Online network mapping pays off

ISIS certainly packed a double whammie with the Fresh Focus Sex-Ed Video Contest that concluded in January. Not only did we get 70 incredible videos from young people all over the country and Canada, but we developed our own unique marketing strategies in the process.

The Chronicle of Philanthropy has written up our success story in a fund raising focused article titled New Rules of Attraction.

And one thing definitely leads to another, as Deb says about the some of the attention we've been getting from new funders, "This is a result of the visibility we generated through the contest and our positioning ourselves as thought leaders online."

Amazingness!

Sex::Tech into the future - themes from the morning

Running around with our nerdy heads in the Sex::Tech clouds was the ultimate. However, the one regret that most of us at ISIS have is that we couldn't enjoy everything. However, the sessions that we did all enjoy together, the keynotes, really framed some of the central challenges public health-ers and educators on shoestring budgets are facing.

Day one:
Given the opportunity, youth will tell us what they want. They will tell us what's missing from the prevention messages they receive. Why doesn't public health employ more young people to reach their peers? "Digital natives" know how this stuff works. They are masters of flash, they are widget geniuses, networking gurus and mobile warriors. We should all diversify the age range of our staff.

Day two:
We are a creative group, scrappy fighters, and strategic friend makers. So...we need to make friends with the ad people, the business people, web designers and folks that don't always live in a pile of epi stats. Partnerships outside of government health arenas and outside of education are a great idea.

For more conference takes:
Margaret (ISIS' youth outreach coordinator) wraps things up nicely on the Sex::Tech blog as does our superpal Cory Silverberg in his post of the century on About.com. Also spreading the word are SexRev2.0 blogger Regina Lynn, Melissa Gira who live-blogged Marty Klein's popular session for thos who missed it, and Jeremy Fisher, our talented Fresh Focus third place winner.

Phalligator will soon return to regular programming with what's happening in the center of the sex/health/technology Venn diagram.

Eighteen Thousand Eight Hundred and Thirty

That's right, as of this morning, 18,830 votes have been cast in our Fresh Focus Sex Ed Video Contest.

Amazing.

What else can be said? The amount of time and investment each video maker put in to this contest has consistently floored me and that same dedication is showing in the votes. I want to take a moment and write about one of the ten final contenders.

(I want to state up front that I love all ten finalists and plan on writing about each one individually, and my writing about this video first in no way betrays a personal bias. )

The video is called Sex.Ed.101 by Kalimah Abioto from Virginia (which happens to be my home state, hmmmmm maybe a little personal bias.) The video is quiet and thoughtful. Some of the other videos used a rowdy, jolly humor that kept me giggling. But this one was tuned way down like a low pleasant hum. Abioto uses dialogue sparsely and juxtaposes still images with moving ones in a beautiful way. Check it out:

Vote for your favorite Fresh Focus finalists!

The Fresh Focus Sex-Ed Video Contest finalists have been decided. Now is your chance to vote for your favorites. It's almost impossible to decide. Really...I don't know how anyone could really pick a favorite. But...you have to.

Here's one of my personal favorites that just barely missed the top ten...but it makes me smile every time.



Go to DoGooder.tv/freshfocusvideocontest to VOTE VOTE VOTE

The winning videos that you select will be presented by Nikol from the Midwest Teen Sex Show on Tuesday morning, January 22nd at Sex::Tech. And youth finalists will be on hand to answer questions.

If you haven't already, check out how MTSS rocks Katie Couric.

Sex: The Delinquency Antidote

There are few things in the world that get me as excited as the Findings section of Harper's Magazine. Each month, Findings is an amazingly constructed list of segue-less scientific findings taken out of their original context. (I'm typing faster just thinking about it.) In this month's issue they published the following finding and it is really something to chew on:

"children who engage in consensual sex in their early-teen or pre-teen years are less likely to become delinquents than children who are not sexually precocious."
The thing about Harper's Findings is that they don't provide supporting evidence or even footnotes to suggest where this finding came from or even how this conclusion was drawn. And whose to say what is meant by the word 'delinquent' in this sentence, but for the moment I say to hell with proper documentation and supporting arguments (I can feel my English teacher mom cringing.)

