Now I have a thing (or twenty) about human rights so contacting me might have been a good idea – pitching to me about a forthcoming event or campaign and saying have a look at this and we’d welcome your comments. Starting the email with Dear Suzy/Maman Poulet would have been even better!!

Oxfam and others have asked bloggers before about different campaigns – they’ve done it with a bit of nouse and understanding about how to pitch to bloggers. Even the Green Party knows about bloggers and getting a list together and asking if you’d be interested and then not patronising the hell out of you when doing so with ‘charidee/marketing’ speak. I bet if I tried to join this outfit they’d have me inviting all my friends to join too and spamming them in a ‘poking facebook’ kind of way.

ammado (with a small a – groan) – I hadn’t heard about them until today’s email – so I headed off to the website to find out more – and here’s the spiel…

‘the global online community of people who care. Providing a free interactive and unique environment, ammado connects nonprofits and engaged individuals to achieve their vision.’

It stinks of Chuggers on the net. Not buzzing in the blogosphere. Well the Irish blogosphere is certainly buzzing about the spam and the way in which the pitch was made.

If the UNCHR had emailed me themselves and said have a look at this I might have been along for a gander – if it were a news story even better – if you had picked one Irish blogger and asked them to blog about it and spread the word ye might of even got somewhere. There are loads of people in the Irish online communities who have advice on approaching bloggers and creating communities. I doubt they’d give ammado a hand now and the hands over the head thing well that’s crap. And ammado don’t want us to blog about the issues – they want us to go to their site and join up and build their community (aka target audience to tap for a few quid every month)

Now on the asylum seekers and refugees thing – when are we going to get angry about the trafficking of young people into Ireland who go missing and are not protected by the Irish State? Putting my hands over my head and taking a photo of myself won’t get them out of prostitution or slave labour – asking questions and getting angry and asking the HSE and Irish government and UNHCR to do something about it might. You see ammado, (aka Amadán to me for ever more) that’s what bloggers do well.

Cue more celebs not entitled to vote here making daft youtubes explaining absolutely nothing about the issues and treating the electorate like morons. While doing the customary ‘we’re on our way, just buttoning up our jeans’ holding post it might help lads if you took down the youtube of Katie French from last years campaign. But RtV and tact were never good company.

PS. The holding page says ‘Rock the Vote is back by popular demand and we want you to get up and vote in the The Lisbon Treaty Referendum.’ Did I miss the facebook group or bebo page calling for their reformation?

However now more than ever we’ll need to know where the money is coming from – this is a referendum and a bit of clarity, openness and transparency will be needed. Maybe the Referendum Commission were duped into thinking there was a popular demand for this sort of thing or is this a front for a section of the No campaign who also seemed to have more money than sense?

I was working today and could not make the auction. What auction? – ah that auction of Michael Lynn’s wine collection that he didn’t take with him when he flit and some other household goods. No sign of the hippo.

If I had been present I could have purchased some Warwick Estate. (Read all about their wines on their blog!) or indeed some of the above. There was a damaged telly going also. It’s all a bit sad really.

However I do still have the champagne I won at the blog awards of which Michael had a large part to play…and very fine champers I’m sure it is too!

Sadly Rock the Vote (the American Brand) thinks it’s still in the US with their ads and the hand signals and taking the piss out of minority cultures or something.  Ah sure if Eminem does it then it must be ok and if a ’2fm dj tells me sure I’ll head out and do the W thing while rocking the vote.’  So will they be telling people how to cast their vote – I don’t mean who for – I mean how to vote in order of your choice. How voting in Ireland works? That’s just a tad important too. Rock the vote? This means what?

Thanks lads for Mario anyway, you can never get too much Stan, Roy and the special one, but sadly they don’t tell me or anyone what rocking the vote actually means or how to do it.  

For those of you who were wondering how can I write a post about the Rock the Vote ads without mentioning my favourite man, Ryan Tubridy. Ryan Tubridy Rocking the Vote? I rest my case!

Discussion also on Irishelection.com

Maman Poulet would usually have no problem in supporting anything that mobilises young people to stick their number 1 (and other votes) on the ballot paper. However Rockthevote.ie with lots of money and no sense it seems are launching in April 07 – that’s one month before the general election folks. Whilst young people are being turned off voting in their droves by crap debates and crapper posters, this crowd aim to break through all the noise in 43 constituencies complete with a Constituency and Community Director and get young people out to vote. Oh yes and when the electoral register is closed and supplemental registration is extremely difficult to do.

You’d think they might have been at colleges throughout the country last September, or at the Oxygen festival last summer or at the GAA finals in September, rocking the vote… Just an idea like…

It would seem that they have money to burn and lots of fancy job titles and descriptions. Would the American who wears a cheap watch and travels economy have anything too do with backing it? Honestly I thought AP had more sense on what they got involved with since the other problems in the past 18 months. In fact wouldn’t any funder of this non partisan initiative have said ‘nice idea but you should have launched last year’?

One wonders if this is aimed at giving a group of mates a cushy job for a few months. Where else other than the website are the jobs being advertised? And if those behind it are trying to keep it hush hush until they launch (that’s right in April!) who’ll get to know about how to apply for a job?

Well now you have read Maman Poulet you might get your CV ready for the easiest money you might ever make. It’s a shame as it could have been such a good idea if executed in a timely manner. Actually thinking about some other private philanthropist funded projects I know about this is probably how they like to organise – ie. tell no-one, give the jobs to your mates and launch late and effect no change.

Or maybe with it’s April Launch date this whole thing is an April Fool’s joke????