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True Spin

I just got back from the True Spin conference yesterday. “A PR Conference for Progessives.” Definitely an intense couple of days. By the end of the first day, if I heard the “Values-Problem-Issues-Policy” hierarchy--or the term frame, I would have wilted. So I ditched the “messaging track” and caught a couple of the more geeky workshops. The first workshop on Friday was lead by a guy named John Amos, who works with an organization called Skytruth. Mostly they’ve worked on wilderness environmental issues. But John pointed out the social and environmental justice potential of mapping, which I’ve been thinking about for a while. Gotta learn more about Google Maps.

Then I went to the geekiest workshop of all--Parsing the Political Blogosphere, lead by John Kelly. John discussed some tools that he’s developing that maps networks of bloggers with shared interests by analyzing what they link to. Interestingly, most blog links aren’t to other blogs, but to resources, such as media outlet sites and Wikipedia. And guess what site is at the center of the blog universe? The New York Times. I know that’s what I link to most often, try as I might not to.  Juniper said yeah, there’s been a couple of active takeover attempts against the Times. Which, in his opinion, must be at least partly politically motivated. 

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