VasGk | Κοινωνικό Νερό

Just wanted to squeeze another Blog post just before the new year. And yes, I will be more active in my Blogging in 2010, it is one of my many 2010, and new decade, resolutions... Maybe because I use twitter a lot, maybe because I was working hard on two political campaigns, I didn't have the time or the drive to keep up with my Blog, however, the next year is going to be a banner year in many aspects. I am really looking forward working on corporate new media communications, you may also find some of my Blog posts to be on business and new media, while still keeping up to date with online political communications and the use of social media. Let me also get myself on record here saying that I will pursue my academic goals in doing some research on new communications and marketing policies, whether that being in politics, corporate B2B, or freelance business. I believe that Direct-to-consumer advertising is going to be re-shaped and utilized more personally, given the fusion that ...

I really like this tool from " Organizing for America ". It is a great method to lobby the House of Representatives and the Senate while utilizing grassroots support for healthcare reform. What I really appreciate is the openness of the tool, in asking people to call their representatives, record their answers and report back. It is these tools, simple, straightforward , and clear, that have the capacity to make the difference.

Yesterday the townhall: "Ask The Chairman: A Virtual Town Hall" ended. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Michael Mullen received 16 video questions . Have a look at the teaser: And just when the pentagon virtual town-hall ended, another defense and security online event began! It's President Obama now, with the "Troop Town Hall". Were these two events coordinated? It doesn't seem so. Why flood the online town-halls with defense and security issues now? If people already directed their questions to Admiral Mullen, does the Whitehouse expect them to direct more (and different) questions to President Obama? I must say that this might be a communications overkill on the outreach to enlisted personnel and their families.

It was awesome to take part in the DoDLive Bloggers Roundtable with Mr. Price Floyd , Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs, talking about the launch of the new defense.gov website and the new social media strategy of the DoD . You can listen to the whole roundtable discussion on defenselink.mil . It was an excellent opportunity for people interested in the new media strategy of the DoD to ask questions, give feedback and propose ideas for implementation. I did manage to ask two questions on: 1. DoD new media strategy for Global audiences. 2. Twitter messages for DoD policy communications - engaging with people online. All the other Bloggers were excellent in their remarks; Mr. Price Floyd responded on military families and the Internet, technical stuff on webpage management and Social media strategies to connect and engage with people online. I was the only blogger from overseas (currently in Vienna, Austria) and I believe that there is a Inte...

From preliminary results 40% to 50% of 15 million registered voters in Afghanistan actually turned up to vote . The total population of Afghanistan is 33.6 million, only 7 million people actually voted, and these people must have been from low or medium risk areas: see the electoral security map on BBC . Citizens that live in areas of Taliban control were probably denied their right to go to the polls. Are these election results accurate under these circumstances? Are these results even statistical valid given the population spread, and war operations in the country? The Independent Election Commission of Afghanistan thinks so and the Afghan Electoral Complaints Commission claims to received a total of 433 complaints during the last two months. I am still not convinced. There are also international observers that monitored the elections and will comment on the results, see the UNDP Elect and the UNAMA . I also came across the " International Security Assistance Force ...

The U.S. government has embraced social media on a number of new federal website projects. The new DoD website is a great example of utilization of new media, on a rather sensitive issue of Defense and Security. It may come as a surprise that organizations as such are engaging through social media. Read the DoD Special Report: Social Media @ DoD . The new public affairs chief, Price Floyd, has revolutionized the way the Department of Defense is communicating with the public but also with people in the military, Floyd said he plans to expand efforts already under way at the Defense Department to tap into social media outlets to reach audiences not reachable through other, more traditional, means . The DoD launched into twitter , facebook , YouTube , flickr , Ustream , Blog , Podcasts , and created a number of Widgets . Even the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen has a twitter account . It is this openness in communications that gives the opportunity to everyone t...

I came across Rand Paul's campaign for the US Senate , the son of Congressman Ron Paul after watching him on the Glenn Beck show yesterday. He seems to follow the republican values of his father, while showcasing a clear view of his own beliefs and the actions that he will take while on the US Senate . The Ron Paul campaign has been remarkable is gaining attention online and continuing the "Revolution" well beyond the Presidential campaign. The Ron Paul revolution is an ongoing campaign that has steered off the " Extended Campaign Syndrome " of President Obama, as Karl Rove explains in a recent article on the Wall Street Journal. I consider this as truly "grassroots politics", a term that has been misused on a number of political movements. Ron Paul is supporting an online fundraising campaign " The Rand Paul for Senate Money Bomb – August 20th, 2009 ", which is a dedicated website that has a target to raise Rand Paul $1,000,000 in one day ...

