Creation and Evolution; Desperately Seeking Copernicus

December 7, 2009 David Housholder

Biology has yet to experience her Newton; her Copernicus.

Biology has not yet come of age. It just doesn’t feel as if it has “arrived” yet.

Darwin will not enjoy his current “Mount Rushmore” status a few centuries from now. He’s just too wrong about some basic concepts.

For a scientific theory (i.e. evolution) to be so controversial well over a century after its “unveiling” begs the question, “What’s wrong with it?” Darwin’s acolytes are still trying to convince us, and generation after generation, it’s not working.

The truth is, we don’t yet understand “life,” and most people are fully aware of the opaque mystery of the topic at hand. All proposed “definitions” of life are hopelessly arbitrary; in the end, life is pretty strange stuff that doesn’t make a lot of sense.

I need to lay my cards on the table–I trust the narrative of the Bible and am a committed follower of Jesus. But that’s not why I have trouble with Darwin and his neo-Darwinian offspring. If I had never seen a Bible, I still wouldn’t buy what they are selling.

It’s just too counter-intuitive.

I’m not the sharpest crayon out of the box, but I can tell stuff that happened randomly (i.e. potholes on the 405) from stuff that got designed (i.e. cool Swiss watches). Life seems way more like the latter than the former. Simple as that.

Many “progressive” Christians try to merge evolution and the Bible. They think they have “solved” the problem by saying, “I can believe in evolution and the Bible.” Problem is, no matter what you think of the Bible, evolution isn’t true. Why buy a compound half-truth (“theistic” evolution) when you don’t have to? Besides, it looks bad–like “trying too hard” to be modern and “with it,” even though the secular evolutionists don’t want or need you. In fact, you embarrass them. And us.

First of all, “science” about the past is dicey. On a good day!

Truth is, the past doesn’t exist. You can’t go there. Even if you were Bill-Gates-rich, you couldn’t take me there tomorrow.

The present is simply all we have. Joe’s Crab Shack here in Newport Beach has a sign: Free Crab Tomorrow. There never is a tomorrow. Only a today.

Science, by definition, is organized observation. We can only observe and measure the present, as that is all there is to see. Science must be “repeatable.” You can’t repeat an observation of something you can’t observe in the first place.

Science is a good thing and I am not anti-science. All truth is truth. But science has been running up against limits, in many areas of study, for several generations now. Science has entered a time of diminishing returns. It has never lived up to what we thought was its potential. It’s just created a lot of yucky chemicals we can’t seem to get rid of.

Complex storytelling about the “past” is fraught with pitfalls. We always tend to read in what we want to see. I want to see a Creator, and I can easily find one; at least I’m honest about my motives–my opponents, on the other hand, pretend to be “objective.” Immanuel Kant described our minds as “waffle irons” which impose our patterns and views on the runny batter of reality “an sich.”

Pick the opposite view to mine, and you can “find” that too.

This is why history is such an “odd” discipline. It is a detailed description of something that isn’t actually there. Add science to the mix, and it gets even stranger. History is written by the victors in life and all storytelling about the past is deeply influenced by our current biases. Our historical interpretation of the past far outweighs any actual evidence; we can write volumes and volumes on Greco-Roman society and we only have a few flimsy pages of actual primary sources from that era (Tacitus, Suetonius, etc.), and most of those earliest manuscripts date from almost a millennium after they were written.

Susan Sontag wrote a magnificent essay “On Photography” which talks, among other things, about how it gives us the illusion that we can know the past. Interesting how Darwin’s theory and photography developed (no pun intended) around the same time.

Before this gets too serious, click on this Friends episode that deals with evolution. It’s actually quite profound.

Let’s just come right out and say that all story-telling (including mine) about the past is deeply agenda-driven. This includes secular, mechanistic evolution theories.

We simply have no consensus, in the USA, as to the place of spiritual/supernatural discourse, if any, in the public marketplace. Big agendas are pushing big ideas.

Most of the reasoning on both sides is totally circular. Pre-define science as having no spiritual content, and voila!, you relegate talking about a Creator to the realm of “feelings” and “opinions,” claiming the turf of “fact” for your side.

Who says science can’t entertain supernatural/spiritual/design components? Some grand scientific world congress that imposes this definition on the rest of us?

Science is nothing more and nothing less than an organized, inductive, collective search for truth by observation, publication, repetition, and consensus. Pre-defining the rules (most narrowly) to ensure your preferred outcome is no longer science.

Pre-defined in non-Designer mechanistic terms, science is no longer worthy of the name “science.” It no longer has the muscle to seek truthful answers to the (big) question: “What are we doing here?”

Getting back to biology–I simply don’t find the argument for evolution convincing.  Neither “mircro (within a species)” nor “macro.”

You can separate out traits (dog breeding, agriculture, etc.), but these are artificially isolated trait groups. Put all the dogs in the world on one of the Hawaiian Islands and in a few generations they’d all look just like their proto-ancestors. There is remarkable consistency within a species.

