In college, I took a class on modern and contemporary American poetry. At some point over the semester, the unofficial slogan for the class became “make it new,” the Ezra Pound directive to the Modernists.

Questionable character though he was, I keep Pound’s advice close to my heart whenever something I’m writing—for work or for myself—seems a little stale. And I thought of Pound once again two weeks ago when I “attended” a day-long Vocus webinar on social media in marketing and communications. During his presentation, David Meerman Scott spent some time discussing “The Gobbledygook Manifesto,” for which, among other things, he polled several journalists to see what “buzz words” they’re tired of seeing in pitches and press releases. According to a slide Scott incorporated into his talk, the number one word, with over 51,000 votes, is “innovate.” (This would also include the derivatives, such as “innovation,” “innovator” or “innovative.”)

Well. Talk about a kick in the pants.

What about when your clients, like ours, are working on real, honest-to-goodness, innovation? What if your clients use “innovation” in their names or their boilerplate language? What if we can’t help but use “innovation” when we talk about them? Are we automatically going to reporters’ spam filters? Is there anything we can do?

Scott moved on to his next slide pretty soon thereafter, but I didn’t. I thought about that slide the rest of the day, and into the next, until it hit me: “make it new.” Don’t talk about innovation the way everyone else is; don’t use the word lightly. Say innovation, but mean it. Don’t just say that something is innovative, explain why. And if the story we’re telling is interesting, but not exactly innovative? Use a thesaurus. Rewrite the sentence. Something, anything, that keeps me from sending the same tired old language to reporters who are tired of receiving it.

I’m a writer by training, so I strongly believe that words carry weight. It was hard for me to realize that I might have been using the wrong ones. But this kick in the pants might have been exactly what I needed, not just to improve my writing but also to make the people I’m writing to take notice. And so, reporters of the world, take note: I’m going to try for a little more Modernism, a little less cliché, and a whole lot of clarity. I’m going to take the communications tools we use every day … and I’m going to do my best to make them new.

My mother purchased this plant as a gift for the ELISE office opening in October 2007 in Philadelphia. At the time, it was so small, it barely looked appropriate on the floor, perhaps more appropriate as a desk plant. My mom actually apologized for its size upon handing it to me, but I knew it would grow.

Around that time, we had just signed Paul Polak as a client and were helping him prepare to launch Out of Poverty. The book was focused on market-based approaches and treating individuals at the bottom of the pyramid as customers rather than recipients of charitable donations. We were reading Sachs and Easterly, helping Paul shape his personal image, brand and messaging.

Now, I find myself still looking at the plant daily: it has flourished, consuming most of the floor space under the window. It reminds me of our growth as a marketing and strategic communications practice, and the increasing scale of our client network.

Our clients are focused on social innovation and entrepreneurship, and they include The Lemelson Foundation, the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Games for Health Project. Because of these related social missions, this collaborative knowledge creation generates tremendous leverage. Our choice to focus on this niche has created a valuable knowledge base and network.

We depend on deeply engaged, inspiring clients to continue to help us grow and today we are honored to announce a new client, the Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE), a network of like-minded social enterprises.

Specifically, ANDE is a non-profit, non-partisan policy program of the Aspen Institute. It is a global network of organizations with a common commitment to build entrepreneurship in the developing world. Since the official launch in March 2009, ANDE has grown to include over 90 organizations, including the Citi Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Shell Foundation and the Acumen Fund.

We welcome them to ELISE and are excited to be working with this organization.

We might just buy a plant to commemorate the occasion!

Flickr user Deepa

One of the things that I love about running a web-friendly campaign, or securing a mention in an online publication, is the potential for the story to go viral. Not every story goes viral; not every story should. But if you have something really important, or really fun, or really timely to share, it’s nice to know that there’s an entire global community with the capacity to Tweet, Facebook or otherwise redistribute the original.