Alexi Giannoulias, currently the Illinois State treasurer , has announced his nomination for the US Senate. Browsing through his campaign website AlexiforIllinois ; a strait-forward political site that has all the basic features ( Contribute and Volunteer being the most prominent) and links to Alexi Giannoulias presence on major social media like twitter , facebook , flickr , MySpace , and YouTube . I expect that he will boost his online communication tools, and be more active in social media when the election closes in. Also, given that he does not receive lobbying, 527 or PAC money, online fund-raising should play a very crucial part in his campaign, real lessons to be learned from the DNC and Organizing for America online fund-raising strategies, but I am sure he already knows that. Now, while on the theme of backstage video clips, (from my previous post: " Behind the Scenes Multimedia - Dora & Hillary ") here is the "Behind The Scenes: The Alexi For Illinois Ch...

I really like this tool by " Organizing for America " as a user, by entering a zip code, you will be re-directed to Twitter (you need to be logged in) where you will be prompted to tweet your senator with a pre-written text Example: "To Sen. Charles Schumer: Please pass health insurance reform this year http://bit.ly/j 63 je #hc 09 #NY #10010" . Note the hashtags that are added automatically and watch your tweet on the interactive map. Great tool! but why only Senators and not all members of Congress? And What about Senators that use twitter? the site could cross reference those that are active on twitter and mention @theirusername. You can find a list of Congressmen and Senators on tweeter by clicking through TweetCongress . Some of the extra features of the site are maybe the most important ones. It is good to tweet out to your Senators but if you want to follow through, you can call your senators with a good set of tools provided, including Calling Tips and Exa...

Far from formal structured political campaigns in most developed or developing countries, there are other examples of people that start a political campaign from zero, with little or no help (financial or otherwise); more importantly it is excellent when this happens in Afghanistan ; a country at war, with democracy just creeping in to the political system. The upcoming Afghan Presidential election is scheduled for August 20th 2009. I came across this video of an Afghan candidate for President, campaigning on a bicycle. What I really appreciated is the simplicity of his decision to campaign, even if he does not stand a chance to win. But this is a success story that explains how democratic transition can give all citizens the opportunity to stand as candidates and communicate directly with people that will hopefully vote for them. I suppose that web 2.0 technologies and the Internet have nothing to do with this campaign since most people do not have access to the net; the inten...

The Republicans have really started to go after Pres Obama on the jobs front, unemployment in the US is 9.5% now ; and there are studies that show that unemployment will approach 10% in 2010, see the OECD Directorate for Employment, Labour and Social Affairs . The first video is from the House Republican Conference and asks: Where are the jobs? I also came across this clip by House Republican Leader John Boehner . In the video job-sniffing bloodhounds follow the stimulus money trail across the nation in search of the millions of jobs from the Obama Administration. This is a lighthearted web video, but the underlying point is no laughing matter, Boehner said. It reminded me of the Southpark episode of Goobacks , where the "Republicans" complained "dey turk errr jeobs!" . Although some have expressed their concerns on the Shortcomings of the Stimulus Plan , Republicans need to understand that this is a long-term plan to save and create more than 3.5 million jo...

So, I came across this video by Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius , where she: "invites our talented and creative citizens to create and share your PSA about flu prevention and good health", and you could win a grand prize of $2,500 cash from the Goverment! You can find more details about the flu competition at the 2009 Flu Prevention PSA Contest . Now, I believe that the Department of Health is not an organization that should give out cash prizes to get people to create videos. I see a big public relations campaign being underway, with President Obama talking about Healthcare reform , but not talking specifics. Have a look at the recent remarks on Healthcare reform . What I do not like is that there are no specifics, just rhetoric and ideas about universal healthcare that are copied from the Hillary Clinton Presidential campaign . Have a look at this Q&A video of Hillary on Healthcare and see how similar President's Obama talking points are. ...

I am going to come back again and write about the outrageous emails send by the DNC . The latest one is signed by VP Joe Biden and informs people that this is a crucial week for Sonia Sotomayor and asks to support Sotomayor and take action ; Oh! and Please donate! It is incredible that " Organizing for America " asks US citizens to give money to support a Judge campaign for the US Supreme Court . Why would any candidate for Supreme Court need money for their campaign? and how come the DNC is fundraising through the Internet on behalf of Sotomayor? In these times of economic hardship, and with the financial crisis still in the forefront of political discussion, the DNC is asking people for private donations to support a judicial campaign. I also came across the following video "Nothing" by the GOP that explains how The Obama administration is devoting $18 million dollars to create a government website to show Americans just where their hard-earned tax dollars are ...

