See What’s Out There

What’s your message? It might depend on your number–501(c)3 or 501(c)4 or 527.

Because this is an election year, many of our projects have a political bent. But how much of one? Well, that depends on the type of nonprofit status a client holds. Most of our clients are 501(c)3s, but some are 501(c)4s or 527s. The degree to which they can speak out on political issues or campaigns is determined by their designation. Some of our clients, like the Sierra Club, have all three designations, in which case, their money has to be divided into different funds with c3, c4, or 527 designations, and used appropriately. (There are actually 28 different 501c designations! But we’re only going to talk about three here).

501(c)3s are defined by the IRS as charitable, religious, scientific or educational organizations and mostly consist of public or private foundations such as Red Cross or Habitat for Humanity. The money they use for media is generally to educate viewers about issues or an organization’s mission, with or without a call to action at the end, such as “join us” or “donate now”. Although they can heighten public awareness about certain issues, they aren’t allowed to show political affiliation or urge people to vote for or against a specific candidate. They can only use a small percentage of funds to lobby. They can issue a “Tell Congress you’re fed up” statement, as it is not specific to any candidate, or release a non-partisan report on a politically charged issue such as global warming, but they must stop short of advocating for or against a particular candidate.

What we hear often is that many (c)3s don’t go as far as they can because they worry that if they violate the restrictions, they will lose their nonprofit status.

c4 funds are different. 501(c)4 organizations are described in the IRS code as non-profits that promote social welfare; but unlike a (c)3, a 501(c)4 organization can lobby for specific policy change. Examples of prominent c4s include NARAL Pro Choice America and Moveon.org Civic Action. Here is an example of the difference: A 501(c)3 can tell you how important it is that you use your right to vote, but a c4 can ask you to sign a petition to Congress about a specific piece of legislation. However, c4 money cannot be used in election campaigns on behalf of or against any candidates.

A 527 group (or 527 funds) can influence the nomination, election, appointment or defeat of candidates for public office. 527 money can be used on behalf of or against candidates; for instance, Political Action Committees (PACs) are 527s. Here is where it gets confusing if it isn’t already. A 527 is NOT allowed to coordinate with a specific election campaign. Rather, it must be an “interest group” who is advocating on issues or mobilizing voters. Not surprisingly, sometimes 527s get into trouble for pushing the limits. For example, in the 2004 election cycle, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth was a famous 527 that was eventually accused of coordinating with George Bush’s campaign in its anti-John Kerry ads during the presidential campaign.

Are you confused yet? Well, let me tell you, it can be hairy trying to work out messaging for these various organizations or funds in the video and social media marketing campaigns we undertake on their behalf. But we really enjoy the challenge and are happy to be doing a lot of work this cycle around the critical elections this fall.

I went to several Web 2.0 sessions at NTEN, Nonprofit Technology Conference in New Orleans last week. It was amazing how many there were, sometimes even two at the same time. They were all very good, and all the same. My one criticism of all of them is addressed at the end of this post. Also at the end, I have embedded the presentations of several of those folks I mention.

The first session I attended was specifically about social networking and led by Brian Reich of Echo Ditto, author of Media Rules!

Brian’s big point was that there’s a lot of noise to cut through and to engage people you must deploy quality, focused, niche communications. Volume and frequency are not primary considerations. Most importantly, participate with authenticity. This is something anyone studying the space knows. You must be a credible member of the community sharing useful information and thoughtful comments before anyone will respond to your asks.

A good tip Brian mentioned was to deputize people to grow your network for you. This is something we have been working on at See3 – methods to build a network of influencers in the social networks who will carry your torch. Giving people certain authority to speak on your behalf, and rewarding them with praise or titles or special invitations to events, etc. In other words, to formalize that relationship is a great idea. Another point Brian made was that perhaps Facebook and Myspace are not for your organization. You may find better success participating in a niche social network like Changents or Gather. I suggest another one to explore, Rethos.