It seems, from whatever incomplete evidence that we have, that species appear out of nowhere, enjoy a long period of “stasis” where virtually nothing happens, and they they go extinct. These “flowerings” of species seem to have happened in a handful of mega-waves over time.

And no one has ever convinced me that one species can become another one. Clearly, it didn’t happen gradually (lizards growing wings ever so slowly over millennia), and if it was a new-species mutation, then it wouldn’t have the right number of chromosomes to mate with anything else (why dogs and cats can’t mate with each other with any offspring)–it would be a mule at best. And the chances of two identical (male and female) mutations who can mate and be the Adam and Eve of a new species? Please.

Let’s go back to the wings. It would take a bazillion years for wings to evolve to the point where an animal could actually fly (try designing a wing that will lift solid matter off the ground–go ahead). All during that time, the non-flying wings would be a serious liability in terms of survival. And during that bazillion years, the genetics of the animal would be screaming to the offspring not to change anything.

Real Darwinists have given up on the “gradual change” story and the neo-Darwinists don’t have anything to convince me that mutations could produce new species. Apparently, species just start, go on for a long time, and die out (looking much the same as when they started).

And micro-evolution going on with humans today? If that were the case, then people in harsh environments (more improvements because of forced adaptation) would be superior to those who have spent thousands of years in “resort” climates. Let the racism begin…

I’m not saying that we’ll never figure this out. I just think that we are all (myself included) missing a really big insight; as big as Copernicus shifting the sun to the middle of the solar system.

I don’t have an answer for the “What are we doing here?” question. I believe God was and is deeply involved. Not because of some old, dusty dogma, but because I encounter supernatural reality on a regular basis, and this reality seems to have focus, personality, and intention. And I am not alone. Most humans in every time and place relate to what I have just written about spiritual things. They will continue to reject a spiritually-sanitized story about our origins.

Perhaps some young person reading this will set aside the tired Creation/Evolution debate and think a truly original thought about what life actually is and how some forms of life relate to other forms of life on earth.

Secular evolution theory has never reached true consensus in our society. It never will. Time for some new thinking.

Time for a Newton.

Time for a Copernicus.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++

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The Future is in the New

BEN ARMENT - Originally posted Tuesday, November 24, 2009   Hundreds of thousands of pastors have converged upon South Barrington, Illinois, at one time or another to attend a Willow Creek conference. For years, it was Mecca for outreach-minded church leaders. They came to learn the models and methods of this larger-than- life church. And that’s a shame.

It’s a shame that most of us missed the beginning of Willow Creek Community Church. We missed the college class where Bill Hybels caught the vision for a New Testament church from Dr. Bilezikian. We missed selling vegetables door-to-door with a teenaged Nancy Beach to help pay the bills. We missed the years of meeting in a movie theater and the infamous “train wreck” (detailed in Rediscovering Church by Lynne & Bill Hybels) that almost killed the church.

Most of us caught the back end of the vision for Willow Creek, when it was tested, proven, and old. Once it broke all records in church ministry, we finally paid attention. When the lakeside auditorium was built and the escalators were installed, we finally woke up. And that’s a shame.

It’s a shame that we only catch on to great ideas when they’re no longer new. Willow Creek is a living monument to the power of vision, but we seem to have learned nothing from its story. When was the last time you paid any attention to a recent college graduate with a dream?

It’s a shame because the future is in the new.

Last year, I worked at Catalyst Conference, where we hosted 12,000 church leaders in Atlanta, 3,500 in California, and thousands of others at one-day events all across the country. The events were packed, the excitement was contagious, and the momentum was unquestionable. This year’s gathering in Atlanta sold out at 13,000 people and became the highest trending topic on Twitter. But hardly anyone was excited about Catalyst when it started. They had to give away hundreds of free tickets in its first year. Only two or three sponsors were interested in exhibiting. The early bird deadline was extended at least three times to reel in the stragglers. Nearly two-thirds of the attendees came from North Point Community Church, and that only happened because Andy Stanley promoted it for $49 two weeks before the event.

What a shame.

We miss out on the most important season of a vision’s lifecycle because we have an undying love for proven ideas and a blatant disregard for new ones. We don’t want to tolerate the hardships or the impossible odds that come with new ideas. We don’t want to take a risk on something untested. We want to gather where others are gathering, celebrate what others are celebrating, and affirm what others are affirming.

I’ll never forget the story of how a pastor visiting Willow Creek got caught measuring the distance from the rear doors to the front stage, presumably for his own building campaign. He wanted his church to be just like Willow’s, but without the unique vision. I think he missed the point. And unfortunately, so have most of us.

