Here’s a quick gander at/guide to some of the great folks we look forward to talking to and/or profiling this week:

Beth Kanter

Imagine if you held so much Internet power, you were able to Google your first name and your very own website were the first to come up. Beth Kanter is able to do just that.

It is impossible to describe Kanter accurately without wholly offending a large bloc of people, but here goes: Beth is God. There. We said it. Beth Kanter is God. Dare you you disagree? Have you ever seen this woman at a conference? Faced with her, you’re rendered awkward, graced, and feeling somewhat irrelevant by comparison of accomplishments. Back up a little bit and observe those around you; they’re all trying to figure out how to get involved in a conversation with her, how to somehow connect with her. In [the extremely approachable] Kanter’s 25+ years of involvement in web-based organization, she has seen it all and she graciously shares slivers of her brain on her blog every single day.

David Sirota

Having been employed by the likes of Ned Lamont and Sen. Bernie Sanders, it is easy to understand why the New York Times has described David Sirota as a “populist rabble rouser.” Sirota has appeared on countless television and radio shows as an all-around sage on all-things political and civic engagement. Further, he has written for The Huffington Post, and The Nation and he serves as senior editor of In These Times. The Uprising, his new book, has won the praise of Bill McKibben, Tom Hayden (legendary Students for a Democratic Society organizer), Naomi Klein, and Matt Taibbi, and it outlines how the netroots can lead a populist rebellion. Also, he is sort of beautiful. But then again, he is also married, so he [unfortunately] wont be appearing in a most-eligible-netroots-activist section any time soon.

Check out this talk at STRAND Books featuring Sirota discussing The Uprising.

Scott Heiferman

Every evening, Howard Dean slips into his PJs, kneels before his bed, folds his hands and thanks Scott Heiferman for everything he has. Dan envisions the great Scott Heiferman and says, “Scott. Thank you so much for helping to get my name out there. I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you. Sure, I lost the Democratic nomination ‘04, but here I am at the head of the party. Not a bad consolation prize, sir.”

I bet you didn’t know that about Howard Dean.

Through creating Meetup, Heiferman essentially put into action one of the original bridges of Internet and grassroots organizing, helping to breed and popularize the term “netroots.”

Oh. And his “notes” are also awesome.

David All

Of Barack Obama, David All recently praised the candidate’s appreciation for “people-powered revolution.” All is especially interested in making this revolution fruitful for the American conservative movement. In the context of the 2.0 activism world, he is essentially the Little Conservative That Could, as he works his tail off to catch the Republican Party up with the left when it comes to Internet political organizing, and he is doing a darn good job at doing so far. Further, All is not only an advocate with respect to bringing the netroots to the right, but also by bringing the entire process to the netroots. He is an all-around advocate of Internet people power.

-Filed in People

I was recently fortunate to speak with Beth Kanter, who, in the process of putting her children to bed, ran through her extremely impressive career in the world of eAltrusim, social networks, platforms, and every other form of simply doing impressive stuff on the web. Her awe inspiring set of experiences goes back to when she was social networking for artists by way of list-serv in mid-80s by matching artists with like-interests. Kanter isn’t someone who is putting out untried and unproven pieces of hypothetical advice. Utilizing the very advice and observation that she makes available to her readers, she has used Internet to raise over hundreds of thousands of dollars for many different causes.

Kanter has written extensively on determining and understanding the social networking needs of a cause or organization, and we talked a bit about the following question: If social platforms were the buzz-concept of last year, what will we be focusing on in this year?

She suggested, as Eric Gundersen of Development Seed had touched upon a few weeks back, that observing the importance of reciprocity and community maintenance is a positive way to consider moving forward (reciprocity existing alongside relationship-building and rewards – the three Rs of fundraising).

Where last year was very much about the emergence of people understanding that we could stage our own campaigns if we could just get people to look at them, this year people will begin to understand that this process is an interactive one. You give a little here and you can more likely expect to get a little here. She gave examples in which she was able to offer aid, consultation and ad space to those in need in order to get donations for projects she was working on. While it seems simple, folks easily forget that by helping fundraise for someone today, you might get access to their several-thousand-strong email list tomorrow when you very desperately need it.

The point isn’t to be selfish, Kanter stressed, or to focus on helping today as a key to make your tomorrow easy. This movement is, however, a natural progression in developing and sustaining a community of giving. Networking does not end at joining a network, starting a campaign or authoring a blog the same way that participation in a community is not a given to one who moves to a neighborhood, simply buys a house and writes a newsletter they expect to come inside, unsolicited, to read. We must interact with the giving community in a meaningful way, especially when they are asking from us. In order to contribute to the construction of a community, we need to look at outreach as a reciprocal process. In doing so, we can feel more confident about the sustainability of our organizational and fundraising efforts.

-Filed in Uncategorized

…when we:

• Contemplate the importance reciprocity in Internet action with Beth Kanter
• Talk to Justin Massa, founder of MoveSmart.org, about how punk rock led to community development
• Assess the successes and challenges of Meetup organizers with over 10 seasoned players
• Find out what makes The Great Clay Shirky tick
• Take a look at why everyone we interview talks about Saul Alinsky as if he were a deity
• Shoot the shit with Ze Frank
• And much, much more

-Filed in Uncategorized