Brian provided an overview of many of the social networks out there. He talked about LinkedIn, but he did not address LinkedIn for Good. I asked him afterwards if he knew of any case studies or saw any potential for using LinkedIn for Good, which launched last year with much buzz but seems like nothing but tumbleweeds rolling by since. His thoughtful response: “I know a bunch of people have tried (and there has actually been some discussion within the NTEN blogs and community about it) to use LinkedIn as a fundraising platform. The LinkedIn platform isn’t structured exactly to support direct fundraising, and I think people don’t necessarily appreciate when you don’t respect the medium. But I have seen groups use LinkedIn to form committees that do fundraising, to have people volunteer time from an in-kind standpoint, etc. So, if you use the right tools through LinkedIn, you can get that much closer to a donation–so I’d say that is a better path. All experiments still, but there is clearly potential.”

Brian emphasized that social networking is not for every organization, and that you must consider your goals, strategies, tactics, and resources, not assuming the use of any particular tool. This notion was echoed by the other presenters on this topic that I saw, but Brian said it the best and with the most authority: “If you leave this conference, go back to your team and say, ‘We need a Facebook strategy’ then I have failed…”

Beth Kanter led a mere four sessions. I attended two of them. The first was about ROI. Coming from a background in SEM and lead generation, I was so glad to see “Web 2.0 ROI” as the title of a session. Beth pointed out a great study on blogging ROI from Forrester. She asked the audience how many people use formal ROI evaluations with regard to social media efforts. I was glad my hand was up but sad it was one of only two.

The first panelist was Eve Smith from Easter Seals. They tried the Causes challenge – seeking donors on Facebook - and her biggest takeaway was that influencers are more valuable than donors. I assume what she means is that if you find the influencers, they will bring you more donors than you could find on your own. Makes sense.

Wendy Harman from the Red Cross gave her case study on Project Listen. She does an amazing job at communicating with and monitoring the blogosphere and reporting on coverage of her organization. Her take-aways from that activity are that internally, people love the feedback from bloggers, and externally, people love to know that you care.

Danielle Brigida from NWF presented a case study on Digg and StumbleUpon. It took her 7 months to establish relationships in the Digg community sufficiently to get good results (ie, popular stories). Just like anywhere else, you have to be a credible, authentic participant and contribute valuable information in order for others to reciprocate. In StumbleUpon, she saw results from being the source of quality, relevant info. I have embedded Danielle’s PowerPoint below.

Carie Lewis, who does tremendous things on Myspace and in other social media channels, gave a case study on HSUS’s video contest after the Michael Vick dogfighting incident. HSUS only got 22 entries but from a marketing perspective it was a success in part because Hulk Hogan did the promo video for the contest. She learned from the experience to require email in the voting tool, target people likely to submit videos, and do more blogger outreach. See3 has run many successful video contests (a few examples here, here and here). Video contests can be a great way to give your community something tangible to do and create great content for your organization in the process.

Justin Perkins from Care2 presented his famous social media ROI calculator. The big take-away here is that if you assume one full-time staff member getting paid $52k/yr dedicated to social media can yield even 10,000 new email addresses for your organization in a year (which I agree would be a lot), then your CPA is $5.20/name. Justin says “there are cheaper ways to acquire email addresses.” He respectfully refrained from plugging Care2, which uses a brilliant petition process to find supporters for your cause among their network of 7 million activists at the cost of between $2-3/name.

My understanding of Care2, based on comments from Care2 clients, is that the lists perform well, however the demographic is clearly progressive, and somewhat skewed to middle-aged women. So how much any organization should rely on Care2 for list-growth really depends on your mission, objectives, and your own community. There is a lot more to this discussion, such as all of the potential benefits to social media marketing beyond strictly list-growth, such as branding, fostering community, creating discussion, distributing media materials, participating in existing communities, and many other results more difficult to fit in a spreadsheet. Again, what are your goals.

Another Web 2.0 related session I attended was See3’s Michael Hoffman about online video, which he already summarized. My take-aways from his session: “viral to what end?” Michael made the point very well that everyone wants their video to go viral, but that is not a legitimate goal in itself. Views do not necessarily lead to donations and email addresses. You need a strategy for your video and your call to action. This relates to Michael’s other session on using microsites to convert views to action. He said it’s important to start with stories and to have a strong call to action. Now here’s the part where I criticize my boss. He showed this as an example of a direct response piece, which is a great video and performed well in the email appeal for which it was created, but not nearly as well as this one, which has a much stronger call to action and is the better example.

