Publications

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Government RSS, push and pull

Government RSS, push and pull

Wired has a story on how the US government is using RSS as a tool for communicating with the public. This is great news, since RSS is a nice way of bridging "push" and "pull" (remember how trendy that distinction used to be?) The Wired story links to RSS Gov, a web...

Beyond the electronic whiteboard

Beyond the electronic whiteboard

As seen on Cairns: Nothing too new about electronic whiteboards as a collaborative tool (see, for example, this experiment from Colorado). But the InterWrite MeetingPad creates a new range of options. It's a wireless, handheld tablet that uses Bluetooth to communicate...

Another setback for political science

Another setback for political science

Yesterday I finally received my doctorate. The actual piece of Latin-inscribed paper showed up at my door care of Fedex (classy move, Harvard!), officially licensing me in the practice of political science. Yesterday was also the deadline for submitting proposals for...

North American Summit on Citizen Engagement: Day 3

North American Summit on Citizen Engagement: Day 3

As posted on Cairns: Our last day began with a panel of elected politicians discussing the role of civic engagement in their work. Listening to their experiences and comments, I was struck by how much of the burden of civic engagement seems to be laid at their feet....

Better than Blogging?

Better than Blogging?

As seen on Cairns: In the course of writing a recent story on e-campaigning, I had an interesting conversation with Michael Cornfield about the blogging phenomenon. Michael is the politics guy at the Pew Internet and American Life project, and a great source of wisdom...

A download button that works

A download button that works

download Firefox immediately. Where will this madness lead? "Submit" buttons that submit your form, without asking you to please reformulate the syntax for your birthdate or street address? Help numbers that connect you with actual live helpful people? Fellow fans of...

Bad sharers

Bad sharers

Looking for a snapshot of how the war against terrorism is hurting the Internet? Check out the letter that ran in the Circuits section of today's New York Times. To the Editor:''Where Good Wi-Fi Makes Good Neighbors'' (Oct. 21) did not take into account two serious...

The Harvard Business Review

Government RSS, push and pull

Government RSS, push and pull

Wired has a story on how the US government is using RSS as a tool for communicating with the public. This is great news, since RSS is a nice way of bridging "push" and "pull" (remember how trendy that distinction used to be?) The Wired story links to RSS Gov, a web...

Beyond the electronic whiteboard

Beyond the electronic whiteboard

As seen on Cairns: Nothing too new about electronic whiteboards as a collaborative tool (see, for example, this experiment from Colorado). But the InterWrite MeetingPad creates a new range of options. It's a wireless, handheld tablet that uses Bluetooth to communicate...

Another setback for political science

Another setback for political science

Yesterday I finally received my doctorate. The actual piece of Latin-inscribed paper showed up at my door care of Fedex (classy move, Harvard!), officially licensing me in the practice of political science. Yesterday was also the deadline for submitting proposals for...

North American Summit on Citizen Engagement: Day 3

North American Summit on Citizen Engagement: Day 3

As posted on Cairns: Our last day began with a panel of elected politicians discussing the role of civic engagement in their work. Listening to their experiences and comments, I was struck by how much of the burden of civic engagement seems to be laid at their feet....

Better than Blogging?

Better than Blogging?

As seen on Cairns: In the course of writing a recent story on e-campaigning, I had an interesting conversation with Michael Cornfield about the blogging phenomenon. Michael is the politics guy at the Pew Internet and American Life project, and a great source of wisdom...

A download button that works

A download button that works

download Firefox immediately. Where will this madness lead? "Submit" buttons that submit your form, without asking you to please reformulate the syntax for your birthdate or street address? Help numbers that connect you with actual live helpful people? Fellow fans of...

Bad sharers

Bad sharers

Looking for a snapshot of how the war against terrorism is hurting the Internet? Check out the letter that ran in the Circuits section of today's New York Times. To the Editor:''Where Good Wi-Fi Makes Good Neighbors'' (Oct. 21) did not take into account two serious...

OneZero

Podcast: From Org Charts to Sitemaps — How organizational structure affects web strategy and implementation

Podcast: From Org Charts to Sitemaps — How organizational structure affects web strategy and implementation

Does your organizational structure support web innovation or inhibit it? Social Signal's first podcast will help you learn how to make the most of your own team's structure from the web strategists at two very different nonprofits: Corrie Frasier,  Online Communications Manager for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Jed Miller, Director of Internet programs for the American Civil Liberties Union. Corrie a

Turning Words into Deeds: A response to Knight Foundation’s 21st Century News Challenge

Turning Words into Deeds: A response to Knight Foundation’s 21st Century News Challenge

What makes for a transformative media moment: a moment when an individual reads, watches or hears a news story and is galvanized to take action on an issue? Social Signal hopes to offer a new answer to that question with the WIDget, a tool that will turn words into deeds by marrying web-savvy media outlets with the latest nonprofit volunteer and donation opportunities.

The WIDget is our proposal to the Knight Foundation’s 21st Century News Challenge, a call for “new ways to understand news and act on it…new ways for people to communicate interactively to better understand one another…[and] new ways for people to use information.”

