Digital Communications at the Democratic National Convention

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Blogger relations advocate Jason Rosenberg, Director of Communications at the Democratic National Convention discusses his involvement in changing the dynamics of online media relations at the Democratic National Convention, setting up the DNC’s online newsroom, and establishing criteria for credentialing bloggers.

Show Notes:

3:18 – Jason Rosenberg on handling online communications at the Democratic National Convention. He talks about being hired as the second online communications director in the party’s history and working to build the most open convention in the Democratic party’s history.

4:00 – Jason Rosenberg discusses how he worked on leveraging online newsrooms and other online communications tools so that users would be able to get a view of the convention as if they were present. He talks about the impact of blogging during the convention and the challenges of convincing other communications staffers that bloggers should be credentialed to cover the event.

6:45 – Jason Rosenberg describes what the qualification process was for selecting bloggers for the national convention. He talks about the two different pools bloggers were selected from and about what he looked for in determining a bloggers’ credibility.

9:00 – Jason Rosenberg gives his perspective on how the DNC has changed the view of the online community’s role in media relations and discusses whether or not he thinks DNC’s online newsroom strategy was successful.

He talks about how he called on the history news media to build a business case for blogger relations among senior level party communications staffers.

12:00 – Jason Rosenberg further describes his goals as director of online communications, using their online newsroom to dis-intermediate the mainstream media’s previous lock on distribution, and on making the national convention as open as possible.

He talks about how making the maximum use of online resources and tools such as Twitter, Blip.tv, Flicker, and YouTube helped him in accomplishing these and other online communications goals.

16:00 – Jason Rosenberg further describes the challenges he faced with his role as director of online communications.

He talks about how he was able to deal with the difficulties and about the evidence he found that helped convince skeptical national convention lawyers and communications staff that despite potential problems that may arise, the online community and bloggers were “ready to play the game.”

19:55 – Jason Rosenberg discusses the changing dynamics in media relations and how despite their novelty, blogs are now increasingly accepted and considered as an important channel for political strategists.

He talks about how the results of the DNC have become instrumental in cementing these changes and why he believes they forever change the future of media relations.

21:17 – End