I am excited and honored to be joining co-panelist Dave Witzel, of Forum One Communications among other pursuits, and moderator Kivi Leroux Miller, of EcoScribe Communications, at the Friedman Foundation’s “Generator Forum” this Thursday. The Generator Forum is asking its panelists and attendees: “How Do We Use Social Media to Generate Advocates and Build Communities?” and, of myself and Dave Witzel, we will specifically apply this question to “The Organization & Social Media Levers.”Below, I have included a preview of my presentation for those of you not able to make the trip to Indianapolis. Knowing that the audience is primarily comprised of non-profits and given the state of the economy, I am hoping to share some “budget saving” tips. And, as a small-town-gal and social scientist at heart, I will also look the importance of engaging online communities in meaningful, sustained ways.Look to use open source, free and social technologies. Citing what C-SPAN was able to accomplish at the conventions and debates with their “hubs” (DNC08 Hub, RNC08 Hub and Debate Hub), I will share what the joint efforts of C-SPAN, New Media Strategies and JESS3 were able to accomplish in leveraging WordPress, Twitter’s API (”application programming interface”), YouTube, Qik and Skype. Not only was this cost effective and efficient, it also allowed C-SPAN to participate in the vibrant 2.0 world that has been built using community-based solutions.Serve the community - look to build resources, platforms and outlets that the community needs and wants. These can be physical (like a website, visualization), access-based (like making something embeddable), or more verbal (like a conversational Twitter account). I would imagine that most non-profits could teach the for-profit world a thing or two about this concept, so I may stand back and be humbled by this.But, for what it’s worth, I will say that it is an often-overlooked tenant when most organizations come online to build a site and/or engage in a conversation. My approach when interacting on the web — as myself and/or on behalf of a client — is to build reciprocity, recognition and community into each project. And, as a Chicago grad, I also have a keen eye to incentives — answering the “what’s in it for me?” question. As you might imagine, this often overlaps with the R-R-C approach, but just in case, I make sure I can answer it before I ask anyone to give me their time or a link.In addition to the C-SPAN projects listed above, two more that I have worked on while at NMS that I would proudly put forth would be Tropicana’s Twitterverse visualization, AnOrangeAmerica.com (also a NMS/JESS3 collaboration), and Intel’s InspiredByEducation.com site (lead by Kara Gaffney and Samantha Saephan of Burson Marsteller, in conjunction with folks from Intel such as Gail Dundas and Ken Kaplan).Be inclusive, not just exclusive. In PR, one often strives to “give the exclusive” (to a prestigious media outlet or a famed tech blogger) — similarly, in news, one strives to “get the exclusive” (an interview or news scoop). And while launching C-SPAN’s Convention Hubs through TechCrunch and Mashable and Debate Hubs through ZDNet and Ars Technica was certainly effective, what sustained the success of these projects was the manual linking to blog posts, reaching out to a variety of bloggers over Twitter, email, phone and IM… and even reading blog and Twitter posts on air (shout-outs to Rob Bluey, ThePete, Cyndi Samuels and Bill Bitner!) By engaging a variety of folks, you also ensure a diverse conversation and a broader base of support to build, promote and share your content and/or message.+++That just about wraps it up for now. Look for my tweets @leslieann44! Also, fellow DC community member and friend, Peter Corbett, will be presenting on “Storytelling, Messaging, & Video Sharing” along with Reason Foundation’s Lisa Snell.+++As an aside, the Friedman Foundation was founded in 1996 “upon the ideals and theories of Nobel Laureate economist Milton Friedman and economist Rose D. Friedman.” The esteemed Milton Friedman, who many of these readers may recognize by name, is also known as one of the forefathers of the renowned University of Chicago School of Economics. While a Chicago student, I had the privilege of hearing him on campus and being saved by his secretary during the winter of my junior year. It was a jogging-on-ice-at-night-in-Hyde-Park accident. Long story. I love digging around YouTube and finding gem clips like this one of Milton, decades ago.

GEORGE WASHINGTON INSTITUTE FOR POLITICS, DEMOCRACY AND THE INTERNET

POLITICS ONLINE CONFERENCE 2008

MARCH 4 & 5, 2008

I am excited to share more once I attend the conference, but wanted to share the basic info for those of you interested in watching the political blogosphere light up as things get popping Tuesday and Wednesday at GW here in DC. Many thanks to Julie and Sam for all their hard work!

My New Media Strategies/Public Affairs teammates Howard Mortman and Patrick Ottenhoff (panelist Tues, 3/4 @4:45PM) have already posted to kick things off — check both out, Howard’s is especially entertaining; Patrick’s, enlightening and a nice preview of his presentation. Hope to see all those interested in the intersection of new media, politics, civic participation and online energy around all of the above… in attendance or cheering from the sidelines.

Also, ran into a lot of speakers, organizers and otherwise at the B&B event (hosted by MSHC Partners, Blog Ads, etc.) at The Space on Monday night… e.g., online powerhouses such as Sam Levenback & Julie Germany (of IPDI/Conference Organizers), Alan Rosenblatt, Michael Bassik; Brian Devine & Bill Beutler & Bryan Roberts (all of NMS/PA); and Diane Rinaldo & Richard Kosinski (both down from Yahoo! NYC) will be attending, presenting and contributing to the 3 day summit here in DC.