The WIDget answers this challenge by by using the latest Internet tools to match issue-oriented journalism with opportunities for concrete citizen engagement. Through a Words Into Deeds widget (WIDget), online media outlets, blogs, audio and video sites will be able to complement any issue-specific story with a set of related volunteer and donation opportunities. You can read about the WIDget and take a look at a mock-up in our draft proposal for the Knight Foundation (PDF).

We’ve made a conscious decision to share our proposal before the December 31 submission deadline because we think that a community converesation about the proposal can help make it stronger, and help us find the best partners to support the WIDget’s development. You can contribute to this process if you are:

  • A nonprofit organization that maintains organizational databases: contact Social Signal to add your database to the list of databases that will be tapped by the WIDget.
  • A nonprofit organization that wants to promote its donor or volunteer opportunities: contact Social Signal to add your organization’s name to the list of nonprofits who want to appear in WIDget listings.
  • A media outlet or blogger: contact Social Signal to add your outlet or blog site to the list of outlets that would deploy the WIDget to offer volunteer and donor opportunities to your readers.
  • An interested observer: share your thoughts about the WIDget by commenting on this blog post or by emailing Social Signal with your comments.

To contact Social Signal, please e-mail widget@socialsignal.com.

Thanks in advance for any comments or suggested partnerships, and we’ll keep you posted on how our proposal evolves.

Attachment Size
WordsIntoDeeds-30Nov06.pdf 354.07 KB
Unexpected phrases

Unexpected phrases

I'm shopping for a baby in Second Life and came across this gem: "We will not replace babies that have been lost, stolen or had their contents removed." posted by Consultini Paperdoll on The Avenues using a blogHUD : [blogHUD permalink]

PODCAST: From Org Charts to Sitemaps: How organizational structure affects web strategy and implementation

PODCAST: From Org Charts to Sitemaps: How organizational structure affects web strategy and implementation

Does your organizational structure support web innovation or inhibit it? Learn how to make the most of your own team's structure from the web strategists at two very different nonprofits: Corrie Frasier,  Online Communications Manager for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Jed Miller, Director of Internet programs for the American Civil Liberties Union. In this, the first edition of the Social Signal podcast, Corrie and Jed talk about everything from how to get senior buy-in to your web strategy, to how interdepartmental cooperation helped the ACLU respond effectively to NSA spying.


powered by ODEO

Religious views of the body & soul after death

Religious views of the body & soul after death

For all of us thinking about death and grieving, the Body Worlds exhibit is holding an interesting event this weekend:

Religious Views of the Human Body and Soul After Death
In conjunction with the InterSpiritual Centre of Vancouver (www.interspiritualcentre.org)
Saturday, November 4, 2006
7:00pm — 7:50pm
Science Theatre (seating is limited)

CBC Radio host Priya Ramu will host a discussion among representatives of Vancouver’s Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish and Sikh religious communities regarding their perspectives on death and dying, the body and soul, funeral practices and the public display of human bodies for educational purposes. The remainder of the program will provide an opportunity for the audience to address questions to our panel.

This event is FREE with purchase of a BODY WORLDS 3 ticket for that evening. Seating is limited and is available on a ‘first come/first served’ basis.

Featuring:
Orai Fujikawa Sensei: Bishop of the Hongwanji Buddhist Temples in Canada
Pandit Prameya Chaitanya: Priest of the Shree Mahalakshmi Hindu Temple
Giani Jasbir Singh Ji: Priest of the Akali Singh Gurdwara Sahib
Dr. Amr Hafez: Islamic Society of BC
Tara Bentall King: Vancouver School of Theology
Rabbi David Mivasair: Ahavat Olam Synagogue


Woohoo! Tivo! Over here!

Woohoo! Tivo! Over here!

I wanted to send people a direct link to Tivo in my post about our home media server, but Tivo's refer-a-friend tools don't include a web badge! If I had a little snippet of code that let me put a trackable link to Tivo into a blog post, I'd be motivated to blog more...

Tales of a Mac media server

Tales of a Mac media server

Earlier this year we purchased a 32", HD-ready Philips LCD TV. So when our DVD player died a few months ago, we found ourselves staring at the PC input on the back of the TV and wondering whether our next DVD player should in fact be a computer. About eight weeks ago...

JSTOR DAILY

Podcast: From Org Charts to Sitemaps — How organizational structure affects web strategy and implementation

Podcast: From Org Charts to Sitemaps — How organizational structure affects web strategy and implementation

Does your organizational structure support web innovation or inhibit it? Social Signal's first podcast will help you learn how to make the most of your own team's structure from the web strategists at two very different nonprofits: Corrie Frasier,  Online Communications Manager for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Jed Miller, Director of Internet programs for the American Civil Liberties Union. Corrie a

Turning Words into Deeds: A response to Knight Foundation’s 21st Century News Challenge

Turning Words into Deeds: A response to Knight Foundation’s 21st Century News Challenge

What makes for a transformative media moment: a moment when an individual reads, watches or hears a news story and is galvanized to take action on an issue? Social Signal hopes to offer a new answer to that question with the WIDget, a tool that will turn words into deeds by marrying web-savvy media outlets with the latest nonprofit volunteer and donation opportunities.

