OpEdNews Makes Web 2.0 Technology Accessible to Groups

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By Rob Kall (about the author) Page 1 of 2 page(s)

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For OpEdNews: Rob Kall - Writer

OpEdNews has added a new set of technologies, unique on the web. This technology is designed to support, enable and empower groups by allowing them to tap the power of the WEB 2.0 technologies that are available on OpEdNews. The goal is to provide tools and technologies for the millions of groups throughout the US and the world focusing on advocacy, interest, political, service and other interests.

Ways OpEdNEws Group Functions Can Help and Support Groups

Most groups, if they have a web site, havbe "WEB 1.0" sites. They are relatively static, don't change very often, don't have much interactivity and have most or all of the content posted by a webmaster. Other members of the group can't add content or comment on the content that is there. If you visit it once, there's no reason to go back, probably, for months.

Ways OpEdNews Groups enable you to tap the powers of WEB 2.0--

-dynamic content that is constantly changing, with new information, new articles, links, blogs added by any member any time, with no need for the help of a webmaster.

-highly interactive-- anyone can post content, participate in threaded commenting, which enables discussions with widespread members-- much better than listerve groups that get cluttered, lost in email folders and trashed with excess copying of old messages.

-involving-- interaction leads to deepened involvement, connection, loyalty, sense of community. People come back to see what's new to engage in dialogue, see who's involved... forget the old front stoop in the neighborhood. We're building a digial one- just for your group.

-Multimedia-- we make it really easy to embed youtube videos in the articles and blog diaries your members post. Audio hosted on other sites is easy to add too. Share images. It's extremely easy to post images with articles and blog diaries. YOu get the power of blogs to without needing to deal with the technology and with the focus that your group needs.

To the best of our knowledge there is no site on the web that combines articles publishing, link aggregation, blogging with empowerment of groups, enabling them to further aggregate content on group pages.

How to make it Happen

-post articles:
When you submit articles you or others in your group write, part of the submission process allows you to delegate the article to the group page, and, if you like, to subject pages, locale pages and the front page.

Most articles published on OpEdNews are spidered by google news. We have to daily deserve that privelege by making sure that we publish real, polished articles-- not blogs, not ads or sales pitches. Articles must be legitimate articles, not fundraising letters or puff press releases promoting the organization. If you submit press releases on events, news about the organization-- these are probably fine.

For details on how to post an article see this FAQ
But you can also designate an article to your group page when you find an article already on OpEdNews. Just below the list of subjects, at the top of the article, there's an 'ADD TO MY GROUPS' clickable link. Click on it and you can add that article to your groups page, or pages, if you belong to more than one group. It just takes a few seconds.

-Post links
submit links to articles on other websites that you want to share with group members. Again, you can put these on your group page and other pages as well.

Sure you could email this to your group, but then it's gone and new members don't see it.
Sure, you can send it to your webmaster to post it on your website, but... isn't your webmaster buried already? And how many people actually send stuff in? And how much actually gets posted to YOUR site? By having members tap the power of OpEdNews group support, you enable all your members to post content to the page. Even if you are moderating submissions, this is a great way to quickly and easily get a lot more information to yyour members. More information, updated more often, adds up to added benefits for your members and a "stickier" relationship with your members. This is a good thing.

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Rob Kall is executive editor, publisher and site architect of OpEdNews.com, Host of the Rob Kall Bottom Up Radio Show (WNJC 1360 AM), President of Futurehealth, Inc, (more...)

The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author
and do not necessarily reflect those of this website or its editors.