Emerging Technologies and the Future of Activism

Alex Steffen , Worldchanging.com
Markos Zuniga, DailyKos.com (no show)
Gideon Rosenblatt, ONE/Northwest Movement-as-Network
Chris Davis, CommEnSpace.org

ONE/Northwest - networks move money and people...there are lessons from biology as it relates to networks...receptors in cells are there to pick up signals from the environment...information coming in is what's important..information and action...intersections with networks.

Blogs are interesting...they are trusted networks of information among people with shared interests...the struggle is translating online activities into offline activism...scale is a factor, for larger groups traditional marketing techniques may be more effective

CommEnSpace.org - looking at data visualization, data coming from government, internal sources...putting data into context...working with intactive web based tools that invite collaboration..e.g. protected lands database including land trust and govt. information

Archival information, rates of change in the landscape...visualize past change rates into the future...

Alex about DaiyKos - edited using "Scoop" software for their front page and individual diaries...question, what comes after blogs? Good for distributing stories, but not enough original content, moving from networks of machines to networks of people...

Questions...

International issues? We know more about local issues...

Networks of people vs. networks of organizations - ONE/northwest functions almost all at the organizational level...but what we want to do is build the networks of constituents...lots of "capacity building" for organizational growth giving people inappropriate advice on the wrong scale...differentiation is key, there's different solutions for integrating different networks...

Three types: 1) resource organizations like foundations, funding, tools, management services; 2) solution organizations working on specific issues or locations; 3) people organizations like MoveOn, not an issue group, they use it to build power and constituencies, act as an intermediary between movement and the general public

What's an example of a people organization? Entity that builds a brand identity, is of service, listens to members but also has some leadership to provide focus (e.g. environmental activist groups). It aggregates both information and service (hiking, information about food, etc.). Solution organizations feed into this...

What is sad is the financial realities, amount of effort that has to be made for fundraising...people organizations can support solution organizations...

Some old school organizations are changing, focus on viral marketing; broadcast = N; netcast = n2; social networks = n3; there are 2 million blogs, more writing than reading; how do we create a content culture, for massively interactive distribution of culture? How do people involve in better ways? Progressive community needs more "public intellectuals" who shape opinion, the way to do this may be in a networked fashion. Current political organizing techniques (email, etc.) are just the first order, we still need better answers for longer term growth of these networks...

Network theory: structural equivalence = nodes playing a similar role will end up as competitors...everyone wants to be the hub of a hub and spoke network; network strategy is the "union strategy" to link the nodes...differs from a coalition by being individual membership based rather than a grouping or organiztions...

People organization: how do people link up? "Cultural creatives" have similar values...scale is important, you can be part of a national as well as neighborhood movement...care2.com is a new portal organization

There are different kinds of networks, how do they integrate; and what about face to face networks? It is like having different data sharing tools for different applications; people with complementary but different focus can use tools to connect; technical work facilitates social and political processes. Supports personal relationship development...

Need to work at global context of how to relate based on individuals rather than government or business structures.

Australian national sustainability network; have government and corporations as clients; foundation having a relationship with a technology provider...need a back and forth dialog...Claire Giadiani (?) new book "The Greater Good" examining low reliance on taxes in the US, reliance on "American Dream" where people can work their way up; one of the key factors have been private philanthropy funds R&D not in the corporate realm.

People organization needs to be a values oriented organization to counteract right wing organizations that do speak to their values. "Moral Politics" by George... Rockridge institute...

Dean campaign, produced a dozen commercials from ad agency people in the network...Civics Based Labs was the company working with these tools, being picked up on the Democratic side of this...Republicans have done a top down system with just as many people linked, but the information only is talking points...includes large broadcast media...progressives don't like to follow orders, there will be a test with very high stakes, including house and senate races...

