Student video presentations - complete list

Here are all the video presentations - I will add any additional ones as they come in. Enjoy and feel free to leave any comments or questions below!

1. Instagram & Snapchat (Summer & Julia)
Video link: https://youtu.be/YuhfXv0yv3M

We talk about how these platforms relate to slacktivism and storytelling while using Kony2012 as a case study.

2. YouTube (Colleen & Morgan C.)
Video link:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7yYD3oSbg8&feature=youtu.be

3. Twitter (Maria B. & Kelly)
Video link: https://youtu.be/-bmnDJtsn34

Discussion questions:
1. How has twitter changed advocacy?
2. What are the advantages and disadvantages of using Twitter for online advocacy?

4. Geolocation social networks (Madisen & Brandon)
Video link: https://youtu.be/1Gxlux4_71o


5. Sousveillance (Ariel)

Video link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1oBIjE8FgT0Gd-mKHd4lnyfRvDTRYi5z4/view?usp=sharing

6. Facebook Live (Maria & Corey)

Video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjLKLu-Rn1o&feature=youtu.be 

Visual Media and Campaigns

Hi everyone!

This is the link to Julia and Summer's presentation on Instagram and Snapchat in relation to Grassroots Advocacy. We talk about how these platforms relate to slacktivism and storytelling while using Kony2012 as a case study.

https://youtu.be/YuhfXv0yv3M

Using YouTube in Activism - Colleen Wachenfeld and Morgan Cooper

Presentation on YouTube by Colleen Wachenfeld and Morgan Cooper
Link to video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7yYD3oSbg8&feature=youtu.be

Twitter and Online Advocacy by: Maria and Kelly

Hi everyone! Here's the link to our presentation about Twitter and the benefits of using it for online advocacy campaigns.

Youtube link: https://youtu.be/-bmnDJtsn34

Discussion questions:
1. How has twitter changed advocacy?
2. What are the advantages and disadvantages of using Twitter for online advocacy?

Joe Biden Instagram Campaign by Gabriela Cantero

Former Vice President and potential 2020 Democratic Presidential Nominee Joe Biden, boasts an Instagram following of 1.4 million, the third most followed presidential candidate behind President Donald Trump (17.9 million) and Elizabeth Warren (2.2 million). The account has decent engagement, averaging about 30,000 likes and  600 comments per post with the exception of a few outliers of well-performing posts with hundreds of thousands of likes and several hundred comments. Most of the posts include anti-Trump rhetoric and copy that promotes his intentions and policy is elected into office. The presidential candidate does an excellent job of utilizing all of Instagram’s features including IGTV, in-story links, location tags and gifs.

A large portion of Biden’s posts are centered on the betterment of black and Latinx American communities with many photos being of the candidate with people of color. Additionally, the candidate’s posts are geared towards younger audiences such as millennials and Generation Z based on the celebrity endorsements that appeal to these audiences. Such endorsements include former U.S. Representative Beto O’Rourke and comedian and actor Keegan-Michael Key featuring humorous or informal text on the posts.

The most prominent and most frequent calls to action on the social media page are to donate to Biden’s campaign and to vote. The link on Biden’s Instagram bio currently directs users the donation page of this website but older posts reference the link directing users to a website to confirm their polling location. This made the calls to action accessible and simple for the audience to execute. Furthermore, these calls to action are direct. While the audience is encouraged and prompted to take initiative as Biden supporters, the social media page does not provoke creativity on the platform with institutional engagement.

Biden’s Instagram page has an emphasis on portraying him as a leader and uses his past experiences and homelife to project his image as a likable and qualified candidate. The page also uses issues Biden advocates for, anti-Trump posts and frequent usage of “we” language to build a sense of unity amongst followers. Community is also cultivated through interactive engagement such as post copy that encourages discussion (ex. “show us how you support Biden during tonight’s #DemDebate.”) Outside of successful social media strategies and tactics, the Biden Instagram page does not use any one innovative approach to promote the presidential campaign.