This year, a considerable number of conferences are closing down. Rob Bell just announced the end of NOOMA. The time is ripe for fresh, new vision, but it’s not going to come from what is already established and proven. The future comes from the new. And this means we all have to take some risks. We have to start looking for great ideas in their infancy. We can’t dismiss a young staffer’s audacious idea just because he’s inexperienced. Sure, he’ll make mistakes, but his idea will become refined by the process. It just might be the next great revolution in the church.

We have to trade our preferences for potential. If we go to the same conferences, listen to the same podcasts, and follow the same preachers, we’ll get more of the same. It’s time to shuffle the iPod and discover some new opportunities.

We have to be willing to break some rules. Great ideas turn into systems that get repeated over and over again. So when a new idea comes along, it threatens our way of doing things. We’ll be inclined to say, “You’re not allowed to do that.” But we have to be willing to break the rules if these new ideas have a shot at making it.

So go ahead—honor the idea-makers of the past. But make room for the obscure, the unheard-of, and the ridiculous. The future is in the new.

Ben Arment is the founder of STORY (www.storychicago.com). He is a former church planter and a daily blogger at www.BenArment.com.

Five Social Media Fundraising Trends for 2009

By Beth Kanter
I usually don't write end of year roundups until those quiet last days of the year, but if Leave09Behind  gets legs, that might be next week!   But I'm a member of the Social Media Advisory Board for SmartBrief, Inc, a terrific daily summary of social media insights and they asked me to do a roundup post for this week.

Over the past six months, I've been collaborating on a book with Allison Fine, titled "The Networked Nonprofit"  and we've been sifting through stories, research, and seeing many patterns. So for this post,  I'd like to share 5 fundraising trends that we saw emerging in 2009 related to fundraising and social media and that will most definitely continue to have impact in 2010.

Less than 24 hours ago, Epic Change launched its TweetsGiving 2009, a 48-hour charity event to encourage people to express their gratitude using online tools and at face-to-face meet-ups.    This two-day event, which ends on Thanksgiving, also invites people to donate to Epic Change.

Last year, TweetsGiving, raised $11,000 to build a classroom in Tanzania using Twitter to spread messages of thanks and opportunities to donate.   More importantly, the event was one of a series of social media fundraisers that offered evidence that Twitter and other social media tools were not just a passing fad.

This year's Tweetsgiving hopes to raise more than $100,000 in donations.   Even though we are well before the ending bell of this year's campaign, there are number of principles that have been in used by other social media infused fundraisers over 2009.  These principles will no doubt be copied, refined, remixed, and extended as nonprofits experiment with social media-powered fundraising techniques:

Weaving Together Online/Offline Into Real Time Web Fundraising Events

Last February, Twestival raised over $250,000 for charity:water in 24 hours through self-organized volunteer events in 200 cities around the world.   While "Tweet and Meet" events, called "Tweet Ups," were popular with Twitter users in 2008,   "Tweet-Meet-Donate" events became more and more common in 2009.

As we march into 2010, might we see the invention of Real Time Web fundraising events?  Or maybe as more nonprofitexplore the possibilities of location-based social networks and fundraising, the distinctions between online/offline fundraising will melt away.

A Platform for Self-Organizing

Social networks like Twitter connect us with people online who share our interests or passions about making the world a better place.   They also provide fertile ground for us to organize rapid, collective fundraisers.   They key is designing the opportunity for connection, plus self-organizing.   As June Holley, a thought leader in networks, would say, "Be Rhizomatic."

We witnessed the power of combining a platform for self-organizing with network building in the winter of 2009 with A Networked Memorial Service for Maddie, in memory of a toddler, Madeline (Maddie) Sphor who passed away suddenly.   The March of Dimes community rallied to raise money in Maddie's memory, unleashing a groundswell of support and sympathy expressions.

Social Media Fundraising As Part of A Multi-Channel Strategy

Using social media channels alone for fundraising will not be as effective as making it a part of a multi-channel straetgy that includes traditional fundraising techniques. This includes using email, web site presence, google ads, face-to-face events and reaching out to the online and mainstream media .

A great example of how well this multi-channel approach works is the Humane Society’s Spay Day.  In 2009, the organization launched the United State Spay Day Photo Contest in 2009 as one part of their overall effort that included broadcast media and other social media outreach efforts as well as offline event.  More than $550,000 was raised last March.

And just last week, GiveMN, a new online web site that hopes to encourage more Minnesotans to give and help create a stronger nonprofit community for Minnesota, raised over $14 million dollars in 24 hours using a multi-channel campaign.

Donors As Program Partners Not Just Check Writers

In May, 2009,   Peter Dietz, founder of Social Actions, reflected on the future of online fundraising and wrote about a shift in donor expectations.  That donors in an age of social media, will come to your organization with the expectation of being full partners in your work, not just an ATM machine to be tapped when cash is needed.

