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).

• Dear Community Managers, don’t be hard on yourself, it’s your company culture that’s not ready to be “social” – The Buzz Bin – "In my ten years of working with corporate communications and marketing pros across Fortune 500, small to medium sized organizations, I have come across two specific types of organizations: i) organizations that have a culture of learning, collaboration and hence find ways to increase efficiencies and ii) companies that have the same beliefs but those beliefs never made it past the MISSION STATEMENT.  I have no problem against the latter as long as you are positively affecting the company’s bottom line and meeting your goals but I do have a few things to say to social media strategists who have been hired to do their job but end up spending more time just wrestling within their office corridors to go “social.”"
• Microsites for Nonprofits: Your Questions Answered | NTEN – "What do you do when you want to give extra publicity to a specific cause or campaign? Featuring one campaign too prominently could distract from other things. If you don't feature your campaign enough, it could get lost in the mix. So what's the solution? One proven method quickly growing in popularity is the microsite. A microsite is a mini-website, generally two to four pages, focused on a specific topic or campaign. These mini-websites are usually graphic-heavy and have very straightforward, action-oriented copy. Actions can include making donations, social media sharing, signing a petition, and more. Microsites can also promote dynamic content."
• Why Being Good Enough Is Never Enough on the Internet – Forbes – This is an important post I think everyone should read! Thanks to Deanna Zandt for being so thoughtful and smart in her analysis: "Let’s break down why the meritocracy myth is both so pervasive and problematic. The Internet is indeed a blank canvas in many ways. The egalitarian nature of the web as platform — for example, technically, no link or traffic is prioritized over another — makes it easier to connect people and ideas that were previously isolated. In the early days of the web, it was stunningly clear to most of us that we could do whatever we wanted, and that freedom was intoxicating. What we weren’t paying attention to was how we brought the advantages we carry in our offline lives– often defined by race, gender, class, and now, technological access and skill– to that blank canvas."
• Ushahidi and the Long Tail of Mapping for Social Change | TechPresident – I couldn't agree more with David's post and analysis of DeadUshahidi, a directory of "dead" installations of the open source Ushahidi mapping platform. Read the full post to hear both David's take, and suggestions for success from Patrick Meier. "DeadUshahidi’s mocking tone towards maps it deems ineffective, without any understanding of the goals of the groups behind them, is problematic. Moreover, mocking people or organizations whose maps don’t succeed hardly seems noble, and could even deter experimentation. In Silicon Valley, they say they celebrate failures and their lessons as key to a culture of innovation and success. While its intentions are ultimately good, it is hard to see how DeadUshahidi fosters such a culture in the world of crisis management."
• Millennial Presence in the Media | Mobilize.org – Did you read the list from ABC4.com of 8 characteristics of Millennials? I think Nathan has a great post here highlighting how off the mark some of those "characteristics" are, especially the idea that all Millennials would be considered Socialists! What do you think?