Overall, the Joe Biden Instagram page is well run with nicely executed media and copy. However, the campaign could enlist several additional methods to further engage its audiences. The campaign could ask supporters to become more involved in grassroots and organization efforts. There could have also been more social media coverage at rallies with an organizer doing an Instagram takeover with live coverage at an event. Despite this, the 2020 Presidential campaign for Joe Biden on Instagram appears successful and well managed.

Joe Biden’s Official 2020 Campaign Website - MB

Joe Biden’s Official 2020 Campaign Website 

Website’s Target Audience: 

This official campaign website is designed for three types of voters: African Americans, youth voters and existing Biden supporters. In almost all of the websites pictures and attached videos, Biden was smiling and/or shaking hands with African American people. This campaign is trying to reach this demographic by showing through different photography mediums that people with the same color and race support him for xyz reasons. Much of these pictures are placed on “Joe’s Vision for America” page ,which lists out his latest plans in bettering the United States of America. The campaign website also tries to mobilize American youth voters on its “Action Center” page and merchandise page. Like its African American reach, this campaign’s page is filled with photos of young adults answering phones and canvassing for Joe. This implementation of photos indicates that the Biden campaign is calling on youth around the country to not only support but to take action as well. This site also allows supporters to purchase merchandise that have a youth stylish feel with its design. Some of the merchandise items include coffee mugs and t-shirts with the slogans “Have a Cup O’ Joe” and “Release Your Tax Return or Shut Up.” Finally, the 2020 campaign web is designed to reach existing Joe Biden supporters that want to look back and see the reasons as to why they believe in him as their candidate. The About Joe page contains a sweet storytelling aspect about his life that doesn’t share policy visions but rather a closer look at Biden's life and time as a working and family man. 

Call to Action:

This website has an entire page dedicated to the Campaign’s call to action. Right as you click on the site you are immediately directed to a donation page with options ranging between $5-$250 dollars. Once you exit the donations option there is a page called the `Action Center”. On this page you can find a range of ways in which an American citizen can help the campaign and/or join the Biden team. Here are following ways the website encourages supporters to get involved: making phone calls for Joe, texting for Biden 2020, finding  an event near you, hosting a grassroots event in your neighborhood, downloading the Team Joe App, finding your local field office, contacting an organizer, organizing a tool kit, running to be a delegate for Biden, and becoming a grassroots fundraiser for Joe.

Entrepreneurial vs Institutional Engagement: 

The Joe Biden 2020 Official Campaign Website takes on supporter engagement at an institutional level. The site lays out a clear instructional platform for supporters to follow. The website is clean and organized; offering tool kits and packets for supporters to use if they intend to take action in Biden’s name. There is no sign of this website being used for supporters creativity. 

Leadership and Community Building: 

The 2020 Official Campaign Website is projects a likable, friendly, “been around the block” image of Joe Biden. It shares videos and pictures from years past that help supporters paint a better picture of the candidates background and life story.

Innovation vs. Missed Opportunities

After looking at all the other democratic candidates website, I would say that Biden’s website design is the most innovative. It is visually appealing, organized, and all of the videos/content are cut to perfection. It is clean cut but also uses innovative technologies such as all social platforms and the Biden app (which Bernie is the only other candidate who has an app). However, the campaign’s website could have benefited from developing another site page that is used strictly for two way engagement between the american people and the campaign team. Blog posts, chat boxes, vlogs are just a few examples of ways the Biden campaign could become more engaged with its audience through the website.

Elizabeth Warren’s Got a Plan for That!

by Thanh Le

Senator Elizabeth Warren, the first woman to represent Massachusetts in the US Senate, officially launched her presidential campaign on February 9th, 2019. Senator Warren has been dominating the Democratic primary debate stages, which should come as no surprise considering she was a debate champion in high school and won a debate scholarship to GWU at 16 years old. Most recently, her impressive debate performance in Las Vegas gave a huge boost to the campaign’s fundraising efforts and a considerable rise in the national poll. Though Warren has yet to come out on top in the past three voting states and is now in fourth place in terms of delegates, her campaign could carry the momentum of the recent surge into Super Tuesday where 1,300 delegates will be up for grabs.

