Why I Won’t be Leaving Twitter for FriendFeed, Bivings Group.

I’m currently following around 160 people on Twitter. Some of these people I know well in real life. Some casually. Some not at all. I’m able to follow and learn from this large group of people because all I see is what they type in their Twitter status bar periodically. Sure, some people tell you what they had for breakfast. But most people exert some level of editorial discipline on themselves, and only write when something at least semi-interesting happens.

They don’t tweet about every meal they have, just the really, really good ones. They don’t share every item they come across on the web, just the interesting ones. The result is a usually compelling stream of anecdotes that is updated throughout the day.

FriendFeed has no such editorial discipline. In addition to receiving those few choice anecdotes each day about the people you follow, you also learn what they are listening too on Last.fm, what is in their Netflix queue and what they dugg on Digg, among other things. I might be interested in knowing that stuff about my 10-20 closest friends, but certainly not about all 160 people I follow on Twitter. It is just too much.

Vint Cerf Says Government Needs To Encourage Internet Competition, Information Week.

Vint Cerf said this week that he never intended to seriously propose that the U.S. government should nationalize the Internet. But he does think the Internet is seriously broken, with an economic system that discourages competition and innovation and encourages harmful monopolistic practices. He argued that the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which governs Internet service providers, is obsolete and needs to be revised.

Cerf, who is VP and chief Internet evangelist at Google (NSDQ: GOOG), and sometimes called the "father of the Internet," told a TechCrunch reporter recently that "the Internet should be owned and maintained by the government, just like the highways." But after I blogged about the TechCrunch article, Cerf posted a comment here, saying nationalizing the Internet "was not intended as a serious proposition."

Is Email In Danger?, ReadWriteWeb.

Email is perceived as work, while Twitter is still thought of as fun. Twitter messages are short, use is casual, and Twitter is a cute piece of technology loved by the earlier adopter crowd. People send Tweets complaining their Inbox is full.

The Twitter experience is lighter because of the user interface. With Twitter, we're presented with a scrollable list of messages.

With email we need to select the message and drill into it. Traditionally email clients show only the subject line, so even if the message is short, the user needs to click. And all these clicks add up.

Drill Now as the conservative MoveOn?, Politico.

The unifying grievance, of course, is the sharp rise in gas prices, and the unifying cause came into being on May 20, when American Solutions, the 527 started by Newt Gingrich, posted a petition that called for increased drilling as a way of lowering gas prices. “We… the undersigned citizens of the United States, petition the U.S. Congress to act immediately to lower gasoline prices (and diesel and other fuel prices) by authorizing the exploration of proven energy reserves to reduce our dependence on foreign energy sources from unstable countries,” it declared.
See also

Within a week, the Web traffic for American Solutions skyrocketed, even beating out MoveOn.org for a couple of days, which led blogger Soren Dayton, who used to work for McCain, to ask, “Is Drill Now the conservative MoveOn?” (The liberal Web behemoth—with over three million members and a proven ability to generate massive amounts of small donor cash quickly—started as a petition to “move on” from Clinton’s impeachment.)

Google Shuts Down Anti-Obama Sites on its Blogger Platform, NewsBusters.

What they did was go to the Blogspot addresses found on the site of the NoObama coalition called Just Say No Deal and constantly hit the "mark as spam" link so that Google's Blogger would be flooded with spam warnings. This caused Google/Blogger to freeze the sites marked.

Apparently, this campaign merely took advantage of Google/Blogger's flawed system of finding spam blogs. So, it looks like what we have here is an Obama dirty trick to shut down political opposition. Looks like Obmatons aren't much for that whole democracy thing, eh?

Political Freelancers Use Web to Join the Attack, NY Times.

The better-circulated political videos have generally come from people with some production experience. One of the most widely seen anti-Obama videos was created by Jason Mitchell, who produces evangelical Christian programming in Durham, N.C.

A conservative-leaning version of YouTube called Eyeblast.tv has recorded millions of hits on the video. But as is often the case with such videos, how many of the viewers come to sneer rather than applaud is hard to tell.

Republicans Offer Online Lunchtime Chats To Answer Convention Questions, Wired.

The planners for the Republican national convention in Minneapolis-St. Paul are answering questions online via live video-stream about the logistics of the event, which is taking place between September 1-4.

