techPresident - Wesley Clark - Comments

About organizing, not press

Nancy Scola — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 18:06:32 -0400

Hey, Elisa. So great to find you here. I wasn't able to make it to BlogHer this year but I did make it out to San Jose in '06 and had a great time meeting some excellent women. Following the conference online this year, it did seem to be quite a success. But let me flesh out what I meant in that "quick hit." For those of us focused on the political blogosphere and press, BlogHer didn't attract as much attention Netroots Nation or even RightOnline did -- part of which does seem to be explained by timing, with those two purely-political conferences overlapping with BlogHer in whole or part. And as Markos mentions, one factor seems to be that, for traditional media at least, there's no clear call on which reporter to send to a conference of women who blog.

But I think there's more to it, and it has to do with the very diversity of the conference. Let me just throw out the idea that it may be (a) fair (b) actually useful to think of BlogHer as one giant umbrella that covers the smaller networks of women connected through their participation the same blogospheres. We have women political bloggers and women mommy bloggers and women food bloggers and so on, and they all occasionally come together under the banner of "BlogHer." I get immense value out of my informal and semi-formal networks of women who work in politics and/or technology, so I know how important that can be. But a huge chunk of that value comes from the fact that these are people who pretty much the same thing that I do. For someone in similar shoes, connecting with men who work in the same arena might be as valuable or even more valuable than organizing with women who work in different fields.

As the political blogosphere and online politics continue to evolve, this thing about Netroots Nation/RightOnline/BlogHer press coverage does, in my mind, point to the question of what's the most useful way to make the best use of limited time and resources. (Alas, there are only so many days on the calender, there is only so much money one can spend on conferences, and, for what it's worth, there are a limited number of reporters available to cover events.) That's still very much an open question, though.

Oh, and I totally would go for Clark as VP

ElisaCam — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 15:18:14 -0400

On a different note: I'm excited Clark is still in the running for VP. I have admired him since I became famliiar with him during the 2004 primaries and think he would make an excellent choice.

Elisa Camahort Page
BlogHer Inc

So little?

ElisaCam — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 15:17:03 -0400

Just want to comment on the framing you inferred from Kos' post:

We're quite up front that we are not a focused, partisan event, but rather a cross-topic educational, community networking and cultural event. As I just commented on dailyKos, speaking for me and my two co-founders (Lisa Stone and Jory Des Jardins): BlogHer was completely thrilled about both the event's success (our fourth straight sold-out annual event) and its coverage...which you can see in its full glory at http://blogher.com/press-clippings. We have had no complaints on either count.

Our *community*, however, is an extremely diverse group, so of course each group wishes there was more focus and coverage on what they do...whether politics, tech, personal or business blogging. More power to them.

Elisa Camahort Page
BlogHer Inc

Trippi is still ahead of America

cfinnie — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 14:23:24 -0400

Someday, Joe Trippi will be right. But, as history shows, it's rarely during the campaign he's working on.

The Internet enabled Howard Dean to be a viable candidate. It did not make him a winner. And I contend that the reason it enabled his high profile and fundraising totals was not because of the tool, but the campaign and candidate. When I first went to the Dean campaign site, I was amazed at what I read there. There was no political parsing. I didn't see calculation and hype. I saw open, honest opinions and I was hooked. So that was the first tool I saw the campaign use. But it was the message that did it, not the tool. When I first saw Dean, he said "only you have the power..." Then campaign then provided the tools and the structure to back that up. So the tools proved the commitment. But they were not the winning message, just the medium.

As the earlier comment points out, blogs are impacting the MSM. But their media reach is still a fraction of Faux Noise. With that big an echo chamber, even the lack of message can be overcome. That's why the Republicans are not worried.

I wish I shared his optimism

Dan Ancona — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 20:50:04 -0400

My feeling is that - if us lefty internet organizer types are hugely and uproariously successful over the next year or so - at most something like a quarter or maybe a third of the electorate is going to be directly impacted by the independent internet media, except maybe for the occasional wild viral hit. There's still a LOT of voters out there watching Fox, and between known site traffic numbers and the last Pew, we know that a lot of folks getting news online are getting it from MSM sites.

Sure, the 'sphere is having a somewhat increasing role in shaping how the MSM covers stuff - and arguably in exposing hilariously brash acts of hypocrisy like O'Reilly's latest stunts - but we've still got a long way to go from where I'm sitting.

Edwards back on Facebook

Joshua Levy — Tue, 13 Mar 2007 17:18:08 -0400

John Edwards' profile is back on Facebook. Apparently there were too many messages going out from supporters and it triggered Facebook's spam catcher.

James, Do you really expect

nottellingwho — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 16:13:14 -0400

James,
Do you really expect that a candidate will be able to personally respond to every query they receive? It doesn't make sense that a candidate would cherry pick to speak directly with one person, while ignoring others...that alienates those he doesn't address. They are much better off putting together videos that have wide spread appeal. Why should a candidate shun the opportunity to speak to as many people as possible and instead waste a vblog on one person?

Just to Clarify

EmergencyCheese — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 15:29:27 -0400

People seem to have this idea that I only want candidates to respond directly to me. Of course it would be cool if they did that, but I'm really interested in seeing them respond
through video to somebody (anybody!) who sends them a video message.

It doesn't have to be me - in this case, Clark did post a video response to me (which you can see under my video 'Wesley Clark on YouTube.. My contention is that if he wanted to make a video response to me, he should mention my name, just like almost all legitimate video responses on YouTube mention the name of the person they're responding to. That's one big way of telling if the person is really responding or if they just want attention for their video.

I'd be very happy to see candidates address their responses by to whomever they wanted to respond to. This is the same advice that Sam Roake, the manager for David Cameron's web campaign, gave to candidates as quoted on the most recent PrezVid post:

"Don't make the videos scripted and spun. Involve the voters: respond to them and address them by name."

-James Kotecki

I wonder where he went...

Joshua Levy — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 14:45:43 -0400

Something tells me he isn't gone for good. His campaign site still links to the defunct profile, and he's fully embraced a bunch of other services... I think he'll be back on Facebook.

John Edwards dies on Facebook

nottellingwho — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 12:06:21 -0400

Edwards has died an enigmatic death on Facebook. He seems to have left the the virtual land of procrastinating college students for greener pastures. So long good buddy... The only question now is, will anyone notice he's gone?

Musta been a strong soda

Nancy Scola — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 09:47:31 -0500

Nope, Clark hasn't declared for 2008.

Wait! I thought he was running.

liza — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 11:24:49 -0500

Didn't he declare at the Winter DNC or is there something I missed while I was out looking for a soda?

:-/

Might Iran become the new Iraq?

nottellingwho — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 23:13:45 -0500

Iran might very well become an emergent issue. Wes Clark is clearly brilliant, and he may be hedging his bets that George Bush will attack Iran. If/when that happens he has been champion opposition to attacking Iran for months, he'd clearly get a big boost. So the question is, will Iran become the 2008 campaign's Iraq?

Nice tool

David All — Wed, 21 Feb 2007 15:01:08 -0500

Another great metrics tool to add to my toolbox. Nice work Micah and David.
________________________________________
David All
The David All Group
http://davidallgroup.com
________________________________________