Some General Thoughts about exposure

[UtahApocalypse]

I agree that coordination would be very helpful in rallying the troops. I also think that a message board is great for doing that task. If this site can handle many more users we should work at that.

I now will point out a few problems in my opinion. First as much as we may want to it cant be directly connected to the campaign HQ, this is because if we are officially tied in then we fall under FEC reporting and guidelines. The second issue is malicious attacks, spammers, hackers, and all of these could be very detrimental to the site.

What I have done so far is like a old fashioned phone tree, only 21st century style. In my meetup I am the Action Alert Chairman. What I do is monitor many RP sites, this one, Digg, youtube, the campaign e-mails. When something big breaks, such as Iowa yesterday I immediately send out e-mails, and make phone calls to everyone in the local group. So far this has worked great !

I do think that the idea is a good one, however there are also alternatives that groups can use.

 

[BLS]

I agree that coordination would be very helpful in rallying the troops. I also think that a message board is great for doing that task. If this site can handle many more users we should work at that.

I now will point out a few problems in my opinion. First as much as we may want to it cant be directly connected to the campaign HQ, this is because if we are officially tied in then we fall under FEC reporting and guidelines. The second issue is malicious attacks, spammers, hackers, and all of these could be very detrimental to the site.

What I have done so far is like a old fashioned phone tree, only 21st century style. In my meetup I am the Action Alert Chairman. What I do is monitor many RP sites, this one, Digg, youtube, the campaign e-mails. When something big breaks, such as Iowa yesterday I immediately send out e-mails, and make phone calls to everyone in the local group. So far this has worked great !

I do think that the idea is a good one, however there are also alternatives that groups can use.

Fair enough....but there doesn't have to be any official coordination.
And while I'm impressed that you are so involved that you know where to go to get the masses motivated (and I mean that sincerely...you seem well connected), you HAVE to admit it creates unneccesary work, where a centrailized forum would be much more efficient. To do it the way you're doing it, would require some serious committments from members to make it work as well.

 

[jj111]

Well, this is a spontanous order that is being created. I check the Meetup group statistics. Did you know that the number of members in Ron Paul meetup groups has increased by 10% (1000 new members) in the last THREE DAYS?????

Did you know that the rate of growth on Meetup is about 17 times faster than the #2 candidate??

Ron Paul meetup membership is 3 times as large as Obama and growing 17 times faster than Obama.

The other candidates do even worse than Obama, a lot worse.

In other words, interest in Ron Paul is taking off like a rocket ship and is like an explosion.

So as we grow, there will be more and more people who volunteer to spread the word. We are organic. We are like a virus.

I think the bottom up approach, spontaneous order, overall works, and I don't think we need to centralize in any official, top down model....

I may be wrong but those are my thoughts at this time...

 

[jj111]

Well, this is a spontanous order that is being created. I check the Meetup group statistics. Did you know that the number of members in Ron Paul meetup groups has increased by 10% (1000 new members) in the last THREE DAYS?????

Did you know that the rate of growth on Meetup is about 17 times faster than the #2 candidate??

Ron Paul meetup membership is 3 times as large as Obama and growing 17 times faster than Obama.

The other candidates do even worse than Obama, a lot worse.

In other words, interest in Ron Paul is taking off like a rocket ship and is like an explosion.

So as we grow, there will be more and more people who volunteer to spread the word. We are organic. We are like a virus.

I think the bottom up approach, spontaneous order, overall works, and I don't think we need to centralize in any official, top down model....

I may be wrong but those are my thoughts at this time...

Regarding links from the official site - why not? They link to Youtube, they link to myspace, they link to meetup.com - why can't they link to a bulletin board if they want to?

 

[jj111]

And if there is a special project that you are serious about, that you need more help on, that you need 1000 or 10,000 people to help you with, all you have to do is spend a little time posting on the various major sites. It's not that hard. From there it will spread like a virus all by itself to the other people supporting RP. It's spontaneous. Personally I am opposed to a top down approach, but I am not opposed to asking for a link from the official site to the best RP bulletin board (although that could backfire too, since bulletin boards are not controllable and somebody might get a post out there that is inappropriate before the moderator can stop it.

