Group Blogging -- Mass

Here's the idea, take something like this:

http://www.dailykos.com/comments/1499582/60250210#comment_60250210

​The Iraqi government hires the Podesta Group to lobby for it in DC​

Whenever you think DC sleaze has reached its low point, it always manages to prove you wrong. Politico's Byron Taub and Anna Palmer this afternoon report that the authoritarian, human-rights-abusing government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Malki is about to hire The Podesta Group as its first lobbying firm.

That firm is run by Tony Podesta (and co-owned by Clinton Campaign Chariman tony Podesta) who legally peddles his influence with Democratic Party politicians to shape legislation on behalf of companies such as BP Oil, General Dynamics, Walmart, and Bank of America. The New York Times, calling him one of DC's most powerful "superlobbyists", described the explosive growth his firm enjoyed since the Democrats took control of Congress in 2006 and the White House in 2008. The Center for Public Integrity reported in 2011 that Podesta and his lobbyist-wife Heather were by far the largest lobbyist-bundlers as of that early point in the election cycle: Podesta came in "with just under $350,000 bundled to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) and the campaign of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada", while his wife "bundled donations have gone exclusively to Democrats — over $322,000 went to the DCCC and DSCC".

www.theguardian.com/...

Divine order calls for commenter to diary it, commenter asks,"Which Part?"

Which part indeed. Then it got me thinking... What if we grabbed these super tough to wrap your head around stories -- those stories like the Downing St Memo, or Hillary's Speaking and Fundraising Fees and quid pro quo -- what if 5 or six of us, or heck 10-20 of us wrote a piece on a different aspect of the story. Putting them all out en-masse at the same time. We could easily make a collection or curation of topics and issues.

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a wonderful idea! Can we choose which subject we want?

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'Well, I've wrestled with reality for thirty five years, Doctor, and I’m happy to state I finally won out over it." Elwood P. Dowd "

Don't know if you want to keep it to Podesta sleaze only, but if it includes other Clinton related sleaze, and there is anyone still watching Tweety give Clinton so much air time:
https://theintercept.com/2016/03/11/chris-matthewss-hardball-guests-have...

It never, never ends...

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Someone over posted today that there's a code you can add to a post -- something like 'discuss this' -- that will mark the post out in some way.

Now, I'm a total newbie to reddit, so this is just me imagining how this would work. Somebody posts something like, 'I find XX issue important but not reported on enough. Anybody interested in researching/writing about this issue, or aspects of it in depth? I've got info on [aspects a,b,c] of it, but I know there are aspects [p, q, r, s] that I don't have time to study. Anybody interested in working together to create a series (or whatever form, group diary,etc) so we can all learn more about this?'

Just a thought . . .

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It has a critical mass. I think a coordinated campaign includes tweets and fb quotes that don't like back to dailykos.

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

we have Groups here.

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Phoebe Loosinhouse's picture

How does one find the list of existing groups and join and how would one start a group if they wanted to?

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" “Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough.” FDR "

Groups is a brand new feature to us as we really had no use for them up until a week ago when our memberlist went from 200 to now over 900. It's also new to me as I just installed it last week by request from the Anti-Capitalist Meetup Group who wanted to start posting here as a group. Since they are our only group so far and haven't really used the function yet I haven't devised a list of groups. If any one is interested in starting a group they can contact me and we'll set it up.

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Phoebe Loosinhouse's picture

The only groups I ever participated very actively in elsewhere were books, cooking and pets. I like being a member of a group much more than I like being an admin so please don't consider that sentence a request to start up those groups on my behalf. But if someone did ever start up those groups I would definitely join.

The idea of project groups as opposed to special interest groups is intriguing and not something I've seen elsewhere. That could be a really great idea.

I know you have a lot going on, building and maintaining the back-end as it is, so no impatience on my part for any improvements. The improvement I personally would put at the top of the list is some kind of reply notification. Lots of people seem to be putting the name of the person they are responding to in the comment title and that works as a workaround in the meantime.

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" “Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough.” FDR "

It is the Holy Grail of blogging and has thus far eluded me. We have everything but replies to individual comments. We have replies made to essays (see the Content Stream) but not yet to comments. Hopefully we can implement it in the very near future, possibly when we upgrade to the new Drupal version that just came out a while ago. I would very much like to develop a comments page like the one we had in DK4.

The improvement I personally would put at the top of the list is some kind of reply notification. Lots of people seem to be putting the name of the person they are responding to in the comment title and that works as a workaround in the meantime.

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ny brit expat's picture

had a bit of a panic trying to repost the international women's day blog (tons of pictures) and I literally froze. But have posted the last piece (thankfully only 4 pictures and transferring links was really easy for which I am grateful). I cannot find the group now, but perhaps you can show me again (or show MrJayTee, Galtisalie or UnaSpenser). I know I would appreciate it.

In solidarity,
NY brit expat

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"Hegel noticed somewhere that all great world history facts and people so to speak twice occur. He forgot to add: the one time as tragedy, the other time as farce" Karl Marx, The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte."

k9disc's picture

I was talking more about strategy and tactics than organization this time... Wink

The groups function tends to silo content. It's great that you can find it all there in one spot and cross post and cross-reference & whatnot...

I'm actually talking about a strategic messaging plan leveraging the perspective, interests and talents we have lying around.

