Obama’s Community of Millions

By Rob Longert, PepperDigital

My colleague Sam Ford was featured in a piece in Fast Company last week on the topic of Governing 2.0, the notion that our leaders and the people around them must be well versed in Web 2.0 strategy. 

Sam continued the conversation about Governing 2.0 on our blog and received a comment from one of our readers, Dustin Bratcher, regarding Obama’s ability to communicate, saying that Obama’s tactics will allow him to “connect with the citizens of this country through the power of the internet and get millions of citizens actively involved in the governing of this country.”

After his historic campaign, it is evident that Barack Obama’s leadership will include a great deal of web strategy.  He announced his VP via text message, his team sent along continuous text message updates about his campaign, voter registration and a number of other issues, his campaign website was extremely interactive, and he had a grasp on how to use technology to get his message across.

Now that Obama has been elected as the next President of the United States, communication with the citizens of our country has become even more important, which is why he unveiled Change.gov, a website to aid in the presidential transition.  Change.gov features a blog, a form where visitors can share their stories about the election, video, a full listing of Obama’s staff, as well as links to other government sites with details about the transition. 

As Sam noted in his response to Dustin Bratcher, the launch of this site proves that Obama already had a plan in place to think about how his digital outreach would transition once he won the election, showing that his team was thinking ahead.  More than just having a plan in place, his plan has a purpose.  Obama is trying to mobilize the citizens of America with a call to action which Boston-based social media, technology and design blogger Gradon Tripp calls the Digital New Deal.

Tripp notes that just as FDR controlled road and bridge construction projects from the White House — President Obama could mobilize the people of our country using Email, SMS, Facebook, Twitter, and other social media tools to help turn this country around and make a difference (check out this BusinessWeek article by Steve Cody and Sam Ford about why government and corporations need to borrow FDR's playbook and truly connect with constituents through Web 2.0).

After the election results came in, Josh Bernoff over at Groundswell called on Obama to “create a community of committed Americans to discuss the solutions to the problems that face us,” to “create a space for the brightest people you know” and “use this energized community to sell those ideas to America,” and by the looks of it, Obama is and has been well on his way to creating this community.

I am eager to see how the Obama team uses digital strategy and technology to create the community Bernoff is referring to, and believe that through innovation, collaboration, and communication, we as the people of the United States will feel far less removed than we have in the past.

*Thanks to Lauren Begley for the heads up about Change.gov.

Comments

[Dustin Bratcher]

Personally, I'm more interested in how Obama uses the internet during his administration than anything else he could do.

At the end of the day, politics are politics, but this is different. This is a wild card because it's never been done. Ultimately, this could bring the public closer to Washington. The citizens could be able to see more of what is going on and voice their opinions easier.

This could be the end of "call your congressman and tell them to vote yes/no" commercials and advertisements. Instead, it will be "log on to the web site and voice your opinions."

Essentially, Obama could implement the internet technology to allow the public to voice their opinions or dissatisfaction with the government or Obama himself. Which, if you think about it, is insane and great all at the same time.

Great because of the obvious reasons, but insane because the government is essentially setting up an easier way for people to complain and "hassle" them in a more concentrated way. I'm more apt to jump on the net than I am to pick up a phone and call my congressman.

It will be interesting to see if this route is taken because this could bring about all of the "change" both parties were talking about through more public opinion. But this could end up being an atomic bomb of change for the old politicians that looks like a stick of dynamite on paper.

[Sam Ford]

Good point, Dustin, that they are making it easier for us to complain to them. But if the job of the government is to represent the people, then--idealistically--complaining is an important part of the problem. Do we taxpayers want to pay for staff that handles sifting through our thoughts? In this case, actually, probably yes, since it's a much more direct use of money than all the money poured into monitoring our opinion in various ways...

[jon]

The president needs to put a perminant end to short selling in the market. sooner than later. short selling does nothing but drive down the market and that is not what we need right now.