Take this compelling example of how deep engagement can lead to better results from Wildlife Direct.  In 2007, WildlifeDirect had 7 blogs in the Democratic Republic of Congo written written about a specific animal by a conservation professional. The blogs were an opportunity to engage people in conversations about the daily challenge of conservation work in Africa These blogs raised $350,000 to pay rangers salaries and help save mountain gorillas in the Virunga National Park.  Says Paula, “Two years later, we have over 70 blogs, donations have risen 4 fold, as has website visitation. We treat our donors as partners in our programs.”

Not recognizing the importance of relationship building and engagement as the first step in getting donations has lead to a number of articles in the mainstream media or research studies to conclude that social media is worthless as a fundraising tool.  If we only continue to use these tools to gather nonprofit trend data, we're missing some opportunities..

The Maturation of Peer-to-Peer Fundraising

Peer-to-Peer fundraising is about empowering people to fundraise on behalf of  your nonprofit. It works for marathons and in lieu of birthday presents or wedding gifts, although sometimes it can be a waste of time for nonprofits.

Last year, Facebook Causes added its birthday wish feature and we saw more peer to peer fundraising unfolding on social network sites.   Ammado has recently launched a new take on peer-to-peer fundraising called giving circles and giving communities that nonprofits should keep an eye on.

Another trend with peer-to-peer giving we are likely to see is that donors will want the opportunity to have a closer tiewith those who benefit from their donations.   In 2010, we are likely to see more interaction - not with the organizations, but with the actual recipients of the dollars.

Click at the Heartstrings

We know that good storytelling that tugs at the heart strings opens the purse strings.    With "click philanthropy"actions, ways that users can easily spread a message or leverage a donation, it is important to tap into human emotion.  Good fundraisers (and marketers) know that tugging at the heart strings can open the wallet.

Tweetsgiving is playing off the theme of gratitude, according to recent research is a powerful emotion that encourages positive behavior, the giving and receiving of thanks (and gifts.)   Drew Olanoff, who was diagnosed with cancer, decided to raise money by taking revenge on cancer through his BlameDrewsCancer.com which allowed you with a twitter hashtag, #blamedrewscancer, to blame anything you want on his cancer.  And finally, fun and public humiliation - as NTEN's executive director Holly Ross discovered, can be good levers for donations.

Although social media as part of the fundraiser's tool box is not yet the norm, these experiments are laying the ground work for even more dramatic successes in 2010.    Social media fundraising tools will come and go, but the ability to leverage one's social graph to raise money for a good cause is bound to be with us for a long time.

What do you think are the key fundraising/social media trends of 2009?   What is important to take into 2010?

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November 25, 2009 in fundraising2.0 | Permalink

Time to Abolish Homework and Save our Families - Read this article

After years of teachers piling it on, there's a new movement to ... Abolish homework 

Vicki Haddock, Insight Staff Writer

High school teacher Phil Lyons has become a heretic: He refuses to assign homework. At Palo Alto's Gunn High School, where he teaches world history and advanced-placement economics, his no-homework policy leaves many new students anxious and their parents aghast, at least initially.