We've got all this collective, networked power and vision, and we rarely tap it.

I like the Podesta Sleaze story angle (although it might be hard to whittle down to a single instance or digestible situation) 30-50 well written and researched stories coming out on a particular topic at a particular time could be powerful.

Brock comes to mind too...

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“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

behind the scene we've had a discussion about implementing Groups here and the "silo" effect that it may have, compartmentalizing the site. The jury is still out.

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Phoebe Loosinhouse's picture

if groups will make sure that all the essays post to the main blog as well as the group blog. That way, everyone gets exposure to content, but the content is nicely compartmentalized in one place as well. Or something like that. I'm no techie.

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" “Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough.” FDR "

k9disc's picture

but this is not a Groups project that I am talking about.

I'm talking about 7-10 writers banging out personal and passionate stories on a single topic from various places.

Perhaps each Group could assign a writer to each story, or people from each group could grab the idea and flesh it out from the point of the Group's perspective, but it's not a group thing.

It's more like a Flash Mob. Boom, boom, pow! A flurry of topical articles tearing apart and examining the issue, person, or policy at hand.

It happens a bunch, inorganically on dKos -- a diary hits, someone riffs on it, others grab it -- the best work of the site has gone down like that, but I don't know whether or not anyone has tried to capture that lighting in a bottle from a methodology standpoint.

Does any of this make sense? Biggrin

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“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

Phoebe Loosinhouse's picture

Sorry for the delay in this reply but I just read this comment.

I guess someone could just throw a topic out there and solicit the responses to be sent to them as a message and they could organize and introduce essays into one large essay - or something like that.

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" “Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough.” FDR "

kharma's picture

utilize the power of multiple brains to tackle a subject. It could be something like "The Clinton Foundation" or "NSA" or whatever. Divide the subject up into different aspects of the story like "Donors to the foundation", "Recipients of grants or benefits", "Nationalities that have participated", whatever. Then a dozen or so people research different aspects and write on them in a compilation so that a huge amount of information can be collected that would take an individual a large amount of time to compile on their own.

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There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties.. This...is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.--John Adams

Unabashed Liberal's picture

that to initiate a Group Post, a member should post a diary in his name, on a broad topic, and then ask for assistance in researching and composing a final product?

Very interesting. I've done this for graded projects, while taking online college courses.

It was really cool--a great way to learn, actually.

Thanks for the suggestion!

(Music City) Mollie
elinkarlsson@WordPress


"The obstacle is the path."--Zen Proverb

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Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.

k9disc's picture

I think collaboration would be amazing.

I'm thinking we choose a topic. i.e.: The history of Podesta or Brock

We all lay out our angles, I would like to do his revolving door history. gjohnsit might want to do his impact on economy or ME affairs. detroitmechworks LGBT impact... and on down the line.

I think that perhaps writing these group projects with a focus on one or 2 progressive values could be powerful messaging and have an impact. Multiple value ladened pieces from multiple demographics could be powerful enough to push an idea onto the national scene.

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“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

Unabashed Liberal's picture

concept, and try to determine if I'm capable of making a contribution to your efforts.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Oh, in recognition of your handsome, talented, and obviously SMART Border Collie, please see below,

Top 10 Smartest Dogs  (Screenshot).png

According to the 'Runner-Up' Chart, we've only had one Breed that's been toward the top of the list. Actually, as much as we adored our sweet and lovely English Cocker Spaniel (who wasn't dumb), both of our Springer Spaniels exhibited more intelligence.

One, the Field Springer, was inherently whip smart. She would do things like pick up her water dish--on the rare occasion that it wasn't full--and carry it up two flights of stairs, drop it in front of us, back up, and in a play posture, boisterously admonish us with a bark.

That was our "Dog Of A Lifetime!"

Wink

Anyhoo, here's the 'Runners-Up' Chart,

Screenshot -- Runners-Up (Smartest Dogs).png

Have a good one!

(Music City) Mollie
elinkarlsson@WordPress


"Vision without action is a daydream. Action without vision is a nightmare."--Japanese Proverb

"Every time I lose a dog, he takes a piece of my heart. Every new dog gifts me with a piece of his. Someday, my heart will be total dog, and maybe then I will be just as generous, loving, and forgiving."--Author Unknown

Screenshot Of 'Barabas' -- Dual Photo From WP With Caption.png

Visit Us At Save Our Street Dogs (SOSD)

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Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.

gulfgal98's picture

into these things takes you down one rabbit hole after another. It is amazing how interconnected all these power people are. I remember there was a poster over a dkos who used to do charts showing these interrelationships. Interlocking directorates of power in our government, and their tentacles run very deep.

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Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

k9disc's picture

It's just too hard to do a good job on the big picture -- and that's my strength.

Too many rabbit holes and intellectual divides too great hop in a few words or single metaphor.

But, whipping up a short concise diary on my political passion or pet peeve in relation to a single issue or person would be much easier.

The Team aspect would also be nice motivation.

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“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

kharma's picture

exactly, if you commit to something you tend to want to complete it.

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There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties.. This...is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.--John Adams

don mikulecky's picture

Our way of thought has been shaped for us and a lot of our problems result directly from this. Systems thinking is a radically different mode of thought and requires a lot of rewiring.

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An idea is not responsible for who happens to be carrying it at the time. It stands or it falls on its own merits.