational concerns. Social Media involves networks and groups but the agents are still individuals. How individuals collaborate within a group will define the message of that group.

Scott Briscoe on 11/3/08 wrote the article The headline was a no brainer in Acronym. His article links to how it read on The Washington Post website.

"Online social networking sites, or socnets, are changing how people get their political news.

Scott's point, "What the article made me think about was that it's one thing to believe that change is occurring, it's quite another to be doing something about it — what are associations doing about it?"

If political advocacy is a major part of your mission, do you know the quantity and quality of the involvement of people affiliated with your organization in social media? Are they pushing forward ideas that synch with your organization? ... How are you training members to get involved in these areas? The circle of people who are engaging in these online communities has grown too large, and the circle who read without engaging is also larger still. ... In 2008, it's too numerous to count in both large and small ways. ... The next page is already beginning to turn; you need to make sure your organization has something to say about what is written on it.

Relate Posts:

• Designing Your Future and Your Success as a Team Effort
  
• Collaboration As Management Tool= Management as Collaboration Tool
  
• Branding as Commodity Finding Connection Through Leadership
• Collaboration Moving Masses Through Compassion

Economic CPR with Web 2.0 Help or Hurt?

We have an ever evolving relationship with the Internet and Web 2.0, as individuals, as societies and perhaps as change-agent organizations. What the relationship is depends to a great largely, though not always, on how old you are and what is more important where you live. Below are a series of articles from the New York Times and other sources that I have run across over the last month or so.

At Harvard Business Voices Tom Davenport asks the question that seems to be asked by many of my generation, Is Web 2.0 Living on Thin Air?

I have highlighted some points from the article to get to the meat of his argument.

Instead of finding more ways for us to all yap at each other, in this more sober economy we may want to emphasize other priorities. What new products and services will make for better, healthier lives and relationships? How can companies improve their performance? How can teenagers improve their math and science skills, instead of their texting skills?

But it wouldn't be a bad outcome if the current crisis led to a more diligent, industrious economic climate. Chatting and socializing are important things, but they're not the only things.

Tamar Lewin's New York Times article makes a counter argument that Millennials are OK and that Teenagers' Internet Socializing is Not a Bad Thing US | November 20, 2008

Good news for worried parents: All those hours their teenagers spend socializing on the Internet are not a bad thing, according to a new study by the MacArthur Foundation.

Hanging out online helps teenagers develop "technological skills and literacy," a researcher Mizuko Itoon a new study “Living and Learning With New Media.” said“...their participation is giving them the technological skills and literacy they need to succeed in the contemporary world. They’re learning how to get along with others, how to manage a public identity, how to create a home page.”

What is interesting me more these days is how this works socially to empower people. Because it does have the potential to empower people, governments are wary of it. NOAM COHEN discussed on December 08, 2008, in Link by Link: The Freedoms That Technologies Help Bring. The issue was the Egyptian government demand that Apple disable the phone's global-positioning system, because GPS is a military prerogative.

Arvind Ganesan, director of the business and human rights program of Human Rights Watch, placed the issue in a larger context.

(F)reedom of information as part of the broader, better known, freedom of expression. Transparency about the government’s budget, for example, can be crucial to eliminating corruption and instituting democratic reforms.

(S)econd, he argued that it was important for technology companies to set principles and follow them. “Here is the big question for Apple: Is this an ad-hoc approach or is there a fundamental policy, balancing the freedom of expression and information with the demands of the government?”

The global perspective in regards to economic impact came on November 18, 2008 from ASHLEE VANCE who looked at Computing From Weather to Warcraft

The falling cost of supercomputer systems has allowed a broader range of corporations and institutions to buy them for everything from processing movie graphics to searching for oil.

The presence of supercomputers in emerging nations like China and India says as much about those countries’ growing national ambitions as the changing state of science and business.

Change-agent organizations must and are becoming a part of this new frontier. The question of whether to change is now moot, it is already happening. Defining the change is now the task. There are many seemingly well-established institutions in existence today that are not making the transition which will, I predict, find themselves floundering when younger and smaller institutions use these resources to define the agenda. This in itself is not that illuminating as many others have said the same thing, it is that I work for one of those well-established institutions.