"At back-to-school night every hand goes up, and they bombard me with various versions of the same question -- 'What are you doing?' " Lyons says. "This year I pre-empted it by opening with an explanation of why homework is a failed approach, and why their kids will actually learn more without it."
He also noted that his students achieved a 94 percent pass rate on the advanced-placement test, one of the highest in the country -- and a success rate that has risen since he jettisoned homework assignments.
Like Lyons, a growing minority of educators and researchers are calling for an end to homework as we know it -- and some are out to abolish it altogether.
Vigorous scrutiny of the research, they argue, fails to demonstrate tangible benefits of homework, particularly for elementary students. What it does instead, they contend, is rob children of childhood, play havoc with family life and asphyxiate their natural curiosity. Learning becomes a mind-numbing grind rather than an engaging adventure.
In an era of more rigorous academic standards and vertebrae-straining backpacks, most American schools seem to be assigning more homework in earlier grades. For two decades, experts have propelled this trend with dire warnings that students in nations such as Japan are besting Americans because they diligently do more homework.
Even the youngest students have begun sweating over worksheets. In Prince George County, Md., a school superintendent famously suggested that preschools were frittering away time better spent on academics by having their little ones nap. In the Bay Area, tutoring companies began tailoring services to a new pool of clients who had just mastered tying shoelaces.
An AP-AOL Learning Services Poll released earlier this year showed that most parents and teachers say children are getting the "right amount" of homework -- an average of from 79 minutes per night in elementary school to 105 in high school. And those who were dissatisfied said they preferred not less but more.
The perceived failures of creative spelling and "there-is-no-right-or-wrong-answer" math have made Americans wary of any newfangled educational fad that seems to encourage slacking. No homework, indeed.
Yet a rebellion against homework is brewing.
"The preponderance of research clearly shows that homework for elementary students does not make a difference in student achievement. It is hard to believe that a strategy used so extensively has no foundation," principal David Ackerman of Oak Knoll Elementary in Menlo Park wrote in a letter to parents this autumn as he put the brakes on homework.
Two new books read like manifestos against what authors consider an avalanche of unproductive take-home assignments. Their titles lay their beliefs on the line: the research critique "The Homework Myth: Why Our Kids Get Too Much of a Bad Thing" by Alfie Kohn, and the more anecdotal "The Case Against Homework: How Homework is Hurting Our Children and What We Can Do About It" by Sara Bennett and Nancy Kalish.
At the same time, an international comparison by two Penn State professors has concluded that junior high students who scored highest in math tended to come from countries where teachers assign relatively little homework -- including Denmark, the Czech Republic and (take note) Japan. Conversely, the lowest-scoring students came from countries where teachers assign tons of homework, such as Iran, Thailand and Greece.
"It almost seems as though the more homework a nation's teachers assign, the worse the nation's students do," concluded researchers Gerald LeTendre and David Baker, who found Americans in the mid-range in the amount of homework assigned and in achievement.
Both sides in the homework wars tend to sling around the phrase "studies show" to bolster their arguments, but pity the poor parent or teacher who starts as an agnostic in search of answers. It's a daunting task, pitting dueling methodologies against sparring statistics.
"Researchers have been far from unanimous in their assessments of the strengths and weaknesses of homework as an instructional technique," summarized the Journal of Educational Psychology. "Their assessments ranged from homework having positive effects, no effects, or complex effects to the suggestion that the research was too sparse or poorly conducted" to say.
Case in point: the glowing assessment of math homework that sprang from a 1997 study by Julian Betts, professor of economics at UC San Diego. He concluded that schools would do more to improve student learning by assigning more homework than by pursuing more costly alternatives -- say, for example, lowering class size or hiring more experienced teachers. He even reported that time spent on homework "appears as effective as time spent in the classroom." In fact, Betts predicted that if teachers doubled the average amount of math homework in grades 7 to 11, it would advance students almost two full grade equivalents and ultimately boost their wages by 25 percent.
At the other end of the spectrum, when two Harvard scientists tracked how well students were doing in university science classes and attempted to correlate that to the amount of homework they did in high school, they concluded that homework alone made no difference.
Proponents cite evidence suggesting that homework instills responsibility, and they note that learning would proceed at a sluggish pace if classtime were consumed with students reading novels, memorizing vocabuary or writing research papers -- assignments better accomplished at home.
Opponents counter with evidence that homeworks' dictatorial nature undercuts responsibility, generates family conflict, and takes away time for creative play and natural learning.
The experts can't even agree on whether the quantity of assigned homework has increased, decreased or stayed the same in recent years.
The most widely regarded analysis of the effect of homework has been done by Harris Cooper of Duke University, who synthesized dozens of studies over time. He just published his most recent conclusions, based on updated research. The six studies he deemed most reliable, which compared similar students who were assigned homework with those assigned no homework, found that in the short-term, homework boosted scores on unit tests of the material, whether it was second-graders learning number placement or high school seniors studying Shakespeare.
No great surprise there -- but does it stick over time? Do students with homework achieve better overall mastery of the subject down the road?
In 12 other larger studies that linked the amount of homework to how well students perform on national academic tests -- taking into account other factors that might influence the connection -- he reports that 11 found a positive link between time spent on homework and long-term achievement.
Among research without such tight adjustments for other factors, more than 70 percent found that homework seemed to have a positive effect, but age made a huge difference. In fact, the benefit was twice as large for high school students than it was for junior high students, and twice as large again for junior high students than for elementary school students.
But at a tipping point, too much homework actually seemed to have a negative effect.
"We're waiting for the absolutely perfect study in which kids are randomly assigned to do or not do homework for their entire academic careers, and then we'll see for sure who did best -- but don't hold your breath for that one," Harris said.
Until then, he's sticking by his old recommendation -- used by many schools in the Bay Area and across the country -- that teachers assign up to 10 minutes per night per grade. In other words, a fourth-grader should be doing about 40 minutes per night and a 12th-grader about two hours.
Homework hasn't always been a given. It emerged in the national consciousness in the late 1800s, as more Americans continued school past the eighth grade. Even in its infancy, homework was controversial, as Steve Schlossman and Brian Gill showed in the American Journal of Education.
The practice was simply "barbarous," declared Ladies Home Journal editor Edward Bok in a 1900 editorial, "A National Crime at the Feet of American Parents." Shortly thereafter, California advocates persuaded the state to ban homework for students under the age of 15 and restrict it for older ones. Their argument: better to let them play in the sunshine.
By the 1930s, reformers were publicly likening homework to child labor. The American Child Health Association tagged both as leading killers of children who had contracted tuberculosis and heart disease.
But at every historical moment when criticism of homework began to approach a crescendo, a national crisis roused the public to support it. In 1957 it was the Soviet launch of the satellite Sputnik. In 1983 it was the release of the report "A Nation at Risk."
And of course, much of the debate over the existence and quantity of homework ignores the obvious question: quality. Not all assignments are created equal -- some are busy work, others inspired.
At this point, the only common ground is that everybody seems to agree on the value of reading at home for pleasure, whether the reader is in first grade or high school.
Of course, what works for the academically high-octane students at Gunn High, in the shadow of Stanford University, may not work elsewhere. It's a point Lyons concedes, although he reasons that disadvantaged students juggling jobs are even less likely to do -- much less benefit from -- homework.
"It all comes down to whether adults trust us to learn," said Gunn senior Akila Subramanian. "Having no homework lets you find your own motivation."
It sounds good -- and yet invites the inevitable question: What if that doesn't work?