Organizing Online - Best Practices from the Frontline

Moderator: Bill Pease, Getactive
Sally Green, Human Rights Campaign
Jason Lefkowitz, Oceana
Don Means, Meetup
Becky Bond, Working Assets
Ruby Sinreich, Planned Parenthood

Three kinds of organizations represented on the panel...

HRC - working in coalition with other organizations...stories from this year...court decision legalizing gay marriage, efforts to fight crackpot anti-gay constitutional amendment in congress...new campaign is "million for marriage" allowing signup....partnering with clickback America...now up to 500k people signed up...

Raised $300k in 24 hours when Bush announced support for constitutional amendment...have encouraged people to make their own pages on this issue...Mark Fiore just did a flash animation for them, leading to a pledge form.

Now testing effectiveness of different approaches for biggest click through rates...

Challenge is translating online people to offline action...signed up with MeetUp to help people organize themselves...need to activate people and still retain enough control over the message...helps connect people with others locally for activities...

Oceana.org (Jason) - online activism is still in its beginning stages...Oceana is for protecting the world's oceans, campaign-focused; international; scientific (numbers oriented) - just won an action to get Royal Caribbean cruise line to start treating its waste...

Lots of groups, hard to get above the noise..online connections can be shallow interactions such as spam, canned letters to congressman, furthers atomization of society, not really activism, too much one-way...repackaged direct mail thinking...everyone gets too much spam...

Not abandoning email, but working to improve the quality of relationships with members and connect with a broader global movement about the challenges facing the oceans...

Core principles are 1) respect the intelligence of membership, then you attract smarter members - no pointless communications, educate people, provide facts and links to detailed raw data, accrue and maintain a balance of trust; 2) engage with your members, show who you are (pictures of peoples' faces), allow interaction, answers to questions, encourage independent efforts, 3) tell the stories, explain and go beyond the dry facts into narrative, close the circle and let them know how the story ends even if it didn't work

E-activism more than managing a mailing list, it's maintaining a balance of trust...still learning how to do this...blog driven by Scoop...

MeetUp - two year old site, not built just for activism, but for all types of communities of interest...offers new choices for getting involved...provides a platform for people who are interested...

It is a for-profit enterprise not just a political tool. Has not been a tool for control, it empowers local groups. Voting is no longer enough; democracy is a good thing, and people should participate.

They are looking into how this works into governance on a local level; people are interested in global activism but opportunities are also local...

Working Assets - social change organization, has generated millions from phone company...80,000 calls and letters to decision makers per month, involved as a political actor and funder...

It's hard to communicate between non profits and technologists ...tackling innovation...WA decided to make an easy tool to help nonprofits get members to vote...20,000 people signed up through craigslist...privacy policy shares information among organizations...uses it for getting volunteers...

Planned Parenthood - 123 affiliate organizations including substantial, bricks and mortar places on the ground...share central database of names so activists get state and national updates...400k in DB....co-own names with affiliates, need to work with them for permission to contact people...

She has a blog...saveroe.com and lotusmedia.org/blog, now what?! Have to protect against right wing attacks...want to work more with opt-in lists, working with affiliates...

Flash movie rightwingeye.com for recruiting; online organizing is to do offline organizing; used getactive software to help do letter writing; protesting Karen Hughes linking planned parenthood with terrorism...showing up at her book signings...

People have different ideas locally about what should be done online, they let affiliates decide locally...

Meetup business models...venues who pay fee (public spaces)...people who partner with Meetup can pay a fee, also premium memberships for people...moving towards sponsoring activities rather than entities...users own their data, not activity sponsors...

Oceana uses RSS feeds but not too many people are using that capability...it's a venue for more frequent communications for those who want it...not used much...organizations like email because it's a push medium...check out progressivepipes ppipes.org for syndicating mailing lists

Cryptorights.org is open source hardware/software system for social justice organizations to communicate...highfyer (?) can send authenticated email with digital signatures, organize with privacy...