The last session on Web 2.0 I attended was called “The Next Latest Thing: The Future of Technology in Nonprofits” led by John Kenyon with Beth. I have to say, the title of this session was misleading. Upon reflection, “the next latest thing” seems cheeky, but “the future of technology in nonprofits” seemed like a fun exploration into the unknown rather than a run-down of the most contemporary tools everyone else was talking about. Nevertheless, what I liked about this session was that John did a great job of getting comments from the crowd after each point, creating some discussion and incorporating feedback into his presentation. What I also liked about this session is that John echoed many things we advocate at See3: tell stories, get user-generated content as a great way to efficiently acquire marketing material and ignite your audience, use media to engage people.

Now here is my criticism of all Web 2.0 sessions, as promised at the beginning of this post: most, if not all, of the case studies are from large organizations with communications teams and resources that allow them to try things like video and daily engagement in social networks. But what about the small organizations that have one person responsible for marketing & communications, and that person is also the network administrator, web manager, and events coordinator? What can they do? We cannot solve their problem of limited resources, but we can find their successful case studies and present them to inspire other organizations like them, which is a majority of nonprofits. I’d be happy to moderate that panel next year in San Francisco.

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At the NTC in New Orleans I was interviewed by Chris Parandian from Mobile Diner and MobileFuture.org. The interview was LIVE, yes live from the conference floor, and, incredibly, it was conducted using a cell phone, a Nokia 93 (I think), over a regular cell network. Wow.

One of my presentations at the Nonprofit Technology Conference (08NTC) was The Age of YouTube: Using Online Video to Reach the Masses.

Here is the session description:

Broadband is finally here and the organizations that are creating compelling and viral video content are reaping the rewards. Those gala dinner videos are no longer enough. Readily available digital video cameras and editing software allow your organization to capture stories and introduce a wider world to your mission. Video content can be seamlessly integrated into your website and provide the compelling hook for fundraising and advocacy. Portable media players enable you to embed your message in hundreds of sites. But, how do you capitalize on the opportunity?
Takeaways:

1. The benefits to using web video
2. Case studies of innovative uses of video
3. How to effectively use video in your e-campaigns

I opened the session looking at the world we live in — the environment nonprofit messages are competing with. Here is the video I showed at the start of the session:

Here is the slide deck I used for the session. Mostly, these are just illustrative of talking points.

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Here is are relevant links to the videos we talked about from the session:

The power of video to breakthrough all the clutter. Example: Yes. We. Can.

The dinner video.
Other pieces you can make from a dinner video. (American Jewish World Service Passover Video)

Bread for the World video we showed as an example of something easy you can do with your staff.

Videos from Amnesty International showing both the man-on-the-street technique and how you can use video in an online campaign and how you can make videos with very different tone out of the same source material.

The funny video.
The serious video.

The PSA type video. An example from Chicago Foundation for Women and a very edgy UK one from Greenpeace International.

A documentary-style video from Columbia College Chicago.

Care2 is an online community where you can promote a video and seed your list in order to reach new audiences. If you are interested, you can learn more by calling Clinton O’Brien
Vice President, Business Development
Email: partners[at]earth.care2[dot]com
Phone: 202-785-7308

AOL quietly offers a program of free banners for certain organizations. If you are interested you should call us at See3 and we can tell you more about it.

If I left something out of this list that I mentioned in the session, please let me know with a comment.

Steve Grove’s YouTube for Nonprofits Tip Sheet. (Steve did not make the session at the last minute, but we got his tips. I will ask Steve some of the questions and publish the answers.)

The Basics

• Reach Out. Post videos that get YouTube viewers talking, and then stay in the conversation with comments and video responses.

• Partner Up. Find other organizations on YouTube who complement your mission, and work together to promote each other.

• Keep It Fresh. Put up new videos regularly and keep them short—ideally under 5 minutes.

• Spread Your Message. Share links and the embed code for your videos with supporters so they can help get the word out.

• Be Genuine. We have a wide demographic, so high view counts come from content that’s compelling, rather than what’s “hip.”