Could early understanding and consensual exploration of sex possibly not cause irreparable damage to kids? This is a hopeful thought. I happen to spend a considerable amount of time reading a host of online teen forums concerning sex and sexuality. In these forums you can see that a lot of teens are sexually precocious and curious. Using the submission to our Fresh Focus Video Contest as evidence, teens don't feel that they have been given adequate adult guidance about sex and they are looking for it other places. The Internet is providing places and avenues for teens to connect with each other and ask questions about sex and their bodies with out worry or pressure. At our January 22-23 Sex::Tech Conference we will be discussing ways to make sure that when young people use technology to figure out how to lead sexually healthy lives there will be good, correct easily accessible information there for them.

Zoe 101 Needs Sex::Tech 101

I'm sure you've heard by now that Jamie Lynn Spears is pregnant. She is Zoe, the star of Nickelodeon's popular show, Zoe 101, as well as Britney Spears' sister. She plans to raise the baby in Louisiana, her home state.

AP reporter John Rogers reports that Nickelodeon is considering launching a "Post-Spears Pregnancy Show," with Linda Ellerbee, a veteran newscaster. Ellerbee proposes a broad discussion about youth relationships, including how you know you're in love, the "right" time to have sex, and value systems. Dan Martinsen, the network's spokesperson, said no decision has been made.

Of course, everyone says this story provides the opportunity for parents to talk to their teens about sex. BUT WILL THEY? History shows most parents are uncomfortable talking to their sons and daughters frankly about sex ed.
PARENTS: Try surfing the Web together for information. Have a discussion about what you know to be true, what you learned when you were young, what you learned thru experience... Come to our Sex::Tech Conference -- where researchers, advocates and young people will guide us through the best of the online world for youth.
YOUNG PEOPLE: Make a video! You have till January 7th to submit your version of a better sex ed for the future. Details at DoGooder.tv (www.dogooder.tv/freshfocusvideocontest)

You asked for time to perfect your entries - Fresh Focus deadline extended!

You can now submit your Fresh Focus Sex Ed Video Contest entries until January 7th! You've asked and we've listened...use your winter break to the fullest.

For inspiration check out a few of the latest entries here. An outstanding one was recently submitted by Antgreen.

This awesome Wed MD article points out that, "it's a lot easier to showcase flaws in sex ed curricula than offer an ideal one." So grab your camera, your phone, your video savvy friends, and tell us what YOU want from sex education.

Teen birth rates may be rising - Let the "why?" debate rage on

In the Washington Post today, an article by Rob Stein called "Teen Birth Rate Rises in U.S., Reversing 14 Year Decline" ponders just why teen birth rates might be rising. The opinions couldn't be more different.

Is it that abstinence only messages have left our teens without the tools to protect themselves, or is it that condom promotion messages are encouraging increased sexual behavior?

Allegra Madsen, ISIS' new program manager, asked John Santelli, teen health expert at Columbia University, about his thoughts on the new data:

"Multiple social and policy factors are presumably influencing the recent rise in teen birth rates," offered Santelli. "One possibility is a decline in contraceptive use. The 2005 YRBS [Youth risk Behavior Surveillance] data suggests such a decline (a small decrease in condom use and a small increase in non use compared to 2003). One factor that may have contributed to a decline in contraceptive use would be the negative information on condom and contraceptive use that many abstinence only programs include."

Another thing is also clear. This debate is being played out among adults, health professionals, politicians, etc. But what do that teens want? What do they think they need?

The Fresh Focus Sex Ed Video Contest gives young adults (under 30) a chance to say what they want. We're asking film makers to imagine the future of sex ed, and what they think would work better. We're offering a $3500 first place prize, along with a chance to screen their videos at the Sex::Tech Conference in SF on January 22nd.

As I posted yesterday, Jennifer Garner isn't the only one who didn't get any formal sex education, check out the Fresh Focus submissions so far and judge for yourself.

Social Site Aggregators - Useful?

Ever take a break at work to check your friends' blogs? Then take another minute to see if any of those new MySpace comments are real? Then another five minutes to upload a few photos of your weekend to Flickr...and before you know it you've forgotten whether your password on Twitter is hotdog1 or 1hotdog and you realize you really should get back to work. Does this happen to you?

I don't have the solution...and perhaps just more to add to the problem. But how can we begin to catalog the multiple profiles, tag collections, photos, podcasts, etc that we all love to consume into one place? And how can we start to realistically digest the media jumbles our friends create?