HRC does their effort with one person, input from others...startups can move more quickly...there's opportunities for non-campaign politics issue oriented blogs...staying virtual enables new organizational models

NGOblogs, open directory, google, yahoo, technorati for searching and discovering blogs and online activists; American prospect web site..also look at open source content management services...anthill communities...groundspring...droople...need layers between the geeks as nonprofits are not technically savvy...

Joan Blades - MoveOn

"Democracy is changing, people are connecting"...MoveOn origins, history, first petition 500k people, raised $2 million, etc...

MoveOn primary...300k people participated, Dean/Kuchinich/Kerry most popular...proved small contributions can provide support...

MoveOn Ad Contest...Bush in 30 Seconds...submitted and rated ads...voter fund has raised $10 million...May 8 Voter Mobilization Day...Bake sales...$750k raised...spinoff groups such as 1000flowers.org for registering women...drivingvotes.org

"50 ways to love your country" - stories of activism...

Movement...where does the connection take us...20^th century broadcast culture, poor quality leads to cynicism and passivity, hollowed out public sector...have to connect, listen, serve, trust and respect, "strong vision, big ears"...there's a hunger for connection to core values of compassion, fairness, justice, opportunity, diversity, community, family, country, freedom, responsibility, democracy..."We"...instead of "Me"

What about the two Americas? Progressive values are American values...lead from the heart...be bold...call to the best in all of us, we're dealing with human beings..America will answer!

Questions...what about international issues? What will MoveOn do? Issues are global...need to give good leaders the political capital to do what they should do across international boundaries...

The election is about George Bush, despite shortcomings of Kerry, it should not be a close race because Bush is unacceptable; MoveOn members see Kerry as a good politician, and think he needs to win.

Future directions require input from members....haven't spoken to conservative crowds...participation is a message that appeals to all ...the dialog focuses on areas where there's a fight...

MoveOn works on national issues, but there are stories about people acting on local issues; people can see opportunities and run with it. It's about everybody taking charge...

Deficits...not an exciting issue, it's pretty dry and Americans don't realize it's their Social Security at stake...

When members have a passion about an issue, the money comes in and the ads can be run....

How do you talk across party lines? MoveOn winning ad was aimed at Americans who watch the SuperBowl; the media has distorted the political picture; many Americans have their facts wrong...need voting by youth, etc. with progressive values...

Planetwork Perspective

Jim Fournier, Planetwork
Elizabeth Thompson, Planetwork

New online journal coming next month...

Opportunities through two pulls - the importance of the November election and the issues around virtual identities....thesis: things happen very fast now...there's actually a long time until November...explosion of changes in social networked software provides augmentation very rapidly; it's possible that the convergence of these two forced will be self reinforcing...can change the dynamics of who votes...

People do not have the same values as the media, the only opportunity is software based tools, not one to many...as these network empowering systems come online, a truly grass roots phenomenon can occur...people can share data in systems with permissions and privacy...

Top-Down vs Bottom-Up Organizing

Marty Kearns , GreenMedia Toolshed
Brad deGraf, Media Venture Collective
Bill Pease, GetActive Software
Jon Stahl, ONE/Northwest
Zephyr Teachout, Americans Coming Together

Media Venture - Smart Mobs vs. Amway...NY Times described the multilevel marketing of the president...Karl Rove comes from a direct marketing background...top down...

Paradim shift from the industrial to the network model...it's not Kerry that will win, it's the progressive networks that are organizing...

Visa model...Dee Hawk set up non-hierarchical decentralized network, from the cathedral to the bazaar...Paul Revere was the first social networker...

"Slime molds" - millions of individual organisms...form a "super organism" to act independently but create something larger...cellular automata model...chaos theory, interesting stuff happens at the edges; just acting locally allows larger behavior to arise....this benefits the left rather than the right...

