Archive
Year: 2009
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Twitter lobby
April 7, 2009
This report, noted by the FH Public Affairs Blog from Washington DC, describes how lobbyists in DC are using Twitter to communicate directly with Members of Congress' 'blackberries'. For this to work, you need a critical mass (or at least the key Chairmen and Rapporteurs) on Twitter, so it may not work just yet in Europe. It's all about communication, as FH's DC office has noted frequently on their blog...
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Let’s compare: Tweeting MEPs vs. Tweeting Congressmen
April 6, 2009
The Hill, Washington DC's version of the venerable EuropeanVoice, has a sub-site called 'Twitterroom', providing 'the tweets you need to read'. From their list, its clear that many more elected officials in the US have jumped on the Twitter bandwagon. It's also not clear to me that there are any 'tweets you need to read'. There are 535 members of Congress, and 116 are using Twitter, or 22%. There are 785 members of the European...
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Europe Can be Pleased with G-20 Outcome
April 3, 2009
Let’s accentuate the positive! The G-20 meeting in London did achieve a much wider consensus and more far-reaching decisions than most people thought possible. Merkel, Sarkozy, Barroso and Obama all said so. The summit was also remarkable for its recognition of the realities of a changing world economy and the ability of its disparate players to make common cause. The G-8 is dead: long live the G-20. It would be good to think that this...
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What would you call ‘Rock the Vote’ in Europe?
April 3, 2009
The Weekly Calendar of Commissioners tells us that European Commissioner for Communication Margot Wallström is meeting with MTV Southern Europe to announce a campaign by MTV to raise awareness of the European Parliament elections among young people. In the USA, MTV has worked closely with Rock the Vote. They host concerts, organise parties, register voters, and clearly have all sorts of bells and whistles online. Rock the Vote even appeared in a West Wing episode.*...
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Public affairs in a global world – a new internet resource
April 3, 2009
Image via Wikipedia Over recent years, our work here at FH Brussels has become increasingly international in nature. The internet has of course contributed to this. In this globally connected age, the issues and policies that our clients care about often transcend both national and regional borders. Internally, this has meant that our Global Public Affairs Practice has seen annual get togethers in the last three years in our global public affairs hubs of Beijing...
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Rubbish ideas and the future of Europe
April 1, 2009
Image by World Economic Forum via Flickr Elections are in the air, as is the Commission, its President and the European economy. So what better way to get a strategic direction for where Europe should focus its efforts than an online survey of citizens. After all, we can't make more of a meal of it than 20, or for that matter 27, heads of state and government. A rather Jed Bartlett looking* (hands in pockets...
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Europe’s Game of People and Politics in Full Swing
March 22, 2009
It looks very much as if early October will be the time for Ireland’s second referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. This is certainly what the ALDE leader Graham Watson assumes after talking with Taoiseach Brian Cowen in Brussels last week. It also reflects recent comments by Europe minister Dick Roche. An earlier vote – for instance to coincide with European elections in June – could go negative, caught up in a surge of feeling against...
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Which MEPs are Twittering? I know a few…
March 19, 2009
Following on from our digital audit of MEPS last year, we now want to know which MEPs have caught the Twitter bug… These are just a few we’ve found so far: Graham Watson Matthias Groote Katrin Saks Benoit Hamon Eoin Ryan Neena Gill Arlene McCarthy Peter Skinner Jim Nicholson Mary Honeyball Andrew Duff Daniel Caspary Jules Maaten Jeanine Hennis Sophie in 't Veld Daniel Cohn-Bendit Åsa Westlund Anna Hedh Kathalijne Buitenweg Helga Truepel Colm Burke...
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A colourful new digital home for the UK office of the EP
March 19, 2009
They say that you can tell a lot about a person by seeing their home. Well, seeing the new website of the UK Office of the European Parliament, I would guess it was designed by someone bored of the EP's preferred colour of sun-bleached blue and who is a bit of an architecture fan. Why else would the UK Office put the Strasbourg Parliament building as the banner image? Strasbourg, the home of the EP's...
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We twitter on EBS2009, do you dare to care?
March 18, 2009
A year ago we posted on the European Business Summit 2008 and their use of video and blogs for their event. Well they are back again for another go - blog here and website here - and so are we. This time we have decided not to comment on their blog, which seems to have more content that last time around, but instead to take up the challenge offered by New Europe this morning and...