TakePart: Spurring people to take action

TakePart: Spurring people to take action from JD Lasica on Vimeo.

The single most difficult issue that those of us in the social change movement confront is: figuring out how to get people to take action. So I’ve been paying close attention over the months to the successful efforts of TakePart, an initiative of Participant Media.

I recently ran into Adriana Dunn, editor of the TakePart blogs, and caught some of her thoughts about the lessons they’ve learned in participatory media. Adriana just wrote an entry about major events related to The Cove, winner of the Oscar for best feature documentary, over the past 18 months. They’ve just passed the 1 million petition mark, but you can sign the petition, write to elected officials or make a donation.

Watch, download or embed the video on Vimeo

Ric O’Barry — the former trainer for Flipper who stars in “The Cove” (and the fellow holding the sign at top right) — appeared on Oprah on April 22, Earth Day, bringing the film’s message to the masses.

TakePart is much more than “The Cove,” however. Check out their beautiful News & Blogs section to see all the worthy causes you can get involved with or learn more about. For example, author Michael Pollan recently did a live chat about the 2009 documentary Food, Inc., in which he appeared.

“We’re not always going to be the one single source of information,” Adriana tells me, “but we do want to be the source where the community can go to find information about nonprofits, social change or whatever issue you’re passionate about.”

Follow @takepart (6,510 followers) on Twitter; Participant Media (SocialActionNow) has not yet taken off there.

Participant Media has either produced or distributed such films as “An Inconvenient Truth,” “Charlie Wilson’s War,” “The Kite Runner,” “The Soloist,” “Syriana,” “Good Night, and Good Luck,” “The Visitor,” “Food, Inc.,” “North Country” and the new “Oceans” and “Furry Vengeance.” See their full list.

Related

• ‘The Cove’: Will movies usher in a new era of social change? (interview with Christopher Gebhardt, general manager and executive vice president of TakePart, on Socialbrite)
• The Cove site on TakePartJD Lasica, founder and former editor of Socialbrite, is co-founder of Cruiseable. Contact JD or follow him on Twitter or Google Plus.