Chaordic is "bottom out"...citizendemocracy.net del.icio.us

Big changes don't come from majorities; amway : industrial economy top town centralized hierarchical command and control extractive competitive; smart mobs information economy bottom out distributed networked emergent restorative cooperative.

Americans Coming Together - campaigns are weird...need to find people and organize, raise money. Obsession is how are the numbers, data and money...they are centralized in message and data...very much driven by money...contributors are more important than volunteers...

There's a core human need to be political, it's like the need for dating...our job is creating an architecture that enables transparent communication within hierarchical structures with good feedback loops; also enables communication between the nodes without abandoning the central control...

ONE/Northwest - works with Seattle area environmental nonprofits...there's differences between candidacy campaigns and grassroots issues campaigns...the latter are longer term and don't have a face...move slower...even victories have to be defended...

Groups have to be editors, taking ideas and repackaging them for the audience...candidates do this better...

Models of affiliates going up to a national organization from chapters give a new set of tools allowing them to be very participative and reactive...

Green Media Toolshed - network centric advocacy...politics have not caught up with the times...example is AARP, just got rolled by the drug industry...networks only live as long as they provide value...

Threats: 1)the bigger you get the more inefficiency you get during down time, more waste when not used; 2) market alternatives - phone banks, mailers, now there are services who do this, mimicking real activity and cheapening engagement 3)quickening of 24 hour news cycle, large groups can't keep up with the pace, can't predict the future 4) people don't join like they used to, parties, churches, no lifelong commitments 5)mob outputs, defining windows of opportunities; networks have different topographies

Spiderman logos on baseball bases - informal networks protested this...and it was axed....Amber alerts legislation passed quickly...large organizational models struggle to keep up....

Snowball effect; a few harmless flakes working together can unleash an avalanche of destruction...get them when they're off balance...

Summary - conventional: hierarchical command and control top down versus emergent democracy decentralized self forming groups, mobilize within social network using peer- to peer communications and distributed intelligence  

Two types are online organizing hubs, AFL-CIO, Planned Parenthood.... And content aggregators, MoveOn, WorkingForChange, Meetup

Advantages from the top down - rich hubs usually get richer; new competitors can win audience and influence; MoveOn can tap into the clustering of social networks; hierarchy is not bad, it divides the labor and operates in a cooperative fashion

Building community involes linking online and offline activity...support critical networking roles, clusterers and connectors and leaders/influencers; each operator needs specialized tools...cultivate affiliation networks, reduce competition

Cascades of political change require cohesion and connectivity across groups all the time, not just every four years...

Questions...in business networks the profit motive is the currency, harder with nonprofits...

We have technical codes and tools for aggregating information but it's not used, centerspace labs, indyvoter.org - the value is not in inventing it yourself but using already developed software...need to pressure large organizations to develop tools and change...people want more filtering and more control over their information

MoveOn works because it is effective, self organizing antiwar protests is an example.....

Bottom up is good for responding, but how do we get bottom up to build agendas; citizen democracy web site lets people decide what issues are important to them...what is the node level that you want to cultivate, it's between the precinct and not the top. Need to get Kerry to respond to the progressive agenda; need to cooperate among groups face to face, build trust...

Citizensspeak .org for getting messages out, targeting groups; give us tools about organizing ourselves..."hotel wake up service" to remind people to act...builds on the excitement of an event...

De.licio.us for links...

Esther Dyson - Social Networks - Platform, App or Construct: Q&A(rgument)

Social networks...database functions and double bind intermediary functions (introductions)

Added value objects in other applications using social networks...reverse entropy, things become more complex but easier to use...

Social networking tools are now integrated with email...problem is poor privacy and security (scrapes Outlook calendars). Two sides: building applications and social rules and customs. Example: Linked in; not enough clues about people who want to be your friend (do I know them? Are they a business contact?) Need a way to have a dialog to place them/know who they are.

Social network investors want growth...but systems must discourage spamming...different people are playing by different rules that need more definition...no easy way for intermediaries to make connections between two friends...