I had the opportunity to be in Corfu this weekend at the informal meeting of OSCE foreign ministers . It was a great experience from any perspective, media and otherwise! This was the first informal ministerial meeting of the OSCE .  During the conference we had the opportunity, as OSCE Press and Public Information Section, to explore new ways to link with the media and the general public utilizing the twitter and facebook accounts of the OSCE. For the scale of the event we did manage to stream the event live and have multimedia (audio and video) of the opening and closing statements and a great photo gallery ! I believe that the most important thing is that we learned so much in preparation for the Formal Ministerial Council in Athens in December 2009.  One of the suggestions is to project the OSCE twitter to the Press Center, so as journalists, reporters, media people and volunteers to keep up to date with schedule, press center and pool updates, media appeara...

There has been so much press coverage on the fallout after the Iranian elections, and most of it coming from social media sources, YouTube, twitter, facebook, Blogs etc. What I don't understand is that: Did people in Iran just woke up to their reality? They are living in a totalitarian state, under the dictatorship of a religious figure (Ali Khamenei), citizens are afraid to talk openly, and always need to be anonymous in case someone from the state comes knocking at their door. So, did some people in Iran just woke up? Why did they have to wait for an election to protest and express their concerns? If the system is corrupt and biased towards the population now, then it must have been like this before the elections! I did also manage to watch some of the press conferences by the Iranian State representative, but I have not seen anything from the Mousavi campaign. Why doesn't the Mousavi campaign have a daily press briefing? Why doesn't Mousavi go on an Interview with a ...

So, I came across these 2 videos from the YouTube channel of the GOP . First, Michael Steel, Chairman of the Republican National Committee, congratulates another YouTube user for his innovative video approach to spending cuts under the Obama administration, and invites him to come to Washington DC and "sell" the use of simple and straightforward messages. You see the important thing about this is that it links to people, it shows that the GOP is monitoring YouTube and that experts do crunch the numbers. It is so far from reiterating talking points and empty words; and I must say that Pres Obama has started to talk in Management speech, sticking to the talking points and playing it really safe. I also saw the new RNC ad "How are Democrats and President Obama going to pay for Government Run Health Care?" But wait! I just remembered how! Yesterday I received an email from The Obama Campaign or should I say the " Organizing for America " project of the ...

So, my first post this month is from the East Village NYC. Visiting New York for the Internet Week , have been to a number of events throughout the city, from Columbia University to downtown Manhattan. It has been an excellent week so far, I hope to attend some late events over this weekend, seen some late Internet parties that look good! I am also touring NYC, I haven't traveled outside Manhattan yet, hope to visit Brooklyn and Astoria before I leave for Washington D.C. Today was fantastic, managed to visit the NASDAQ opening bell live at Times Square! I have Diana to thank for that. There are so many subjects that I would have liked to Blog about, but couldn't find the time, like Presidents' Obama speech at Cairo University and some new Internet techniques from the U.S. State department website; Oh yea, and the Euro elections... forgot about those... anyways, According to weather reports, this weekend will be sunny in NY, hope to hit as many Internet week evens as I can,...

Even if facebook was a great campaign tool for the previous US Elections and plays a big part in any western European political communications plan; we can clearly understand the power of facebook in politics by analyzing the recent ban in Iran. The upcoming Presidential elections in Iran are set for the 12th of June. The current opposition is utilizing the Internet and social media sites to connect to young and first time voters, while appealing to Internet users. facebook was banned in Iran for one reason - politics. The current state owned, or controlled, media provide the opportunity even for Iranian politicians to be pro-active in Internet political communications, and connect with voters that use the Internet as a medium of non-biased news. facebook in Iran provided a clean platform for all politicians to connect with citizens and campaign like in any other western country. The ban, only made facebook a more legitimate place to campaign and clearly demonstrated, that even in a...

Reading the recent investigations on the UK MPs' expenses, I really had laugh looking at the telegraph MPs' expenses on Google Earth ! At the same time I do think that there are excellent examples of UK Members of Parliament using the Internet to be more open, transparent and connect in two way communications with the general public and their constituents. One great example I came across is Liberal Democrat MP Jo Swinson in this video from the UK Parliament's YouTube Channel and I must say that Ms. Swinson comes across as a very fresh and innovative UK politician. I do believe that online engagement with politics gives the opportunity to politicians to become more active in direct communications with members of the public. The segmentation of Parliamentary constituencies provides UK MPs with the opportunity to engage with people in their local community and create virtual constituencies in dealing with the problems in the local community, while connecting with peop...