Penelope Trunk Takes the Pressure Off

Yesterday, OK day before yesterday, Penelope Trunk had a post on Reality check: You're not going to make money from your blog in Blogging, Journalism. I don't follow anyone with twitter-like devotion, but I find a good deal of useful insight reading Penelope.

Almost everyone should forget about making money directly from blogging. It's so unlikely that it's a total waste of your time trying. I am actually shocked at how ubiquitous the idea is that blogging is a get-rich-quick scheme. Or even a get-rich-slowly scheme. It's not. Blogging is a great career tool for creating opportunities for yourself. But here are eight reasons you should stop thinking about money from blogging:

Personally, I am glad she is taking the pressure off. Besides, this blog was never right for making money. I follow pathways that interest me, not the market. I am inconsistent in doing posts and I do more re-editing and reformatting than actual writing since I am basically passing along information I found interesting. Below in bullet points are her reasons and why I agree.

1. Big bloggers come from big media.
Most big bloggers today have a strong background writing for print.

I do try to make my writing at least passable, even it mean coming back again after a few days to make corrections, but I do not consider myself a professional writer. The fact that I get visitors through the Paradigm Online Writing Assistant (links now repaired at left hand column) helps me to pay more attention than I might otherwise.

2. Sure, there are exceptions. But you're probably not one of them.

If we desire that blogs and networks become part of the democratic infrastructure, does it make sense that only the exceptions participate? There are easily over 5 million sites and blogs out there, but 5 million works nicely because it means the first million are the top 20%. According to Alex.com there are a number of blogs, this one included, between the 1,000,000 mark and the 500,000 mark. They may not have the impact of the top 1% like Google and Techcrunch individually, but in aggregate I believe that they can have an impact with venues such as Bloggers Unite For Hunger And Hope or Blog Action Day.

3. Even if you can do it, supporting yourself with a blog is crazy hard.
Blogging to support yourself is a complete full-time job.

When my life gets complicated blogging is the first thing to go, well maybe not the first, but it drops way down the list. I started this two days ago. Recently I have had thoughts as to how this could work for local communities, but I am hesitant knowing the commitment needed to make it work.

4. You probably have to be controversial to make money blogging.
And if you are making good money from your blog, you'll have hundreds of people telling you how you're an idiot. Do you want that? Really?

I find online arguments, unless done by professionals in the field, tedious. I am not interested in proving any point. I would much rather find some new avenue of inquiry to pursue.

5. You can make more money flipping burgers.

I don't flip burgers and I make far more than I could blogging. Even if I made it a component of my work life it would not add to my bottom line. It does have value both for myself and I believe, in aggregate with others in the blogosphere, for the world.

6. Please shut up about your book deal.

OK, would you believe movie deal, how about cable?

7. Blog for better reasons than money.
In the book, Blog Blazers: 40 Top Bloggers Share Their Secrets, Stephane Grenier asked forty bloggers what their definition of blogging success is.

Penelope also tells us about gaining the other benefits of blogging for your career. I am becoming to believe more in the idea of small voice blogs of which I am one.

8. Banner advertising is the mafia.

I actually pretty well suck at this monetize stuff , maybe from lack of really trying, but I have other objectives when I do this.

Blogging to Save the World from My Laptop

One topic I keep repeatedly going over is why I blog. The basic reason was as a learning tool, which I learned was readily shared with others, which I found I enjoyed doing. My other blog was created in part to apply what I had or was learning to a worthwhile cause.I picked the Millennium Development Goals because I was impressed with the cause and the people who are associated with it. It also provides the maximum potential leverage for my efforts - blogging to Save the World.

Now that brings up the potential of being labeled a slacktivist because my BrianDRPM persona does all of its activism online. The trouble, if you can call it that, is that the more you explore, the more you get drawn in by the good work that is being done by so many others. I do find my conflicted about so many doing good works on-the-ground while I merely provide some minimal support through this blog.

My real life/day job persona does have the potential of doing some good for the community for which I work, but I do think about leaving city government after retirement (which is not that far away) to perhaps work for a nonprofit. Yet I can't help but thinking that Web 2.0 will play a larger role in non-profit activism in the future. Even from that perspective there is still a great deal to learn but fortunately many to learn from.