On the Web, Supporters of McCain Wage An Uphill Battle: Republican's Online Presence Lags Far Behind Obama's, Washington Post.

No doubt. Less than five months before Election Day, with polls showing the presumptive Democratic nominee holding a slight edge over his Republican counterpart, there's one place where Obama unequivocally trumps McCain: the Web. And what's most telling about the online drubbing is its spontaneous, grass-roots nature -- the way Obama's Internet portrait is drawn and refreshed every day by enthusiastic supporters, whose blogging, YouTubing and networking aren't controlled or limited by any campaign.

That's best seen on the Big Three social networking sites -- soc-nets, in onlinespeak -- where the junior Illinois senator beats the senior Arizona senator right into the ground. On MySpace, Obama lists more than 401,000 friends to McCain's nearly 56,000. A similar sevenfold gap exists on Facebook, where Obama supporters number 1,040,185 while McCain's clock in at 152,570.

And on YouTube, it's like Obama and McCain operate in two separate layers of the atmosphere. McCain's channel, which has posted 208 videos, has been viewed 3.7 million times; Obama's more than 1,100 videos on his channel have been viewed 53.4 million times.

John McCain Is Way Behind Online: The GOP candidate trails Barack Obama in Web fund-raising and vote-getting. Now McCain's campaign is scrambling to catch up, BusinessWeek.

The Republican Party is taking other steps to further its online agenda. On June 24, All's consultancy, the David All Group, helped launch Whereisthered.com along with the College Republican National Committee. The communal blog follows three college Republicans as they travel cross-country through "Red" congressional districts. The aim is to show young voters the widespread appeal of the party across America. Last year, All introduced a donor site, Slatecard, in part as an answer to the Democratic ActBlue, a four-year-old online political action committee that lets users contribute to any Democratic candidate and that has raised $53 million. Slatecard won't release membership numbers or say how much it has raised but All says the goal for this year is $1 million.

The Web Is Where It's At for Youth Vote, AdAge.

A new survey, released today by PR agency Waggener Edstrom Worldwide, shows that a strong majority (64%) of 18- to 35-year-olds are relying on digital communications to stay informed on this year's election because it provides the easiest way to access and share information. And in another blow for traditional media, the survey also finds that an overwhelming majority (76%) prefer online sources rather than traditional news sources because respondents feel the latter attempts to control and shape the news. The one bit of good news for traditional media: 38% of those responding to the survey have more confidence in its content; only 30% had more confidence in internet content.

McCain's 'Dr. No' Web Video Meets With A Collective Shrug, Wired.

"What strikes me about the Dr. No video is that it actually makes Barack Obama look really cool," says Thierry Daher, CEO of Vanksen, Culture Buzz New York, an online marketing company. "They picture him with James Bond music in the background, and you have someone who’s tall, thin, and good-looking -- he’s probably closer to James Bond than Dr No."

In other words, the images and sounds just don't support the underlying goal and message of the advertisement, Daher says.

But he says that he finds the McCain campaign's previous web video "Words," more effective.

But, he adds: "I’m not sure that there’s anything really viral about it. It’s just a negative ad. There's no 'wow effect.'"

MSHcast #3: David All and the Organization of the Rightroots, MakeSomethingHappen.com

Podcast interview of David by MSH's Alex Steed. Obv. worth a listen.

Learning from YouTube Masters... , CitizenTube.

Build networks. Email lists matter - Matthew said Newsbusted was a success from the beginning because their massive email distribution network was a great pipeline to distribute their links.

Say something original. Both Josh and Robert stressed this - online video is a great place to say something that isn't being said somewhere else.

The "Rocketboom" strategy. Matthew touched on this... and though he took some flack for it from the audience, it seems to bear true: it does not hurt to have an attractive female starring in your videos.

Resources for DemocracyInAction Conference Presentation on Advocacy Tools, e.politics.

Below are resources for a little presention I like to call,
Cheap, Quick and (Sometimes) Dirty: Creating Integrated Online Campaigns Using Off-The-Shelf Parts

Great list of useful links.

Netroots Nation Organizer Says McCain Welcome to Attend, Wired.

What about John McCain? Has he been invited? He’s got a DailyKos button on his website.

