As so often seems to be the case here at chaos central, I’m up to my eyeballs in work. Fortunately, there’s a lot of other stuff out there worth reading:
- Fighting a Campaign Online – Crawford Kilian recounts his challenges as an e-campaigner for NDP candidate Sherry Shaghaghi, including the deluge of questionnaires from various organizations, interest groups and individuals. I honestly don’t know what the solution is to that problem; it’s bedevilled every campaign I’ve worked in.
- Writing at Communicate or Die, the online labour communications blog, Steve Dondley asks, “What would you tell powerful labour leaders about the Internet?” He thinks organized labour is missing the e-boat; what e-bout you?
- Kathy Sierra recommends that anyone trying to tell a service or product ask themselves, “How does this help users kick-ass?“ It’s her way of filling in the blank in the sentence, “It’s the [mystery phrase that will save your company], stupid!” Which makes me think: if I look at an election platform and ask, “How does this help voters kick-ass?”… what, if anything, would be the answer?
- And Steven C. Clemons of The Washington Note is having second thoughts about participating in blogger conference calls, where political bigwigs convene sympathetic bloggers and dish out insider poop (that is, lightly embellished talking points). He wonders if there’s a journalistic ethical dilemma at play – or if the practice reduces political bloggers to echo-chamber shills.