E-mail Vicki Haddock at vhaddock@sfchronicle.com.

Copy and Steal Everything November 13, 2009 by iowaadguy Mark Mathis

There is an organization for colleges called CASE (the Council for Advancement and Support of Education).  It is equally well-known as “Copy And Steal Everything,” because after the CASE awards and conferences, most ideas are ‘lifted.’  If students did this they would receive an F; if businesses and organizations copy, it is called ‘best practices.’

Too many times we are quick to copy others when it comes to marketing.  We see a competitor doing something and we are fast to follow.  The problem is that many times we don’t know the underlying strategy behind the marketing decision.  

I saw this firsthand when I made a visit to the Des Moines airport.  On the airport walls were seven colleges advertising on back-lit Duratrans.  As I looked around, I didn’t see one prospective teenager within a mile of the advertising messages.

It looked like they were advertising to each other — not to a target audience .  On the surface, it looks like a bad college media buy for the money.  But I’m sure each institution of higher learning points out that the competition is there so they need to be there.  This thinking fills a lot of media outlets.  Follow your marketing strategy, don’t play follow the leader with your marketing money — the “leader” may not have sound reasoning behind the media buy or idea.

10 of the Best Social Media Tools for Entrepreneurs

October 26th, 2009 | by Barb Dybwad http://mashable.com/2009/10/26/socia-media-entrepreneurs/

Whether your company is just starting out, just starting to turn a profit or already on the verge of an acquisition, as an entrepreneur you’ll be constantly evaluating the tools that will help get your business to the next stage.

Even if the ink on the business plan isn’t dry yet, you want to be armed with the social media tools that will play an important role in company communication, product and brand promotions, and business development for your startup. Some of the tools in this list will be familiar, but it’s worth taking a moment to reframe how they might become power tools in a business context.

10. Monitter
9. YouTube
8. UserVoice
7. MailChimp
6. Get Satisfaction
5. Twitter
4. Facebook
3. Basecamp
2. LinkedIn
1. Google Apps for Domains

What Does "Missional" Even Mean?

What Does "Missional" Even Mean?

Demos of Internet Users - Pew Research

Pew Research Data share

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Four Essential Tweaks to Your Appeals in a Recession

By Katya Andresen: Oct 29, 2009

The Chronicle of Philanthropy this week said the nation's biggest charities are forecasting a nine percent decline in giving this year - the biggest drop since the publication started tracking private donations in the early 90s. In an interview with the radio program Marketplace, publisher Stacy Palmer said it's affecting how nonprofits ask for money:

"One of the things most nonprofits are very aware of is that some people don't have jobs and they can't appeal to them, so they're focusing on the people who are affluent still and who still have money to give. They're very careful to not make a pitch to somebody who can't afford to give."

That might not be the case for most nonprofits - or if it is, it applies only to major donors, which is one circumstance in which a nonprofit may have intimate knowledge of a donor's circumstances. Most nonprofits are unlikely to know who among their supporters has a job.

In fact, the Chronicle on its website suggests as much. Apparently most of fundraising is as aggressive as ever:

"The push to be more aggressive in seeking donations continues. The biggest charities are stepping up their efforts to solicit individuals, trying to explain more clearly why they need money, focusing on donors who have stopped giving, experimenting with new methods of online fund raising, and putting more time and effort into securing planned gifts. Charities are also reorganizing their fund-raising departments, sometimes because they have been forced to lay off employees. They are encouraging fund raisers to share responsibilities and work more closely with people in different departments."

You cannot possibly know the economic circumstances of all your individual donors - though hopefully you're aware of the status of your biggest donors. And you can't stop asking for money entirely.

So what are you supposed to do?

Ask, but with four things in mind:

1. Empathy is appropriate. Acknowledge times are hard - for everyone - right now. If a donor can't give, they'll appreciate you understand this.
   
   
2. Show you are tightening your belt. Describe every step your organization has taken to tighten your belt and operate as efficiently as possible this year.
   
   
3. Demonstrate that all donations count. Because you're stretching every dollar, make the point that every donation helps more than ever this year - whatever the size of the donation.
   
