Open Election Ambassadors - help Scoop spread the word

Friday, 24 March 2017, 5:21 pm
Article: Opening The Election

Scoop is seeking people who are concerned about the lack of transparency in politics and the lack of openness in the media conversation around it to help us create a more open election. Our “Opening the Election’ campaign seeks to address these issues by providing an avenue for you to participate in creating a more open media discussion around the 2017 National election.

What is an open Election Ambassador you ask?

Becoming an Ambassador will involve you becoming a supporter of the campaign and helping us to spread the word and promote opportunities for people to get involved in the discussion or to check out media created by the project. There will also be opportunities to come along to real world and livestreamed events which will give citizens opportunities to ask questions to politicians and hold them accountable for their promises.

There will also be stickers! Everyone loves Stickers - especially our ‘Open Election Ambassador’ ones featuring the above crest designed by the talented Scott Broadley, local illustrator, designer and Scoop supporter.

Find out more about how to pledge and get involved here:

The Problem

We believe the Media should more closely serve the needs and interests of the people. This project seeks to provide opportunities for everyone to participate in open and reciprocal debate about the issues and policies that matter to them.

We think too much political coverage these days tends to focus on ‘the game’ of politics and play into the spin and the all too often superficial debates framed by the major political parties. As we saw in the recent US elections this leads to a media focus on personality politics and a proliferation of clickbait and even fake news. This situation creates a serious deficit in our democracy as our media lacks a focus on the solutions and policy, which enables people to participate fully in the debate or to vote meaningfully.

Our Solution

We are now crowdfunding to drive a citizen-led news project this election to ensure a wider range of society is involved in the discussion around solutions to key issues. This will help us retain everything you already love about Scoop and make it even better through this innovative open news project.

The Open News Project will use online discussion tools to surface community views and innovative solutions and will engage freelance journalists to investigate key election issues. We believe this fresh approach will result in news content produced through this project being framed more constructively and drawing attention to innovative policy solutions created by and supported by citizens from all sides of the debate.

Why we need you as an Ambassador

Our Network of Open Election Ambassadors will be crucial to the success of this campaign. Firstly, in order for us to break through the stranglehold of mainstream media and google and facebook to get this campaign funded we are going to need a number of supporters to help boost our social media posts and email their networks.

Secondly, once the campaign itself starts, we are going to need our ambassadors to help us breakthrough the election year information overload in order to reach the audiences who need to see this information.

We want to inspire disengaged or non-voters young and old alike to reconsider their disengaged approach and give them inspiring solutions and fresh ideas upon which to make their voting choices. We believe a diverse range of ambassadors is the best way to achieve this.

How to become an Open Election Ambassador

1. Pledge on our campaign here: pldg.me/scoop17
You can choose the Open Election Ambassador Reward and you will get a kit with instructions, stickers and other tools. Otherwise feel free to email us to request a supporters kit if you cannot afford to donate. joe@scoop.co.nz

2. Sign on to support our Thunderclap Social media swarm here:
Sign on to send this message out with all our supporters in a social media Flashmob on 10 April:
“NZ'ers want a more open Media and transparent politics. Let's create this together by #OpeningTheElection:”

Thunderclap is a reputable platform used by organisations as big as the United Nations and Al Jazeera News to amplify a certain campaign or message. A few scattered Tweets or Facebook posts get lost in the noise of social media, but when a critical mass of supporters shares the same message at the same time, their friends and followers are more likely to take notice. This means that our reach will extend beyond our existing network, growing our audience and exposing this message to a broader community.

We need 100 supporters by 10 April in order for this message to go live so please sign on.

3. Use the Open Election Ambassador Icon as your Social Media profile
Grab our Open Election Ambassador Social media Avatar here and make this your Facebook or Twitter Profile Picture for the duration of the crowdfunding campaign.

4. Email your networks
The good old email is still the most effective way to get the message out there. Send a heartfelt email to a select group of friends you think could be interested or even people involved in organisations that could sponsor this campaign. Tell them why you think the ‘Opening the Election’ project is worth supporting in your own words. If people have funds to contribute that's great, but if not they too can help us amplify the message.

5. Last but not least - Follow us on Social Media:
Please follow us and share our posts about the campaign.
Also feel free to tag us and any interested friends in a personal post about why this campaign is important to you.
Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/ScoopIndependentNews/
Twitter : https://twitter.com/ScoopNZ
#OpeningTheElection
Thank you for your assistance in spreading the word and helping us to ‘Open the Election’, together we can build a more open and democratic media and transparent politics this election year.
Click here to find out more and Pledge now

Joseph Cederwall
Community Engagement Manager
Scoop

© Scoop Media

Opening The Election

A 2017 Open News Project

Help Scoop to open the news this election cycle through a participatory, citizen powered and open licensed news project in collaboration with expert freelance journalists and editors. We are building a groundswell of readers and citizens to help Scoop implement this more open approach to independent media in 2017.

Contact Opening The Election

• News - Election2017
• Supporters - Thank you page
• Email - joe@scoop.co.nz