Ordinary people + YouTube = Making a difference

In July, I finally learned how to upload to YouTube and posted here and here about this phenomenal tool that allows people like me to be heard and seen.

This morning I received an e-mail alert from Democrats.com about the results of its recent video contest comparing Dick Nixon to Dick Cheney.

The winner is Jen Datka, a student, activist-musician, and first-time filmmaker. Her awarding winning video is "Nancy calls for impeachment." Here's more about Jen in her own words.

Tonight I’m taking my camcorder to the Healdsburg City Council to film its response to a request that Healdsburg ban the use of plastic bags by its large stores. I posted about the ubiquitous plastic bag here. My friend and politically ally, Tod Brilliant, is spearheading this action.

Tomorrow I plan to post about the plastic bag hearing, complete with imbedded YouTube video clip.

YouTube phenomenon

I’m not over my fascination with YouTube, not quite yet. I’m still reveling in being able to upload video clips. My efforts are described here. I dream about running around with my camcorder, capturing all sorts of fascinating stuff to upload.

My awareness of its impact on society has increased 100% this week. It’s everywhere, apparently even affecting schoolground fights (see cartoon).

Even Juan Cole, “my” Middle Eastern expert, posted a video clip from the Democratic presidential candidates’ debate at his blog, Informed Comment yesterday morning. Check it out: it has nothing to do with the Middle East.

I received several thoughtful comments to yesterday’s post, YouTube steals the Dem debate...but what about poor and older people? The consensus appears to be that everyone, including those who are most likely to feel disenfranchised, i.e., the poor and elderly people, are better off with this wondrous tool that allows ordinary citizens to be heard.

Yesterday editorial observer Adam Cohen’s column in The New York Times, YouDebate: If Only the Candidates Were as Interesting as the Questioners wrote: “The most striking questions in the YouTube Democratic presidential debate were the ones about sick people. Two brothers from Davenport, Iowa, submitted a video of themselves feeding a parent with Alzheimer’s and asking, “What are you going to do to fight this disease now?” A 36-year-old Long Island woman who said she hoped “to be a future breast cancer survivor” removed a wig to reveal a bald head and asked, “What would you as president do to make low-cost or free preventive medicine available for everybody in this country?

“ What the format did … was make the proceedings more entertaining, and it injected real people into arid public policy debates. In a modest but real way, it worked.

“The debate was certainly more lively than the usual candidate face-off. Not even CNN’s selection of the videos, or the fact that the subject was an election 16 months off, managed to squash all of YouTube’s offbeat charm. If the now-familiar line-up of Democratic candidates is going to provide yet another familiar answer to yet another question about global warming, why not have it asked by a talking snowman?

“…The entertainment value alone made the new format worthwhile. American democracy is going through some rough times. Many ordinary citizens are apathetic, while special interests are drowning the system with campaign contributions and attack ads…”

Cohen’s article concluded with, “…bringing the people into democracy is a healthy thing.” YouTube is doing this. I’d add the suggestion from John of Cincinnati, Ohio, who commented to yesterday’s post, “One of the things we're doing in Cincinnati is attempting to change the nature of the public conversation in a way that's more inclusive. See A Small Group.

(cartoon – TheAge.com)

"YouTube steals Dem debate"...but what about poor and older people?

Ha! Just as I thought: The YouTube - CNN joint effort to involve the public in the Democratic Presidential candidates debate on Monday night catapulted You Tube into national prominence. Coincidentally, that same night I finally learned to upload a video to YouTube after working on it for hours and hours since last February, as described in yesterday’s post, Gritty determination.

1. How do I know that YouTube will now become a household word (if it isn’t already)? Because I saw these headlines yesterday morning:

1. YouTube steals the Dem debate - The medium and the questions are the message in the San Francisco Chronicle.

2. Public Voice Adds Edge to Debate - Democrats Face Questions from Internet Users in Unorthodox Format, in the Washington Post: "Democratic presidential candidates shared the spotlight Monday night with ordinary citizens from around the country in a two-hour debate that featured sharp and sometimes witty video questions and often equally sharp exchanges among the candidates on issues ranging from Iraq and health care to whether any of them can fix a broken political system.

The debate, co-sponsored by CNN and YouTube, underscored the arrival of the Internet as a force in politics. The citizen-interrogators generated the most diverse set of questions in any of the presidential debates to date and challenged the candidates to break out of the rhetoric of their campaign speeches and to address sometimes uncomfortable issues, such as race, gender, religion and their own vulnerabilities.”

How refreshing! But wait a minute. What about and older people? Are they being shut out?



















On Monday I also recall reading the Washington Post article, Binary America: Split in Two by A Digital Divide: “Less than a mile and a half from the Citadel, the site of the Democratic presidential debate tonight, sits Cooper River Courts, a public housing project. Forget the Web. Never mind YouTube, the debate's co-sponsor. Here, owning a computer and getting on the Internet (through DSL or cable or Wi-Fi) is a luxury.

‘I am low-income and computers are not low-income,’ says Marcella Morris, sitting on the front step of her apartment building on a sweltering day last week.”

Not only low-income people but older people, who never felt confident enough to use a computer, much less upload to YouTube, are likely to be excluded in the future digitally-empowered campaigns.

So what’s the solution? I think those of us who have entered the electronic era should remind ourselves not to be too enchanted with how easy it now is to be heard. For starters, let’s remember to spend some time working on getting out the vote and volunteering to drive people who need a ride to the polls. I hope you'll share your ideas with me and others by posting a comment on how to make sure everyone is heard and involved in the voting process.

(photo of obviously poor woman and children - this is a classic from the Depression by Dorthea Lange; photo of older people: Phillips Blogs)

Gritty detemination

Last night, YouTube and CNN teamed up for the first formal 2008 Presidential candidates’ debate. Over 2,000 questions for the candidates were submitted to YouTube. You can watch the CNN streaming video of the debate here.

I’ve known that YouTube is a force to be reckoned with since the November, 2006 election because I was involved with the Video the Vote effort as a supervising attorney on the National Campaign for Fair Elections national voter protection hotline, 1-866.OUR.VOTE. As calls came in about a problem at a polling site, my job was to alert the Video the Vote crews, who scuttled to the scene, filmed what was going on and uploaded it to YouTube.

When I received a great little camcorder from my older son Jeff for Christmas last year, I was determined to use it to interview people on a variety of political subjects to upload to YouTube.

However, for several months, I’ve been struggling to learn how to upload video clips. Without going into any detail, you can hear from my voice in this ten second test that I filmed last night around midnight that I am full of gritty determination (I know, I know, we “upload” to YouTube, not “post.”). I finally succeeded this morning.

Why am I posting about this?

1. I’ve spent so much time learning to upload video clips that I’ve run out of energy for posting about anything else.

2. I think YouTube is going to play a very important role in politics in the future. The collaboration between YouTube and CNN to cover the Democratic Presidential candidate debates was even covered in China.

3. I want to have the technological skills that allow me to participate in the political process in the future.

Sidebar: I’m having a great time filming my infant twin grandchildren and am delighted that I can now upload to YouTube so other family members who don’t live nearby can see them as they grow.