10 Megapixels For $200 Dollars

Meet the Kodak EasyShare C180.

What is and what is not "private" is being redefined by technology.

On a daily basis.

For good and bad.

The Pope Has A Web Strategy

And a fairly good Vatican YouTube channel,which launched Friday.

The Press Association has more details:

Pope Benedict XVI said he hopes the Vatican's new YouTube channel will enrich a lot of people and help them find answers to their spiritual yearning.

The Vatican launched the channel, www.youtube.com/vatican, on Friday as its latest effort to use new technologies to get its message out to the masses.

Benedict said, during his weekly noon blessing, that "wise" use of such technologies helps promote the search for "the true, the good and the beautiful" across borders and ethnic divisions.

He said he hoped the YouTube channel, which features clips of papal activities, will enrich a wide range of people "including those who have yet to find a response to their spiritual yearning" by letting them learn about Jesus.

New Media Change Comes To Washington, First Whitehouse.Gov Blog Post

From the new White House website:

Change has come to WhiteHouse.gov

Welcome to the new WhiteHouse.gov. I'm Macon Phillips, the Director of New Media for the White House and one of the people who will be contributing to the blog.

A short time ago, Barack Obama was sworn in as the 44th president of the United States and his new administration officially came to life. One of the first changes is the White House's new website, which will serve as a place for the President and his administration to connect with the rest of the nation and the world.

Millions of Americans have powered President Obama's journey to the White House, many taking advantage of the internet to play a role in shaping our country's future. WhiteHouse.gov is just the beginning of the new administration's efforts to expand and deepen this online engagement.

Just like your new government, WhiteHouse.gov and the rest of the Administration's online programs will put citizens first. Our initial new media efforts will center around three priorities:

Communication -- Americans are eager for information about the state of the economy, national security and a host of other issues. This site will feature timely and in-depth content meant to keep everyone up-to-date and educated. Check out the briefing room, keep tabs on the blog (RSS feed) and take a moment to sign up for e-mail updates from the President and his administration so you can be sure to know about major announcements and decisions.

Transparency -- President Obama has committed to making his administration the most open and transparent in history, and WhiteHouse.gov will play a major role in delivering on that promise. The President's executive orders and proclamations will be published for everyone to review, and that’s just the beginning of our efforts to provide a window for all Americans into the business of the government. You can also learn about some of the senior leadership in the new administration and about the President’s policy priorities.

Participation -- President Obama started his career as a community organizer on the South Side of Chicago, where he saw firsthand what people can do when they come together for a common cause. Citizen participation will be a priority for the Administration, and the internet will play an important role in that. One significant addition to WhiteHouse.gov reflects a campaign promise from the President: we will publish all non-emergency legislation to the website for five days, and allow the public to review and comment before the President signs it.

We'd also like to hear from you -- what sort of things would you find valuable from WhiteHouse.gov? If you have an idea, use this form to let us know. Like the transition website and the campaign's before that, this online community will continue to be a work in progress as we develop new features and content for you. So thanks in advance for your patience and for your feedback.

Later today, we’ll put up the video and the full text of President Obama’s Inaugural Address. There will also be slideshows of the Inaugural events, the Obamas’ move into the White House, and President Obama’s first days in office.

e-Government And The Changing Relationship Between Voters And Elected Officials

NPR's The Kojo Nnamdi Show hosts a good discussion on the topic last week.

From their website (where you can listen online or download a podcast):

The Obama Era & The Digital White House

As a candidate, Barack Obama used an array of online tools to organize supporters and raise money. Now, his administration will try applying the same tools to governing. Tech Tuesday looks at the future of e-government, what we know about the new WhiteHouse.gov webpage, and how relationships between voters & elected officials may change.

Guests

Lee Rainie, Founding Director, Pew Internet & American Life Project

Darrell West, Vice President and Director, Governance Studies, Brookings Institution

Andrew Rasiej, Founder, Personal Democracy Forum; Co-Founder, techPresident.com

What 2012 Republicans Will Be Up Against

Barack Obama 2.0, an unprecedented and awesome (if done correctly) political machine.

That will have four years, and tens of millions of dollars, to tune itself up.

Content, Content, Content

As in, the backbone of any political or corporate communications strategy must be "quality content" or all the latest and greatest new media bells and whistles aren't worth much of anything.

Law and Disorder's Julien Sanchez makes this point by taking a close look at how the Republican Party is struggling to learn how to use new media technology as "a means to an end" without letting that same technology be viewed as "the end":

It's not that they [the GOP] shouldn't be thinking about how to do online organizing as well as the Obama team did, but at times the impulse to focus on modernizing tactics and strategy makes me think of the Microsoft execs convinced that the right ad campaign will finally convince people they love Vista.

Conservatism has much bigger problems right now than a paucity of Twitter skills. (I say this, for what it's worth, as someone who's often classified as part of the broad "right," my frequent criticisms of this administration notwithstanding.) Front and center is that the end of the Cold War and a governing party that made "small government" a punchline has left it very much unclear what, precisely, "conservatism" means. The movement was always a somewhat uneasy coalition of market enthusiasts and social traditionalists, defined at least as much by what (and who) they opposed as by any core common principles. The Palin strategy—recapturing that oppositional unity by rebranding the GOP as the party of cultural resentment—is just a recipe for a death spiral. Conservatives don't need to figure out how to promote conservatism on Facebook; they need to figure out what it is they're promoting. To the extent that a new media strategy is part of opening up that conversation, great, but it had better not become a substitute for engaging in some of that painful introspection.

The whole thing is very much worth a read.