I really like bottom up, spontaneous order. That is the strength of this campaign, not a weakness IMHO

 

[PatriotOne]

So as we grow, there will be more and more people who volunteer to spread the word. We are organic. We are like a virus.

I think the bottom up approach, spontaneous order, overall works, and I don't think we need to centralize in any official, top down model....

I agree with this. Trying to organize and centralize groups/forums/organizations would stop the viral effect. In fact I think it would be impossible to do it and would just cause turf wars.

I do understand the need for a central place to post action items though (similar to the call to arms for Failor),. Perhaps we could entertain a webpage common to all forums, etc., where certain people can post actions items and moderators/designee's can check it throughout the day and cut and paste them to their own groups. Or something like that. Definately something to think about more tomorrow.

Good night all

 

[CountryB4Party]

Fantastic!!! BUT....I just registered...and I'm the ONLY Person online right now. I realize it's 1:20am CST, but in our forum alone there is 35 people online right now.

We need to decide if it's easier to move New York City into Buffalo, or Buffalo into NYC......

Well, that's because we have just kicked off the forum and we spent time to work out the structure and any admin kinks before promoting it. This post to this forum, other than the main Meet Up forum, is the first.

While it is good to have communication within your group, consider the person - possibly without experience - organizing a new group. What is that person's resources?

With more centralized group, a person in Florida can draw upon the plans, efforts, resources, information and achievements of a group in CA without having to reinvent the wheel.

As for a direct HQ connection, there can be a volunteer liason, and we are working on that relationship and structure right now.

If you guys decide you don't want to join because others haven't yet (although I am not certain I understand that position), please know you are always welcome.

We will be kicking off a couple national campaign initiatives (specifically ballot access working with HQ) within the next week. Check back with us to see if the info can benefit you guys because participation in every county in many states will be critical to getting RP on the ballot.

Yours in Liberty,
Dena

 

[Suzu]

And if there is a special project that you are serious about, that you need more help on, that you need 1000 or 10,000 people to help you with, all you have to do is spend a little time posting on the various major sites. It's not that hard. From there it will spread like a virus all by itself to the other people supporting RP.

True, but consider this:

RP's message is so powerful that as he gains traction and people start taking notice, there will be a significant number of people in greater force than current who will be out to ruin him and the campaign - not just opposition camps but controlled media.

Because of this, there are certain discussions and planning topics that shouldn't be available for public view - to prevent tipping your hand, so to speak. I believe this is self-explanatory, but I will provide a couple of relatively minor examples:

One example of planning is a recent thread topic for a national signage splash in the wee hours of July 4th. Making this information public allows any opposition interested to remove these signs and replace them with their own, or, alternatively, opposition camps could plan to conduct the same splash in the same areas with signs from a campaign that has greater resources than the RP group. The result would greatly weaken, or in the worst case, cancel, our impact.

Another was a call for info to HQ made in public for a Constitutional type campaign theme (booklets, etc). Whether or not this is adopted, the idea and discussion in public sets the stage for the better financed opposition to start promoting and making the Constitutional position their position (a few already have followed Paul's lead in this area) before we can even get RP's tie straightened and out the door. The point is not to tip your strategy even at the grassroots level because this level is the easiest to access.

It is unwise and counterproductive to freely hand over your strategy or reveal your weaknesses to the opposition. We don't live in an honest world, and the stakes are too high.

 

[jj111]

True, but consider this:

RP's message is so powerful that as he gains traction and people start taking notice, there will be a significant number of people in greater force than current who will be out to ruin him and the campaign - not just opposition camps but controlled media.