The “Warren for President” official website https://elizabethwarren.com serves as the digital platform where all constituents can learn about the campaign plans and the candidate’s story, as well as how to get involved and organized to support Warren in the primary and general election. I noticed when searching for the website that the campaign paid for Google Ads so that the official page comes up as the first result at the top whenever there’s a search of terms related to Warren. The headline’s customized versions include “Working For The Middle Class” and “End Corruption In Washington” which reflect the core messages of Warren’s campaign.

The first landing page of the website, even before reaching the main page, is an immediate call-to-action “Can you chip in?.” The message has changed slightly today to reflect a new update that is the latest CBS national poll “Elizabeth in second!” before asking supporters to chip in. The page that follows then greets visitors with the official campaign slogan “Dream big, fight hard, and win,” emphasizing the grassroots movement, and a simple suggestion to “Stay in touch,” asking for contact information - email address and zip code. The “Donate” buttons are very prominent both with the top-of-the-page banner and end-of-the-page nudge. The campaign marks reaching out and speaking to voters a high priority but only requires quite low commitment, as “Start making call” redirecting to a complete walk-through toolkit where you can make calls from your home or anywhere with Internet access. The “Find an event near you” section offers the chance to get more involved with higher commitment, such as canvass, rally, meet-and-greet, outreach, community events, and so on.

The campaign offers a good mix of opportunities for institutional and entrepreneurial engagement. Inside the “Help elect Elizabeth Warren” page is the comprehensive toolkit with extensive details on how advocates can get involved with Team Warren and be part of the movement. Whether it is contacting voters, hosting an event, or organizing the community, Team Warren provides step-by-step instructions and detailed materials. Supporters are also encouraged to create their own event plans and submit them to the campaign for approval. In short, the campaign gives supporters the basic tools and guidelines, and they can pick and choose what to do with it.

Warren’s campaign is known for their substantial amount of comprehensive plans and detailed proposals - “I have a plan for that” even becomes the unofficial slogan. The extensive plans and fact squad not only reflect Warren’s progressive records but also demonstrate how she’s more than qualified and prepared to hold the highest office in the land. As president, Warren will get things done and her leadership will make a “big, structural change.” “Meet Elizabeth” tells the story of her humble upbringing and incredible journey to become a law professor and US Senator because “America invested in kids like her.” It presents her as a progressive champion but also reflects the disappearing American middle-class - making the “story of self” becomes the “story of us.”

Supporters can apply to join the community of fellow progressives in support of Warren’s presidential candidacy at “All in for Warren.” However, there is virtually no link on the website directing to social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube. Warren has a great following on all of these platforms and it will be useful to direct visitors there so they can connect, show support, and spread the words on social media. Besides, the campaign has a lot of creative and interesting merchandises but they are not very visible or featured in any innovative way on the website. To sum up, the “Warren for President” official website did a great job overall of providing a digital platform for constituents to learn more about and get engaged with the grassroots movement, but there are a few missed opportunities that they could have used better.

Fun fact: A TikTok featuring a hilarious “recap” of Elizabeth Warren’s stellar performance at the last debate went viral this weekend. The clip ends with this quip “Join me at Elizabeth-Warren-dot-you-just-got-knocked-the-fuck-out-dot-org… Lizzy out!”. This address is now registered and redirects to Elizabeth Warren's official campaign website.

Hear the Bern! - Alyssa Bradley

On April 8th, 2019 Bernie Sanders launched an innovative initiative to excite potential voters, wonks, political pundits, and general people looking to find new information on the Vermont senator with his podcast, Hear the Bern. Hear the Bern is just one of many ways Sanders is hoping to reach supporters.With Hear the Bern, Sanders is hoping to give interested parties a unique insight into how his campaign works, the surrogates and leaders within it, and general opinions on current policy ideas, events, and news stories. 

