Tag: activism

Great reads from around the web on August 11th

By BylineAmy Sample Ward on

I come across so many great conversations, ideas, and resources all over the web every day. Here are some of the most interesting things I’ve found recently (as of August 11th). You can join the conversations in the comments, or click through to the original posts to find what others are saying.

To follow more of the things I find online, you can follow @amysampleward on Twitter (which is just a blog and resource feed), or find me on Delicious (for all kinds of bookmarks).

  • Social Versus Entrepreneur – "Grammatically, the word social modifies entrepreneur, indicating a social entrepreneur is one whose entrepreneurial activity is social in nature. I think about the word social as referring to social welfare, be it poverty alleviation, environmental protection, or any type of intervention that benefits humanity in what has traditionally been thought of as a charitable way. With so many new ventures founded every day, it is becoming increasingly more difficult for me to decipher what the social purposes of some initiatives are. This is a significant problem for the social enterprise movement."
  • Submit your Case Study to the Global Digital Activism Data Set! – "The goal of the Global Digital Activism Data Set (GDADS) project is to turn qualitative case studies of digital activism around the world into a non-proprietary quantitative machine-readable data set in spreadsheet form that will facilitate the work of scholars in this new field." Learn more and submit your case study today!
  • http://manage-volunteers.org/ – "As far as we know, it is the first such comprehensive listing of options for causes, nonprofits, and NGOs who need tools to manage volunteers. Organizations that rely on volunteering can compare and contrast the wide variety of volunteer management software available, and more quickly identify the software that is right for them. Software developers may also gain better recognition and hopefully more customers by having their software listed on the database. <br />
    <br />
    Our goal with this site is to help nonprofits and other volunteer organizations grow and thrive by giving them easy access to the<br />
    resources they need to better manage their time and volunteers. <br />
    <br />
    Our goal with this site is to help nonprofits and other volunteer organizations grow and thrive by giving them easy access to the<br />
    resources they need to better manage their time and volunteers."<br />
    <br />
    Check it out and provide your feedback!
  • The 2010 Social Networking Map / Flowtown (@flowtown) – I love maps and I work in social media; so I always love the maps of social media! Here is an updated version of XKCD's Map of Online Communities; with updated numbers and networks.
  • Four social media lessons from the New York Times | Creativity_Unbound – "If you look at the Times from another perspective – that of partnerships, social media behavior, and content – the company’s actually a shining example of how to hold onto core values and evolve at the same time. Here are four things it’s done that serve as examples for any traditional company, including advertising agencies."

… Continue readingGreat reads from around the web on August 11th

Great reads from around the web on May 17th

By BylineAmy Sample Ward on

I come across so many great conversations, ideas, and resources all over the web every day. Here are some of the most interesting things I’ve found recently (as of May 17th). You can join the conversations in the comments, or click through to the original posts to find what others are saying.

To follow more of the things I find online, you can follow @amysampleward on Twitter (which is just a blog and resource feed), or find me on Delicious (for all kinds of bookmarks).

  • HOW TO: Turn Slacktivists into Activists with Social Media – "Throughout the non-profit world, organizations struggle with social media’s impact on the volunteer and donor cycle. The rise of “slacktivism” — doing good without having to do much at all — challenges organizations to rethink the way they cultivate their core volunteers and donors. There are some important social media strategies for transforming those one-click “slacktivists” into fully engaged activists. Here are five tips from some of the best in the non-profit business."
  • In Effort to Boost Reliability, Wikipedia Looks to Experts – Digits – WSJ – "Wikipedia is teaming with universities in a bid to entice professors and their students to beef up its coverage of complicated public-policy topics — part of a move by the online encyclopedia to strengthen editing and fill in gaps in its articles. The Wikimedia Foundation, which finances and oversees the nonprofit site, received a $1.2 million grant from the Stanton Foundation to work with academic experts on Wikipedia articles related to public policy, which could include everything from political theory to legislative history and issues such as health reform and science. The goal is to get professors — and, in turn, their students — involved in producing more articles on public policy and improving the quality of the articles that already exist."
  • The Next Generation of American Giving – Online Fundraising, Advocacy, and Social Media – frogloop – Here is a great guest post from Jocelyn Harmon on the Care2 Frogloop blog: "“Our donors are aging-out.” “We need to attract younger donors.” “We need to be on Facebook.” These are some of the common refrains I hear from nonprofits. It seems that everyone is trying to bring younger donors into the fold. But what does younger mean? Does it mean connecting with the Baby Boomers, creating a gateway to the Millenials, or both? And, how do you do it? Should you buy a list of 50 – 60 year olds, or should someone on your staff become savvier with email marketing and social media? A new study, by Convio, Edge Research and Sea Change Strategies, The Next Generation of American Giving: A study on the contrasting charitable habits of Generation Y, Generation X, Baby Boomers and Matures, answers these questions, and more. See an overview of the findings below."
  • ChatRoulette : Web Ecology Project – "This paper represents an initial study of ChatRoulette.com, conducted between February 6th and 7th, 2010 by researchers in attendance at Web Ecology Camp III in Brooklyn, NY. We sampled 201 ChatRoulette sessions, noting characteristics such as group size and gender. We also conducted 30 brief interviews with users to inquire about their age, location, and frequency of ChatRoulette use."
  • Twitter tactics – Louder.org.uk campaigning resources and info – "Twitter is growing at gigantic rate, experiencing 1,500% growth in the last year (for more stats see The State and Future of Twitter 2010). For those who are not converts it does seem to be the latest in a line of social media tools that everyone thinks you should be using. But what is in it for campaigners trying to bring about social change? Below sets out three main ways in which campaigners have already been using Twitter in their work to get you thinking and there are also three great examples to illustrate. Please add any experiences or thoughts of your own."