The quick and dirty run-down:

• WHAT: Politics Online Conference (http://polc.ipdi.org/)

• WHEN: Tuesday & Wednesday next week (4^th and 5^th). Agenda is here: http://polc.ipdi.org/Agenda/default.aspx

• MUST SEE PANEL. As noted, NMS/PA teammate Patrick Ottenhoff is speaking at 4:45 PM on Tuesday in “breakout session #4” – “Political Cartography 2.0: Web Mapping & The Election Cycle”
  • More details here: http://polc.ipdi.org/Agenda/cartography.htm

• WHY. The panels are great, the attendee and sponsor list is impressive, PA’s own “Hoff” will be on the cartography panel; meet new people, fortify current relationships, learn new things.

• WHERE. The Renaissance Washington DC Hotel is located at 999 Ninth Street NW, Washington DC 20001. Directions here: http://polc.ipdi.org/Directions/default.aspx

Shout outs to friends and colleagues:

David All

Patrick Ruffini

Robert Bluey*

and Erik Erickson (1 degree of separation via Jon Henke)

* JESS3 designed blog

h/t to TownHall’s Matt Lewis…

The upcoming edition of Campaigns & Elections Magazine will feature Republican eCampaign guru’s (from left to right), Erick Erickson, David All, Patrick Ruffini, and Robert Bluey.

UPDATE: available on eBook here (see page 36)

UPDATE 2: NMS bud, Bill Beutler shares his support and thoughts on the article here, check it!

(I also posted this over on Jess3’s blog here)

While the event was titled “Citizen 2.0: Radically Rethinking Democracy in the Digital Age,” I think there was a sub-text to the event that was as interesting, if not more so, than the idea of a Citizen 2 dot oh (which is how the Yahoo!s were saying it. And yes, they call themselves Yahoo!s). I will post the top-line, take-homes over the weekend about this magical, mystical Citizen 2.0, but here, I wanted to put forth my 2.0 cents on the other thing I observed.

Given the setting (Willard), the speakers (Karl Rove, Max Cleland), the attendees (I would wager most were over the age of 40?!) and the cocktail/hors d’œuvre after party (top shelf, all the way around)… this was no Internet-is-for-the-young OR the Internet-is-for-people-in-their-pajamas-living-at-home kind of scene. I have been to quite a few events, conferences and workshops in the new media space and let me tell you, this was the fancy-schmanciest yet. It was also the first where there were secret-service looking types walking around and talking into their cuff-links (okay, the latter part of the sentence was a stretch, but you get the point).

(kind of looked like this)

And if we follow my (errr, Durkheim’s) “look at the shadow if you want to know about the form” logic from my last post, then reading these cultural symbols (people, place, things) points to the emergence of a few other new “2 dot oh” species:

The “influential 2.0″ - I would roughly define this term as fitting people in positions of power/decision makers, or are people who have direct in-roads to these influentials — in sectors such as government, business, etc. — that are getting hip to the existence and importance of “the blogs.” Hearing that Karl Rove reads blogs would be an example of this — he is both influential in his own right and, well, you know, has influential friends.

• … and by “the blogs”… I mean to say the conversations and ideas being shared online… I would also include the things that are actually broken online by websites, blogs and media sources alike (read: the 24/7/365 news cycle).
• … and in agency speak… an “influential” is an actual thing/person as opposed to an adjective.

The “strategist 2.0″ - Strategists and consultants — such as those from the political, PR and advertising phyla — who make their money leveraging the influence, relationships, fundraising potential, Word-of-Mouth marketing, etc. from “the blogs” (and other online media, groups, networks, outlets, and so on).

• While Rove did not go much further than talking about micro-targeting and e-mail lists, it seems that he could be called a strategist 1.5 (falling short of the full 2.0 as he did not seem to embrace an integrated new media strategy of harnessing the power of social media, blogs, etc. — oh, and he is sort of not doing this anymore, so that also must be taken into account… he was mostly talking in terms of “in the 2000 and 2004 races”)

The “politician 2.0″ - Ok, now I am starting to annoy myself (and yes, I know people have already killed the meaning of “2.0″ by adding it onto everything and probably have applied it to this arena already) but let me have just one more.

• We have already seen the neotenistic form of this animal from the candidates in the 2008 presidential election with everything from Barack’s social network (yay Blue State Digital), to live-blogging on the FredFile (full disclosure, Fred is a NMS client), to the multiple announcements made via canned videos on websites, not live on TV.
• One of the speakers at the Yahoo! event made the point that perhaps in 20 years, there will be a candidate who will leverage all of their online connections and their online persona to actually become president. That would be interesting and not out of the realm of possibilities (so take note, all of you out there on Gaia, mebo, Facebook, myspace, iminlikewithyou, etc).

Looking at this photo 2 years ago, save for the Yahoo! banner in the background, you would have been safer to guess that the caption would be about some traditional business or media event or some traditional outreach (e.g., $500 a plate dinner), and not some event with the phrases “new media” or “Internet strategy” or “Web 2.0.” Times they are a changin’

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On the personal side of things… a few quick notes and pics:

Max Cleland was an amazing speaker, not to mention an incredible person. He has overcome a great deal of adversity and has achieved more than most above-average people. So cool. So funny. So nice. When I talked with him and gave him my card (green thing in my left hand below), he asked for my address so he could drop me a real note. Old skool is the new school. I will be checking my mailbox!

For all the photos fit to click, Jesse has a great gallery over on his Flickr account… and a great post too. So does my colleague, Bill Beutler (far left in the picture above).UPDATE: I have also reposted an adapted version of this entry over at DC Tech Beat.