   
4. Show impact. Thank your donors profusely for their past help and explain in tangible, vivid terms how their donations have made a big difference. And then do it again and again and again. Donors usually don't stop giving because they don't have money. They usually stop giving because of a surfeit of appeals and a shortage of thanks. Show donors that they are making good things happen - and give them credit for every piece of good news you have about your programs.
   
   

A last point: If you have to reorganize your fundraising department or merge departments because of downsizing - something the Chronicle suggests is prevalent - look at this as an opportunity. It's a chance to show you're focused on efficiency and it's also a great way to get rid of silos where they should not have existed (ie, between marketing and development). Tough times can hold good lessons. Let them make you a better fundraiser.

Source: Nonprofitmarketingblog.com

Joseph discovered the secret to life - Pastor Paul - www.hopechurch.me

When Joseph was a teenage boy, God inspired him with some amazing dreams. In his first dream he saw all of his brothers bow down to him like sheaves of grain. And the second, he was the center of a galaxy of stars. As he shared these dreams with his brothers they grew angry and threw him into a well. And his life went down hill from there. He became a slave, was unjustly thrown in prison for doing the right thing, and was forgotten for years.

But the day came when the Pharaoh - the most powerful person in the world—asked Joseph to interpret Pharaoh's dreams.  At this point, Joseph said, “It is beyond my power to do this,” Joseph replied. “But God can tell you what it means and set you at ease.”  Genesis 41:16

From a teenage boy, thinking he was the center of the universe and operating by his own power to years later trusting fully in God’s power, through his troubles, Joseph discovered the secret to life - I can’t but God can!

Maybe your dream is dying. Maybe you feel discouraged by what is not happening in your career, your family, your finances, or your life of faith.  I believe that God allows each of us to get to the point where we say...
          I can’t do this!
          Only God can make this happen!

In your family, work, or this family of faith, God wants to bring you to that point of saying, “I can’t do this. I need God’s help. I need to learn.”  When you are aware that you can’t do it, then you open the door for God to show His power. Then God can do something even greater in your life!

By grace,

Pastor Paul

pauls@hopechurch.me

Think Big or Go Home by Mark Mathis @ MV&E

Think Big I

October 23, 2009 by iowaadguy

Another diner opened near me.  Nothing special.  No big menu item.  No strong logo.  No theme.  I would say, no future.   They were thinking small.

Now, Schwartz’s Montreal Hebrew Delicatessen (http://www.schwartzsdeli.com/index2.html ) thinks big about its small menu and small restaurant.   Sure the menu is small, but the food is huge.  Huge smoked meat sandwiches.  Lines out the door.

It is easy in a recession to think small about everything.  But I’m not just thinking about how much you spend on marketing, but how you focus your money, effort and thinking for the greatest results.

Donald Trump said, “If you are going to be thinking anyway, you might as well think big.”  It takes no more calories to think large and shoot for impact.   I found this street art in Chicago.  Grant Wood is big in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, but he is enormous in Chicago.   And the promotion power is unmatched.

Big may be one of the most important ways for people to remember your brand.   There are a hundreds of souvenir shops along the Florida coast, but there is only one Souvenir City.  You know you are there because of the huge shark mouth.  You can buy hermit crabs anywhere, but you can only have your sun-burned body photographed by the big shark head at one souvenir shop. 

Big thinking differentiates you.

So the next time you do an event, plan a meeting, or open a deli, think big and see what happens.  And if you go to Schwartz’s in Montreal, try the Large Plate Smoked Meat. Your eyes may be bigger than your stomach — and you’ll love every pound.

Very Interesting - Why Christians Should Use Twitter

Why Christians Should Use Twitter

TONE HOEFT - Originally posted Monday, October 12, 2009 

In order to understand the reasons why Christians should use Twitter, one must examine why Twitter has become so popular. Part of Twitter’s popularity is that it provides a way to stay constantly connected with the world around you. What makes Twitter unique is the fact that these people don’t have to live anywhere near you—they don’t have to be next-door neighbors. You can have a close-knit community of people from all across the world. It’s part of (pardon my use of buzz words) building the global village.

In a sense, Twitter means you never have to be alone. If you are following a moderate amount of people (who actually update their “tweets”), then you can always be aware of what others are doing. Not only that, but you can instantly comment on these activities or thoughts and get an instant response. So what separates Twitter from a chat room? With a chat room, you have to be logged into the service. With Twitter, you don’t have to always be logged in. You get to tap into this feed of conversation whenever you want at your own convenience. This is why people love it. It’s the feeling of community, but only when you so desire.

Don’t believe me? I’ll let the stats speak for themselves. According to recent statistics, Twitter is showing 600 million unique visitors a month. Let’s put this into perspective. The population of the United States is 306 million people, meaning that roughly two United States make up the population of Twitter. That’s a lot. This is of course, looking at the data optimistically.

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Now if you put all of this together, you will see how the implications of what this means for Christians are huge.

I’ve always thought that the best and most effective form of ministry is one that allows you to live life alongside other people. When you allow someone else into your life, you allow them to see who you truly are. This means they see all your ups and your downs.