Example: ICANN...notion of community setting policy...definition of community was a problem...lots of diverse viewpoints...but now thinks online is not a place for resolving disputes although it does more things; online medium favors the literate English speaker...has a polarizing effect...

In the end, face to face meetings are the best for resolving matters...these are tools and you need the ability to use them

Questions - decision making tools? First establish community, agreement that decision will be binding, purpose is inclusion, not the decision per

Accountability...authentication/ peer to peer standards anti spoofing, etc.; requires persistent reputation/ identity...ebay allows reputation inflation...complex set of rules...anonymity is not generally a good idea...

Privacy issues; Linked in is working on this...whitelists...more complexity, analytics, brokering; identity management structure but doesn't solve social network problems or portability or control of data...

Problem: people have different online identities; balance between responsibility and ability to start over...difficult to deal with...

Ideal network: not winner takes all; better to have a small valuable community rather than a big one with no meaning; strong identity infrastructure ; hard to trade off good defaults and low complexity; groups should be able to set different parameters.

Ben Cohen - TrueMajority

Online organizing; business leaders for sensible priorities

History: started ice cream business...Pillbury/Hagendas tried to get them dropped..."what's the doughboy afraid of?"; campaign to fight this...business grew, decided not to sell it, but do things differently...decided to do a  public stock offering...1 in every 100 Vermont families bought stock

Set up foundation to give back 17% of pretax profit...

Problem: many human needs, education, etc...while pentagon consumes half the federal budget...business groups express their voice...focus on cultural creatives...activate people who agree...based on overarching values rather than separate issues...

Coincided with the rise of the Internet and email...enabled virtual organizing and monitoring of congress...involved with computer voting problems...

Sweet space is intersection between online and offline activism.... Need to get members to show up at legislator's offices...have produced animation showing federal budget, generated 100k new members...now doing road trips with trailer/George Bush pants on fire...Bush Begone 2004 house parties; rid ourselves from harmful pests!

Links: truemajority.org/oreo for the animations...

E-Voting

Ren Bucholz, EFF
Arthur Keller, Open Voting Consortium, UCSC
Ben Cohen, TrueMajority
David Dill, VerifiedVoting.org

Verified voting - handing responsibility over to a private corporation who counts the vote and then shreds it; need secure voting, ability to do recounts, paper ballots...

Issue is trying to build a jet plane while flying it...new organization needs development; tech watch organization; ability to get technologists involved as well as activism, watching the testing, and overseeing polling places...

True majority, relying on Verified Voting for expertise, put on a press conference at secy's of state convention. Federal senate committee is blocking bill, working on the state level now...obstacle is the disabled and foreign language speaking community; feel paper trail makes machines less accessible, need to overcome their objections. Pitney Bowes makes machines for counting paper ballots, can be an ally

EFF - knows how to sue people...gave advice on leaked Diebold code...also need to work at county level

VoteWatch - nonprofit for monitoring voting...will the next president be elected by the people or by mistake? 4-6% of voters are disenfranchised; faulty equipment and confusing ballots, registration mix ups, polling place operations, absentee ballot procedures are other factors;

2000 problems - Oregon, Iowa, New Mexico, Wisconsin and Florida; the margin of lost votes was greater than the margin of victory other states were close...

Votewatch is a citizen's effort independent of government agencies; allowing us to sample precincts and come up with error rates. Providing legal teams with evidence for going to court later...

Open voting consortium...developing free voting software with paper ballots; can use touch screen technology with bar coding; need for auditing, using digital signatures, paper ballots; use money to develop a publicly owned system which is open source...also need to replace canvassing systems to determine who voted...

Also need to have procedures for handling spoiled ballots, other problems...

Questions...how to get involved...need volunteers, one hour worth of training, two hours on election day, will be a statistically accurate based on random selection...close states plus California...can register online...need a transparent, complete audit trail...

