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Joe Trippi's Latest Trick

Regular readers of my blog will know what side of the political fence I sit. 

But I am a big admirer of Joe Trippi- the man behind the failed, but nonetheless very innovative Howard Dean for President campaign.  Trippi is straight out of the Cluetrain mould; a visionary who understands that the Internet and all it's small places (loosely joined, of course) is where future campaigns will be fought and elections won or lost.

Whilst his candidate- Howard Dean- failed (by a long way) in his bid to secure the Democrat Presidential nomination last year, the "Blog for America" campaign was far from a failure.  Dean and Trippi ran America's first presidential campaign organised primarily through the Web, attracting hundreds of thousands of supporters to their grassroots movement, and amassed more than $15million in campaign monies.   

Sure, the White House remained elusive, but the campaign did manage to turn an obscure ex-governor into a real presidential contender. It was anything but politics as usual.  It was great stuff.

And now Trippi has outlined his next trick:

"At the Politics Online Conference at George Washington University,   Joe announced he is planning to release a website that will ask grassroots donors for their email address and a pledge of $100 for the 2008 Democratic presidential campaign. Here is the catch. Those pledges are only going to go to the first Democratic candidate who promises they will NOT take contributions of more than $100."

WOW!  This is true campaign finance reform, funded and controlled by the voters.

But more than just handing over your dollars, Joe wants his pledgers to help.  He wants them to come up with some criteria -- some guidelines as to what thresholds they think a candidate should accomplish for them to feel comfortable that their pledges would be going to a legitimate contender and to make sure that it is not tampered with and the true intent is upheld.

This is really great stuff, and as much as I hate to say it, I can't imagine any Conservative Party coming up with such an exciting idea.

So, if you thought Howard Deans Internet and blogging campaign was the future, stay tuned!

Screaming screaming like 17th-century Puritans

Glad I don't live in London, or read the London Times.  Here's the Times' Simon Jenkins on bloggers:

These people claim to be the unofficial legislators of free opinion. They quake, rant, muckrake, scream like 17th-century Puritans. Most of the blog sites regurgitate and spin what the mainstream media (dismissively the “MSM”) has spent millions finding and checking. Most are fanatically conservative. All you need is a taste for exhibitionism and a fancy name: mediabistro, FishBowlDC, wonkette. One Yahoo blogger, Ted Rall, gives warning of the blogosphere: “A new sheriff’s in town. He’s drunk. He’s mean, and he works for the bad guys.” The web is the Bushites’ revenge on the liberal media establishment. A blog polarises or dies.

The web has undoubtedly honoured its claim to be the democracy of the air. Every columnist’s motto may be Milton’s “Opinion in good men is but knowledge in the making”. But to what end? On the web, opinion travels first class while facts go steerage. The opinion blogs that I occasionally read — one is formed every seven seconds — show scant respect for the disciplines of journalism.

What a load of interesting assertions....It sounds more like another example of the Print Media quaking in the face of a ne blog every seven seconds; "We are the Print Media.  We represent the people.  Fuck them."

Scott Burgess sets Mr. Jenkins straight, here.

Semantic Compositions

For fans of language, words, the changing face of communication, weasel words,  physcolinguistics and clear thinking, here's a blog I found (via John @ Business Evolutionist).

It's call Semantic Compositions and offers up great stuff like this and this.

Rappers & Bloggers

Yo!  Some cool Sunday reading.

(via IA)

The death of the Ignorance Premium. Or: "Why Blogging matters"

Two excellent posts from Hugh Macleod that talk about the impact that smarter markets are having when it comes to making purchasing decisons:

"Many of us make our living simply because other people are willing to pay a premium for something.
INFORMATION: Too busy to find out about the latest movies. That's OK, I'll gladly pay a premium to hear what the jounalist in The New Yorker thinks.

FOOD: Too busy to figure out an interesting place for my date. That's OK, I'll pay a premium and take her to a really expensive restuarant. Even if she doesn't like the food, she'll be so impressed by the decor it won't matter.

RENT: Too busy to find out where the hot real estate deals are. That's OK, I'll just pay a premium and move into an already-gentrified neighborhood.

CLOTHING: Too busy to find out what goes into the making of a really nice suit. That's OK, I'll just buy a well-known label whose schtick I'm in tune with. Good enough for the guys at GQ, good enough for me etc.

So, the less information you have, the greater the premium you are prepared to pay, and vice- versa:

Know diddly-squat about tailoring? Then you're more likely to pay that extra $300 for that Armani, less likely to save $600 from going with the old man in Chinatown.

But then EnglishCut comes along... suddenly the conversation available to most people gets much smarter.

Know diddly-squat about tech? Then you're more likely to go with the $400 iPod, less likely to go with the $250 Microsoft-powered alternative.

But then Robert Scoble comes along.... and suddenly the conversation about personal stereos gets much smarter.

Suddenly the Ignorance Premium is devalued. Exactly.

It's about the MICRO Smarter Conversations absolutely wiping the floor with the MACRO Brand Metaphor/Ignorance Premium.

It's typically great, thoughtful, but so obvious stuff from Hugh.

Going Off Topic

After finishing my last post, I was reminded of a comment made by Johnnie Moore following a conversation with fellow bloggers Freddie Daniells and Max Blumberg:

"(There are)bloggers who keep to a topic and those who don't. I have both sorts in my feedreader. I find both interesting. I am definitely in the second camp. I don't stick to the point here."

I am glad Johnnie likes bloggers who go off topic.  My blog goes off topic, in fact it is all over the shop!  I tend to blog about whatever "floats my boat".