I had a chat with my brother recently and ...like you do, the subject of communication reach in social media came up ;-). When he asked me about twitter, I urged him to open an account and start tweeting! "Yes but, what is twitter?", he asked. Just repeating a twitter definition seemed very obvious. I remembered watching Biz Stone in an interview at the Colbert Report saying that one of the reasons that twitter has a 140 character limit, is because a txt SMS is 160, so in order for twitter to send out tweets (as SMS updates) it had to be less than 160. The extra 20 character space is for the @username and other network info. So, I think twitter as being, not just a mini-blogging platform, but an open SMS pool, where you SMS "OR" answer to " what are you doing? "; BUT everyone can see it, and reply back. It is a compilation of thoughts, news, information, and advertising all together. Tweets as public SMS is like searching for tweets in your area. Twi...

I came across this video from Mike Bloomberg, welcoming the 15,000 supporter to the Mike Bloomberg facebook page . The NYC Mayoral elections are scheduled for the 3rd of November 2009. Mike Bloomberg comes out with an active facebook campaign. I really like the straightforward message by the Mayor, keeping the facebook campaign active, while asking people to get the word out and grow the Bloomberg facebook presence. The campaign is trying to involve people (Not just ask for their vote!). Jill Hazelbaker , communications advisor to the Bloomberg campaign, writes: "Over the next six months, countless supporters will organize, knock on doors, write to their local papers, and make phone calls into their communities. We know this to be true: whether you lend us one hour or one weekend, whether you can make 25 calls or 250, your time will make a difference in this race."

I truly believe that most people want to be involved and vote in the upcoming European elections, although I clearly disagree with the communication policy of the European Parliament on GOTV . The major European Parties (which are a result of transnational party collaborations) do not have pan-European campaigns, EU citizens will vote for a national and not a pan-European party. The problem is that individual country issues and local politics play a bigger role than European issues in the upcoming elections . This is what this new party the Newropeans is trying to accomplish. According to an interview by Bart Kruitwagen in EurActiv " Only with the proliferation of trans-European parties can we build the "strong and stable democracy needed to see the EU achieve its potential as a "world power". Also have a look at their magazine . However they are in need of a sound communication strategy, especially online! When we also start to explore the role of youth enga...

You might think that a pan-European "Get out the vote" campaign will be an opportunity to embrace and promote the upcoming EU elections . Well, after watching this video clip I must say that I feel disturbed and surely not motivated to go and vote. I cannot believe that the EU Parliament has not put more research into it. As I commented to the European Parliament facebook page "Who does these commercials?! did you ever thought of consulting a Marketing or Political Communications consultant? This is amateur stuff!!! Plus it is repulsive to look at; do you honestly believe that screaming women and Friday the 13th figures will make EU citizens go to the polls? Really?..."

So, I traveled to Thessaloniki for the Greek Easter, and you can imagine my surprise when at the tolls just outside Athens I saw these flags by the Greek Communist Party please note the hammer and sickle symbol at the top of the flags. Now, my first reaction was total surprise! I asked myself whether this photo would be possible on any other European highway; I am now back in Vienna, Austria and it really strikes me as impossible. Also, along with the flags, there were volunteers covering all lanes, with fryers explaining the values of the communist party with the slogan "Trust the KKE in the upcoming EU elections". I must say that this is one of the first campaign moves from a Greek Political party for the upcoming European elections, scheduled between 4 and 7 of June 2009. The message was clear enough: even if you don't agree with the Communists, vote for them in the European elections to send a "message"... whatever that means... Also in the same fryers the...

What would you ask José Manuel Durão Barroso, the current President of the European Commission? I came across the site http://w ww.tellbarroso.eu/ - a great example of EU politics coming up with a website, and an opportunity to put EU Internet into good use... there is also a facebook group but with very little support, given that we are talk ing about the EU. The "Tell Barroso" website an initiative by the Centre for European Studies asks all Europe ans to answer: How can the EU improve your life? All in all the website is not anything spectacular and the multimedia and communications team at the EU Commission could definitely have done a better job in engaging with the citizens of the EU and creating a community like website that users can interact and co-operate with one another. Instead the site just asks vague open ended questions like What areas affecting your daily life should the EU focus its energies on? they urge people to think of as many issues as come to the...

