website statistics

Archive for the 'Startups' Category

The XYZ of ABC?

Published by William Beutler on January 9, 2007 in Blog Consultants, Campaigns, Facebook, Netroots, Online Fundraising, Republicans, Social Networking and Startups. 13 Comments

Last August conservative bloggers joined with Alexandria-based Campaign Solutions to address the GOP’s weakness in online fundraising. Already they were two years behind the Democratic pioneer in this space, ActBlue. The result was ABC PAC and Rightroots, and when I reviewed it upon launch, I found a lot to be desired:

Rightroots is the only slate [of candidates] available; other interested parties have been told they’ll just have to wait. I’m told that eventually it will be brought up to parity with ActBlue: Bloggers will have a personal ID with the site to track their accounts, and ABC PAC will make it possible to donate to any federal GOP candidate (right now only high profile candidates are listed). … As yet, a proof of concept is really all it is: It’s more like a shareware demo that only lets you play the first level.

Mike Turk, the GOP strategist most responsible for putting the site together, responded in the comments:

ActBlue has been in development for two years, and already raised north of six million dollars. To compare the functionality of a site that has been online for less than two full days, and which publicly states it is trying to put together funds for further development to a site like the one ActBlue is today is a bit disingenuous. … Given full funding, full functionality and a full catalog of candidates, ABC PAC has the potential to meet and exceed what ActBlue has done – and we plan to do so.

It seemed to me that ABC could have debuted with more functionality than it did — it should have built upon what ActBlue had pioneered — but his response was fair. However, I kept checking back throughout the fall, and while the fundraising numbers attained respectability, the ABC website itself never improved. (Disclosure, however, did improve — the front page of ABC now gives an idea of how your money will be handled.)

My main point the first time around was that ActBlue was a Web 2.0 kind of site, like a Facebook for progressive fundraising. You could sign up for your very own account, compile your own slate of candidates, keep track of your progress and follow the rankings. Not only that, but there was plenty of reading material about how ActBlue works. ABC, on the other hand, appeared to be ony a few pages deep, everything was locked down, nothing was customizable, and the only interactive feature would perhaps be watching the figures change.

Flash forward a couple months, and the situation is even more dire for online Republican activists. First, here’s a screen capture from ActBlue’s front page as of last night:

ActBlue front page, 2007 YTD

Now let’s compare that to the front page of ABC PAC, taken at the same time:

ABC PAC front page, 2007 YTD

Note the figures. Yes, it’s all this cycle. The top 5 presidential candidates on ActBlue have received about $434,000, while all candidates on ABC PAC have collected exactly $298.

The stark difference continues as you explore each site. ActBlue’s page for the ‘08 presidential contest provides plenty of options for supporting a candidate, on the site and off, and also-ran apparent runner Dennis Kucinich has raised just $20 shy of ABC’s top recipient. Edwards is the clear fundraising leader, because his own campaign is making use of ActBlue’s infrastructure. If you go to his website and click “Contribute” under the “Take Action Menu,” you will be redirected to to ActBlue.

By contrast, it doesn’t seem anyone has linked to ABC in over a month. Will one of the just-hired GOP blogger consultants persuade one or more of their candidates to use ABC PAC? They can’t, at least not without talking to the Donatellis first. But why would you even bother? The website is boring, an obvious corporate job without even the faintest sign of the social networking tools that make ActBlue so cool.

And what of Rightroots itself, the monopoly blogger slate from the ‘06 cycle? It is no longer linked off the main page, and if you punch in the URL yourself, you’ll find a generic ABC page thanking you for your support:

Because of you, ABCPac was able to raise almost $300,000 for Republican House and Senate candidates, online! … We are currently in the process of expanding and improving our web site and will be announcing our new efforts in the coming months.

Maybe that’s true. But if that assurance was available somewhere besides an orphan page, I’d be inclined to take it more seriously. Besides, ABC doesn’t need to get a little better to be useful. It needs to get a lot better. Currently, there is no baby to throw out with the bath water.

As of now, putting ActBlue and ABC side by side is like comparing the Wii to a Tiger Electronics handheld. ABC isn’t even playing the same game as ActBlue, and it is far from clear that it ever will.

Update: For further discussion and debate on this topic, see (in chronological order going back nearly a week) Patrick Ruffini, Mike Turk, Rob Bluey and Todd Ziegler.