Beyond the benefits of the web to media campaigns, though, is the unparalleled capacity for breaking news—from traditional news outlets that also publish their content online—to travel faster than it ever had before. Google and Yahoo, for instance, both feature constantly updated “news” sections that excerpt the day’s top stories; if you want the full read, both sites will redirect you to the original source. This aggregation system helps news consumers find all the information they could possibly need in one place, and then click through to learn more. In a hat-tip to the 21st century, news aggregators understand the average internet user’s attention span and seeks to facilitate their information quest, rather than complicate their news browsing by making them scroll past or skim over stories of less interest. Google News takes this even further by providing multiple sources for many of the stories at the top of its homepage, in order to allow readers to consider multiple sources and and develop better informed opinions. At a time when print media is floundering, it’s inconceivable that anyone would oppose technology that directs traffic to traditional journalism.

Or is it?

Last week, the FTC drafted a proposal for social media changes that would theoretically help to defend traditional journalism. Included in this document is the proposal that “hot news”—new or breaking stories—be “protected” from Google News, Yahoo News, and other aggregators that publish excerpts of news stories that originated with traditional outlets. The only way excerpts, even short ones, from these news stories could run on outside sites would be with express permission from the source—permission that in some cases can take hours, or even days, to obtain. Instead of an important news story going viral because of its accessibility, it would risk being buried by less important, less protected material. Google, naturally, opposes the FTC’s proposal, and I agree with them. I don’t want any harm to befall traditional journalism; I just think the FTC should be more realistic about how “traditional” anything is in the age of social media.

In the communications industry, we’re all about telling the story to as many people as possible. Anything that helps spread the word is good by me.

My grandma’s a cool lady.

A couple of months ago, after getting a new computer, my sister signed Grandma up for a Facebook account. And while she doesn’t post to Facebook much, I know she logs in on a regular basis, to see what her fifteen friends—nearly all of them family—are up to.

I know this even though she never comments on my page, she calls me when she sees something I’ve posted that she thinks is worth discussing … like she did last week, after I posted some information about the house I’m buying with my boyfriend.

“I’m concerned about your Facebook. What if the sellers see your post and don’t sell you the house? And what’s with this comment on the link from someone who says he’s put in an offer over list price?”

“It’s a joke, Grandma.”

“But what if the sellers see it, think they can do better, and don’t accept your offer?”

“They won’t see it, Grandma.”

And so it went, until, finally, I had to remind my grandmother that hey, Facebook is part of my job so she should trust me on this issue. My Facebook profile is on more or less complete lockdown. I stopped short of making myself entirely unfindable (because that’s kind of annoying), but if you search for me on Facebook and we’re not friends, this is all you see:

It’s enough to let you know if you’ve tracked down the right Jill Ivey: a photo of me, my current city, and (for those people from high school trying to get back in touch), my hometown … but nothing else. So Grandma’s fears were unfounded. The sellers of our home-to-be had no way of being in on the conversation happening on my wall.

My privacy is important to me. With every change to Facebook’s privacy policy, I’ve been sure to learn what’s changed and how it affects my account, then update my settings accordingly. But this blog post isn’t about Facebook’s ever-changing, somewhat controversial, now-theoretically-streamlined, privacy policy, which Kira covered recently. This is a post about personal responsibility and common sense.

Stories about people not getting into college/not getting a job/experiencing some other calamity because of their Facebook posts are commonplace now … and yet they keep springing up. Some people, it seems, just don’t know when it’s time to back away from the computer and think before hitting “publish.” This isn’t as important if you’ve set your privacy dial to eleven, like I have. But if your profile is less locked down, anything that will be visible to people outside of your immediate circle of friends—seen by clients, coworkers, or complete strangers—whether it’s a post about your upcoming vacation or photos of your weekend shenanigans, needs to be subjected to some special consideration.

I’ll call it the Grandma test. How would your Grandma feel if she was looking at your profile? Would she call you like mine did, concerned about what other people would think if they saw your latest post? If the answer is yes, then don’t hit publish—or if you do, make sure you understand just how many people are going to see your post.

Back when Grandma was my age, people kept their private lives private and were thoughtful about those parts of themselves they chose to share with the world. And what’s wrong with doing things a little old school now and then?