Hear the Bern is described as a show hosted by Bernie himself, but since its inception he’s been on the show less than 10 times - which is understandable because he is running for President and a new episode of the show is released weekly. Instead the show’s main host is Briahna Joy Gray, National Press Secretary for his 2020 campaign. Every week she speaks with Bernie supporters on topics such as his black support, how to bridge the center with the left, climate change, views on corporations, and many other topics. In each episode she brings an expert supporter on the topic and ends the show with a call to action for supporters to donate, read the website for more information on Bernie’s views on the topic, or by letting the audience know about a televised town hall or debate coming up. 

The show not only targets voters who are already strong supporters of the campaign, but also targets critics or undecided voters. The past three episodes since Iowa voting have begun break down why Bernie won all three states and address criticisms of the campaign. In the most recent episode released February 24th Gray speaks about the campaign’s tremendous Nevada win as a “political earthquake” that caused the political establishment to lash out on television and in print. This statement is for the supporters to show that they’re breaking ground. She then goes into detail about who exactly they won - hispanic voters by over 50%, white voters, voters under 50, second place with black voters, etc. This is for the critics who say his audience is only white males (i.e. Bernie Bros). These messages serve as a way for supporters and potential supporters to get involved with the campaign. I think the biggest draw for campaign podcasting is it gives supporters message points and tips on ways to talk to people who are on the fence about their particular candidate. With Hear the Bern, Briahna Joy Gray unpacks what has happened over the past week or unpacks specific policy proposals in a human way which leads to a better understanding of what the campaign hopes to accomplish. Because of this, the podcast is able to build a strong community of listeners and activists who are interested in being high information voters. 

Additionally, the podcast is a great example of the story of us technique. With each week highlighting a different subject it allows voters to learn why they should be excited for this campaign and how his win could affect our lives. One component of the story of us technique is making sure people know why you’re organizing and why they should too and Hear the Bern does that. 

With Spotify and Apple Podcasts being more rigid, it’s difficult to be innovative with the platform. However, Gray promotes the podcast on her social media platforms, specifically Twitter which gets users more involved. There is also a version on Youtube. When she was creating the podcast on marijuana legalization she asked the Twitterverse who they thought would be the best guest on the show. This is something that can cause users to participate more and also know what’s coming for the next week and whether they’d like to listen.

 Hear the Bern is definitely a hidden gem of the campaign. It’s not talked about very much on Twitter or at rallies so unless you’re someone seeking out a lot of Bernie, you probably won’t be able to find it which is definitely a missed opportunity.  If Bernie were to give it a shoutout at a rally or link to it more often on his campaign Twitter platform, it could be much more useful and reach more people. 

Hear the Bern Spotify

Amy Klobuchar- Facebook Page

Candidate: Amy Klobuchar

Platform: Facebook

There is clear indication that presidential hopeful Amy Klobuchar wants her campaign to appear authentic and grassroots. In her “about” page on Facebook, they use the words “homegrown campaign.” The campaign wants Klobuchar to seem like a down-to-earth, authentic, Midwestern candidate. The problem is, that is all the Facebook page says about her. They have an intense, steady feed of clips from debates, links, and short posts that are likely also tweeted out.

            Their demographic seems to match what we know about Facebook. The engagement on the page is mainly from people who are middle age or older. There doesn’t seem to be much engagement from young people. That being said, this seems to be more of a platform for very professional posts from the campaign. There isn’t any engagement with supporters from the official Facebook page, as far as I can tell.

            There are a couple calls to action on the page. The main, and most obvious, call to action is to vote for Klobuchar in the upcoming primaries. The only other major call to action is to “join us” at the official website. There are invitations to events and rallies, but there isn’t a major call for social justice or change. The main message of the Klobuchar campaign, according to the Facebook page, is that if you don’t like Trump, you might like her. I’m not meaning to discredit her policy points or agenda, but that is how the Facebook comes across. One post reads, “Trump’s worst nightmare is that the people in the middle, the people who are tired of the mudslinging and the name-calling, will have a place to call home this November.”

