Personal Democracy Forum 2008
Session: Making "ONFFline" magic: Converting online "friends" to on the ground activists (Skills track)
Note by David GalielDavid_Galiel:
This note by DavidGaliel, not jonmandell as currently showing - "tweak" settings apparently not saving in software)
Joined in middle of session - not hearing "best practices". Hearing why our candidate did this and why it is great. Perhaps too soon to expect folks to talk openly about plans. May have missed more of this discussion earlier in the session.
Question from audience about casual volunteers, activists, "super-activists" - do these new tools help to move people up the ladder in terms of their activity, or do people pretty much stay at the level they start at.
Answers along the lines of it's the same it's always been, offline or on, using traditional community organizing tools still work, some folks grow into bigger roles but most find their comfort level close to where they began. The hard thing is finding and identifying people at different levels and involving them in the first place, new online tools can help with that. Consensus on this panel is that the internet has not done a great job helping with this. Emphasis on panel is that offline organizing and activism is key - but little discussion I see of the "converting online friends to on the ground activists" which is the title of this session. It seems to come down to good database management. Eh. Nothing new media about that, it's still mostly email-centric.
Question from audience - how do you deal with oversaturation with messages, keep activists engaged? Answer about Facebook Causes makes important distinction between "signing up" and actually *doing* something. Suggests setting (appropriate) entry bar, not making it completely painless to "friend" or "join" or "support" (or, rather than entry bar, requiring minimal level of participation to stay member of group).
Lo-tech suggestion: start breakout sessions with question to audience: what do you want to hear about?
Slight-tech suggestion: post schedule online and allow registrants to submit questions ahead of time; have moderators aggregate and select from those questions and use to guide discussion
higher-tech/higher-touch suggestion: practice what we preach, make PDF an unconference, a la BarCamp.
(Note - not meaning to knock presenters or diminish their contribution; I figure there are plenty of people submitting blow-by-blow factual notes about the sessions, so I'm choosing to share more idiosyncratic personal responses. What one gets out of a conference depends on where one is at coming in, so others may have found this breakout and the Live Web one I started at more useful. I'm struck mostly by how folks tend to think what they are currently doing is the right thing to do, and thinking that whatever does not work is a function of perceived limitation of the Net. Of course, the reason we are here is because folks innovated outside the known and forged new ground online, but we're not hearing a lot about future innovations. Perhaps in the midst of a campaign season it is hard to get folks to think beyond the November horizon (hell, I'm focused on the campaigns I'm advising, and what tangible tools I can bring home to them, too, but that's what the product tables are for, I don't come to sessions to hear personal anecdotes or product demos). I'm looking for more discussion about the potential of these technologies for civic engagement, for rejuvenating our democracy, for encouraging constructive collaboration. For what happens after November. YMMV, and perhaps the rest of the conference will shift to that focus.)
Joined in middle of session - not hearing "best practices". Hearing why our candidate did this and why it is great. Perhaps too soon to expect folks to talk openly about plans. May have missed more of this discussion earlier in the session.
Question from audience about casual volunteers, activists, "super-activists" - do these new tools help to move people up the ladder in terms of their activity, or do people pretty much stay at the level they start at.
Answers along the lines of it's the same it's always been, offline or on, using traditional community organizing tools still work, some folks grow into bigger roles but most find their comfort level close to where they began. The hard thing is finding and identifying people at different levels and involving them in the first place, new online tools can help with that. Consensus on this panel is that the internet has not done a great job helping with this. Emphasis on panel is that offline organizing and activism is key - but little discussion I see of the "converting online friends to on the ground activists" which is the title of this session. It seems to come down to good database management. Eh. Nothing new media about that, it's still mostly email-centric.
Question from audience - how do you deal with oversaturation with messages, keep activists engaged? Answer about Facebook Causes makes important distinction between "signing up" and actually *doing* something. Suggests setting (appropriate) entry bar, not making it completely painless to "friend" or "join" or "support" (or, rather than entry bar, requiring minimal level of participation to stay member of group).
Lo-tech suggestion: start breakout sessions with question to audience: what do you want to hear about?
Slight-tech suggestion: post schedule online and allow registrants to submit questions ahead of time; have moderators aggregate and select from those questions and use to guide discussion
higher-tech/higher-touch suggestion: practice what we preach, make PDF an unconference, a la BarCamp.
(Note - not meaning to knock presenters or diminish their contribution; I figure there are plenty of people submitting blow-by-blow factual notes about the sessions, so I'm choosing to share more idiosyncratic personal responses. What one gets out of a conference depends on where one is at coming in, so others may have found this breakout and the Live Web one I started at more useful. I'm struck mostly by how folks tend to think what they are currently doing is the right thing to do, and thinking that whatever does not work is a function of perceived limitation of the Net. Of course, the reason we are here is because folks innovated outside the known and forged new ground online, but we're not hearing a lot about future innovations. Perhaps in the midst of a campaign season it is hard to get folks to think beyond the November horizon (hell, I'm focused on the campaigns I'm advising, and what tangible tools I can bring home to them, too, but that's what the product tables are for, I don't come to sessions to hear personal anecdotes or product demos). I'm looking for more discussion about the potential of these technologies for civic engagement, for rejuvenating our democracy, for encouraging constructive collaboration. For what happens after November. YMMV, and perhaps the rest of the conference will shift to that focus.)