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 accepted online technology as your organizational savior? – Small Act – “When your leadership has Shiny Object Syndrome, you’ll often come to work to find newspaper clippings on your desk or links in your email all about the Next Big Thing. There will be a note attached that says, “Let’s do this!” You’ll sigh inwardly, instantly thinking of a dozen reasons why it probably won’t work or why you lack the time and energy to give it the best shot possible (mainly because you’re probably still wrestling with the previous Shiny Object du jour), but you’ve fought and lost enough battles of this type to know that you might as well suck it up and do what they’re asking. The problem with Shiny Object Syndrome is that it operates on the assumption that because something is “popular” (like, say, Foursquare), then simply using it will guarantee success for your organization. This isn’t always the case. In fact, it rarely is.”
• 10 Non-Profits Leveraging Pinterest for Social Good – “There’s no question that Pinterest is the hottest social network right now. From your friends and family to celebrities, athletes and designers, everyone’s pinning visually interesting content. But did you know that non-profit organizations are pinning, too?” Have you tried Pinterest? Do you think it would be valuable for your organization or a waste of time?
• Forget Generation Y: 18- to 34-Year-Olds Are Now ‘Generation C’ – Interesting inforgraphic about the “Connected Generation” – what do you think? “It’s hardly news that young adults are the most digitally connected, but now Nielsen has come up with a new name for this group based on their common behaviors: “Generation C.” The C stands for “connected,” and the group comprises Americans between 18 and 34 — who are defined by their digital connectivity, Nielsen and NM Incite’s U.S. Digital Consumer Report says. They consume media, socialize and share experiences through devices more than other age groups.”
• Infographic: Do people still trust the news during election season? – Very interesting new infographic helping dissect data from a national poll examining whether or not Americans trust the media during political peaks. “The survey revealed the dramatic lack of trust Americans hold for sources of election news of all mediums. Of the six media types explored in the survey (cable news stations, network news, newspapers, talk radio, internet news sites, and blogs and social media), ‘traditional’ news outlets scored highest in terms of perceived credibility compared to newer and less traditional mediums…”
• Business competitiveness is defined by social innovation | Guardian Sustainable Business | guardian.co.uk – “There are few companies that can afford to not label themselves as green and something similar is happening to the word social. From corporate social responsibility to social business to social investment, previously limited to charitable activities and workers’ rights, social is on the march to becoming the new green. As with any label, ubiquity is as much a measure of success as a sign of abuse. And as with green we have to smarten up and learn to ask the right questions. For social impact some judge by good intention, while others measure by human development indicators or complicated calculations on social rates of return.”
• Spring of Code – “The OccupyLondon tech team is pleased to invite Occupiers and friends from the Open Source software community all around the world to participate in the biggest series of global Occupy code sprints yet, the Spring of Code.”

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).

• Constant Contact Survey Reveals Social Media is a Critical Marketing Tool for Event Planners; Usage Expected to Increase | Business Wire – "A new survey from Constant Contact® finds that social media marketing has become a critical marketing tool for small businesses and nonprofits planning events, with 77% of event planners currently using social media to market their events, and another 14% planning to do so in the next year. The survey also reports that event planners still rely heavily on email marketing, online event marketing tools, websites, and print advertising to promote their events, indicating that traditional forms of event marketing still play an essential role in promoting an event." Get the free ebook "The State of Event Marketing" at: http://img.constantcontact.com/docs/pdf/EVM-EBOOK.pdf
• Upgrading Voter Registration – "Approximately 24 million active voter registrations in the United States are no longer valid or have significant inaccuracies, according to the Pew Center on the States. Research in Pew's report, Inaccurate, Costly, and Inefficient, underscores the need for registration systems that better maintain voter records, save money, and streamline processes. This is an effort that eight states are spearheading with Pew’s support." Registering people to vote, so long as you allow anyone to register for any party and do not advocate for specific voting actions, is not outside your 501c3 status. I really wish more organizations included voter registration efforts in their community work!
• What We Talk About When We Talk About Digital Activism | The Meta-Activism Project – "Usually when we talk about digital activism we talk about concrete anecdotes (the Arab Spring, the 2012 presidential race, the Koman/Planned Parenthood blow-up) or abstract trends (slacktivism, cyber-war, hacktivism).  What we rarely talk about is how we talk about digital activism: Is our focus in the right place? Do we know what we’re talking about? Are we being honest?"
• Jillian C. York » The Arab Digital Vanguard: How a Decade of Blogging Contributed to a Year of Revolution – This is a terrific piece from Jillian York – a must read on digital activism! "This article was first published in the Georgetown Journal of International Affairs Vol. 13 Issue 1 (Winter/Spring 2012), “Language, Identity and Politics” and is re-published here with permission."
• The Age of Mobile Email Has Arrived. Are You Ready? | NTEN – "What if you found out that one-quarter of your subscribers were reading your emails on their mobile phones? There’s a good chance they already are. (And if they’re not, they will be soon!) As of November 2011, 89.6 million Americans are using their mobile phones to access their work or personal email. That's an increase of 28% in the last year alone."

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).