Because of this, there are certain discussions and planning topics that shouldn't be available for public view - to prevent tipping your hand, so to speak. I believe this is self-explanatory, but I will provide a couple of relatively minor examples:

One example of planning is a recent thread topic for a national signage splash in the wee hours of July 4th. Making this information public allows any opposition interested to remove these signs and replace them with their own, or, alternatively, opposition camps could plan to conduct the same splash in the same areas with signs from a campaign that has greater resources than the RP group. The result would greatly weaken, or in the worst case, cancel, our impact.

Another was a call for info to HQ made in public for a Constitutional type campaign theme (booklets, etc). Whether or not this is adopted, the idea and discussion in public sets the stage for the better financed opposition to start promoting and making the Constitutional position their position (a few already have followed Paul's lead in this area) before we can even get RP's tie straightened and out the door. The point is not to tip your strategy even at the grassroots level because this level is the easiest to access.

It is unwise and counterproductive to freely hand over your strategy or reveal your weaknesses to the opposition. We don't live in an honest world, and the stakes are too high.

I think the point you make argues even more forcefully for a bottom-up, decentralized approach. If there is a secret project, find your group that you confide in, keep it to yourself, and do it. Have a face to face meetup for that.

The more decentralized we are, the harder it is for the opposition to try to throw a wrench into the gears.

 

[CountryB4Party]

I really would like to clarify a couple of points:

Please understand that no one has said anything about "secret" projects. What is being discussed are strategic projects, initiatives and efforts that need to take place on a national scale (individual groups doing the same or similar) to achieve a much greater impact (the whole is greater than the sum of its parts).

Please consider this: which do you think would gain more attention and give the entire campaign more credibility with the populous (many, who, by the way, currently perceive supporters as "fringe" and the campaign unorganized and "out there"), individual groups doing their own thing with different messages, vastly different actions, at different times at different locations throughout the nation or....

Individual groups across the country coordinated to act in strategic concert to send a strong message and make a greater, collective impact?

(I am talking about critical ground effects with the populous not online impact.)

The second point is: this is a political campaign...and organized efforts are needed to achieve this very difficult mission. This has been executed many, many times before us, and these very discussions have been had many times before us. Let historical examples of political campaign successes and failures guide you.

Maybe it's my age and my level of professional experience, but I cannot understand a position of not working as a collective body, using collective energy, skill and talent and collective resources to create efficiencies to effectively achieve a mission, and it is completely foreign to me that strategy, planning and PR discussions continue to be held in public places for the opposition (including anti-RP media) to view.

But, again, maybe I am letting my 20+ years national marketing and communications campaign experience (albeit not political in nature) blur my judgement and distort my perspective.

Meanwhile, may I suggest to you guys who want to work independently and not benefit from group efforts to engage in researching ballot access measures and the punctilious ballot requirements in your state. All the pavement pounding and online "viral" activities will be for not if RP isn't on the ballot.

Yours in Liberty (and sincerely trying to understand these positions),
Dena

 

[jj111]

I am not arguing with you. I just think there is room for both approaches. This is going to be a huge wave of people interested in Ron Paul. There will be room for people wanting to join top-down groups and systems for Ron Paul, and there will be others wanting to work on decentralized areas.

I don't think it's either or. I think, for example, if you or anybody else wants to organize some sort of national, strategic project, initiative or effort, nothing is there to stop you. It will be a "free market" full of choices as to how people help Ron Paul, and some of the market will go to those who organize national strategic projects, and some won't.

If you can make it happen, all the power to you. I personally believe bottom-up decentralized efforts are more efficient, but I think there is a market and a need for both approaches.

 

[beermotor]

NO NO NO NO NO.

In another way, HELL NO.


Get your centralizing impulse out of here. I recommend a good hot sauna, purge that evil right out of you. This is the worst idea ever; the worst possible route. A central point is easy to kill. We must grow organically all over the place.

Google blog search is your friend. Continue to fight the good fight. Use email lists, forums, everything. Start your own local forums. Continue going to meetups. Stop whining. Act.

 

[CountryB4Party]

Beermotor says, "Stop whining. Act."

To whom are you speaking, my friend? I don't believe anyone is or was "whining". And if you are speaking to me, I am, and have been, acting - refer to my first post in this forum and in this thread.