Those internal conflicts aside, it does seem that Web 2.0 is not only taking a greater role in defining activism, especially global activism, but the this online global activism is redefining or reformulating how we use Web 2.0. So the question seems to be, how do we make Web 2.0 an optimal tool for the causes we wish to support and how do we use it do define our own roles in those efforts?

The efforts of one of my Orkut friends and the person who was essential in putting together the Stand Up and Take Action Against Poverty and for the Millennium Development Goals campaign in India is summarized below.

He is also competing in the India Yahoo UnCannies and has been nominated under the online advertising category.

Stand UP Take ACTION - social media for social change

View more presentations from Rupesh Mandal

I also checked out some of the competition on Alexa.com.

• Adultdost.com has a traffic rank of: 203,381
• Pixtelevision.com has a traffic rank of: 187,730
• Endpoverty2015.org has a traffic rank of: 268,934

Related Posts (from my other blog)

• Web 2.0 and Social Impact from the Ground Up and from the Server Out

• Updating Resources dgCommunities

Still 50 ways to better social media

This blog started off exploring pathways into the world of Web 2.0 and found a myriad of pathways available through social media which involves learning, experimenting and then using either here or at my other blog Milestones for a New Millennium.

One source of information, insight and inspiration that I discovered during these web-explorations is ASAE and the Center for Association Leadership and their blog Acronym which has been a source of posts for this blog. This particular post by Kristin Clarke was done last year, but the 50 Ways to Use Social Media for Better Marketing still works (I will bypass any discussion of procrastination). Kristin reblogged something that Chris Brogan did, so this is a re-re-blogged post. I could have just connected to the Chris Brogan post, but I wanted to let people know about ASAE and the Center for Association Leadership. I think, as someone who is still learning, that it is worthwhile to remind ourselves of these points when trying to create a media program that takes advantage of the web's connectivity.

I am a longtime fan of the interesting e-newsletter by the Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA), and one reason is because of its practical how-to and trends coverage. Check out this succinct piece titled "50 Ways Marketers Can Use Social Media to Improve Their Marketing" by Chris Brogan from the July 14, 2008, WOMMA newsletter. This would make a great education session sometime, now that I think about it. Feel free to post other tips.

50 Ways to Take Your Blog to the next level is another useful post on social media from Chris Brogan.

Making Change Making More Change Bit by Bit

One pathway of exploration that this blog has taken me is global health delivery. It was initially an interest in how business management systems could improve the efficiencies of social beneficial delivery systems such as global health. It has been a fairly frequent topic of contemplation both here and at Milestones for a New Millennium. Over time I have become interested in participating, first by blogging about the Millennium Development Goals, participating in collective actions such as BlogAction Day Against Poverty and BloggersUnite for Refugees and World AIDs Day, and now by participating with Change.org and creating a fundraising page for FightAIDSTuberculosisMalaria. There is still the internal conflict of having so much to do with the "Real World/Day Job" and not relegating one's self to mere slacktivist mode. Below is the more or less official pitch.

Hello,

I am raising money for FightAIDSTuberculosisMalaria.

Please take a moment to visit my online fundraising page and make a donation. It's really easy - you can donate by credit card and receive an immediate tax receipt for your donation.

Thanks and best wishes,
Brian

Here's my page:

http://www.change.org/myfundraising/FightAIDSTuberculosisMalaria

YouTube From the Self Indulgent to Global Outreach

One of the more popular social media tools on the Internet is YouTube, which started off as means for millions to upload self-indulgent videos of themselves, has now become both an information resource tool and a means of connecting with others on social causes. The challenge for those who would use this resource to connect with others, especially new converts, is gaining the trust of those you would use to help disseminate the videos through social sites such as Face Book or MySpace without having to spend a fortune. The New York Times published two stories that deal with these issues.

BUSINESS / MEDIA & ADVERTISING | January 18, 2009

Ping: At First, Funny Videos. Now, a Reference Tool.

By MIGUEL HELFT

YouTube is rapidly morphing into a popular search engine and a new entry point into the Web.And now YouTube, conceived as a video hosting and sharing site, has become a bona fide search tool. Searches on it in the United States recently edged out those on Yahoo, which had long been the No. 2 search engine, behind Google. (Google, incidentally, owns YouTube.) In November, Americans conducted nearly 2.8 billion searches on YouTube, about 200 million more than on Yahoo, according to comScore.