Merry GOP-Round

Published by William Beutler on January 4, 2007 in Blog Consultants, Campaigns, RNC, Relaunches, Republicans, Startups, Virginia Politics and Website Design. 3 Comments

It’s been a busy few weeks for Republican bloggers in Washington: since late December, a number of Republican aides and activists have changed jobs, created new partnerships or relaunched old ventures. Let’s take a walk:

  • Start with Jon Henke, the Virginia delegate to QandO who this summer took on the thankless task of trying to save George Allen on the very Internet that would eventually do him in. His next job might not be much easier, but it should at least be a little more stable — on January 1 Henke officially announced he’ll be joining the Republican Communications Office of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell as New Media Coordinator.

    His family will be following him from Richmond, and I hear he could use some tips on finding a place in DC.

  • My headline references one childhood amusement, but let’s invoke another: If there’s a game of musical chairs being played, it’s over at Heritage.

    Last year Mark Tapscott, Director of the Center for Media and Public Policy, decamped for the Washington Examiner editorial page. Shortly thereafter, Tim Chapman took the job, fresh off a stint at Townhall during its late-middle period. Now he too is moving on, to assume the role of Senior Communications Adviser for Sen. Jim DeMint. Taking his place as of February 1 will be Rob Bluey, current online editor of Human Events.

    Replacing Bluey will be TBA, a hotshot young go-getter straight out of… okay, I know you know what TBA means.

  • There probably are not very many new media consultants working for presidential candidates at the moment — Pat Hynes (McCain) and Peter Daou (Clinton) come to mind first — but now there is another: Just a few weeks ago, when ex-Gov. Mitt Romney did not yet have to put an “ex-” before his title, the likely presidential contender hired the blog coordinator of then-Sen. Bill Frist’s VOLPAC. Bluey had the story first, reporting Romney’s acquisition of Stephen Smith, not to be confused with Stephen A. Smith.
  • A development of a different sort is the relaunch of PatrickRuffini.com. When Ruffini accepted the job of eCampaign director for the Republican National Committee in 2005, the first casualty of the job was his popular and beautifully-designed personal blog — by his choice, not the RNC’s. (Doing right by your job and your blog is no easy task, I’ll tell you what.)

    But as of the new year, PatrickRuffini.com is back — and back, and back, and back — with a sidebar blog, retooled 2008 Wire and a tech blog called Overclocked. If you’ve had to take this one out of your aggregator before, you’ll probably enjoy putting all these new feeds back in this time.

  • Maybe the most interesting development is the creation of the David All Group. All has made a name for himself doing creative work, mostly on behalf of Rep. Jack Kingston. I believe All’s firm is the first Republican strategy firm in Washington predicated on social media and the blogosphere. At launch, the site features a blog where All comments on politics and technology, which is already more than a perfunctory product demonstration — see, for instance, his in-depth, screen shot-laden (extra points) recap of how the “macaca” controversy unfolded.

    But something else caught my eye — the business address. I’m not quite an expert on Capitol Hill, but I was pretty sure the listed address was on a residential block. And I’m still a journalist, kind of, so…

    David All Group, located in residential Capitol Hill

    Yup. I don’t know if it’s his home address (and I don’t blame him for not returning that e-mail query) but it’s certainly somebody’s residential address.

  • A much more complex story is the recent sale of community site RedState to Eagle Publishing. That one will get its own post, soon enough.

Into Thin Air?

Published by William Beutler on November 21, 2006 in Blogging Officials, Candidate Bloggers, Daily Kos, Journalist Bloggers, Startups and Website Design. 1 Comment

Air Congress Logo, Danny Glover, Kris Meister

At the risk of turning every other other post at Blog P.I. into an update of what former colleagues are up to, I’ll attempt to turn your attention now to the launch of a new site by Danny Glover (just promoted to editor of Tech Daily, coincidentally) which happens to have been designed by a former colleague from my present job, Kris Meister. They say Washington is a small town, and it’s true, assuming you mean just the NW quadrant.

In any case, the site is called Air Congress, and it’s the logical progression of Danny’s work keeping track of congressional (and other professional) blogs at Beltway Blogroll. He writes in the Air Congress inaugural post:

Much of the content here will come directly from lawmakers themselves — the video clips they post from floor debate, the podcasts they create on various topics and more as today’s high-tech innovations take root in government.

The site also will highlight audio and video content about federal policy from other sources, including the executive branch, trade associations, advocacy groups, government watchdogs, journalists and bloggers. Plus there are plans for original AirCongress content.