Beermotor says, "A central point is easy to kill. We must grow organically all over the place. "

Since a "central point is easy to kill", I suppose the majority of national campaigns - political and other - with some form of organization as the most frequently opted and employed approach have simply been successful despite themselves and their organization? Say, Democrats and Republicans for, oh, the past 50 years.

However, the Libertarians with their decentralized, everyone do their own thing, laissez faire approach have realized abundant success?

Curiously, beermotor, do you speak from national campaign experience of any kind?

jjj111, I agree with your assessment. As I have previously stated in another forum:

'There are two questions we should each ask ourselves:

1. To best achieve our mission, do we have the time to work effectively in a decentralized manner?

2. Are you (not you specifically, but any volunteer) the type of person who can work more efficiently with a centralized or a decentralized approach?

When a volunteer answers these two questions, then he / she will know where to direct energies. All approaches and valuable contributions to the achieving same goal should be welcomed rather than opposed.'

However, regardless of one's approach, I still cannot wrap my head around people not seeing the value in coming together in some fashion to work in concert to make a greater national impact, and I certainly cannot understand having strategic planning and PR discussions of any kind on an open or semi-open forum.

Yes, yes, maybe I do need a suana.

Yours in Liberty,
Dena

"Google Blog Search"......hhmmm....wondering how to teach all those potential RP voters who don't have computers or who only use computers for e-mail exchange or simply do not have the time to search...like most of my family, and, believe it or not, many of my 40-ish year old friends...to use Google Blog Search.

My point: there is a great mass of people who aren't like 'us' and this information sharing and education (promotions and exposure) has to effectively and quickly transfer to the ground without MSM. Internet is a great tool that serves a larger role with each passing election; however, we will have to wait a couple of generations before it will win a nomination.

 

[Shmuel Spade]

Since a "central point is easy to kill", I suppose the majority of national campaigns - political and other - with some form of organization as the most frequently opted and employed approach have simply been successful despite themselves and their organization? Say, Democrats and Republicans for, oh, the past 50 years.

Yes. And if you follow any third party news you'll see the dirty tricks that the duopoly get down to in order to maintain their duopoly. All of the campaigns and candidacies that have been defeated in the last century or so (a number that exceeds the number of winners by far) have been defeated as they were because they could be attacked at a central point. This is the reason that campaigns decentralize, and start creating 50 or more individual campaigns for their candidate on the level of states or lower.

However, the Libertarians with their decentralized, everyone do their own thing, laissez faire approach have realized abundant success?

The LP has been anything but a laissez-faire operation. They've been top-down, centrally managed since the founding of the party. Murray Rothbard assumed that the key to success was to imitate that other successful ideological movement: the Socialists. The Socialists had strict party guidelines, strong directives, and clear ideological stances on things as addressed in their platform.

At at a subsequent meeting of the LP, which noted that the party wasn't succeeding like he thought it should under those Socialist practices Murray turned and pointed to the cynical semi-member of the party, Sam Konkin (SEK3), and asked the crowd, "Is he the only other person who understands what's going on here?"


We already have a central location for updates, notices, and suggestions for coordinated action. It's emblazoned on almost every poster, T-Shirt, card, and placard supporting Ron Paul: http://www.ronpaul2008.com/ When you're there you're encouraged to sign up and receive the updates. There's a reason it's called Campaign Headquarters. If you don't sign up, then you don't sign up. As simple and logical as that. The rest of the campaign develops organically as it already has. The official Ron Paul 2008 site already contains links to all of the most important elements of organic growth under "Social Networking." The "Upcoming Events" section will tell you what's coming up. Sure, a link to this forum would be great (especially now that were getting occasional official posts from Justine Lam), but I'm not sweating it.

And what of your offline friends? They'll be dependent upon their friends who are online, just as it is for all of the other campaigns.

 

[JoshLowry]

Whatever happens we are ready for. Servers can be added but growth is very manageable at this point in time.

