By Griff Wigley, on May 19th, 2006
I had coffee in Northfield this morning (at my corner office at the Goodbye Blue Monday Coffeehouse, natch) with long-time Minnesotan Steve Borsch — blogger, podcaster, and a Web 2.0 thinker/doer/collaborator.
Steve contacted me via email earlier this week after we both contributed some brainstorming emails via Sean Kershaw at the Citizens League. It turns out we have other Minnesota colleagues in common, including Patricia and Craig Neal at Heartland Circle, Mike O'Connor, and Eden Prairie City Manager Scott Neal.
Among the multiplicity of topics we discussed: how Web 2.0 technologies can improve the civic health of geographic communities. See Steve's recent blog posts, Web 2.0: Connecting people to dots and Lessons of Community for Web 2.0 for more on this issue. But more importantly, subscribe to his Connecting the Dots weblog and podcast to follow his thinking at it evolves. I'm going to enjoy getting to know him better and will look for ways to collaborate.
By Griff Wigley, on May 12th, 2006
Last week I tagged along with Tim Erickson and St. Paul e-democracy colleagues (left) at the Lexington Outreach Library.
I took some photos and teamed up with Tim to record some audio for possible inclusion in a podcast. Click photos to enlarge and see 20+ photos in the edemocracy outreach photo album.
Left: library patron Robert McCaster and Tim Erickson;
Center: Alice Neve, Supervisor, Lexington Library and Kaltun Deriye, Somali Outreach Coordinator.
Right: Tim interviewing members of a Somali family
See 20+ photos in the edemocracy outreach photo album.
By Griff Wigley, on May 10th, 2006
I attended a Heartland Circle Happy Hour last night, courtesy of the firm's co-founders, Patricia Neal and Craig Neal. They hosted an informal gathering of some of their area members at the Enjoy! restaurant in Apple Valley. Click photos to enlarge.
Left: Yogiraj Achala, Vonda Vaden, Patricia Neal, Craig Neal, unidentified, Francois Paradeise, unidentified
Right: Mary Hamann-Roland, Matthew Rochte, Craig Neal
Left: Dave Labno, Don Thomas, Loretta Anderson, Russ Schoen, Myron Lowe
Right: Virginia Selleck, Cheryl Persigehl, Dave Labno, Don Thomas, Loretta Anderson
By Griff Wigley, on May 7th, 2006
Last week I had a meeting at the Citizens League with Sean Kershaw, Executive Director, and Stacy Becker, Becker Consulting, who’s heading up the League’s Minnesota Anniversary Project (MAP 150).
We explored the variety of ways that tools like blogs, forums, salons, podcasts, etc. could be used for the project and they’ve invited me to submit a proposal.
I’ve got a long and satisfying history with the League, back to the late 80s and early 90s when Curt Johnson (now with Citistates and a client) was executive director.
I had coffee in Northfield this morning (at my corner office at the Goodbye Blue Monday Coffeehouse, natch) with long-time Minnesotan Steve Borsch — blogger, podcaster, and a Web 2.0 thinker/doer/collaborator.