BUSINESS / MEDIA & ADVERTISING | December 14, 2008

Digital Domain: Advertisers Face Hurdles on Social Networking Sites

By RANDALL STROSS

Web advertising experts see a myriad of difficulties in making brand advertising work on social networking sites.

And when they try to take advantage of new “social advertising,” extending their commercial message to a member’s friends, their ads will be noticed, all right, but not necessarily favorably. Members are understandably reluctant to become shills. IDC, the technology research firm, published a study last month that reported that just 3 percent of Internet users in the United States would willingly let publishers use their friends for advertising. The report described social advertising as “stillborn.”

Change-agent organizations do not have the same goals as companies such as Procter & Gamble. They will face similar issues when attempting to get others to put videos or other social media outlets on their websites.

Youtube, itself, has become more of a social outreach advocate than merely a social gathering site. One example is their work at Davos, the location for the world's latest economic forum.

New Videos from the Davos Question Matthias Lüfkens - The Davos Debates continue... Dan Shapiro joins the Davos Debates Ramazan Salman and Rabbi Soetendorp join the Davos Debates Imam Abu Eesa joins the Davos Debates Ramazan Salman -Social Entrepreneur- joins the Davos Debates Cindy Ehnes joins the Davos Debates Harvard University's Peter Galison joins the Davos Debates S-G of the OECD Angel Gurria joins the Davos Debates Tammy Haddad and Andrea Newman networking at Davos 2009 Ricardo Young Silva joins the Davos Debates Professor Muhammad Yunus responds to the Girl Effect Zurich Financial Services CEO James Schiro joins the Debates Zurich Financial Services CEO James Schiro joins the Debates Jeff Nathenson fails to join the Davos Debates Zurich Financial Services CEO James Schiro joins the Debates Arthur Yap joins the Davos Debates Olivier Piou of Gemalto joins the Davos Debates Social Entrepreneur Fernando Nilo joins the Davos Debates Professor Mohammad Yunus joins the Davos Debates Ann Veneman talks about the Girl Effect at Davos

Advanced Blogging For Business (& fledgling activists) Tips - HubSpot

One of my current interest is exploring how to leverage social media for social causes such as supporting the Millennium Development Goals. Although the target audience of the presentation below is business, the lesson to be learned can still be applied to change-agent organizations.

Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

Advanced Blogging For Business Tips - HubSpot

View more presentations or upload your own. (tags: blog business)

Branding as Commodity Finding Connection Through Leadership

Umair Haque, Director of the Havas Media Lab, wrote in the early part of this year on The Shrinking Advantage of Brands in Harvard Business Publishing. His definition is not universally accepted, as can be determined from the comments section of the piece, but it does give me some ideas regarding social media and collaboration.

His definition: What is a brand? It’s a promise: information from a firm promising you a set of costs and benefits from the consumption of a good or service. Brands shape your expected value.

As I posted in my other blog, I have been having an ongoing discussion of leveraging social media on behalf of the Millennium Development Goals in one of the End POVERTY / Fim POBREZA forums. What the discussion comes down to in my mind is, does one both lead and empower through social media in raising consciousness about a social cause and how? Branding a social cause can either be an empowering exercise or a form of propaganda.

What is different from Haque's definition of branding compared to others is that he seems to see it, at least orthodox branding, as an iconic devise used to synthesis the costs and benefits into one object, phrase or idea. The interaction costs are so inexpensive with Google or other online tools, it makes it easier for consumers to find the information that they seek, especially from each other. "The cheaper interaction gets, the more connected consumers can talk to each other – and the less time they have to spend listening to the often empty promises of firms." Haque's point is that information about expected costs and benefits doesn’t have to be compressed into orthodox branding logos, or slogans because your audience can debate and discuss their expected values in detail. The trouble is that for social causes most don't, they only connect passively.

Seth's Blog also had a post on the rapid growth (and destruction) and growth of marketing back in October of this year. Seth realizes something that Haque left out in his article which is that brands can also provide a vehicle for social emotion and connection, but it is a vehicle in to which the audience can imbue social emotion and connection rather than depending upon someone else to "feed" it to them.

Social media, it turns out, isn't about aggregating audiences so you can yell at them about the junk you want to sell. Social media, in fact, is a basic human need, revealed digitally online. We want to be connected, to make a difference, to matter, to be missed. We want to belong, and yes, we want to be led.