Prior to 2004, the definition of a “facebook” was a pamphlet given out each fall to college freshmen that contained the names and faces of every student in their incoming class—a handy little who’s who of yearbook-style thumbnails that maybe even listed everyone’s hometown. By the time I arrived at college in the fall of 2005, the word had taken on a new definition.

The premise was similar, but the “book” was online, and in addition to hometown, you could see the political views, relationship status and favorite quote—ranging from the Dalai Lama to Lil Wayne—of your friends and anyone who shared your college network. You could even write messages on their “walls”, the Internet equivalent of the ubiquitous white boards tacked to the doors in every residence hall. I remember feeling acutely distressed when I finally got a Facebook account late that summer, and discovered that I was way behind the curve: my future classmates were already making friends and planning meet ups. Clearly I was doomed to be alone.

Well, I managed to catch up once the year started, but my little case of freshman anxiety proved just how quickly Facebook was spreading, and foretold of how omnipresent it would become.

Since then, Facebook has taken on a life of its own: one that founder Mark Zuckerburg probably never imagined when he launched it from his Harvard dorm room. In the next few weeks, Facebook will claim it’s 500 millionth user—slightly less than the population of North America.

But with this growth comes a growing list of pros and cons. Most obviously, Facebook retains its original purpose. As Jill remarked on the blog a few months ago, Facebook is the most convenient and direct way to stay in touch with people you likely would’ve fallen out of contact with if Facebook didn’t exist. It’s nice to feel connected at the click of a mouse. Facebook can also be a great networking and marketing tool. My sister is interning for a non-profit this summer, and one of her major projects is to figure out the best way for the organization to utilize Facebook to gain followers and recognition.

Of course, there are drawbacks too, many of which we’ve discussed before. For the last few years, Facebook has repeatedly come under fire for its ambiguous, complex privacy settings which allow third party sources to access certain information about you unless you specifically opt out. Just two days ago, a New York Times blog considered the benefits of a government takeover of the website in order to reign in the chaos. Earlier this week, Zuckerberg himself published an op-ed in the Washington Post to address some of the privacy concerns felt by millions of disgruntled users, and just this morning, Facebook unveiled new privacy controls which are aimed at shifting control back to the user—it remains to be seen if they are up to snuff.

And like any pop culture phenomenon worth its salt, Facebook was recently featured on South Park. The episode pokes fun at society’s sometimes compulsive obsession with the site—the need to up one’s friend count, the necessity of returning a poke from one’s grandma. South Park humorously comments on how easily we become engrossed in the virtual, and neglect our reality.

In six short years, Facebook has gone from an Ivy League social outlet to a household name, fodder for parodies and a regular subject of the news. And in another six years, who knows what the state of Facebook will be? It’s hard to believe that it could become much more accessible or widespread than it already is—but for some reason, I don’t doubt the possibility. Astronauts Facebooking from space? Don’t count it out. Until then, we’ll have to wait and see.

Here’s something that surprises people who might think of me as more of the writerly type: I actually have a bit of a science background. As an undergraduate, I minored in psychology and filled as many requirements as I could with classes in cognitive neuroscience. I also spent a summer working in a sleep lab at the university hospital, screwing up my own circadian rhythms while monitoring the behavioral and intellectual effects of too much or too little sleep, with or without various prescription medication. As disinterested as I was in my high school science classes, in college I developed a fascination teetering on obsession concerning the science of the brain.

Maybe that’s why, when I started working at ELISE, I was so excited to have the opportunity to work with Games for Health. To be fair, GFH isn’t just focused on cognitive health—games showcased every year run the gamut from fitness oriented exergames to games that help doctors learn new surgical techniques—but as someone who has no gift for playing video games, I was most attracted to the benefits that playing these games can have on neurological development. It’s like a light went off when I was researching some of the people who would be attending that first Games for Health Conference I worked on: “Yes! I get it! Why can’t video games be used for brain development?”