Well, there are some new options to try. Each has some strengths and some wussiness too. My friend Lauren from Object Adjective (they designed the Sex::Tech website for us) recently reviewed Plaxo Pulse.

Some others are Flock, FriendFeed, ProfileLinker, Fuser, Spokeo and MyLifeBrand.

Flock seems promising. You can access and update many social sites (the usual suspects plus Piczo, del.icio.us, Twitter, etc.). Flock even supports massive (up to 1000) picture uploads. One major downfall is that you have to download it. Alas.

What does this have to do with ISIS and sex you ask? Well, I'm not entirely sure, however, we have this contest called Fresh Focus. To promote the contest we have MySpace pages, a Flickr account, a couple of blogs, friends and colleagues that blog about us, press releases, emails coming in, emails going out, podcast promos, youtube videos...you get the idea. How can we manage all this stuff, even with a stellar cast of 6? We're working on finding the best way.

Happy Turkey everyone, if you do that sort of thing.

Fresh Focus buzz ... controversy and excitement!

The Fresh Focus Sex Ed Video Contest, a joint effort between ISIS and RH Reality Check, is making some waves...and we don't expect things to calm down before the videos premier at Sex::Tech!

Andy Carvin, internet activist, education technology expert and host of Learning.now, highlighted us in his article titled Social Media vs. Social Diseases. He brings up some very interesting issues and elaborates on one of our main goals, which is to let the young people who have the greatest need for frank sex education tell us exactly what they need:

"I’m so intrigued by this project, because it’s basically accepting the premise that students will likely participate on their own time, far away from the classroom, since that’s the only way for them to be frank and open about the issues. They want students to talk about a particular curriculum, but do an end-run around the entire educational system, using the Internet to engage students without interference by teachers or administrators."

Andy also reviews some of our current submissions (which you can watch here).

In related news, our Sex::Tech keynote hosts, creators of the Midwest Teen Sex Show, were just featured in the Wall Street Journal in an awesome article by Andrew LaVallee. The article discusses the satirical nature vs. educational value of the show, two things that aren't necessarily in opposition to each other. Ultimately a great article!

The podcast is No.7 in the Health category on iTunes with 50,000 subscribers. Way to go MTSS!

Nikol and Britney will be at Sex::Tech!

Check the promo video from Midwest Teen Sex Show. Nikol and Britney will be at Sex::Tech in January to present the finalists and winners of the Fresh Focus Sex Ed Video Contest.



We have gotten several video submissions already...check them out and plan your own!

Deb rocks on Real Life Real Talk radio

Deb Levine, ISIS Executive Director and founder, joined Real Life Real Talk yesterday for a radio interview. Check out Deb as she talks about ISIS' growth, inSPOT expansion, issues with verifying sex information online, and about the upcoming Sex::Tech conference and Fresh Focus Video Contest.

Check it out here. Go Deb!

Fresh Focus: Sex Ed Video Contest has launched!

Internet Sexuality Information Services and RH Reality Check in conjunction with Dogooder.tv present the Fresh Focus: Sex Ed Video Contest. You could win a $3500 scholarship or cash equivalent just for making a video about sex! Videos -3 minutes tops- should be submitted to DoGooder.tv by December 31st, 2007 and should follow one of two contest themes:

Theme 1: Share your sex ed experience so far. Show us how and why it sucked or rocked.

Theme 2: Redesign how sex ed could be delivered. Imagine that anything is possible.

Voting will begin on January 4th. The winning videos will premier at the Sex::Tech Conference: Focus on Youth, taking place January 22-23, 2008 at SFSU's Institute for Next Generation Internet in San Francisco to an audience of health professionals, youth activists, educators and tech wizards!

First place wins a $3500 scholarship to the educational institution of your choice (or cash equivalent) and a free trip to San Francisco to attend the conference; second place wins $1000 cash; and third prize is your choice of a Nikon P5000, a Nintendo Wii or an iPhone. Content and creative vision will be weighed more heavily than production quality. Film makers must be between the ages of 15-30. See the official rules for more details.

Check out our contest partners:
Advocates For Youth
ISIS-Inc
RH Reality Check
NSRC
SIECUS

Snag the press release HERE.