The next day Seth's Blog had a post on Leadership is now the strongest marketing strategy. He again "markets" his new book on leadership called Tribes from the post the day before. He thinks of his leadership book as actually being a marketing book and vice-a-versa. According to Seth, "The next frontier of marketing is in leading groups of people who are working together to get somewhere."

What works is leading. Leading a (relatively) small group of people. Taking them somewhere they'd like to go. Connecting them to one another. It's enough if the tribe you lead knows about you and cares about you and wants to follow you. It's enough if your leadership changes things, galvanizes the audience and puts the status quo under stress. And it's enough if the leadership you provide makes a difference.

It is easier to be merely broadcasters, putting together a list of iconic branding devises and hurtling it out at hoped for followers. Louder is easier not better. According to Seth, "People want to connect. They want you to do the connecting. Now we're leaders." It is not, however, the definition of leader in the orthodox sense. Claiming leadership regarding the branding of a cause can be a matter of hazardous hubris, both the branding and leadership require a high degree of authenticity.

It seems to be to be a matter of encouraging collaboration by first providing information, education and then following with avenues of action, but realizing that everybody else can and at least a small group should be doing the same thing. How to encourage them to do so around a specific branded cause may be the true role of leadership. How to specifically do that is still a matter to be further explored .

SAUDADES SERENDIPITY

I wrote before about being part of the Orkut group End POVERTY / Fim POBREZA and about accepting the small pages status of my blogs. Part of the reason is that there are greater opportunities for sojourns into serendipity. A friend Ju from Orkut by way of Brazil recently led me on such a sojourn and into some small insights into his culture.

Um dia a maioria de nós irá se separar. Sentiremos saudades de todas as conversas jogadas fora, as descobertas que fizemos, dos sonhos que tivemos, dos tantos risos e momentos que compartilhamos...

Saudades até dos momentos de lágrima, da angústia, das vésperas de finais de semana, de finais de ano, enfim... do companheirismo vivido... Sempre pensei que as amizades continuassem para sempre...

Hoje não tenho mais tanta certeza disso. Em breve cada um vai pra seu lado, seja pelo destino, ou por algum desentendimento, segue a sua vida, talvez continuemos a nos encontrar, quem sabe... nos e-mails trocados...

Podemos nos telefonar... conversar algumas bobagens. Aí os dias vão passar... meses... anos... até este contato tornar-se cada vez mais raro. Vamos nos perder no tempo...

Um dia nossos filhos verão aquelas fotografias e perguntarão: Quem são aquelas pessoas? Diremos que eram nossos amigos. E... isso vai doer tanto!!! Foram meus amigos, foi com eles que vivi os melhores anos de minha vida!

A saudade vai apertar bem dentro do peito. Vai dar uma vontade de ligar, ouvir aquelas vozes novamente... Quando o nosso grupo estiver incompleto... nos reuniremos para um último adeus de um amigo. E entre lágrima nos abraçaremos...

Faremos promessas de nos encontrar mais vezes daquele dia em diante. Por fim, cada um vai para o seu lado para continuar a viver a sua vidinha isolada do passado... E nos perderemos no tempo...

Por isso, fica aqui um pedido deste humilde amigo: não deixes que a vida passe em branco, e que pequenas adversidades sejam a causa de grandes tempestades...

Eu poderia suportar, embora não sem dor, que tivessem morrido todos os meus amores... mas enlouqueceria se morressem todos os meus amigos!!!

Vinícius de Moraes

I used Google Translator to go from Portuguese to English and have now made it a permanent widget on this blog, translating the words is only part of it though.

I started by learning more about who was credited with having written the quote (English translation) he sent me. I learned for the first time about Vinicius de Moraes, but I also learned about Fernando Pessoa and found a number of good sites about him, Poetry International Web - Fernando Pessoa and Pessoa's Trunk. Seems that, at least on the web, both men are credited with penning the words.

I am not worried about who actually said it, but it demonstrated to me that those words are a deep part of the Brazilian/Portuguese culture, demonstrating the importance of Friends.