Your Channel:

• Design Your Channel. Go to Channel Design, then choose a color scheme to match your logo or other materials, and decide which modules you’d like to display on your public profile.

• Add Banners and URLs. Go to Branding Options, upload your icons and banners, and enter any of the other options you’d like to use.

• Choose Your Top Video. The top video on your channel automatically plays each time someone visits your page—choose it wisely. Update this video regularly to keep it fresh, or keep your most important video there as an introduction.

• Get Donations Flowing. Sign up for Google checkout, then go to your Google Checkout Options, enter your ID and Merchant Key, and choose donation amounts. Once you’ve filled in the information, the button will appear on your public profile and all of your video pages.

Your Content:

• Direct Dialogue. Make videos that create a dialogue about your work and what you’re trying to achieve. Ask questions and solicit video responses.

• Call to Action. Harness the power of user-generated content by asking supporters to submit videos to your cause. Create a group to collect these videos together; find ways to give recognition to the best ones.

• Tell Serial Stories. Engage viewers with a series of videos that tell a story around a specific theme, and keep them coming back for more. Once you’ve created a few episodes, put them into a playlist. This allows you to develop several video narratives targeted at particular demographics.

• Respond to Current Events. Address relevant news stories by posting videos that explain your position. You can then embed them in emails to your supporters—a video message can be more effective than a text-laden email.

• Use Endorsements. Whether they’re from celebrities or people you’ve impacted, it helps to have supporters chiming in about why your work matters.

Networking and Distribution

• Tag and Title Well. Tag and title your videos with relevant keywords—that’s how users will find your content as they navigate YouTube.

• Embed, Embed, Embed. Broadcast your videos over the web by embedding them on your website and encouraging supporters to do the same on theirs.

• Click “Subscribe”. Subscribe to the YouTube channels you’re interested in to stay up-to-date on their content; they may return the favor.

• Engage and Interact. Draw attention to your work by interacting with both allies and adversaries through video responses, text comments, or joint projects/debates.

• Make Web Traffic a Two-Lane Road. Use your video description field and branded banner URL to drive users to your website, and link to your YouTube channel from your website to encourage people to interact with your video content here.

For video production tips, go to: http://youtube.com/video_toolbox

New Orleans, March 21, 2008 - FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The Humane Society of the USA has just won best overall video in the 2nd Annual DoGooderTV Nonprofit Video Awards, sponsored by See3 Communications and NTEN - the Nonprofit Technology Network.

Their video, called Overlooked: The Lives of Animals Raised for Food won best video out of the 160 entries to this year’s contest. Other category winners included Greenpeace International, ASPCA and Center for Constitutional Rights which won for their video George Bush Hates Santa.

More than 5000 people voted in the contest.

All of the winning videos can be seen at DoGooderTV, home of nonprofit video.

The 160 entered videos were then judged by a panel of experts in video and nonprofits, including Jeff Pulver, founder of the Video on the Net conference, Danny Alpert, Executive Producer of See3 Communications and award-winning documentary filmmaker, and Suzanne Muchin, Principal, ROI Ventures, a Chicago-based organization helping social entrepreneurs create scalable enterprises.

Here is video of Michael Hoffman, CEO of See3 Communications, giving out the awards at the final lunch at the Nonprofit Technology Conference in New Orleans.

Heather Mansfield over at DIOSA | Communications give us the heads up on how the MySpace experience is evolving:

MySpace soft launched Apps yesterday… a list of those currently available can be found here:

http://apps.myspace.com

I am testing the “Rate My Page” and the “iThink” Apps on my page:

http://www.myspace.com/nonprofitorganizations

It’s definitely going to have a huge impact on how people use MySpace… and MySpace design… I’ll be curious to watch how nonprofits on MySpace use Apps. Anyone else out there experimenting?

Heather will be demonstrating the new MySpace Apps in a webinar in April. You can learn more about her webinars here.

The New York Times Magazine on Sunday was all about philanthropy.

Here’s what you need to read:

What Makes People Give?