• Can Members of Congress Keep Up with the Digital World? – Online Fundraising, Advocacy, and Social Media – – "Let’s face it, the world is no picnic these days. We’re facing climate change. The world’s oceans are on the verge of being irreparably damaged. One of the worst humanitarian crises continues to escalate in the Horn of Africa, where famine, war and drought are threatening 13M+ people. Thankfully, we have some incredible nonprofits on the ground who continue to tackle these issues everyday, raise awareness and mobilize people into action. And now more than ever, people are reaching out to their members of congress through online channels to voice their concerns about some of these very issues. But how is Congress responding? Are they adopting new methods fast enough to respond to their constituents in the digital age? Is the fear that their responses could be modified with malintent valid? The Congressional Management Foundation new study, Communicating with Congress: How Citizen Advocacy Is Changing Mail Operations on Capitol Hill provides some good insight."
• Donate Your Account | HelpAttack! – "Well how about that – after Epic Change’s use of JustCoz, and Al Gore’s campaign with Climate Reality Project in September to get folks to donate their status updates, someone has gone and open sourced the concept.  Donate Your Account seems to allow anyone to set up a campaign, and allow others with Twitter or Facebook accounts to automatically re-broadcast messages from that campaign."
• 92% of Americans Take Action for Social Good [INFOGRAPHIC] – "Ninety-two percent of American’s took action for social change this past year, according to the Social Change Impact Report from Walden University. The report was created as a kind of barometer for who is engaged in social change, what issues matter to them and how they’re working together. Surprisingly, tech did not play a huge role. According to the report, people from Generation Y were more likely to get involved through traditional means than digital. Only 52% of the demographic posted a comment or expressed an opinion through a blog or website (it’s unclear if this also includes Facebook or other social networks). This, however, butts up against more promising stats such as 80% of respondents believe technology is getting more people involved in social change than ever, and 65% of adult respondents say that social media is not just a fad."
• The Case for Innovation in Advocacy | Association Advocacy Chick – "I am not an innovator. Correction: I have been convinced that I cannot be an innovator. If you were to play word association with advocacy, I’m sure innovation is not the word you’d come up with.  But why is that? Many associations insist that it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.  Yes, traditional lobbying, grassroots advocacy, and political involvement are effective ways of moving or defeating legislation.  However, what if there’s a way to make those methods even better?  Fly-ins are great, but expensive.  Political action committees are prohibited for many cases.  What does that mean for the in-house lobbyist who needs to convince a few key people to support their legislation?"
• How The Seemingly Chaotic But Wildly Successful Fringe Festival Makes It Work | Fast Company – "This has been an explosive summer–markets in turmoil, cities in flames, politics in meltdown. So it's a relief to enjoy and learn from an explosion of a different sort–the explosion of creativity taking place this August in Edinburgh, Scotland, at the renowned Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The festival, a one-time icon of artistic rebellion, is now the largest arts gathering in the world. It is also an entertaining case study in the power of grassroots innovation and open-source creativity, a positive symbol of how unchecked human energy, shaped by a few simple rules, can unleash truly amazing results."

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).

• The Revolutions Were Tweeted: Visualizing Prominent Information Flows during the Tunisia and Egypt Revolutions – This is a very cool visualization from danah boyd pulling together twitter accounts and displaying tweets, reactions, and much more. Really interesting to see the combination of various kinds of information sources – from traditional media outlets to individuals.
• Too Many Messages and Only One Facebook Page: April 6th Movement in Post-Mubarak Egypt | technosociology – Check out this great guest post by Susannah Vila on the technosociology blog! "This post draws from over 30 in-depth, semi structured interviews conducted with coordinators of and participants in the Egyptian revolution between March and August 2011."
• A Roundup of Valuable Twitter Tools – Noupe – A great round up of Twitter tools – some great long-time favorites and some newer tools. Any others you'd add? "It is hard to argue against the value of Twitter these days, especially for businesses and professionals looking to network and stay ahead of the curve. Like the throngs of designers and developers that have flooded this social media outlet’s streams and sapped its API since its inception. And with so many amazing tools available to expand on, and enhance the overall user’s experience, Twitter is becoming even more useful and handy than ever before."
• How Much Money Do Americans Give Online? [INFOGRAPHIC] – "Everyone says it’s hard to measure social good success. Well, non-profit consultancy Convio begs to differ. The firm recently put out an infographic showing that the Internet is the fastest-growing channel for non-profits. The graphic compares money raised, awareness gained and a variety of other factors across a three-year period. Since 2008, non-profits have cracked the $1 billion mark for online fundraising. In 2010, the average online gift jumped up to $91.94."
• Five Ways for Human Service Nonprofits to Reset their Funding Models – "…most nonprofits have in effect two customers— the beneficiaries they are supporting, and the funders who are paying for the work. In most instances (unlike business) these are not the same parties. … But this is a balance that very few nonprofits manage to strike; the lion’s share of their energy and focus goes into their program model, not their funding model. The big empirical finding runs counter to the conventional wisdom that nonprofits need to diversify their funding across multiple funding sources— foundations, high net worth donors, small individual contributors, corporate philanthropy, government, etc.— in order to grow and become more sustainable. What we have found instead is that for the vast majority of large nonprofits, especially for those with budgets of $50 million and up, it pays to focus, not diversify across different sources."

