By Jonathan Rogers

Editor's note. My family is on vacation the next two weeks. This week's editions of TN&V will be written by others. Next week TN&V will consist of previous columns that were particularly well received. Please send your comments to daveandrusko@gmail.com.

Reflecting the changing cultural and informational landscape and NRLC's dedication to optimizing every possible opportunity to spread the pro-life message, NRLC presented its first-ever workshop on online social networking at the 2009 NRL Convention. Contributors included NRL News editor Dave Andrusko, resident IT guru Patrick McGee, and State Organization and Development assistant Luis Zaffirini.

Dave Andrusko argued that social networking and traditional forms of communication, such as NRL News, complement one another. While social networking (such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube) rightly receives much attention, for a sizable portion of the population there is still no substitute to assembling in one place (a newspaper) a wide variety of information that can be easily accessed.

The enormous capacity of the Internet and new social network mediums for distributing information, Andrusko said, enable the pro-life movement to work around a media establishment which is deeply biased against pro-lifers. Lacking the deep pockets of our opponents, pro-lifers can create a self-organizing network capable of almost instantly getting word out on legislative and educational issues at virtually no cost.

Andrusko concluded that by posting or spreading pro-life information, or commenting on other blogs or news stories and correcting media bias, pro-lifers are "helping the Movement to level the playing field in a way that was impossible ten or fifteen years ago."

Social networking, of course, can be used by both sides. In fact, as Patrick McGee explained, it was pro-abortion President Barack Obama who revolutionized social networking by "empowering" individuals to actively engage in his presidential campaign. Outlets like blogs and Facebook accounts enabled the Obama team to quickly disseminate information and use a large network of voluntary activists to in turn spread that information further. In McGee's words, Obama was able to turn individuals into "social network hubs."

Because information nodes like Facebook and blogs are two-way forms of communication where users and visitors can share posts and discuss in an easily accessible forum, the Obama campaign was able to dramatically expand its reach to millions of individuals, and to do so cheaply and quickly. Pat concluded by calling for pro-lifers to become their own "hubs" of information, a task which should be eminently feasible given that pro-lifers already have a well-established physical network of chapters and groups. What is now needed is for those chapters to also become a virtual presence, where they can easily share and discuss information.

Luis Zaffirini, with considerable experience in grassroots organizing, explained how social networking operates as a tool for list management. As an example, if a right-to-life chapter sets up a Facebook page, the group leader has an extremely simple way of contacting all members.

These social networks operate on the same principles as older networks, such as phone trees, just in a newer and quicker-to-access forum. Using the example of Wordpress (free software for creating and maintaining a blog or web site), Zaffirini described other tools for pro-lifers.

A Wordpress blog is easy to start and cheap to operate, and is essentially free advertising for a group or chapter. And as Andrusko pointed out in the follow up question-and-answer session, by connecting with NRLC web sites, Facebook groups, and Twitter accounts, pro-lifers can more easily communicate both with each other, and with National Right to Life.