You must be logged onto your facebook account to participate in “What’s Your Issue.”

Not a member of Facebook? Join Now

Read Artist Statement For “What’s Your Issue?”

"What's Your Issue?" is a new project from Tiffany Shlain and her team at The Moxie Institute to engage the Facebook generation in an online video dialogue about the most heated issues of the 21st century. With the U.S. presidential elections around the corner, people from all over are discussing hot button issues – war, health care, education, religion, global warming, immigration, taxes –yet too often these conversations, and the people with shared concerns, remain disconnected. Social networking sites, however, offer new opportunities for people to engage in conversation across demographics and geographical location, and to connect with others who have similar concerns.

“What’s Your Issue?” invites participants on Facebook to upload a webcam video stating what they feel are the most important issues of the world today in 5 phrases or fewer. The application then sorts the videos according to these words, and groups the videos (and their creators) together with common phrases. “What’s Your Issue?” thus not only creates a provocative, democratic online video conversation, it also generates a network of unexpected links both within our communities and outside of them. (i.e. “Health Care, Globalization, War, Art in schools and Poverty” has a shared link with “Gun Rights, Health Care, Christianity, Social Security, and War on Terror.”)

“'’What’s Your Issue?” utilizes the power of networks to build community, challenge our preconceptions, and encourage conversation about the interconnectedness of issues, people and our future,” says Tiffany Shlain, director of The Moxie Institute. “It experiments with how artists, filmmakers and activists can engage and connect with other people in new ways through evolving technologies.”

*NOTE: You must be logged onto your facebook account to participate in “What’s Your Issue.” After you are logged on, you can go here...

This project by The Moxie Institute was commissioned by The San Francisco Foundation Grants for the Arts/San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund through support from The Wallace Foundation. Tiffany was selected with 50 thinkers to tackle the subject of diversifying participation with evolving technologies. To learn more visit The Wallace Commissions.

The Moxie Institute is an organization that creates new experiments to provoke discussion and action. This new online project is an extension of their award-winning projects and films that engage people in important issues of our day using film, the internet and live events. Their projects include: an upcoming feature-length documentary, Connected: A Declaration of Interdependence, their film “Life, Liberty & The Pursuit of Happiness,” a poignant film on the importance of reproductive choice, a Sundance selected film and used by activists around the country and their film The Tribe, winner of 14 awards, selected at over 100 film festivals including Sundance and Tribeca and the #1 most downloaded short film on iTunes. The Tribe was just selected to be showcased in YouTube’s new curated “Screening Room”, to debut on September 7, 2008.

This application was developed by SocialMedia.com, the leading independent social advertising network and provider of social platform services. Learn more at Social Media.

**

Not a member of Facebook? JOIN NOW

After you are logged on, you can go here to experience “What’s Your Issue?”

__________________________________________________________________________

About The Moxie Institute:

Emerging technologies have radically transformed the ways that ideas are circulated and absorbed. The Moxie Institute is dedicated to creating new media/cultural projects, determining the most effective means of using these new technologies to reach people, and sharing our research with media makers interested in social responsibility and change. The Moxie Institute is led by Tiffany Shlain, who founded and ran The Webby Awards for nearly a decade. 

About The San Francisco Foundation:

The San Francisco Foundation is the community foundation serving the Bay Area since 1948, with current assets of more than $1 billion. Through the generosity and vision of their family of donors, TSFF awarded grants totaling $89 million in fiscal year 2007. Bringing together donors and building on community assets through grantmaking, leveraging, public policy, advocacy, and leadership development, TSFF addresses community needs in the areas of community health, education, arts and culture,community development, social justice, and the environment. The San Francisco Foundation is a community foundation serving San Francisco, Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, and San Mateo Counties.

About Grants for the Arts:

Since its inception in 1961, Grants for the Arts/San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund (GFTA) has distributed over $170 million to hundreds of nonprofit cultural organizations in San Francisco. In 2008/09 nearly $11.5M has been allocated to 231 groups and activities. The goal of the Fund is to contribute meaningfully to the presentation and enhancement of existing art forms while assuring the ability of others to experiment, to dare, and to find new as yet untested ways of adding to our cultural panorama.

About Socialmedia.com:

Socialmedia.com is the first and largest independent social advertising network. Reaching over 35 million unique users each month from traffic driven from over 5,000 applications, socialmedia.com enables advertisers to uniquely engage audiences on the world’s largest social networks such as Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, Hi5, Orkut and Friendster. The Socialmedia Advertising Platform provides advertisers with a turn-key system for executing and managing social network buys. Socialmedia.com’s services  are available to both developers and advertisers are looking to create awareness or monetize social media traffic. Socialmedia.com is based in Palo Alto and San Francisco. For more information visit www.socialmedia.com.