Originally posted at my own blog.

Social media -- those avenues to send instant, short, widely-distributed messages and images -- cuts both ways:

• It can be used to organize protesters, but it can also be used to identify protesters and arrest them.
• It can be used to spread information, but it can also be used to spread MISinformation.
• You can use it to promote your organization and cause, and others can use it to tear down your organization.

And it's been used to organize protests since the 1990s - so can we stop now with how "new" it all is?

GreatNonprofits recently announced that 26 organizations working in the science and technology fields have qualified for the 2010 Top-Rated Science & Technology Nonprofits List, based on user reviews submitted during a national campaign in August.

Changents is hosting a contest with P&G Give Health calling for bloggers to share why they are clean water Change Agents. What's in it for bloggers? A few great things:

The event is called The Big Blue Test because the blue circle is the international symbol for diabetes. The idea of a shared "blood sugar test-in" started with an activity organized in July 2009 by TuDiabetes. More than a thousand people participated then. Now, we seek to reach thousands of people with diabetes through seven other diabetes social networks and Twitter. The activity incorporates 14 minutes of physical activity to reinforce the importance of exercise.

People with diabetes have to test their blood sugar routinely. It can be a very lonely activity. So we want people to take The Big Blue Test, to shed light on this chronic condition and the importance of exercise on World Diabetes Day.

Although we've gotten some amazing submissions for Making Sense of Diabetes so far, we thought it'd be a good idea to collect some tips for those who may not be as inclined to appear in front of the camera and a few others for those who want to do it but are not quite sure how to complete SOME part in the process of putting together a video for Making Sense of Diabetes (or anything else, for that matter). Here you go...

FIRST THING: THE STORY

It’s election fever in British Columbia right now.   Interesting to see how the three major parties are handling their web presence…see how the 3 major parties stack up. Read more

Arun Chaudhary, New Media Road Director for Obama for America, shares his thoughts on how to produce quality online video under tight constraints.

What can we learn from the unstoppable Obama PR machine that just rolled over the country? Never mind the politics: the campaign was the smartest publicity siege that’s been seen in a long time. It’s particularly worth paying attention to how Obama and his crew of merry techsters paid attention to the net. They pulled a bunch of cool tools from their utility belt: social networking sites, twitter, text messaging, and even virutal advertising in video games.  Find out more about their strategy and how it could work for your non-profit...

With a few more days to go before our deadline of Nov. 1, I wanted to appeal to the rest of the NetSquared readers to help us reach our goal of 20,000 signatures, in an attempt to appeal to Google so they will consider doing a World Diabetes Day doodle on Nov. 14.

So far we have collected a little under 9,000 signatures (using iPetitions.com, if you are curious) on DiabetesDoodle.com.