Everyone is welcome to join so it's not like we have any limitations. It comes down to what the users prefer.

I think forums do provide a great platform for sharing your ideas and discussing news so by all means please do spread the word. The more the merrier.

 

[belian78]

I can say from experience that this forum has been the most informative that i frequent. I am on the Myspace group for RP as well as a few others, and this is the one that i find information on the soonest. also, as far as discussing the issues, i've found a few members here and there on other sites that are really knowledged, but nothing like here. It seems everyone has a pretty good grasp on each issue, and if not, knows where to find explanations.

If we were to use one forum for major initiatives like the Iowa meeting on the 30th, i think this is the place to break it from. like someone else mentioned, in all your bulletins and blogs and such just add a link here. anyone new to RP will gain a far greater understanding of Ron and his campaign here than anywhere else.

*ok let me go wipe the brown off my nose and get back to work. LOL

 

[joenaab]

1. I agree very much with what Smuel Spade wrote in that the campaign home page is the ideal place to get everyone to join and follow. I think the DailyPaul site would be a great place to point everybody for dependable and timely blog news.

2. I agree with jj111 in that both the centralized top-down approach and the decentralized bottom-up approach can be employed to great effect. It's been four months since RP declared his candidacy. I'd score the progress so far to be an A++. It was ALL accomplished bottom-up decentralized shoot-from-the-hip good 'ol fashioned grassroots politicking.

3. Though there have been grassroots campaigns in the past, I think what we are witnessing has no precendent, especially when you consider the Internet tools we have at our disposal and the depth to which RP is anti-establishment.

4. Somewhere between 40% to 80% of RP supporters ABHOR central authority (from latest Gallup Poll ).

5. No way in the world can 100,000 people share a forum! When there are 100 people on this site it's hard to keep up with the popular threads. There will be a new thread added every half second!

I think this "machine" is growing and morphing and adapting extremely well and I love all the ideas in this thread and the passion behind them. We can put some faith in the random adaptations that produce newer and ever more novel approaches to advancing the good doctor's cause. The central authority can be the campaign HQ and if we feel it can be improved, direct our requests and ideas and offers to help to HQ.

 

[Shmuel Spade]

I can say from experience that this forum has been the most informative that i frequent. I am on the Myspace group for RP as well as a few others, and this is the one that i find information on the soonest. also, as far as discussing the issues, i've found a few members here and there on other sites that are really knowledged, but nothing like here. It seems everyone has a pretty good grasp on each issue, and if not, knows where to find explanations.

If we were to use one forum for major initiatives like the Iowa meeting on the 30th, i think this is the place to break it from. like someone else mentioned, in all your bulletins and blogs and such just add a link here. anyone new to RP will gain a far greater understanding of Ron and his campaign here than anywhere else.

*ok let me go wipe the brown off my nose and get back to work. LOL

I'm sure we all thank you for your kind words. A lot of us have done a lot of research as a result of our support for Rep. Paul. And some of us have even come to support Rep. Paul as a result of our prior research.

 

[LibertyEagle]

Originally Posted by BLS View Post
I absolutely agree...it never hurts to have MORE publicity, but having a 'central' or 'main' area of information and organization is going to be ESSENTIAL to getting us all to work TOGETHER.

I totally agree with this. It would stop some of the reinvention of the wheel over and over again and would utilize the grassroots support much more efficiently and effectively.

 

[BLS]

I totally agree with this. It would stop some of the reinvention of the wheel over and over again and would utilize the grassroots support much more efficiently and effectively.

I understand the viewpoints against centralization.

But let me give you an example of why doing it unorganized is bad.

How many sites have "Iowa Trip" threads/meetups?

I'll bet you can find 10 sites with a Iowa Trip scheduled for June 30th.
Each site having between say (for argument) 5 and 20 people going.

So, instead of having between 50 and 200 supporters, you got 10 teams of 5 or 10 teams of 20, and the very real possibility is that these teams may be around the corner from each other and not even know.

The argument is it leaves this support very much in the arms of 'chance'.