The AP reported this week that Hillary Clinton and the US Department of State are embracing new media to spread the word about American foreign policy and help restore Washington’s image.
Its refreshing to see that the State is experimenting with social media to help carry out their mission of creating a more secure, democratic, and prosperous world for Americans and the international community. We saw this work successfully for Obama during the campaign and it will be exciting to see how “Government 2.0″ progresses in the coming years.
Here are some of the changes Hillary’s team took since taking office:
- They have revamped the department’s Web site (http://www.state.gov) and the Gi blog (http://blogs.state.gov and http://twitter.com/dipnote) with a fresh array of features, graphics and colorful posts.
- Users can track her foreign travel on an interactive map (http://www.state.gov/secretary/trvl/map/?trip–id5)
- They can keep up virtually with her every move through Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/user/statevideo).
- They can pose questions through an “ask-the-secretary” column (http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/ask/secretary/117297.htm) that recently was revised to “text the secretary.” (http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/ask/secretary/120236.htm)
According to the article, Hillary’s staff says they also plan to venture further into the realm of social networking, an animated online world called Second Life, and cell phone technology.
Having moved to the Silicon Valley area in 2007, just as Twitter was emerging and Facebook opened up registration to non-college students, it’s been very interesting to see the progression of these tools to mainstream. Its essentially history in the making and we’re all watching it happen.
Leave a Reply