This article is really about how some social scientists, economist types are looking at why people give. It turns out that much of what fundraisers think they know is right, but there is a lot of subtlety. The main example in the article is about matching programs. The research suggests matches lead to more giving, but the type of match — whether 1x or 2x or 3x the gift — had no impact at all. The article looks at the psychology of giving.

Some highlights:

For a long time, philanthropy was mostly ignored by social scientists. It’s not an especially large part of the economy, and most charities operate on a shoestring, without the resources to finance research projects. But this is starting to change. Americans gave $295 billion to charity in 2006, equal to 2.2 percent of the country’s gross domestic product, up from about 1.8 percent from the mid-’70s to the mid-’90s, according to the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University. Most philanthropy still comes in the form of small gifts, but there is also a growing group of donors, like Bill and Melinda Gates, who are interested in bringing some of the quantitative rigor of big business to philanthropy.

Academics, for their part, have come to realize that charities provide an excellent laboratory for studying human behavior, in part because so many of them are desperate for the kind of free-of-charge consulting Karlan was offering. When charities are designing their donor appeals, they often go by nothing more than a few rules of thumb, some of which may be profoundly insightful and others a good deal less so. “I think some fund-raisers have developed terrific intuitions, passed on through the fraternity of fund-raisers,” says Paul Brest, president of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation in Menlo Park, Calif., which often works with charities. “But a lot of the intuitions don’t work. Look at how much junk mail you get.” Matching gifts were another good example. People figured that they worked, because — well, how could they not? They seem so sensible. …

…Last year, Princeton University held a conference at which List, Croson, Andreoni and others who study charitable giving got together with fund-raisers from Africare, the National MS Society and elsewhere. I spoke with three people who listened to the academics present their work, and all said they found it invigorating. “We all have different strategies and takes on how to reach out to potential donors,” said Nicole Eley of Africare, which sends development and relief aid to Africa. “Many of them work, some don’t — it’s a trial-and-error process.” It’s easy to imagine that the academic research may eventually serve as the building blocks for a unified theory of how to raise money.

The Celebrity Solution

This article is about celebrity involvement in philanthropy and specifically looks at Natalie Portman, someone who has become the spokesperson for the growing field of micro-lending.

Some highlights:

In 2004, Natalie Portman, then a 22-year-old fresh from college, went to Capitol Hill to talk to Congress on behalf of the Foundation for International Community Assistance, or Finca, a microfinance organization for which she served as “ambassador.” She found herself wondering what she was doing there, but her colleagues assured her: “We got the meetings because of you.” For lawmakers, Natalie Portman was not simply a young woman — she was the beautiful Padmé from “Star Wars.” “And I was like, ‘That seems totally nuts to me,’ ” Portman told me recently. It’s the way it works, I guess. I’m not particularly proud that in our country I can get a meeting with a representative more easily than the head of a nonprofit can.”

Well, who is? But it is the way it works. Stars — movie stars, rock stars, sports stars — exercise a ludicrous influence over the public consciousness. Many are happy to exploit that power; others are wrecked by it. In recent years, stars have learned that their intense presentness in people’s daily lives and their access to the uppermost realms of politics, business and the media offer them a peculiar kind of moral position, should they care to use it. And many of those with the most leverage — Bono and Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt and George Clooney and, yes, Natalie Portman — have increasingly chosen to mount that pedestal. Hollywood celebrities have become central players on deeply political issues like development aid, refugees and government-sponsored violence in Darfur.

For Good, Measure

This article is about how foundations have found Jesus in metrics.

Some highlights:

The question that troubles many of the newest philanthropists, though, is whether their bequests will have a notable impact. Much of their money either goes into or comes out of private foundations, those largely opaque institutions with huge endowments that, in the jargon-rich environment of philanthropy, differ from charities like the Red Cross in their tendency to engage in long-term “strategic grant-making.” Such foundations do not exist to give emergency aid during crises arising from war or natural disaster; instead, their purpose is to attack social and scientific problems at the root, a process that sometimes requires substantial allocations of grant money over 5, 10 or even 20 years. That’s a long time to wait before you know whether your money is doing any good. As Judith Rodin, the head of the Rockefeller Foundation since 2005, puts it: “Critics have talked about the field of philanthropy and said: ‘Has it really made a difference. And how would you know?’ ” To Rodin, these are perfectly legitimate questions, even when they’re posed indiscreetly by business titans who only recently entered the genteel world of charity. “If we really want to do work that makes a difference, work that has some effect, then we have to know whether it is working,” she told me recently. “And if you really do it well, you don’t only want to know what works; you want to know how it works.”