I continued my serendipitous search and found other connections to my Canadian birth and Irish ancestry through some very interesting sites from Germany Biographeme | vita nuova, time4time.blog, onClicknyc · New Media Design and Corporate Design... and most interesting of all Eccentric, which brought me to the Canadian pianist Glen Gould and Irish singer ROISIN MURPHY Fansite. Overpowered, Ruby Blue :: AbsentMinded.

Ju teaches a very important lesson why people take up causes such as the Millennium Development Goals. It is not always to make massive political paradigm shifts but finding personal ways to connect through countless small interactions for a better world. It is through the means of first defining ourselves as the path to redefining the world.

Inform, Engage, and Empower During Your Freetime

One new set of connections created through my Milestones for a New Millennium blog was through becoming one of the moderators for the Orkut group End POVERTY / Fim POBREZA.

I find that Orkut offers more of a conversation regarding relevant topics than does Facebook. It is an international conversation spanning the globe. Lately the direction of the discussions has been on the best means of directing the discussions. The basic format for the discussions is the web itself and more particularly Orkut, but we are open to numerous avenues of communication. The question is which avenues are best for both open dialogue and advancing the cause of the Millennium Development Goals?

A recently learned term is Slacktivists, basically well-meaning but all too often ineffectual (at least until a tipping point is reached) social activists hanging on and together through social media. At the other end of the continuum are professionals (as in "gets paid for it.") in the social media/Web 2.0 arena. Most of us hope to be somewhere in the middle trying to help when and where we can on a part-time and unpaid basis.

Slacktivists may be those who take no more effort than clicking a button to join a petition, but they are still a step above those that don't know and/or don't care. I try to put a good deal of information on my blog to make it easier for others to connect in the hope they will pursue their own pathways. The basic web connection is information through shared self-education. Then comes engagement which does sometimes mean signing online petitions. There is also the potential, as the Obama campaign has demonstrated, for empowerment.

It is not just the IT-intelligentsia's road, it is a journey for all of us. Ethan Zuckerman discusses Technologies and Emerging Democracies: Building a Better Gatekeeper in an MIT video. I agree with both Zuckerman and others in my Orkut conversations that Hi5, Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, and Zuckermans's favorite Reddit among dozens of others offer their own unique impressions regarding their areas of interest, but it also means that the Web is balkanized. Are we "Gatekeepers" or are we attempting to break through the gates?

Is there a way to better leverage the collective wisdom of these international connections being created through these groups? Just trying to keep up with all the information and maintain my two blogs is an effort. Then there is that pesky real world day job. I try to rise above being a slacktivist or at least attempt at being a fairly prolific slactivist. Without the educational background and professional expertise in the Web 2.0 world, how does one best use these online resources to endeavor to connect and make a difference in the world?

I have a good deal of respect for experts in this field, but their professionalism is often related to the medium not the message. The question is how best to connect? One earlier post exploring this idea which I revisited and reedited was Being Human, Working, Writing Stories, Being Human.

We Are All Getting Digital - Old Rocker Shows the Way

| New York Times August 10, 2008 An Old Rocker Gets Digital By FRED GOODMAN

Peter Gabriel, the rock musician, has become a powerful player in the emerging online music industry by helping artists find new ways to market their music on the Web.

This has been sitting in my draft bin for about a week. Going digital is not really breaking news, it is an on going transformation. I am pleased that it is an Old Rocker leading the transformation.

This has been an off and on topic for this blog for sometime. What is of interest is the transforming of older paradigms defining mass media industries, such as music, into newer paradigms. The transformation has impact on individual artists and businesses, but it also has broader impact on how we define ourselves in terms of community. It also makes for an interesting model as to how endeavors that are more social in nature can survive in an environment which is more business, the combining of artistic freedom with the creation of an economically sustainable enterprise.

Past posts on this subject
The Power of Many! Music For All?
Troubadour Troubles - Economic, Legal, Moral? You Pick
Confusing Means and Ends and the Pathways Between Them

The Musician As Businessperson The Entrepreneur as Artisan

Getting Your Say Getting Heard

In my last post, I admitted that a limited number of readers and visitors were coming to either one of my blogs. I am though quite happy with the quality of visitors. While no longer chasing numbers, I still visit Feedburner and Sitemeter to see who has dropped by. According to Sitemeter, Milestones for a New Millennium was recently visited by the University of Bristol, Mt. Sinai School of Medicine, University of Sussex and the United Nations. These were, to be fully truthful, a result of searches, but I still like the idea that something I write could be picked up by a highly regarded institution even for a glance.