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).

• Groupon Case Study: Jolkona’s Groupon Experiment | Community Organizer 2.0 – Check out this great interview by Debra Askanase with Laura Kimball, discussing their experiment using Groupon! "Jolkona ran a Groupon deal as an experiment to try to raise money for a specific campaign using Groupon. Jolkona partnered with the Seattle International Foundation (SIF), which pledged to match every donation, dollar for dollar, up to $25,000. Starting July 26th, Groupon Seattle’s G-Team allowed subscribers to join Jolkona and SIF in making an investment in women’s leadership by pledging support in increments of $10. For each $500 collected, Jolkona would fund one week of training for a woman leader to come to Seattle and participate in a 10-week fellowship program, run by iLEAP: The Center for Critical Service."
• Year-end appeals have you stumped? Four quick tips to get the ball rolling | Big Duck – "This is the time of year when most people I know are thinking about ‘back to school’ and beginning to plan their fall/winter holidays and vacations. Of course for us Ducks and most of you, this time of year is dominated by the ever-glorious year-end fundraising appeal. These days, the year-end giving season starts as early as October. In fact, as I write this (in mid-August), we’re already at work on several year-end campaigns. If you’re not quite there yet, here are a few quick tips I hope you’ll find useful to get your fundraising wheels in motion."
• When Communities Identify Their Own Poor, Aid Has The Most Effect | Fast Company – "When governments and NGOs plan on giving assistance to the most needy, how do they know who needs the most assistance? It's a question people are at great pains to answer, yet social welfare programs around the world are still plagued by error and abuse. That has not deterred the development of programs to help people escape extreme poverty. But because the poor–especially those earning less than $2 or $3 per day–typically hold informal jobs with no official records about their earnings, conventional ways to determine need are ineffective. MIT researchers in a recent study (PDF) looked at two alternative methods for establishing who needs assistance."
• 7 Things Nonprofits Can Talk About on Facebook Besides Themselves « – "Recently I met with a client who was sensitive about what they posted on Facebook, because they not only had privacy issues to be concerned with of their constituents, but they didn’t think that the other things they do would be applicable to their fans on Facebook. In other words they didn’t think that their fans on Facebook cared about what their organization was doing other than fundraising."
• Complex and Contradictory: A New Way to Think of Digital Activism | The Meta-Activism Project – "The effect of digital technology on political contention is neither good nor bad, it is both.  Yes, the Internet can help activists mobilize and re-frame public issues.  It can also distract citizens and feed apathy.  It can also help repressive governments watch and censor their citizens.  The sooner we accept digital technology’s complex and contradictory effect of political power dynamics, the sooner we can move forward to answering more interesting questions about those effects.  What contextual factors lead to these different outcomes?  Why does one factor win out over others when all three are in play?"
• 5 Reasons Social Media Measurement is Making You Lie to Yourself | social media measurement | Social Media Consulting – Convince & Convert – I love the comparision Jay makes here between Twitter and email, followers equals sends and actual Twitter reach (people reading and responding) equals open rate. Really changes the impact of those Twitter numbers! "Social media measurement causes unsavory (and ineffective) marketing behavior because unlike the rest of our marketing key performance indicators, social media metrics are out there for anyone to see."

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).

