(Note:  I'll be in the Bay area in October 2006 and could meet face to face.) 

Goal:  Find the right combination of Web2.0 tools for a volunteer core group to use to help turnout people for a local social-justice event, scheduled in 3 months.

In just one volunteer network, for example, nationally there are 10,000+ local people, already involved in various communities, to mobilize for particular events.

Tools I have so far:

• WhizSpark event website summarizes the event, displays photos and fosters interaction through e-mail invitations.  This page then serves as an event artifact.
• PR Web press release distribution.

Tools I need: 

A local community network and project-oriented collaborative web space. Coordinators first learn to use this at a local face-to-face meeting.  Then together for 3 months they utilize it asynchronously to help build participation for a successful event.  The website would include simplified workplace e-tools and short videos, appropriate for busy volunteers.

Its purpose is social facilitation: to encourage people to perform better at simple tasks when they know they're observing one another.  Tasks include extending personal invitations to attend the event, listening and engaging others to participate based on their particular interests and gifts.  See: 12 Guiding Principles of Community Engagement.

WhizSpark invitation websites produce Excel spreadsheets. I want to mash up and report invitations sent, etc. graphically in the collaborative web space for others to see.  Bar charts and a campaign thermometer would help build campaign momentum by representing:

• Event invitations sent so far

• RSVPs received
• 1-on-1 Visit (survey) results, represented with tags.

Simplified, volunteer-appropriate features in collaborative web space might also facilitate:

• mailing list (spreadsheet) display
• project management
• document downloads
• a discussion forum.

Today there is a downward spiral of civic apathy.  Our national stockpile of social capital  -- our reserve of personal bonds and fellowship -- is seriously depleted.  We need  democratic social-capital strategies like this to enable busy people to act bettertogether.

There's also a market for such event-organizing tools.  Example:  school reunions.  But on this wetpaint.com High-School reunion wiki notice the last comment:  Poor planning.

Web2.0 tools could help facilitate more effectively-planned events by supporting grassroots coordinators online to engage and mobilize busy people.

Mac Johnson  psmcovky at usa.net

New Richmond, Ohio (Cincinnati area)

"...Remember me as a drum major for justice."  -- Martin Luther King Jr.

Hello,

We would like our grassroots organizers (Communities United to Save Darfur) to be able to easily create their own chapter sites. Ideally, folks would be able to go to our home page and type in their zip code.  If they find a local group, they could sign up.  If they do not find a group, they could create their own.

We are currently using Democracy in Action, and while they “technically” have this option -  the tools are hardly “point-and-click” and only one of our almost 200 groups has been able to produce a website.

Does anyone know of tools out there like www.dfalink.org?

I think DFALink was created by Blue State Digital, but are there similar open-source programs out there that are as easy to use for the end user (no programming skills at all required)?

Thanks,

Noah