Faces of Social Entrepreneurship

You can learn about and see some social entrepreneurs.

Michael Gainer started Buffalo ReUse to creatively salvage materials from the 10,000 abandoned houses the city is demolishing over the next 10 years.

Other Articles worth reading include:

Self-Made Philanthropists

This is a profile of Herb and Marion Sandler

How Many Billionaires Does It Take To Fix A School System?

“Last month, The New York Times Magazine invited five interested parties to lunch to discuss the new world of educational philanthropy. What follows is an edited transcript of the conversation.”

As my readers know, I have been saying for a while now that the Obama campaign is a tremendous case study in the right ways to use the web, Web 2.0, and new media to energize and engage supporters.

There is an interview in Fortune online with Rishad Tobaccowala, who has the title of chief innovation officer of the media buying division of Publicis, which is a giant advertising company. While we in the not-for-profit world are looking at how the Obama campaign can be a model for what we are doing with issues and organizations, those in the advertising industry are also taking note.

What Mr. Tobaccowala does is see the Clinton campaign like the big established brand and the Obama campaign as the upstart. For him, it becomes a cautionary tale for big companies. For me, it is something the more established organizations should take note of. You can read the whole interview with Mr. Tobaccowala here and below I have excerpted the highlights.

Fortune: Who is using media more effectively in the Democratic primary - Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama?

Tobaccowala: Definitely, Obama. He is a digital candidate while she is the analog candidate. Don’t misunderstand me. They both primarily use traditional media. In fact, he’s outspent her in traditional media. But his Web site is amazing. It’s completely and continually updated. It feels alive and energetic.

His campaign also actively uses e-mail to keep you totally informed. Like if Obama is debating live, they say go watch him. They also created these challenges - when Clinton donated $5 million to her campaign, the Obama campaign sent out a note saying we have to match this quickly. In 24 hours, people donated $8 million to Obama.

They use the Web to support their grassroots community approach by getting people to make supportive phone calls, arrange for rides and places to stay in states where primaries are being held and more.

Why else is it better to be the digital candidate in ‘08?

Well, think about it for a minute. Unlike Obama, she’s used traditional media almost entirely, like her town meeting on the Hallmark Channel. She got maybe 250,000 viewers. But the Black Eyed Peas made this great music video about Obama. It gets almost a million views a day online. The Obama campaign quickly realized how powerful it was and ran it on their home page.

So part of their ability is to figure out from the blogosphere or via crowdsourcing, whatever you want to call it, what works and begin using it. A lot of the Obama campaign messages are not their own but they point to and highlight stuff created by others. It’s created by the crowds.

In fact with over a million donors contributing, they position the entire campaign as one owned by the people. That’s what makes it so authentic. While both teams spin stuff, Clinton’s team tends to be rather unsubtle in their use of spin and attack and this really does not work as well these days.

…

Think of it this way. Traditional media is based on command and control. But the digital world is all about grassroots. Traditional media is about authority. Digital is about authenticity. You can see it in the language they use. Obama uses the language of “we and you,” which is inclusive and nods to the wisdom of the crowds. She uses “I and me.” His stuff is about “yes, you can.” Which is about the buyer. She talks about “experience from day one.” That’s about the seller. That doesn’t resonate anymore.

One key thing you recognize from everything from MySpace to the blogosphere is that people want to have a voice. We keep talking in my business about how the buyer is in control. Her campaign believes the seller is in control. That’s why it’s better to be digital. That doesn’t mean you knock out analog. Obama still relies very heavily on traditional media, too.

…
In the digital world you want to get signals from all over. But in what appears to be in her campaign a command and control word, Hillary just has loyalists. It’s like an echo chamber of nonsense. On the blogosphere everyone is laughing at her staff. They had a tin ear about what’s going on in the real world.