Watching the polling place is only one part of this; also need an audit function...problem with electronic voting is so much of the processing is obscured...technology must be transparent for the process to be transparent...

Budgetary constraints...creating software that will work with Diebold machines which is open source...vendors are highballing bids for change, so it might not be a real constraint; we bought expensive machines, but that wasn't the problem, the process was the problem...security through obscurity doesn't work...

Useability is a problem; governor's race...candidates placed next to top candidates received more votes in counties with poor ballot design...10% of LA county votes not counted...there are lots of other problems, purging of voter rolls, etc.

The problem is generating sufficient trust that a person's vote is counted correctly without compromising the secret ballot system or allowing verification that someone voted a certain way (e.g. for vote buying)...

Brazil has a good system including faces of the candidates, mandatory voting...India also has a good system...illiteracy is a problem, but have simpler elections...machines are not inspected as to software. India had surprising results; in India you vote for a party.

Need rules; if you have two clocks you're not certain of the time...also a stopped clock is right twice a day!...

Problem is complexity of voting system, myriad of rules in different jurisdictions...on the federal level they will not act, there have been successes in places like Ohio, this is an ongoing national (state by state, county by county) effort to improve the practices...

You can circumvent this by using absentee ballots...need help to collect data, go to the web site to volunteer and is analyzed real time by statisticians, will uncover discrepancies in close states...

OnLine Organizing

Andrew Greenblatt, TrueMajority
James Rucker, MoveOn
Michael Stein, eBase/Groundspring

Groundspring is a nonprofit software developer/ASP and online advocacy tool, acquired eBase, other mergers...doing work on training, consulting for nonprofits using internet...helping with vendor selections and book on online advocacy...

Tools can be expensive and complex to use...new vendors and open source packages are appearing...groundspring is $50 per month, etc. allowing groups to do more things more cheaply...

True Majority...there's a different America out there, we are on MoveOn's list but haven't been to a NASCAR race...most Americans did not buy something online...they try to be more humorous and whimisical...draw people in at the bottom and then to more detailed level; start with what America is interested in...

Their mindset changes from a leadership to a service mindeset...top down bottom up is not the point...the top can put up an opportunity and see what is picked up..

MoveOn focused on making it easy for busy people to get involved...it's not about cool technology, it's about how tools fit into the goals of organizations and people...relationships and serving a community...going beyond the geek circle...

Questions - politicians seeing campaign as spam...but they should figure out who their constituents are; they have to respond online...have to figure out how to fill out the form...

Oreo clip brought in more members than trump...TrueMajority plans to give tools to people to send to their friend...

These are values based rather than issues based organizations...need to remain topical...MoveOn builds an ongoing story to an issue, Bush in Thirty Seconds...300k new members joined when story rejected...

Problem is issues that take a degree of information, MoveOn doesn't create stories, they act based on interests...one paragraph summary should be enough to solicit involvement...have an action form to suggest issues...to see if there's a buzz around this...

True Majority - it's like a cartoon, their role is not usually to explain the issue but to promote activism...picked up on "computer ate my vote", but that was unusual

Can there be a tutoring/mentorship to help people organize...bake sales and house parties...they play a role which is a gatekeeping...there is a steamrolling effect, people who take action will want to take more... MoveOn wants to focus on clear actions with simple responsibility that will cause others to take off on it...

Growth means expectations grow larger, civil core values are there, not a radical, need to focus on actions they can accomplish on a core level based on what people care about. There's a filtering process, 1000 emails a day...have to do some screening...

TM has more of a slacktavist membership, it's important to integrate and tie online and offline efforts together...

Need more tools for grassroots organizing...vendors...have tools in Meetup and Yahoo groups...true majority is an offshoot of business leaders organization...tools are not the same in business vs nonprofits

It's a mistake to let the Christians have the value label (family, etc.)...we have more complex concerns. Need to do a better job explaining.