There has been so much talk and analysis of the first overseas trip by President Obama; I will just comment on the discussion that he had during a student roundtable in Turkey. After a question regarding the European future of Turkey, Obama talked about the Sarkozy opposition to Turkey EU membership and in answering he said: "You'll probably have to ask him directly, so maybe when he comes here, he'll have a townhall meeting like this one". After seeing the video I sensed that there was a bit of sarcasm in the President’s answer. But he makes a good point; foreign leaders do not have townhall meetings with the public in most of their trips. It is one of a first for US Presidents as well. I do not know if he is going to insist in having these meetings in future trips, and whether other politicians will follow his example. Then again some politicians do not know, or are afraid of this sort of open discussions, with no moderation or formal Q&A. You do not know th...

You see it not enough for politicians to be involved with the public through websites and new social media. Young citizens give an excellent example on how they have embarked on an online campaign ( www.sendmyfriend.org ) trying to bring together hundreds of thousands of students and teachers in the UK who want the government to keep its promise and make sure that every child can go to school, no matter where they live in the world. In doing so, in January of this year, they managed to get the UK Prime Minister, the leader of the Conservative Party and the leader of the Liberal Democrats to answer to the same questions concerning the Millennium Development Goal on Education. What is more I have also noticed that recently on the G20 Summit in london "Send My Friend to School 2009" was present with the 14 year old James Simmonds who was chosen to be one of the official G20 Voice Bloggers. Young people are utilizing online avenues to reach mainstream politics. They are mak...

What I did about a year ago was to subscribe to all UK MPs that had email updates through their websites. Most of them just email automated bot-like RSS updates. Although I have to say that many have really improved since then, embracing and utilizing new media (I will be posting on online UK Political Communications next week). I recently received an email update from George Galloway , rallying his supporters to send an email to Canadian conservative politicians, and demand from Jason Kenney Canada's current Minister of Citizenship, to allow the UK MP to enter Canada and attend a number of events. I am not going to comment on the sort of events that Mr. Galloway is attending, or his political views. I was really impressed by the Step by Step Guide that the email gave DIY Instructions: 1. Copy and Paste the email of the Minister 2. Copy and Paste the emails (c.c.) of the entire Canadian Conservative Caucus 3. Don't Forget to fill the subject line with a specific message 4. Cop...

So, Pres. Obama in his push to communicate his proposed economic plan has started campaigning again. I believe that this is a brilliant communication method, given that the White House Website has undergone such a huge redesign and the President is keen to engage with citizens and have the first ever Presidential online town hall. The questions were picked after users of whitehouse.gov “buzzed” or “digged” them to the top of the pile. He also manage to address a few questions more from the actual audience in the room. Now, I also had a read through a Blog post “Obama like Dora” from a good friend Achilleas Ioakimides. Achilleas, as a communications advisor to the Minister Dora Bakoyannis, has created the segment “Live with Dora”, where the Minister answers to direct questions from citizens through her Website . Both great examples of politicians and citizens coming together online.

Hey everybody, It has been long since my last Blog post; but I have been keeping active in my social media responsibilities… Hope to tweet even more now that I will have my new blackberry! As you might have noticed, I currently work at the The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe in Vienna. I am at the PPIS (this stands for Press and Public Information Section) in developing a social media strategy for the Organization and using a multimedia approach to get the OSCE message out, create awareness and further expand the communication strategy. Check out the official facebook page of the OSCE , follow OSCE updates on twitter and be sure to watch our videos on the OSCE YouTube channel! Will try to Blog even more! But keep up with me on twitter!

Coming up to the  February 10th Israeli General Elections  and I must say that after a first read concerning Israeli politics I got more confused than ever.  Middle-East politics is complicated enough given the recent GAZA operations, and of course not forgetting the history behind the current situation. Nevertheless, this is an election, and Tzipi Livni is out there utilizing Internet Political Communications.  Her website , I must say there is a first page photo-plug of her with the new U.S. President , is really strait-forward! no clutter and endless links, focus on multimedia and photos, simple and to the point, really easy to use in getting the message out. She has a YouTube Channel   - a flickr photo-stream  a Twitter account , and a facebook page all relaying messages for the upcoming election. I do not know if there is a policy decision for the social media to be named as "Tzipilivni4pm" and "Tzipilivni2009" and only be created for the upcoming election, ...

I haven't stopped watching CNN for the the duration of the inauguration today... while micro blogging and updating facebook through CNN.com/LIVE and Twitter. Congrats to President Barack Obama!  Do check out the new whitehouse.gov and the new YouTube Channel ! PS> will try to write a post on my new ventures in Vienna Austria, for the time being you can visit the OSCE ...