Hi social media, hello can of worms
To follow-up with my idea of doing my research proposal on e-advocacy I spoke with the Canadian Cancer Society’s in-house social media expert. She was FULL of great information, advice, and insight. After speaking with her I get the sense that 1) not-for-profit organizations recognize social media is just a part of modern day advocacy and fundraising 2) are learning how to incorporate traditional forms of advocacy onto social media networks 3) there have been examples of success followed by a large amount of uncertainty regarding social medias’ ability to affect the policy process. I get the feeling this is unchartered territory. When I mentioned literature she said “what literature?”….yup. Methods?!!
chrika
cleeleroux
cuylerka
juliopreuss
kristinsztuka
mannyarroz
snc10
waynesoon21
yasmin hartung
4research 
So many possibilities – it will depend of course on your question, as well as your aims. What is it about e-advocacy you’re curious about? How it works? If it works? What non-profits think about it? What the “audience” thinks? Once you’ve narrowed this down, you’ll get a lot closer to picking a method – could be anything from surveys to experiments to interviews at this point, but you’re getting closer though! Much, much closer 🙂
Sara Grimes
October 1, 2010 at 11:03 am
There may not be academic literature about this specific aspect of social media, but I am sure there is something about social media itself that you can use. And, although I am not sure how well accepted it would be, there is always non-academic literature you could probably use.
One example that comes to mind is Malcolm Gladwell’s recent article “Small Change: why the revolution will not be tweeted”, in which he argues that social media doesn’t work for high-risk activism, but may be very powerful for lower engagement causes.
Even if the New Yorkers’ article itself is not considered good literature, the references he cites – from Clay Shirky’s “Here Comes Everybody” to “The Dragonfly Effect: Quick, Effective, and Powerful Ways to Use Social Media to Drive Social Change”, by Smith and Aaker, should be useful.
juliopreuss
October 1, 2010 at 4:58 pm
I’m thinking I might link my topic of interest to social media to make it more applicable to the faculty of information. In particular, looking at blogs. Let me know if you pursue this avenue, maybe we can share resources.
Also, thanks for the article Julio! The idea of weak-tie connections and the establishment of networks were pretty interesting. Hopefully I can find more info.
waynesoon21
October 4, 2010 at 3:28 am
I think I am going the opposite way. Social media is one of my main topics of interest and I am trying to find the best way to apply it to the issues favored by the iSchool faculty 🙂
juliopreuss
October 4, 2010 at 11:52 am
Thank you everyone for the feedback! I have been trying to get passed thinking of e-advocacy (and social media in general) as some unmeasurable and unwieldly area of study. After reading several articles detailing the use of ethnographic methods to research internet use I’ve decided to focus on the users of social media, that is the people working within the organization who are using it as an advocacy tool. I am thinking interviews and surveys of several organizations and then a comparative analysis would help me tease out how e-advocacy is percieved within charitable organizations.
Thanks for the articles Julio, I am definitely going to read them.
Wayne, I will definitely shoot you any articles I see that might be relevant to your topic.
yasmin hartung
October 11, 2010 at 4:00 pm