• Marketing to Media-Savvy Gen Y: Transparency, Authenticity – Advertising Age – News – "They entered the consumer market during the stormiest economic climate since the Great Depression. And like the generation that was forever altered by the harsh sacrifices of World War II, millennials are likely to be permanently affected by the Great Recession and its long-term ripples. But these characteristics won't change about the demographic: They are vocal, demanding and discerning."
• Online Fundraising, Advocacy, and Social Media – frogloop – "Can I be honest? I’m worried about the lack of nonprofit leadership creating a culture of innovation. While multi-channel outreach such as action alerts, microsites, social media, fundraising appeals, direct mail and telemarketing are good strategies to have in your toolbox to fundraise and market your organization; it’s simply not enough anymore. To truly raise your nonprofit’s profile (aka increase brand awareness), grow your constituency, and raise even more money in 2011 and beyond, organizations need to also focus on innovating."
• Facebook And Skype Officially Announce New Integration – "Today Facebook and Skype officially announced a new partnership which includes the complete integration of the Facebook newsfeed into Skype as well as the phonebook which lists all of a Skype user’s Facebook friends. This is another major partnership for Facebook who has announced numerous partnerships in recent weeks, including yesterday’s announcement with Bing."
• National Theatre’s Twitter Screw-up – What We Can Learn From Other People’s Mistakes | The Nest – "Over the last month, The Nest has been conducting social media training in nine regional theatre venues across five states. Commissioned by national touring agency, Performing Lines, the training assisted venues in marketing the forthcoming tour of Red Stitch’s acclaimed production of ‘Red Sky Morning‘. We helped marketing and management staff get to grips with, and genuinely leverage, social media to help sell the show."
• URL Shorteners: Blind(ly) Heading Towards Disaster? – Online Fundraising, Advocacy, and Social Media – frogloop – "Social networking has forced nonprofits to be comfortable with two-way communications, transparency, and adapting to short social conversations using limited character counts. As part of this communications evolution, nonprofits have grown accustomed to relying on url shorteners such as bit.ly and ow.ly to quickly share links to blog posts, advocacy and fundraising campaign on social networks. Plus some of the tracking stats (number of clicks, referrer, locations) have been useful to nonprofits in helping to determine which links resonated with their constituents. However, just today a .ly shortener called vb.ly has been seized by the Libyan government for failure to comply with Islamic law. And now this has all .ly url shorteners on high alert. You may be wondering how this is possible and what kind of impact will this have on nonprofits?"

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."

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).

• More Startups. More Jobs. – Here's a great conversation starting piece by Eric Ries: "Advanced countries are competing to attract the world’s best entrepreneurs — the US should too. Entrepreneurship is one of the most significant contributors to a nation’s prosperity. In an increasingly globalized economy, many of the advanced nations in the world are racing to attract the brightest entrepreneurial minds, regardless of their country of origin. The startups created by these highly skilled immigrants will generate most of the jobs and wealth in these countries in the future. This is a race we cannot afford to ignore."
• 2009 In Social Media: A Cartoon Review – Rob Cottingham, from Social Signal, created a very fun video that recaps all the major contributions of social media to the world in 2009 – think you were on top of it all? Well, check out Rob's video and see what you missed!
• Highlights from My Conversation with Tori Tuncan, Founder of Lend4Health – Zane Safrit – "Tori Tuncan, founder of Lend4Health, joined the show recently. Lend4Health is a non-profit organization that facilitates community-funded, interest-free micro-loans as a creative funding option for individuals and groups seeking optimal health. Currently, Lend4Health is facilitating loans for the "biomedical" treatment of children and adults with autism spectrum and related disorders. Tori shared the story of her journey to date with Lend4Health, helping children and their families who experience autism spectrum and related disorders." You can listen to the audio recording of the interview or read the transcript.
• How Digitized Content Democratizes Knowledge – PC World – "If you follow the trend lines for book and magazine availability, pricing and the costs of distribution and digital storage, we'll soon find ourselves living in a world where literally millions of titles are available to just about everyone, just about all the time. How will that change human culture?" This very interesting post from PC World explores implications of the changing digital landscape – it's a great read!
• Chief Reputation Officer: Whose Job Is It, Anyway? – Forbes.com – "n the 20th century, PR and marketing were separate but unequal career paths, and CMO was the highest-ranking and most-respected title to which one in those jobs could aspire. The standard career paths in these areas were relatively linear: As a lead communicator, you went to j-school, did a turn in journalism or an agency and then apprenticed under a "gray hair" boss until he retired. This is compared with the typical path of a chief marketing officer, who got his or her M.B.A. in marketing, hired agencies that made him or her look good, learned how to manage big budgets and award-winning creative and then got in the running for the corner office. Today that is changing because of the increasing importance of reputation management."