worried about Jay's strategy

MORE: my posts...

Jay,

The thing looks a bit scattered to me (I think it needs to get a lot more focused). Who are all the people that would be interested in this and what kind of problems do *they* see? Why not have some sort of an *informal* meet-up with interested people in NYC, for instance?

Something in the line of: Anybody who would possibly consider this meet me at this or that coffee shop and let’s talk about it! (I’d make sure most of the NYU journalism students could attend – the meeting would not be at the time they would be in class for a mandatory course or something…; if you end-up having a huge turn-out you may have to head over to some big classroom somewhere).

I think people would respond a lot better face to face than over the internet. Especially at the beginning, you want some sort of social interaction going (I think….). If they like the meeting (and I think most would), they would likely tell their friends etc. (so you get some word of mouth going on). I think a whole lot more people would be posting comments and getting involved as a result.

Delia

P.S. Oh… I wouldn’t be telling people: “What are you waiting for?� I know you didn’t mean it that way, but it can come across as not very respectful… I think it’s good to keep in mind that none of these people *have* to do any of this stuff… (and most of them are not just sitting around waiting for something to do to turn up…) So in some way they need to be shown that their efforts would be acknowledged (as basically a sacrifice on their part) and made clear that NewAssignment would really appreciate them.
P.P.S. I like Amanda’s suggestion too (getting a list of volunteers through other non-profits if possible). I’d still try to informally meet up to the extent that I could.
(http://www.newassignment.net/blog/jay_rosen/developments_with_new_assignment_aug_20_sep_9#comment-64)

Jay,

I think the beginning of a project is very important: it’s like making a first impresion. This is all would-be volunteers can *see* (at this point… right! but you have good publicity… *now*… so I suspect quite a few potential volunteers have been looking at this stuff). People get a gut reaction of what the project would be like from what you tell them now…

Yeah… having a “huge turnout” was the (maybe overly) optimistic way to look at it, but even if you just get 5 people talking about it (and none of them journalism students), I see no harm in trying. I still think you might be surprised what a face to face would do (both in terms of turnout and in terms of the quality of the discussion and positive externalities following from that).

But I maybe wrong, of course… All I’m saying is that… *I* would give it a try…

Delia
(http://www.newassignment.net/blog/jay_rosen/developments_with_new_assignment_aug_20_sep_9#comment-66)
...
... why wasn't he taking advantage of the great publicity he was having?
(couple of posts *up* -- the NAN blog comments go the other way round)