Meanwhile, Obama has used the Web to learn things and continually refine his message. His campaign knows exactly what works and what doesn’t, what pictures are right, what messages, and when to send it all out. He’s continually adapting. The only thing he never fiddles with is “Change you can believe in.” That’s been his slogan from day one.

…
Getting back to Hillary, do you ever run into any advertising clients with troubles?

Sure. I actually use the campaign as a case study. I work with a lot of market leaders. I tell them think about Clinton as a market leader with a brand name and to think about Obama as an upstart without a brand name. I spell out all the things we’ve just talked about - command and control vs. grassroots and authenticity and the two candidates’ different approaches to the media. Then I say which one of those do you think is your company. The first guy I did with say, “You’re right. We’re Hillary!”

As part of our preparation for the NTC in New Orleans in March we have decided to give up to 6 organizations some free consultation with See3 Executive Producer Danny Alpert. Danny is a producer, director and editor whose films have aired on PBS, HBO and A&E and have been nominated for an Academy Award and national Emmy Awards. Here are the details:
——————————————

Free Online Video Consultation at Nonprofit Technology Conference

Not sure how to use video to its highest potential in telling your organization’s story and begin incorporating video into your messaging? Sign up for a free one-on-one storytelling strategy session. Sit with Danny Alpert, See3 Executive Producer and Award Winning Documentary filmmaker and brainstorm on new video stories, approaches and styles, explore how to repurpose your existing audio-visual assets and how to distribute your media to the widest and most effective audiences. This is one of the most fun-and maybe the most productive-30 minutes you can spend for your nonprofit’s communications.

Only 6 people will be selected so reply today to info[at]see3.net and tell us how you might use video (for example, do you have a campaign coming up, are you redesigning your website and want to include video, and so on). We will work with you to set up a convenient time during the conference.

The newspaper business is in trouble. Their trouble is connected to the media fragmentation that I so frequently talk about and the rise of the web as a source for news. It is also connected to having sites like Craig’s List take away classified revenue, which has traditionally been a key pillar to newspaper profitability.

Sam Zell thinks the newspaper business will survive. I am not so sure.

If you are watching The Wire you can see the parallel impact of budget cuts to the police force and budget cuts in the newsroom. In my hometown newspaper, The Baltimore Sun, budget cuts mean that serious news coverage declines, foreign bureaus close and a paper that was once a well-respected part of a thinking man’s daily diet is now just a mere shadow of itself.

David Carr in the New York Times suggests that The Wire is placing too much of the blame for the failures in the newsroom on the management staff that has to make them. He suggests that the show should spend more time looking at the structural issues that are the root cause of the problem.

All of this matters because there is no way for us as a society to address the problems that ail us, if we don’t know what those problems are. If you are a nonprofit working to help low-income Americans or to rebuild the levees in New Orleans or to assist developing countries, you then should care deeply whether and how people get their news.

Today on Techcrunch, Michael Arrington blogs from Davos about a suggestion that government step in to save the whole newspaper industry. The title of his post is “If Real Journalism Fails as a Business, Should Government Step In.” He wrote this because he heard Columbia University President Lee Bollinger mention the idea in a session at the World Economic Forum.

An interesting discussion is on venture capitalist Fred Wilson’s blog today. His post is called Rethinking the Local Paper and he writes about a vision where the local paper is actually an amalgam of “hyperlocal” postings from the moms and dads writing about their neighborhoods. He sees a business model where I assume the big international stuff is covered by the professionals but it’s supplemented by lots of detailed and organized posting from the neighborhood. So the pothole and the PTA meeting are covered by the people it most impacts. This is a level of journalism that local papers could never do and the technology now makes it possible to do it. He points us to two websites working on different aspects of this issue. One is called Outside.In and the other is called Everyblock. Everyblock was actually funded by our very forward thinking friends at the Knight Foundation.

Outside.in takes more blog posts and that kind of info. Everyblock grabs police reports (eek! I don’t want to know!) and things like city permit information — who is building where, etc. Here’s my office neighborhood on Outside.In and on Everyblock.

We will stay tuned to see how all of this plays out. As a nonprofit you need to be thinking not only about describing what it is you do and why it matters, but also in giving people the necessary background they would have once received from their local newspaper.