After 10 months and 250 posts I have jumped around all kinds of topics,I have followed themes for a couple of days and then suddenly switched when I get a new bee in my bonnet.  I have experimented with different writing styles and tried different ways to "talk."  I have had lazy posts and posts that I am more passionate about.

However, during the last few months my blog has taken on a bit of a "political" look.  But once I start my new job I will have a whole stack of new challenges and issues to talk about, so my blog will take on more of a "business" appearance, for a while anyway.

I am sure that this extreme ad-hoc approach does piss some people off, but it probably keeps others interested.  They might even be the same people.

Hughtrain/Cluetrain... and Jeff

Hugh added this to yesterdays post:

"We live in very amazing and exciting times. I hope to God you concur."

Mmm, I don't think Jeff does (see my comments from yesterday):

"Does it matter to you at all that there are honest people just trying to do an honest day's labor to feed and house and educate their families inside the companies you want to destroy? Truly, I'd like to understand this. Do you not get the connection or do you not care that gunning after companies is gunning people's jobs? Is this just "war" and that makes "collateral damage" okay?"

Memo Jeff:  Read Cluetrain and you will see that no-one is trying to destroy your existence.  Nor is it a war, quite the contrary, it's an invitation for you to come and play!

It is all about letting YOUR company know that markets are getting smarter; they are talking a new language and exchanging knowledge like never before.  We want YOUR company to move down from the Ivory Towers and join the conversation (it's already happening!), and talk our language.  We hate how YOUR company pitches to us, sells to us, preaches to us, positions toward us.  All we want is for you (ie not YOUR company) to talk- straight- to us, to take yourselves less seriously, to find a sense of humour,   If you don't or your company won't let you 'cause you are too busy,that's cool, we'll find someone who will find the time to talk.  We'll get back to you.... actually, no we won't:

Cluetrain Manifesto #88:

"We have better things to do than worry about whether you'll change in time to get our business.  Business is only part of our lives.  It seems to be all of yours.  Think about it: who needs whom?"

Cluetrain Manifesto #89:

"We have real power and we know it.  If you don't see the light, some other outfit will come along that's more attentive, more interesting, more fun to play with."

The answer is simple, Jeff.  Talk to us, and you will survive, you can keep on keeping on earning your "honest living".

And if you dunno how to talk to us, grab Hughtrain, and read it.  Read Part Seven (How to Have Smarter Conversations) a couple of times.  It'll get you thinking about how YOU and YOUR company can talk to it's market (who are people you know, not a demographic).  For some more meat on this bone check Signs Never Sleep.

This isn't a war Jeff, but some companies will die for no other reason than they say nothing of interest to anyone, or they refuse to join the conversation.   As a result all their customers doddle off somewhere more interesting.

Ask your boss if he can still provide you with a job that allows you to earn the cash necessary to "feed and house and educate" your family, if you have not customers....

Sharing

Seth wants to know what the point of this is (Numanuma).  I dunno if there is one Seth, but it kept me amused for a while.  Maybe it is a lost "Idol" audition or something...

Whilst the video itself might be pointless, the absurdity and humour of watching some fat kid sing some bizzare opera-cum-disco-techno song, does proove a point at how rapid the internet is, and in particular blogging, when it comes to letting people share stuff.

In the space of about two days Technorati lists 388 links from 352 sources for this kids' space on the web.  So it's obviously kept lots of other people amused (or something!) as well!  The mind boggles at just how many people have seen this dude belt out his tune.

Call it Viral, call it Word of Mouth or even Buzz, it doesn't really matter.  It's just another small piece, loosely joined, that is being shared around.

A nation of journalists

It seems that the Cluetrain is echoed louder and louder with every passing week.

Here is another example from Ashley Highfield, director of BBC New Media and Technology, forecasts that a cultural shift where personal media expression is merging into collaborative media (like weblogs) will change the mass media monoliths we have today.
"Media will become a substitute for society as the society we will live in will be fragmented," he says. "People want to be fundamentally more involved in media, as they no longer know their neighbours. The major shift will be that media will become a two-way process.  The people will be in control. Everyone will offer their own stories. We will become a nation of journalists and cameramen."

Conversations.  Communication.  Stories.  Involved.  Journalists.

Get it yet?

More Space

It's bloody warm today here in Melbourne (37C of 99F), and I am too hot and tired to really write, but I did want to talk about a cool project that Todd (of A Penny For... fame) is pulling together... really fast!  It is called "More Space":

10 bloggers.
10,000 words each.

Basically Todd wanted to see what would happen if he gave some business bloggers more space to talk about their interests and expertise.  The 10 bloggers will write about topics they are passionate about, the topics they write about every day, but in more detail than is usually available in a blog entry (without losing reader intrest).  Then the whole shebang will be brought together and published (in print and PDF, aswell as MP3).  Some of my favorite bloggers are involved and are already talking about their "bit" on their blogs.  Amazing when you think that this project is only a week old!:

Evelyn Rodriguez from Crossroad Dispatches
Rob May from Businesspundit
Johnnie Moore from johnniemoore.com
Curt Rosengren from Occupational Adventure
Jeremy Wright from Ensight.org
Matt Homman from the nonbillable hour
Andrea Learned from Learned on Women
Lisa Haneberg from Management Craft
Todd Sattersten from A Penny For...

Plus one other to be announced... there are some proposals here.

Even if this is a bit Change This-ish, and has drawn some criticism, I'm looking forward to seeing how it all pans out.