I lost access to my dKos account twice now because I forgot to renew domain names on time. Let that be a lesson to me.
While I was away, I thought about how to maximize my influence. My first stop was Wikipedia. Did you know that the Wikipedia article on the Iraq War was viewed 164,101 times last month? Or that plug-in hybrids were looked up 13,672 times in the same period? How about the Wikipedia article on depleted uranium? viewed 25,508 times in June. Here's what I learned about Wikipedia: Anything goes, as long as your first priority is to improve the quality of the encyclopedia. That is, believe it or not, one of the oldest and still-standing official Wikipedia policies ("WP:IAR" as Wikipedians say.)
But recently I discovered Twitter. Who have I been able to influence there? After the fold....
Here are some of the people whom I have likely been able to reach on Twitter but not Daily Kos:
@cbsmcmanus - head of CBS News and Sports
About three dozen other news reporters, many if not most of whom frequently speak with @BarackObama at the @WhiteHouse and elsewhere. It's not very hard to Google for lists of very influential members of any press corps, Washington or otherwise.
@cspan, @cspanwj - C-SPAN Washington Journal - who put one of my tweets on their screen and read it.
@LordDrason - The guy in charge of the science and defense ministries in the U.K.
@SarahBrown10 - Gordon Brown's wife.
@theRealBuzz - Buzz Aldrin, who follows @SnoopDogg
@KaiFuLee - the president of Google China, and someone I went to school with
@DonBlankenship - the president of Massey Coal in West Virginia, with whom I feel like I carried on a decent conversation about liquefaction for oil displacement and sequestration as plastics stock.
@Davos - the Swiss economic organization
@Dennis_Kucinich - actually I guess I would probably be able to influence him here, to some extent
The @WonkRoom and several other Center for American Progress staff and contact points
@NSF - the National Science Foundation has been excellent
@KQED_CapNotes - lots and lots of State and local reporters, too.
@Worden is the director of NASA Ames in Mountain View, California
@SirDickBranson and @HansRo, Hans Rosling, - two of my personal heroes, and economic heroes of the globe
@SuzyWelch, her husband @JackWelch, their daughter @SophiaGraceW, and her friend @BabyGirlParis - who may be more of a philanthropist than you think
and how could I forget @Oprah
and Admiral Mike Mullen @TheJointStaff
and @RickWarren
and the @SIEU is there too, although I haven't had anything to say to them about #EFCA yet. Plenty of more influential opportunities.