If Christ is affecting your life, people will see a difference in your life as compared to the others around you. If Twitter is a gateway to instant community all the time, then Twitter becomes a way to live intentionally different lifestyles with people all across the world. No longer does incarnational ministry mean that you have to be in physical proximity to each other. Incarnation ministry and authentic communities can now happen halfway across the world.

Of course you can make an attempt to make your “tweets” holy and righteous, but let’s face it, no one is holy all the time. We all have faults and we all make mistakes. This means that when you post on Twitter an angry outburst, people will see that—when you post something less than righteous, someone will read it. But it also means they will see genuine moments of impact and change in your life as well. By allowing others to see your life as you truly live it, we become a true living witness to Christ.

Now I’m no expert at living like this. Most of my tweets are far from profound and spiritual, but it has allowed other people who are not Christians to be able to see that not all Christians are judgmental and closed-minded. While I still think that living life with others (in real life) is the best way to reach out to people, Twitter gives us a new way to do this in a world that is slowly turning more digital by the second.

I’m not asking you to sign up for a Twitter account, but I am asking you to consider how we can use new media in a way to reach out to others. I know there are pastors out there who consider media and technology as a waste of time, but how relevant can you be if you ignore the very place where people are spending their time? 600 million people. Think of the impact.

Tone Hoeft is pursuing his Master’s degree in Communications from Eastern Washington University. To learn more about him and read more of his thoughts, visit www.inproximity.org. You can follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/thoeft.

Are You Committing These Ten Marketing Crimes?

Are You Committing These Ten Marketing Crimes?

Scott Ginsberg (www.nametagtv.com)

Oct 16, 2009 -

1. A. Worst letter in the alphabet. It suggests you’re one of many, not one of a kind. Instead, you need to strive for “thee.” As in THEE premiere dentist in your city. THEE best dry cleaners around. THEE website for unemployed professionals. Are you “thee” or “a”?
   
2. Adjectives. Utterly useless. And sadly, most websites and marketing materials are nothing but adjectives. Just sitting on the page; saying how awesome you are. Whoopee. Look: You need testimonials. Proof that you actually help people solve problems. Proof that you’re the answer to something. Is your message peppered with proof or just a bunch of adjectives?
   
3. Anonymity. In an attention economy, anonymity isn’t just the enemy – it’s bankruptcy. That’s why you’re going out of business. Because nobody knows you, nobody’s heard of you and nobody’s talking about you. Are you invisible?
   
4. Arrow. If you’re still operating on the old school model, you’re probably shooting a LOT of arrows. “Target Marketing,” as you call it. Ha! What a waste. What an antiquated approach. Especially now, in our My Culture, in which customers are going to get WHAT they want, WHEN and HOW they want it. Your challenge is to reverse your marketing and become the bull’s-eye.  A big, beautiful, juicy target. And the best part is, you don’t have to waste your money AND self-qualified customers come out of nowhere. Cool. Are you aiming or being aimed at?
5. Average. That’s just not going to cut it anymore. And here’s why: Competence is assumed. Competence is the price of entry. And when there are a gazillion other instant choices out there, people have no motivation to pick anything other than the best. Lesson learned: Be amazing or be out of business. Are you a C?
6. Boring. Just another word for bankrupt. Especially in commoditized industries where service is the key differentiator. Which means your challenge is to make the mundane memorable in every possible touchpoint. Are you a snoozer?
7.  Branding. We’re done with that word. Instead, focus your efforts on expressing your identity fully and freely. Concentrate on transferring your passion to others. Make what you sell a natural extension of your personality. It won’t feel or look like branding, and as such, people will buy it. When was the last time you updated your brand identity?
8.   Clever. If someone uses this word to describe you, your website or your business, it’s NOT a compliment. You don’t want to be clever. Clever is short-lived, annoying and easy. You want to be smart. Or cool. Or simple. Much more enduring, attractive and, yes, hard to pull off. What is the one word you want people to use when describing your marketing?
9.  Comma. You never want one of these anywhere near you. In the words of my pal Robert Bradford, founder of the Center for Simple Strategic Planning, “Every time you add a comma to the description of what you do, you decline a little bit more.” Periods. Periods. Periods. Commas are for unfocused hacks. Pick a lane. Which punctuation mark does your offering have?
10. Customers. Customers are overrated, clients are useless and prospects are for amateurs. You need FANS. Like a rock star. Or a ballplayer. Or a red-carpet actor. Fans. The people who are fully engaged. The people who love your stuff. The people who are insistent upon using you. And I mean this in the most non-stalker way possible. How many fans do you have?

Scott Ginsberg, aka "The Nametag Guy," is the author of eight books, a professional speaker, an award-winning blogger and the creator of NametagTV.com. For more info or for his list of “24 Ways to Out BRAND Your Competitors, e-mail scott@hellomynameisscott.com.