The WIDget is our proposal to the Knight Foundation’s 21st Century News Challenge, a call for “new ways to understand news and act on it…new ways for people to communicate interactively to better understand one another…[and] new ways for people to use information.”

The WIDget answers this challenge by by using the latest Internet tools to match issue-oriented journalism with opportunities for concrete citizen engagement. Through a Words Into Deeds widget (WIDget), online media outlets, blogs, audio and video sites will be able to complement any issue-specific story with a set of related volunteer and donation opportunities. You can read about the WIDget and take a look at a mock-up in our draft proposal for the Knight Foundation (PDF).

We’ve made a conscious decision to share our proposal before the December 31 submission deadline because we think that a community converesation about the proposal can help make it stronger, and help us find the best partners to support the WIDget’s development. You can contribute to this process if you are:

  • A nonprofit organization that maintains organizational databases: contact Social Signal to add your database to the list of databases that will be tapped by the WIDget.
  • A nonprofit organization that wants to promote its donor or volunteer opportunities: contact Social Signal to add your organization’s name to the list of nonprofits who want to appear in WIDget listings.
  • A media outlet or blogger: contact Social Signal to add your outlet or blog site to the list of outlets that would deploy the WIDget to offer volunteer and donor opportunities to your readers.
  • An interested observer: share your thoughts about the WIDget by commenting on this blog post or by emailing Social Signal with your comments.

To contact Social Signal, please e-mail widget@socialsignal.com.

Thanks in advance for any comments or suggested partnerships, and we’ll keep you posted on how our proposal evolves.

Attachment Size
WordsIntoDeeds-30Nov06.pdf 354.07 KB
Unexpected phrases

Unexpected phrases

I'm shopping for a baby in Second Life and came across this gem: "We will not replace babies that have been lost, stolen or had their contents removed." posted by Consultini Paperdoll on The Avenues using a blogHUD : [blogHUD permalink]

PODCAST: From Org Charts to Sitemaps: How organizational structure affects web strategy and implementation

PODCAST: From Org Charts to Sitemaps: How organizational structure affects web strategy and implementation

Does your organizational structure support web innovation or inhibit it? Learn how to make the most of your own team's structure from the web strategists at two very different nonprofits: Corrie Frasier,  Online Communications Manager for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Jed Miller, Director of Internet programs for the American Civil Liberties Union. In this, the first edition of the Social Signal podcast, Corrie and Jed talk about everything from how to get senior buy-in to your web strategy, to how interdepartmental cooperation helped the ACLU respond effectively to NSA spying.


powered by ODEO

Religious views of the body & soul after death

Religious views of the body & soul after death

For all of us thinking about death and grieving, the Body Worlds exhibit is holding an interesting event this weekend:

Religious Views of the Human Body and Soul After Death
In conjunction with the InterSpiritual Centre of Vancouver (www.interspiritualcentre.org)
Saturday, November 4, 2006
7:00pm — 7:50pm
Science Theatre (seating is limited)

CBC Radio host Priya Ramu will host a discussion among representatives of Vancouver’s Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish and Sikh religious communities regarding their perspectives on death and dying, the body and soul, funeral practices and the public display of human bodies for educational purposes. The remainder of the program will provide an opportunity for the audience to address questions to our panel.

This event is FREE with purchase of a BODY WORLDS 3 ticket for that evening. Seating is limited and is available on a ‘first come/first served’ basis.

Featuring:
Orai Fujikawa Sensei: Bishop of the Hongwanji Buddhist Temples in Canada
Pandit Prameya Chaitanya: Priest of the Shree Mahalakshmi Hindu Temple
Giani Jasbir Singh Ji: Priest of the Akali Singh Gurdwara Sahib
Dr. Amr Hafez: Islamic Society of BC
Tara Bentall King: Vancouver School of Theology
Rabbi David Mivasair: Ahavat Olam Synagogue


Woohoo! Tivo! Over here!

Woohoo! Tivo! Over here!

I wanted to send people a direct link to Tivo in my post about our home media server, but Tivo's refer-a-friend tools don't include a web badge! If I had a little snippet of code that let me put a trackable link to Tivo into a blog post, I'd be motivated to blog more...

Tales of a Mac media server

Tales of a Mac media server

Earlier this year we purchased a 32", HD-ready Philips LCD TV. So when our DVD player died a few months ago, we found ourselves staring at the PC input on the back of the TV and wondering whether our next DVD player should in fact be a computer. About eight weeks ago...

THE VERGE

Singing goodbye to a Facebook “friend”

Singing goodbye to a Facebook “friend”

This week I participated in a fireside chat with Rochelle Grayson for Canadian Women in Communications, on The Pros and Cons of Social Media Marketing. It was the scrappiest conversation I've ever had from a (notional) podium, probably because Rochelle and I know and...

Status report on the perpetual home media overhaul

Status report on the perpetual home media overhaul

Gillian Shaw's delightful weekend story in the Vancouver Sun covered online alternatives to cable, and outed me once again as the World's Most Committed Cross-Platform TV Consumer: And then there are the techno geeks like Vancouver's Alexandra Samuel opting for a...