… Continue readingGreat reads from around the web on May 17th

Great reads from around the web on January 29th

By BylineAmy Sample Ward on

I come across so many great conversations, ideas, and resources all over the web every day. Here are some of the most interesting things I’ve found recently (as of January 29th). You can join the conversations in the comments, or click through to the original posts to find what others are saying.

To follow more of the things I find online, you can follow @amysampleward on Twitter (which is just a blog and resource feed), or find me on Delicious (for all kinds of bookmarks).

  • JustGiving blog: Seven-year-old Charlie raises more than £100,000 for Haiti! – Read this great case study from JustGiving about Charlie's bike ride to raise money for Haiti relief support. "Charlie was really upset by the television footage of the Haiti disaster, so, in conversation with his mum, he came up with idea of cycling around South Park near his home in Fulham, London as many times as possible. As Charlie puts on his JG page, ‘at least 10 laps, I hope!’. Charlie set himself a fundraising target of £500 for UNICEF – not an insubstantial amount for a seven-year-old."
  • Why We're In the Age of the Citizen Philanthropist – There's a great post up on Mashable with quotes from Britt Bravo (Have Fun Do Good), Kari Dunn Saratovsky (Case Foundation), and Peter Panepento (Chronicle of Philanthropy). "Our new communications technologies have empowered the individual, and caused a disruptive effect on the non-profit sector. Here are five examples of the citizen philanthropist’s immediate impact."
  • Footnotes: Online Outreach on a Budget – January Nonprofit Blog Carnival – "This month we spent some time collecting posts about nonprofit communications on a budget. Below you'll find a combination of great resources that were submitted, and information I've found useful in my own research on online outreach. So bookmark this post and take the time to apply this knowledge to marketing and communications at your organization – it's cheap (or free) and has worked for others!"
  • Online Branded Communities: Misguided and Missing the Point – Marketing News Blog – This is an excellent review of best practices and case studies for online community management. Even though the authors (Kathy Baughman and Steve Hershberger) are focused on for-profit brands, the lessons ring true across sectors. "If you ask brand managers the purpose of online communities, the reply you’ll most often hear is “customer engagement.” Among marketers, this term is more prevalent than Frisbees at a dog beach. But the real question is this: Are brands providing meaningful and engaging experiences to their customers through their online communities? Our research on 135 online communities representing 45 major brands indicates that, with few exceptions, the answer is no."
  • Idealware Field Guide to Software for Nonprofits by Laura Quinn in Computers & Internet – "What types of software should your nonprofit be using? It’s hard to even know even what types exist, let alone what might work for you. Through a friendly, easy-reference format, this book helps you pinpoint the types of software that can help your organization based on your needs and your level of technology savvy, and provides user-friendly summaries to demystify all the possible options.

    The 84-page Field Guide includes an overview of 35 different types of software, helping you to understand what each is, how it fits in with your needs, how much you might expect to pay, and some of the most common vendors in the area."

… Continue readingGreat reads from around the web on January 29th

Great reads from around the web on December 2nd

By BylineAmy Sample Ward on

I come across so many great conversations, ideas, and resources across the web ever day. Here are some of the most interesting things I’ve found recently (as of December 2nd). You can join the conversations in the comments, or click through to the original posts to find what others are saying.

To follow more of the things I find online, you can follow @amysampleward on Twitter (which is just a blog and resource feed), or find me on Delicious (for all kinds of bookmarks).