The last bit is reassuring, because the biggest risk in Air Congress’ strategy is that the audio-visual content emanating from Capitol Hill is often excruciatingly dull. As someone who subscribes to to every political podcast I can find, from Judd Gregg to Xavier Becerra and Arnold Schwarzenegger to Dave Freudenthal — but rarely listen to any one of them — I think I speak with some authority.

That’s why I figure Air Congress’ best bet for success is not so much in being a collector of legislative podcasts (though if thorougly indexed, that could be useful) but rather in acting as a guide to the best, worst and most noteworthy among them. As Chris Anderson would say, we need a better filter.

To that end, I have a vague sense that such a project would benefit mightily from an open rating and tagging system, elements of which are already in use at YouTube and Daily Kos, respectively. Short of that, only the most dedicated political junkie could pull off such a feat — but then again, there’s every reason to think Danny is just that political junkie.

Hot Or Not: From Beltway Insiders To Blogosphere Outsiders

Published by William Beutler on October 24, 2006 in Blog Consultants, Blogging Officials, Journalist Bloggers, MSM vs. Blogs, Seriously, Startups and Website Design. 11 Comments

HotSoup LogoWhat to make of HotSoup, the non-partisan, non-ideological, mostly non-everything political discussion/debate site just out from Beltway insiders Carter Eskew, Matthew Dowd, Joe Lockhart and Mark McKinnon plus media types Ron Fournier and Allie Savarino (and top-heavy with yet more executive co-founders)? It’s difficult to be polite; I won’t always be.

Toward the end of its debut week, there isn’t much talk at the site. Nor are too many non-”Hardball” news outlets talking about it. Among those who have, appraisals tend toward the grim.

One is GOP Internet strategist Mike Turk, who once worked on a similar project called Grassroots.com. Upon HotSoup’s announcement this summer, Turk warned of the pitfalls at Personal Democracy Forum. But as he wrote this week at his blog, Kung Fu Quip, the problems were bigger than he’d thought:

Perhaps the most vexing thing about the site is the apparent lack of any correlation between the name and the content. Their content is divided into “Issue Loops” but that bears little relationship to Hot Soup. They might as well have called the site Eggplant.com.

Honestly, I don’t get it. I have a lot of respect for the people involved in this, but it may be the most poorly conceived idea since Kevin Federline.

Earlier in the week, Paul NcManara of NetworkWorld.com had pled for sanity:

This group cannot be operating under the illusion that all they have to do is provide a platform and the Lincoln-Douglas debates will break out. They must know there’s a good chance that not every Hotsouper will come willing to bridge divides, celebrate differences and gain enlightenment.

Yes, they can be, but to their credit, they seem to: This week Fournier or somebody posted a message in the non-blog front-page meta window, “Hot Corner,” admitting that things need to be retooled:

We knew HOTSOUP.com would go online as a figment of its future potential, and that the finishing touches would come from you. That’s exactly what’s happening …. By scores, we’ve received your comments and criticism through feedback@hotsoup.com. Even better, many of you felt empowered enough to use the site itself to post your critiques in Issue Loops …. This take-matters-in-your-own-hands approach is confirmation of the core value behind HOTSOUP: It’s about you …. That’s why we’re hard at work at this work-in-progress … Among the problems we’ve fixed or are fixing: 1) Speed and performance of video …. 2) Content cutoffs in Loops …. 3) Discussion board display order …. 4) Loops ranking on homepage …. Thank you for your suggestions, and keep them coming. Only you can make the Soup the hottest site around.

It’s since been pulled (in favor of a blithering anecdote about their MSNBC appearance and something about the ONE campaign) — whisked away to who knows where. As I said, it’s not a blog. It’s just a square called “Hot Corner.” Once an announcement is pulled, it disappears into the aether. Please, people. Get a blog.

But there are many more problems than (I think it’s) Fournier addresses. For one, the registration process asks for too much information, and gets unpleasant when you don’t tell it where you live, what’s your job title, how you vote and where your ancestors came from:

HotSoup registration information required

Did I mention the site looks awful? The color scheme is unappetizing, its navigation tools are scattered, no RSS feeds are provided, and they have pictures on the front page where the content should be (c.f. Digg). The actual content (aside from “Hot Corner,” which apparently is not considered as such) is relegated to a narrow column just off-center:

HotSoup Front Page

Check the source code, and you’ll see the site is almost entirely rendered in Flash. Or, turn off your Javascript and watch the site disappear. There’s scarcely an indexable ASCII keyword on the page, so it isn’t likely to rank well in Google searches. This site should be rebuilt from the ground up. Most of the web-oriented co-founders arrive from a social networking site called SisterWoman.com that exhibits none of these amateurish flaws, which makes this venture’s absurd failure to launch all the more perplexing.

