I’d love to hear The Gillmor Gang talk about what I was writing up in my previous post: Leveraging Social Media to “Push Back”.  (As one way to help build what George Soros wants to help progressives build:  a “response mechanism” to rival and exceed the mechanisms of the Right) They (the Gillmor Gang and the other @ folks I include)   are a crew that is always talking about what works in Social Networking and WHY,  and have a passion to explore how the social graph can help create relational  links between people that strike a chord and create a momentum that is powerful. 

I already included Scoble and Searls in the @s I tacked on to the original post,  because they have been amongst the people I have followed the longest and have talked about the power of harnessing a significant channel for enabling voice;  and it seems to me to be an opportune time , politically,  to enable the wider “harnessing of voice” so that we can have a healthier smorgasboard of ideas instead  of all the LEFT-RIGHT extremities that focus on conflict instead of helping us talk about what is needed.

But I want to explore the tools that could be made available for users to  help build this grassroots distribution/response system to help us get to the real conversations.

I wonder if this topic is “too explosive”;  there are bound to be a lot of tech people who would frown on the sentiments expressed in pushing for finding ways to “combat” right-wing disinformation.  But ,  as Soros probably knows,  there is a dire need for the tech savvy of the left of center political community (or even the “left-of-what is now the right”,  since there are some conservatives who are not of the ilk that seems to be the dominant GOP mode).

This also may be a topic that is dwarfed by other events,  like the release of new wikileaks documents,  the TSA protests,  and the Korean standoff/scuffle/threat,  not to mention the Thanksgiving holidays.

When I got a reply back from Doc Searls asking for more details,  I had a few days when I tried some additional posts about the call for “quick response mechanism” and my seeking some thoughts and/or opinions from the best social media minds I follow,  and maybe some will trickle in this week.  I also want to let everybody know that I would welcome thoughts from anywhere,  not just the folks I flagged with their @twitterName.  I hope for something to come of this.  And I also sense that there will be a lot of relevant issues arising from this that would be good exploration for the church to use in thinking about what kinds of conversations we need to be having and what stories need to be told. 

I picked on Steve, Robert,  and Doc here because I’ve gotten replies from them before (or retweets or follows from them),  but if any of them think that other “Gillmor Gang” regulars/frequenters might be interested  in this or have something to say,  please invite them to do so.  I am a regular watcher of the show,  and am really curious as to what “the Gang” would say on this topic;  I’d love to hear where they would take this.