You know, we would love to see him there, but I don’t know if he knows that we exist because we’re mostly on the internet. His wife is the one who helps him with his e-mail. So if she’s a fan -- obviously somebody had to be a fan -- because somebody had to put that DailyKos button on there.

Of course, we’re love to see them there.

Internet for Everyone campaign aims to bridge digital divide, ars technica.

The press conference brought together some unlikely allies. "This is the first time in our history that we have tried to build fundamental infrastructure on the basis of a Neanderthal philosophy," announced Stanford law professor Lawrence Lessig, "which is that we don't need government to do it." Seated next to Lessig was David All, founder of the Republican fundraising site Slatecard—and normally a proponent of that "Neanderthal" philosophy. All later argued for wider broadband access as a means of fostering the next generation of tech entrepreneurs.

Daily Digest: PdF '08 Roundup -- Crickets Seem to Greet "McCain is Aware of the Internet" Meme, techPresident.

In fact, we're going to go out on a limb and argue that PdF '08 might be the most mediated -- videoed, Twittered, blogged -- conference in all of recorded history. Some evidence in favor:

CNN iReport has posted video interviews with several attendees, including such techies as Esther Dyson, Craig Newmark, Robert Scoble, taken in the main conference hall. Via Qik, Micah Sifry streamed live from the conference hall with groups of conference goers including writers Jonathan Alter, David Corn, and Nancy Watzman; Dan Cantor of the Working Families Party; Ben Relles and Amber Ettinger of "Obama Girl" fame.

Obama's Secret Digital Weapon:Blue State helped create the Web machine that brought in the bucks and built the buzz. Now it's looking to sign up more corporate clients, BusinessWeek.

Besides Obama, Blue State has attracted more than 100 clients, including such widely known corporate names as AT&T (T) and Stonyfield Farm. There is also talk that the firm could continue playing a role as a contractor in an Obama White House. "Blue State is using technology to give people a chance to become involved, whether it's a voter or a customer," says film marketer Lisa Smithline. While director of creative marketing at independent film company Focus Features in 2006, Smithline hired Blue State to promote the Iraq war documentary The Ground Truth through a vigorous Web campaign that generated 500 screenings in churches and community centers. "They cross over and really reach those who have never been reached before," she says.

Net Neutrality Advocates Call For Fast, Universal Access To The Net, Wired.

"We're going to create one of the largest coalitions ever assembled, which is going to demonstrate to policymakers that the will of the people is to create an internet system that has competition, access and that fosters innovation," said Josh Silver, the Free Press' executive director at a Tuesday press conference unveiling the initiative at The Personal Democracy Forum in New York City. "It's going to be public interest organizations, individuals and industry [aligned together.]"

The coalition, consisting of one of the FCC's Democratic Commissioners Jonathan Adelstein, and a group of entrepreneurs, academics, non-profits, a venture capitalist and Google's Vint Cerf, each gave testimonials on the importance of universal access.

I'm here in NYC for day two of Personal Democracy Forum. Day one was focused on how the Internet is changing politics and campaigning - solid ground no doubt, but today the conversation will zero in on how the Internet is changing governance itself.

While I've wanted to add some more commentary on what's been going - frankly I've been too busy at the conference to stop and blog. But thankfully the good folks at PDF have picked up the slack and made the time to get some content up.

So for the most comprehensive round-up of what's been going on at Personal Democracy Forum, I have to direct you over to techPresident, which has the goods on the goings on of day one.

But the most interesting discussions at PDF are going on right now on Twitter, when PDF doesn't break it.

Everyone at the conference been using the hashtag #pdf2008 to tag their tweets and you can use the niffy site Summize.com to follow along with the conversation.

 Check it out, and join in conversation - remember - #pdf2008.

Thanks to the high speed Internet at PDF, you can enjoy your daily Second Cup this morning. Check back for some posts on the conference soon.

Next Week: Conference Reverse-Engineers the YouTube Election, Wired.

Many of the leading lights in online politics, technology, business and academia will gather to share their ideas about how to really execute the idea of letting citizens have more of a say in how they are governed.

"What's different this year is that the entire political and media establishment has finally woken up to the fact that the internet is now a major player in the world of politics and our democracy," says Andrew Rasiej, co-founder and publisher with Micah Sifry of the TechPresident blog and annual Personal Democracy Forum. "We are watching a conversion of our politics from the 20th century to the 21st."