            The platform is definitely just encouraging people to plainly follow instructions. There is no creative engagement on the platform. It is about as institutional as it could get. It does not seem like it is encouraged either. There is engagement, but most of it is just negative comments about Klobuchar. Even a professional Santa Claus came after her. 

It does not seem like the Klobuchar campaign is trying to engage with people in any meaningful way that would build up leaders in her community of supporters or rally people behind her in any particular way. If the most you can do is go to her website and try to figure out engagement there, the platform is surely lacking.

            They are not using Facebook in any new or innovative way. I would have liked to see them use the platform as a sort of forum for engagement, where Klobuchar could engage with people directly and have conversations with supporters. Instead, the way the Facebook is structured, you end up seeing more comments about how bad she is than actual posts by Klobuchar. The comments call her out for not being the midwestern grassroots leader that she is trying to portray. There are fears on the page that she is just another Washington insider doing whatever she can to get elected. While I take issue with those sentiments for any candidate, this Facebook page is not doing anything to quell those concerns.

Elizabeth Warren on Facebook by Kelila Rotto

The last presidential election in 2016 made it clear how influential social media, especially Facebook, can be in politics. While it’s now clear that people were influenced by Russian interference on Facebook, the fact that much of it was done on this platform says a lot about how Facebook influences people’s opinions.  

Although Facebook doesn’t seem to be as important in this election, only a fool would discount this platform after 2016. About seven-in-ten U.S. adults, that is 69 percent of people, use Facebook. While younger audiences are not likely to engage on this social platform, older audiences are probably still looking on Facebook. People will visit Facebook just to take a look around, but if you can get someone to commit to liking a candidate’s page, you have an audience that will automatically see your posts and can amplify the messaging.

Elizabeth Warren’s Facebook banner is a video with key images and words to draw in the audience and get them excited. It has phrases such as “Dream Big” and “Fight Hard”, but a key is seeing the word “Grassroots” which gives the credit back to the people who are at the bottom. Most of the imagery includes Warren interacting with audiences and hugging people. This shows the campaign as including individuals and giving credit to the person looking at the page. But this is not left without a call for action. On the bottom right of the banner there is an easy ask for the viewer. All it says is “text fight to 24477”. It’s simple, but that is why it is perfect as the first thing you see.

Additionally, most of the messaging on Warren’s Facebook page focuses on the effect of every person who pitches in fighting side by side. Very few posts use a first person “I” or refer to “my plan”. Instead, they focus on the community and what Warren’s supporters can do together.

The pinned post, the first post anyone who clicks on this page would see, is thanking supporters. This gives credit to those who donated for “building this campaign” or “a movement”. It is inspiring as the first thing as it is clear that the campaign has far exceeded the original goal. As a new supporter or an old supporter, the Facebook page seems to be about keeping up momentum and making those who follow Warren feel good about how they have helped contribute.

Warren’s campaign is using this platform for two distinct purposes. Firstly, about half of the posts seem to be informational. Whether this be a video or a link to an article which shows Elizabeth Warren’s values and campaign promises. This in itself may be a type of ask because posting is kind of a way of asking people to read the post or watch the video. Many other posts ask for donations but only a small amount like $2 which almost anyone can give. But they are sure to ask in the context of what this donation is fighting for.

Because of the platform, Facebook does not tend to be entrepreneurial in the type of engagement it encourages. While it allows for two-way communication and encourages conversation from the audience, this page is run in Elizabeth Warren’s name and does not allows for others to create their own posts, people can only comment on posts created by the campaign.

However, it should be noted that this is only Warren’s “personal” account. There is another account where the audience can be more participatory and make their own posts in order to contribute. Interestingly enough, these two accounts work together as a whole. One to give information and ask for a donation, and another account designed to create more interaction and even build a community through the participation on the page.