Other searches picked up by FeedBurner were, Search for “OBAMA MDGs”, Search for “millennium learning goal” and Search for “2008 millenium development goal obama”

If you blog, you get a chance to have your say, and you have a good chance that somebody is at least going to "hear" you. I don't believe one can expect more.

Change in Pathways But Not A Change in the Path

The site is going back to its original intention of being a learning portal. The efforts toward blogging will be focused on the new blog Milestones For A New Millennium. I will still be making posts here but with less regularity. The difference being that this policy will now be followed on purpose rather than by happenstance as has been occurring.

This site can provide two important avenues. It can be used to explore issues which relate to but don't deal directly with the subject matter of Milestones For A New Millennium and it can be used to work through some of the subjects prior to posting on Milestones For A New Millennium.

Helping Myanmar (Burma) rebuild, Using Architecture to Rebuild Humanity

A number of the stories that have been held in the draft bin deal with architecture. The concept of architecture, however, applies to more than the design of individual buildings. It also applies to other things such as the web and to entire cities.

Does architecture give us a model as to how we can we use the Web to drive social change? The TED prize is one avenue created to bring about social change. Architecture for Humanity leveraged a 2006 TED Prize to build the Open Architecture Network, linking communities around the globe with architects and designers who can help them solve problems.

In 2006, Cameron Sinclair asked TED to help him build an open-source platform to help architects connect with communities in need of designs. The result was the Open Architecture Network -- a successful website that acts as both a clearinghouse for building plans and a vibrant social network, allows its users to sample, remix and customize design work for their needs. To help Sinclair's wish come true, join the community at the Open Architecture Network's website.

One of the latest examples of their work is their attempt to help Myanmar (Burma) rebuild, with Architecture for Humanity as told by the TED TEDBlog by on 5/6/08.

Following the devastating Cyclone Nargis in Myanmar (Burma), Architecture for Humanity asked for help in rebuilding the country over the long term. They wrote:

While the media will focus its attention on the loss of life, there will be millions displaced in the coming weeks -- and like most natural disasters, there's no plan for long-term sustainable reconstruction. Large aid agencies like Oxfam and Care will be knee-deep in immediate delivery of aid. How will the country respond to the long-term strategic need to rebuild the country?

In the first 6 hours of this drive, AfH raised $4,000 from over 120 donors. Learn more about this appeal >>

Lessons Learned Lessons Applied

The new blog is still undergoing construction. Actually construction is not right because it is still in the design phase and undergoing is not right because I haven't done anything with it for last few weeks. This post is partially to get back on track.

While this current weblog has provided a number of lessons that can be applied to the new one, there is still the matter of deciding what the new weblog is supposed to accomplish and how to achieve that. One primary lesson being applied is that Milestones for the New Millennium is far more focused than this endeavor which tends to follow its own path of exploration.

The new blog is focused on the United Nations Millennium Development Goals and the efforts of others to see those goals accomplished. The eight goals though still provide a wide range of topics to write about. Within each of those goals, is it to 1. End Hunger 2. provide Universal Education 3. ensure Gender Equity 4. ensure Child Health 5. ensure Maternal Health 6. Combat HIV/AIDS and other diseases 7. ensure Environmental Sustainability or 8. create Global Partnerships; there are both milestones to celebrate and millstones to rail against. The efforts of those supporting End Poverty 2015 will be prominently featured.

The concept, though, of overcoming all the world's problems for the thousand years before us is daunting. The notion that we will be successful in pushing the world's governments into meeting their promises by having people stand up is almost naive. It is still, nonetheless, worth supporting.

The Millennium Milestones blog is based on the premise that there has to be other avenues connecting the global perspective of the Millennium Development Goals with the individual activities of organizations and people working at the local level. There is also the "how" as well as the "what". This blog has explored social-entrepreneurship and the efforts of those trying to make the world a better place. There is the expectation that increased awareness will not command compliance from world governments but that their lack of commitment will inspire others to take matters in their own hands. It will be the day-to-day efforts of hundreds working through organizations utilizing new technologies that will lead us to fulfilling the Millennium Development Goals.