A few days ago, after receiving information about GFH that included mention of an autism-focused panel at this year’s conference, a reporter wrote the ELISE team to get clarification: he knows that gaming is compelling to autism patients, especially children and teens, but how can it be beneficial? Suddenly, the cobwebs that had formed over my cog neuro studies were swept away, and I set to putting together a little page-long mini research paper on the subject. Because I am a big nerd.

The gist of my research project, which we sent back to said reporter, is this: many, but not all patients on the autism spectrum have what’s called a right-brain delay, which, among other things, makes them especially attentive to small, precise or repetitive tasks—like video games. And because these particular autistic patients naturally gravitate toward gaming, video games can be modified or developed that can actually have a therapeutic value to the patients while also appealing to them. Gaming systems like the Wii, for example, encourage movement mimicry, and use a very simple interface (with a minimum of buttons), which both makes the system easy to use and encourages the player to focus on physical tasks that require balance and motor skills. Similarly, a special game called EASe Off-Road has been developed specifically for autistic children with hypersensitivity to sound. The game employs sound-based therapy by training autistic children to develop the visual systems responsible for balance and body awareness and encourages concentration.

Perhaps my favorite example of video games helping to treat autism is Space Race, developed by researchers at the University of Missouri to help retrain the parts of the brain that improve focus and concentration using a neurofeedback system. According to a 2008 article about Space Race: “The result of the training is that pathways in the brain which may have been damaged, or just switched off from lack of use, can be repaired and reactivated”—essentially, the right side of the brain can eventually be turned on and used for cognitive processing and everyday tasks, all with the help of a relatively simple video game.

And really, how cool is that?

Learn more about video games for autism therapy, as well as games for medical education, health awareness and more at the 2010 Games for Health Conference, May 26-27 in Boston. Visit gamesforhealth.org for more information.

Two weeks ago, a book that could change your life was released. Sound like a hefty claim? Not according to J. Kirk Boyd, author of 2048: Humanity’s Agreement to Live Together. Kirk’s claim, precisely, is that your life and the lives of every human being on the planet will change by the year 2048.  This is the year that, according to the book, mankind will implement an International Bill of Human Rights, designed to fully realize the freedoms we are born with. And apparently, Kirk isn’t the only one who believes this is possible—far from it. Last week, 2048, Kirk’s debut book, climbed all the way to an impressive #2 on the San Francisco Chronicle’s NCIBA/IndieBound Bestseller List.

The exciting announcement comes on the heels of a weeklong tour through the Bay Area, during which Kirk conversed with attendees and sought input on the document he feels can be a reality by the year 2048, the 100^th anniversary of the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a major inspiration behind the book. Through 2048, Kirk hopes to fulfill the dreams of Eleanor Roosevelt and many others who imagined a world in which human rights are globally protected.

Kirk recently returned from a mini-tour of Canada, and plans are in the works for an extensive East Coast tour in the fall. In the meantime, he encourages people to visit the website of the 2048 Project and contribute their insights and feedback on the current draft of the Bill. For Kirk, the key to successfully creating a more just society is the participation of as many people, from as many walks of life as possible.

We at ELISE extend our heartfelt congratulations to Kirk, who is changing the world one book at a time.

Flickr user jimmywayne

It’s Earth Day! In Philadelphia, even our Mayor is getting involved, with his pre-holiday announcement that he plans to make Philadelphia the nation’s greenest city by 2015. Mayor Nutter isn’t the only notable green mayor: San Francisco (where we spent some time last month) has Gavin Newsom; Phoenix has Phil Gordon; even New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has been praised for his efforts to make the Big Apple more sustainable.

Increasingly, the efforts of these mayors, as well as the work of other, less political green advocates and innovators, are appearing in the mainstream press. But before “green” became a hot topic sure to sell magazines and newspapers, a handful of blogs were dedicating their resources to promoting energy efficiency, sustainable living, slow foods and other environmentally-friendly coverage. And even with sustainability now leading issues of Time Magazine and earning multi-page spreads in The New York Times, it’s really the bloggers who still lead the way in environmentally focused coverage. So we wanted to dedicate this year’s Earth Day blog post to these green bloggers: some have been around for years, some just a few months, but all are consistently ahead of the curve.

