Daily Digest: Conservatives Planting Early Flags in Twitterland

BY Nancy Scola | Friday, December 5 2008

Reinventing the Grand Old Party, One Tweet at a Time: A new list of conservatives on Twitter is making the rounds, a project of conservative writer Michael Leahy. (More on Leahy, including his challenge to Barack Obama's natural-born citizenship, here.) Some names you might know in top spots: Rep. John Culberson, a.k.a. the tweeter on the Hill, is at #2, and techPres contributors Patrick Ruffini and David All are at #5 and #8 respectively. Most interesting, though, are Leahy's 10-step guide to building a conservative community on Twitter (see sidebar) and projects like getting all 168 members of the RNC tweeting. Conservatives are eager to colonize Twitter, not wanting to let this space pass them by in the way that the blogosphere largely has.
Pew: Give Americans the Open and Interactive 'Net They Want: The days of throwing up a brochureware website and calling it a day are largely dead and buried. Pew Internet Project's John Horrigan digs into his group's research and says that, in 2008 and beyond, Americans won't settle for anything else than a collaborative experience on the web. Making a bit of a leap, Horrigan says those findings offer two lessons for President-elect Obama: embrace an open wireless landscape, and close America's broadband gap.
Rangel Dinged for Overpaying for Sloppy Sites: Err, let's dial back that sweeping statement about the bells tolling for brochureware, shall we? That seems to be exactly the sort of 1.0 website that troubled Congressperson Charles Rangel paid his son's firm just under $80,000 for, reports Politico's Luke Rosiak and Glenn Thrush. That sum represents the very most any member of the House of Representatives spent on web work during the 2004-2006 cycle. Did Rangel get his money's worth? You be the judge. (One "expert" quoted by Politico says that site's worth no more than $100, but that seems a bit absurd -- web firms don't get out of bed for that kind of money.)
The Most Popular Political Video You've (Maybe) Never Seen: Boing Boing guest blogger (and Personal Democracy Forum '08 keynoter) Clay Shirky makes a case for why and how an anti-Obama YouTube video gained huge attention -- we're talking 13 million plus views, people -- amongst conservatives while provoking nary a peep from lefties. The two-minute "Dear Mr. Obama," complete with earnest soldier, oddly-placed American flag, and heart-tugging twist ending, was, says Shirky "like Democratic kryptonite." Give his post a read, and be sure to dive into the revealing debate in the Boing Boing comments. And for a fuller context on the making of this YouTube hit, check out our Micah Sifry's contemporaneous reporting.
Obama (Finally) Works His List for Clinton: Politico's Ben Smith notes that the Obama operation has done something today that Hillary Clinton's camp has been wanting for months now: it hit its massive email list to raise some cash to ease her considerable campaign debt. (Thanks, Shaun Dakin.)

In Case You Missed It...

Nancy Scola reports that Egyptian activists opposed to the government of Hosni Mubarek are posing a challenge to the State Department's so-called Public Diplomacy 2.0. Nancy also highlights a handful of compelling projects profiled at yesterday's Alliance of Youth Movements Summit that was hosted by Facebook, State, and others.

And our Matt Burton has a look at the GovTwit directory of government tweeters, calling it an "incredible resource."

View the discussion thread.

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This Isn't What Political Air Time Usually Means

MoveOn.org is asking supporters for $150,000 in donations to fly a plane above high-dollar fundraisers for Mitt Romney with "a message that reminds voters how he represents his corporate and 1% donors." MoveOn previously hired a plane to fly over Romney's Liberty University graduation speech with the message "GOP = HIGHER SCHOOL DEBT." GO

There's a New $200 Million Fund for Super-High-Speed Broadband Projects

An initiative to build and test gigabit-speed broadband networks is set to fund up to six next-generation Internet access projects across the country, fueled by a new $200 million broadband development funding program, Gigabit Squared and Gig.U announced this morning. GO

New Rice University Paper Chronicles Impact of the Internet On U.S. Foreign Policy

We all know that the Internet has transformed the way that the United States conducts diplomacy, and the way that it views national security, but where should we look to find evidence of this? This is the wide-ranging subject matter of a new paper published on Tuesday by Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy. The paper provides a round-up of some of the major turns of events between 2005 and 2011 in the realms of Internet governance, the development of online public diplomacy at the State Department, the evolution of the Internet-fueled Arab Spring, and the establishment of the shadowy U.S. Cyber Command in Fort Meade, Maryland, among other things. GO

Messin' with Lamar Smith, Revisited

Remember that grassroots fundraising campaign to put a "Don't Mess with the Internet" billboard in the home district of Rep. Lamar Smith, Republican of Texas and sponsor of the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act? All of the money required came in, and Fight for the Future, the advocacy group opposing more stringent copyright protections online, writes that the billboard went up. GO

Republican National Convention Organizers Sever Ties With Becki Donatelli's Campaign Solutions

After eight years producing online content for the Republican National Convention, GOP web consultant Becki Donatelli's Campaign Solutions is off of the project. "Campaign Solutions was retained to help develop our convention website and digital strategy, but they are no longer involved in convention planning," James Davis, the convention's communications director, told techPresident Tuesday. It's unclear what precipitated the of the relationship between the convention organizers and Campaign Solutions, which has been producing the online component of the event since 2004. But Donatelli's name surfaced in a controversial anti-Obama ad pitch sent to a Super PAC backed by TD Ameritrade founder Joe Ricketts, which appeared in its entirety in the Times last week. Ricketts has since disavowed the proposal and Donatelli has denied any involvement. GO

PD+ This Thurs 1pm: Thriving Online With Howard Rheingold

I'm really looking forward to talking with author Howard Rheingold this Thursday on the next PD+ teleconference. His new book, Net Smart, is a concise and thoughtful guide to understanding and making the most of the hyper-networked, always-on, firehose of information and distraction that is the contemporary experience of anyone who uses ... GO

City of Joplin, Mo. Launches New Online Center Ahead of Tornado's Anniversary

The city of Joplin, Missouri launched its new web site over the week-end ahead of the May 22 anniversary of the massive tornado that devastated the city and killed 161 people. The new site enables Joplin citizens to sign up for emergency alerts via text message, e-mail and RSS. In addition to those alerts, individuals can also sign up for ... GO

In Virginia, City Council Debates to Include Questions Posed Online

The Alexandria Democratic Party in Alexandria, Virginia has partnered with online civic engagement platform ACTion Alexandria to include questions solicited in an online forum in the final Democratic primary debate for a City Council election there on June 4, ahead of the June 12 election, according to a statement released by the group. ACTion Alexandria hopes to work with both parties during the general election.

Participants in the project can add questions to the forum, or vote on questions that have already been posed, although each user is only given three votes to distribute. Users are also encouraged to use their real names. Questions submitted so far hit on topics ranging from broadband access to a ban on food trucks in the city.

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