Lefty blogs, tech blogs, and coalition politics 101, NextRight.

We all understand the rallying effect of the war clearly. Net neutrality is an obscure and poorly understood regulatory issue that seems to energize the online gaming community, high-bandwidth users, and others. And telco-immunity gets lots of coverage from civil libertarians and technology people.

The upshot is that the success of the Democratic netroots may be as much or more about basic coalition politics than any great technological or political innovation. Afluent, socially moderate-to-liberal, tech-saavy people were attracted to the Democratic coalition through these arguments, anger at the war, a message about the GOP becoming too socially conservative, They were given a series of tools with which they could organize, and they developed more, like Act Blue.

On Facebook, it's game on for McCain, CNN.

Anyone who thought John McCain’s campaign – which launched its very first Facebook application just two days ago – would make a major push on the social networking Web site when pigs fly… is right.

McCain’s new “Pork Invaders” application, launched Friday, is a video game that requires users to dodge incoming projectiles from flying pigs. If a user takes a hit from one of the application’s pigs, the user loses one of the three lives granted at the beginning of the game.

Saying thanks in a conference presentation, SethGodin.

I hear quite a few presentations given at conferences. Approximately 5% of the official welcome speech consists of a litany of thanks. The organizer is busy thanking the committee that handled the arrangements, the sponsors, the executive director, the tireless volunteers. I've heard people try hard to read the names superfast, or really slowly, or mumble through them...

Not only is this a total waste of time for most attendees, it doesn't even satisfy the core objective, which is thanking and rewarding the folks who helped. And it certainly doesn't encourage others to look forward to helping out.

Facebook faux pas: The geek's guide to netiquette, the Independent.

Leave me alone!

Coping with the deluge of virtual social interaction relies on disabling as many of channels of communication as possible, and deleting some friends. Yes, they might take umbrage, but don't worry. And if you get defriended – don't be disheartened. It's nothing personal. People can just become sick of being messaged, poked, invited and flirted with. Debrett's says wait 24 hours before accepting a friend request, so you can think it over. But maybe a better strategy is to leave them hanging. Then nonchalantly reject their request. They'll cope. It's only social networking, after all.

Net Neutrality Brings Foes Together, WebProNews.

Conservative Instapundit blogger Glenn Reynolds did the unthinkable today: He agreed with a liberal, which is likely against stricter interpretations of The Conservative Thought Bubble Creed (Hannity, Defense Against Liberal Arts, pg. 1). Worse, the liberal is employed by MoveOn.org, with whom agreement is punishable by excommunication and revocation of golf club membership (Limbaugh, chapters 7 and 11, El Rushbo's Guide To Neo-Conduct).

The issue making a crossing of the political aisle a much shorter trip: Net Neutrality.

Likely expecting a fiery debate on every topic during WNYC's Brian Lehrer's interview of Reynolds and MoveOn's Adam Green, Lehrer was greeted at the 23-minute mark with sudden conservative/liberal kinship. Green lauded the "people-powered" Internet with its "people powered" politics and noted Net Neutrality was something both the left and right agreed about.

Study: Social networks may subvert 'digital divide', CNET.

As an added bonus, social networks may be part of the reason that low-income students are largely just as technologically proficient as their peers, contradicting parts of a 2005 Pew study that detailed an economic "digital divide." According to the new study, a full 94 percent of students use the Internet, 82 percent use it at home, and 77 percent have social-networking profiles.

The "digital divide," obviously, goes far beyond Facebook profiles, and social networks come with a whole host of new problems like cyberbullying, but at least there are signs that it could be leveling the playing field a bit.

What’s It Like on the Straight Talk Express?, BlueyBlog.

Martina Stewart of CNN reports today that the McCain campaign launched it’s first Facebook application — a tour of the bus. Davis White, director of advance for the McCain campaign, shows off some of the cool features on the Straight Talk Express.

Download the New Online Politics 101, e.politics.

Almost two years in the making, the new version of “Online Politics 101: The Tools and Tactics of Online Advocacy” is now ready for downloading! New chapters cover online political advertising, political databases, choosing the right tools, along with expanded chapters on social networking, fundraising, video, blogs and more. It’s an essential guide to doing politics on the internet, and it’s absolutely free.