One of its selling points appears to be bringing famous-for-DC types to the blogosphere. But The Huffington Post — which was proclaimed to be the failure that HotSoup actually is — already did. (Still, I can’t let it go without noting that Arianna promised Gwyneth Paltrow, yet has so far only delivered Lynne M. Paltrow.)

HotSoup is closer to George Clooney’s “post” at HuffPo than a real meeting of the minds: It’s painfully obvious that most celebrity HotSoupers didn’t sign up themselves, their assistants or HotSoup did. Will we ever see them jump into the fray? How about you, Mary Matalin? Donna Brazile? (Seriously, John Ashcroft?) Hey, maybe even at some point Mark McKinnon and Allie Savarino will weigh in — you know, two founders of the site.

·      ·      ·

For the next part of my act, let’s roll the blooper reel. First, at the top of the main page you can find a link titled “Issue Loops,” and if you click on it even tonight, you will see:

HotSoup, No Issue Loops

Assuming there were threads to be found here, this is what you would want on the front page. This isn’t amateur hour; this is the afternoon before.

And this one is less a blooper, if anything more of a practical joke:

HotSoup marijuana question

The second blooper, now apparently changed but still not actually fixed at the time of this writing, occurs on the celebrity pet issue page for Lance Armstrong, where an unidentified patronizing author/moderator (see “Editor’s Comments” in box at right) demands:

HotSoup, Lance Armstrong

Never mind the fact that here the Beltway insiders are pretending they’re like, the new outsiders, man. Because whether you like it or not, Lance Armstrong has a pitch for his side, which you can pretty much ignore and skip to the very end:

HotSoup, Lance Armstrong's question

Is Lance’s ghostwriter a fan of Joyce? Maybe we’ll find the answer if we just click on the “more…” button…? No:

HotSoup, Lance Armstrong, no files

Okay, now I get it. What big issues aren’t being addressed in current online debate? There are none. This comic software glitch is emblematic of why HotSoup.com is going to fall far short of its lofty goals: Try to be everything to everyone, and you will be nothing to nobody.

Others are already doing what they think they are. If they don’t like the partisan debate sites, there are plenty of online forums already offering whatever kinds of debate you want: Slashdot, Kuro5hin, OffTopic.com, Anandtech, even Something Awful and Genmay. Try the Corvette Forums. You might be surprised.

Though most online forums are not about politics, all the big ones have off-topic sections where debates left, right and beyond are carried on around the clock. HotSoup is going to bring you… prepared text from Lance Armstrong’s agent? The experience of being hounded with insipid questions — “Is the sentence stiff enough? Too stiff?” — by Ron Fournier?

Blooper-wise, best of all is the unenlightening, unlinkable and surely soon-to-disappear V-Factor sidebar:

HotSoup V-Factor

Take it away, Mike Turk:

Something called the V-Factor rates posts on a scale between “never” and “definitely will”, but completely fails to indicate what they will never or always do? What the hell is that?

Update: I had thus far left out any mention of Right Wing News blogger John Hawkins’ involvement w/r/t the Conservative Forum he was asked to oversee — which so far is less popular than the now-defunct Conservative Grapevine message board Hawkins once ran all by himself — but now “Hot Corner” is mentioning it, and well, see for yourself:

…. Today we welcome the many readers of “www.rightwingnews” to the Soup ….

Never mind the fact that Hawkins has been on board since before the launch, so it makes no sense to welcome his readers “today.” Apparently HotSoup editors are not among the readers of Hawkins’ site. Because, depending on your browser, typing in “www.rightwingnews” won’t get you very far.

Update, months later: Things I should have said when the site was still operational:

  1. If it was supposed to actually be “hot soup,” it must have been carrot and pea soup. It never looked appetizing.
  2. Per the image asking what issue “our mainstream media and our leaders” were ignoring, why were the “voices” all people featured in the mainstream media?
  3. One of the key points that I did make was that this thing was bound to fail because it never had any buy-in from the famous-for-DC names attached to it. Carter Eskew and Mark McKinnon might have been interesting discussion leaders, but they never tried.
  4. The apparent teenager asking about legalizing marijuana is actually a married adult, possibly with kids. Months later, I saw him on “The Colbert Report.”
  5. The Corvette Forums have actually been pretty big on Fred Thompson.

I think that was about it.