The White House joins the conversation

President Barack Obama started his career as a community organizer in Chicago 20 years ago. In the Presidential Campaign he applied these skills to create the successful community organizing website, MyBarackObama.com. Now that he is in the White House, Obama is turning to the American community again to help embody his goal of making government inclusive, transparent, accountable and responsible. This past week he announced the launch of the Office of Public Engagement with the mission to serve as an open front door to the White House. To do this, the goal of the office is to engage in online and offline conversations with American Community. Online they have created Whitehouse.gov as a way to communicate the latest happenings in the US Government using social media such as blogs, YouTube, Flickr and Twitter. The website also serves as an online outlet to send questions, comments, concerns, or well-wishes to the President or his staff. Offline they plan to hold town halls and other in-person events throughout his term (not just during the campaign).

Gone are the days of the one-way, closed communications. In a Web 2.0 world, where the consumer holds the power through the web and social media tools, companies must adjust to survive. The Office of Public Engagement is a great example how one of the largest organizations known for red tape and one-way conversations has made the change. It's all about having conversations with your customers and not at. What are you doing to engage and listen to your customers?

Comments

[Becky Blanton]

Perhaps in your rush to gush you didn't see the Cyber Security Act of 2009.

"The Cybersecurity Act of 2009 gives the president the ability to "declare a cybersecurity emergency" and shut down or limit Internet traffic in any "critical" information network "in the interest of national security." The bill does not define a critical information network or a cybersecurity emergency. That definition would be left to the president." http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2009/04/should-obama-control-internet

Then again you probably didn't read Senate Bills 773 and 778: http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=93966

They're part of the Act introduced by Senator Rockefeller - who told Congress recently he thought the internet should be shut down in the nature of Homeland Security. The internet is in greater danger than you realize BECAUSE of Obama.

"The whole thing smells bad to me," writes Larry Seltzer in eWeek, an Internet and print news source on technology issues. "I don't like the chances of the government improving this situation by taking it over generally, and I definitely don't like the idea of politicizing this authority by putting it in the direct control of the president."

See what the media OUTSIDE OF CBS, ABC and NBC are saying....

[Rebecca]

Becky, thanks for bringing this to my attention. I was not aware of of these bills.

The Office of Public Engagement is a brand new office. I am interested to see the impact American Citizens can make through this new effort to communicate. However, it is encouraging to know that when a bill such as 773 and 778 come up, we 'should' have a connection to the White House on the other end listening and 'hopefully' responding.

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I am interested to see the impact American Citizens can make through this new effort to communicate.