  • ReputationOnline » Blog Archive » Jonathan Waddingham on ‘Can you turn fans into consumers?’ – Jonathan Waddingham from JustGiving has a great post up today: "The advent of Facebook fan pages has been great news for brands wanting to create communities without having to build their own social network. In many cases, it’s largely pointless trying to create your own community when the people you want to attract are already part of another one… But what do you do with your fans once you’ve got them?"
  • How Facebook turns active users into community managers – without paying a dime (video) | Powered by John Haydon – John Haydon has a great post and video discussing facebook's strategic design that empowers users to be community managers. "You want to develop a stronger, more passionate community. You want your members to invite like-minded folks to join your community and you want the cultists to encourage others to be more active. You them to do both of these things regularly. And you want this all to happen naturally – because it won’t happen if you push."
  • Social Media Analytics: Twitter: Quantitative & Qualitative Metrics | Occam's Razor by Avinash Kaushik – "Twitter is amongst new media channels that are challenging how we communicate, with whom we communicate and perhaps most fundamentally how we (Marketers) influence people. … So in this post my hope is to share with you what is unique about measuring one such channel, Twitter. The blog post is also sprinkled with my own words of folksy wisdom as to how you should use the channel for maximum impact."
  • Is Your Organization Human Enough for Social Media? — SocialFish – "Social media can be overwhelming. There are so many tools, none of which you’ve used before, so you don’t have an intuitive sense of how they work, let alone if they are really helping you get the work of your organization done. And if you’ve gotten into these tools at all, you’ve probably noticed that they are not implemented in the same way as many other initiatives within your organization. You’re not sure who’s supposed to tweet or blog, and suddenly there are people outside of your staff who are saying things your staff used to say."
  • Three Ways You Can Help Build The Future of NABUUR | NABUUR Blog – "NABUUR exists so people like you can make a real difference for communities worldwide. With your contributions, you have improved the lives of countless others. You have proven it works. Now, your talents and time are needed to take the next step: make NABUUR itself self-supporting and driven by a global community of volunteers. In the last year alone, the numbers of volunteers and villages have doubled. Together, we learned how to connect, share and work together via the internet, without bureaucratic controlling bodies. NABUUR is following this path itself: already, many of you have taken over work that previously required office staff. And a bold next step is ahead! From January on, NABUUR will be volunteer-run: no more office staff. The NABUUR platform will remain online, and limited central support will still be available, but how it will develop will be up to the community to decide."

… Continue readingGreat reads from around the web on December 2nd

Great reads from around the web on November 24th

By BylineAmy Sample Ward on

I come across so many great conversations, ideas, and resources across the web ever day. Here are some of the most interesting things I’ve found recently (as of November 24th). You can join the conversations in the comments, or click through to the original posts to find what others are saying.

To follow more of the things I find online, you can follow @amysampleward on Twitter (which is just a blog and resource feed), or find me on Delicious (for all kinds of bookmarks).

  • Have you always wanted to be a 'climate insider'? | TckTckTck – The 350ppm movement is doing a lot of hard work in the lead up to the talks in Copenhagen this December. "Our latest feature is a global rapid response community we launched last month, called ClimateInsider. ClimateInsider is fast becoming the new media hub that will support a digital rapid response network leading up to and during Copenhagen climate change summit." Check it out and apply to be an Insider now!
  • Facebook Charity Interview Questions – Earlier this year, John Carnell created a series called Twitter Charity Interviews that has over 40 interviews with nonprofits using Twitter talking about how, why, and what they do with the micro-blogging tool. Now, John is looking to replicate the process but focus on Facebook. If you want to share the ways your organizations is using Facebook to engage with supporters, visit this link to get the questions and the submission information.
  • Give to the Max Day – GiveMN – giveMN.org created Give to the Max Day as a way to kick off use of the new giving platform. It was more of a success than they expected with huge numbers of participation and donations! You can see the full results here and check out the site, too.
  • Strategy stuff – a three pronged approach – "Drawing together a few discussions I have been involved in recently about the different types of documents an organisation – such as a council – might need to put together to define its approach to engaging online, I thought it might be useful to set out how I think it could be done."
  • New Start Magazine: The toolkit for practitioners in regeneration, economic development & sustainable communities – "New Start is the toolkit for regeneration practitioners. It's a creative and informative magazine, but it's more than that: it's an online news service, a recruitment aid, a partner for organisations wanting to spread learning and to showcase good practice, and the place that the sector's leading thinkers use to kick-start a debate on key issues."

… Continue readingGreat reads from around the web on November 24th