Planet Green/Treehugger
Both part of the Discovery television network, Planet Green and Treehugger have not only been very generous with their coverage of ELISE clients, but also have become two of our go-to outlets for resources about sustainable innovation; healthy, organic recipes; and tips for greening our households (who knew vinegar could work so much magic?) If you’ve never poked around Planet Green and Treehugger, we strongly suggest you go do it just as soon as you’re finished reading the rest of this post.

Inhabitat
Inhabitat’s tagline, “design will save the world,” does a better job of summing up their website than we ever could. Looking at technology and practices that can someday direct us towards a “smarter and more sustainable future,” the blog (where we have also secured coverage) isn’t just concerned with what’s green: it’s concerned with what’s green, designed well, and infinitely practical, whether in the developed or developing world. Plus, hey, lots of pretty pictures.

Dot Earth
Although Andrew C. Revkin is no longer regularly contributing to the New York Times‘ print edition, his popular, informative Dot Earth blog is still going strong. Concerned with the effect that the earth’s growing population will have on our shared natural resources, the Times blog is opinionated and informative, based as much on hard facts as deep convictions. We kind of love it.

Care2
Less a blog than a community portal, Care2 encourages visitors to not just educate themselves about being green, but also to get involved in green causes and to interact with others who might have similar interests. Send an e-card, sign a petition, or vote in a poll. The blog posts are still there, but Care2 uses its platform to be so much more.

NextBillion
NextBillion isn’t a green blog, per se, but the site, which focuses on the connection between development and enterprise, operates on the explicit understanding that sustainable technology is also, sometimes, the easiest and most affordable to disseminate in the developing world. And we’re not just saying that because NextBillion has covered our clients.

Grist
One of the oldest blogs on our list, Grist approaches its reporting on sustainability and the environment with a sense of humor, encouraging readers to “Laugh now—or the planet gets it.” Filled with original reporting and in-depth analysis on other outlets’ green stories, Grist explains their light-hearted tone in a way that would be less endearing if their content wasn’t so consistently informative: “At Grist, we take our work seriously, but we don’t take ourselves too seriously. Because of the many things this planet is running out of, sanctimonious tree-huggers ain’t one of them. ”

The GOOD Blog
Although GOOD produces a monthly print magazine, it’s their blog that we visit on a regular basis (and that a few of our clients have contributed to) for upbeat profiles of young green inventors and optimistic suggestions for people looking to trade Subaru for Schwinn. Like NextBillion.net, The GOOD Blog is not explicitly “green,” but emphasizes the idea that sustainability and responsibility help us all.

Green Is Sexy
Actress Rachel McAdams, who is pretty sexy herself, started this blog with two friends to spread the word that a handful of tiny lifestyle changes can make a big impact on the world around us. Filled with tips for everything from road trips to beauty tips, Green is Sexy is chock full of eco-minded suggestions that seem obvious, but you might not have thought of yourself.

Triple Pundit
For anyone who associates the green movement with “hippies,” Triple Pundit is here to prove you wrong, examining the business of green and a triple bottom line—people, planet, profit. This is not where to go for advice on a good, non-toxic toilet cleaner. Instead, check out posts on Deutsche Bank’s renovated German headquarters or BP shareholders.

World Changing
With contributors around the globe, World Changing is the closest thing we’ve seen to an independent, green-focused media conglomerate. The Seattle-based nonprofit posts content ranging from contaminated water in the third world to the effect of climage change on some of the world’s most developed cities, and is consistently rated as one of the top eco mags in the Nielsen Net Ratings system.

Here in Philadelphia, spring has sprung. The weather is warming up, and people are out and about—jogging, walking their dogs and getting some good old-fashioned exercise. But there is more than one way to get in shape these days. Forget soccer games. Try video games. Organizations like Games for Health are bridging the gap between the indoors and outdoors by applying outside activities to inside games.

