Kind of a no-brainer panel topic for someone who works at Digital Eskimo, although this was a classic SXSW example of brilliantly-titled panels being less-than-brilliant.
The panelists were: Jon Lebkowksy of Social Web Strategies; Rob Reed, who blogs on Max Gladwell; John McElhenney of Clear Green Technologies; and Emily Gertz, the journalist who maintains the global warming blog at Change.org.
A slow start with too many definitions (although, an interesting definition of sustainability: “Applying knowledge, rather than labour, to materials”) turned the audience sour — which they indicated on Twitter, which the panelists were watching.
One highlight was Gertz’s introduction, in which she covered some of the problems and mistakes we make in communicating about sustainability:
- preach only to the converted
- failing to inspire the converted; we need to mobilize people on our side to act further, to engage others and to believe in the cause
- failure to think big enough (the point is transformation of underlying political/social/economic system, not small steps)
- failure to conduct tactical moderation (filtering out disinformation and propoaganda)
- humourlessness: we’re often a sombre, grim community
Gertz also cited some examples. Check these out: usanpn.org, greatsunflower.org and the tweetawatt.
What I got from the audience – and the panelists — is that there’s still a lack of knowledge about how to apply social media expertise to audiences inside and outside the sustainability sphere. The so-called experts at the front of the room could only point us to a few sites. There are plenty of projects, but almost all with sparse audiences (and a lot of audience crossover); no shortage of great ideas for sustainability, in other words, but still a shortage of great ideas to build and rally those communities.
The opportunity, therefore, is still huge.
1 Comment...
John, thanks for your coverage. I have captured the notes of the session here. SMFS Glad you dug Emily’s contributions. She is indeed an Eco Rockstar.
@jmacofearth