Co-founded in 2004 by Ben Sawyer, the Games for Health Project brings together researchers, health professionals and game developers to share information about the impact games and game technologies can have on health, health care and policy. Supported by The Pioneer Portfolio of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Games for Health is produced by the Serious Games Initiative, an effort of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars that applies cutting-edge games and game technologies to a range of public and private policy, leadership and management issues.

Each year, the efforts of the GFH Project culminate in the Games for Health Conference, a comprehensive three-day meeting that provides attendees with the opportunity to develop new projects and improve existing efforts in the health and health care fields. Spanning topics such as exergaming/active games, health training games, disease management efforts and more, this year’s sixth annual conference will be held in Boston from May 25 to 27 and will feature an array of 40 sessions led by 60+ industry-leading speakers.

ELISE will be in attendance, and we are looking forward to getting the inside scoop on the innovations and advances made over the past year in the health gaming space. More from us as the event draws closer.

Image credit: Flickr user raphaelle_ridarch

Team ELISE spent five days last week in San Francisco for the NCIIA’s annual March Madness for the Mind showcase of student invention. As always, the event was a roaring success, and we met some really engaged collegiate entrepreneurs who we’re sure you’ll be hearing more from in the future.

But this year’s event still managed to be unique in many ways: it was the first time that March Madness for the Mind was held in San Francisco; the first year that an actual head-to-head element was added to the programming, in the form of an all-team video competition; and the first year that the NCIIA collaborated with Inventors Digest magazine to promote the event. In many ways, this looked like your standard media partnership: Inventors Digest featured NCIIA-supported inventors and NCIIA staffers in its pages (including a gorgeous cover story), and the NCIIA in turn made sure that Inventors Digest’s logo appeared on the March Madness for the Mind Web site and throughout the annual conference and at the public event. But the partnership took a turn into the experimental, incorporating an ambitious social media campaign surrounding the video competition.

At first, the social media integration was simple: NCIIA and Inventors Digest announced the partnership on their respective Web sites, then repeated the announcement, briefly, to their Facebook fans and Twitter followers. This enabled both organizations not only to get the word out about the video competition, but also to strengthen their connection through the use of hypertext—which is to say that every time Inventors Digest was mentioned on the NCIIA’s site, if even in passing, NCIIA provided a link back to Inventors Digest, and vice-versa. And a few weeks later, when Inventors Digest announced its own competition, to launch officially the day of March Madness for the Mind, the relationship between the two organizations was further solidified as it became the NCIIA’s turn to post about Inventors Digest’s activities.

Once the details of the partnership were solidified, ELISE created a social media release via PitchEngine that allowed us to streamline the process when we were actually doing the pitching: we could send a link to the release instead of needing to copy-paste or send an attachment; low-res photos were downloadable directly from the release’s slide show and high-res photos were linked at the bottom of the page; and compelling video could be viewed and linked to without any need to leave PitchEngine and visit YouTube. The release received several hundred views within the first days of being posted and began getting traction on its own: when doing our final round of short-lead pitching, we found that some bloggers had found the release on their own and were familiar with March Madness for the Mind before they heard from us. And at least one story about March Madness for the Mind appeared when an intrepid blogger stumbled across the release without receiving a pitch from our office at all.

The social media release was also dynamic, allowing for even the tiniest updates as they happened. So when the NCIIA/Inventors Digest video competition finally went live on the Inventors Digest Web site, we were able to seamlessly integrate the updated information into the release’s links section. We’d like to think that updating this link had at least a little something to do with the 109% Web traffic increase that Inventors Digest experienced during the run of the competition—but we’re well aware that, in reality, this highly successful component of the March Madness for the Mind social media campaign was only partly because of our stellar social media release.

Mostly, it was because the video competition went viral—and that’s the true mark of a successful social media campaign, because, as Peter Shankman will tell you, “viral” isn’t something you can force. If you have good content, internet users the whole world over will want to share it. You still need your communications team to help create this content and get it posted, but it’s up to the rest of the world to decide if it’s worth sharing.

And when they do? That’s how you know you ran your campaign right.