My very good friend Morgan's book that she edited, "Voting in America" is now available for order. It's three volumes that "surveys the legal foundations, historical development, and geographic diversity of voting practices at all levels of government in the United States. It marshals the demographics of voter participation and party affiliation in the 21st century by age, occupation, location, region, class, race, and religion, and parses the roles of interest groups, hot-button issues, and the media in mobilizing voters and shaping their decisions. Finally, the set anatomizes the critical voting debacles in the 2000 and 2004 elections and assesses the proposed remedies, including online voting and electronic voting machines."

Go pick up your copy today! Or request it from your library.

Drink: A Cultural History of Alcohol by Iain Gately

I want to wish a happy Father's day to the best dad in the world -- mine. :)

If you're looking for something to do this Father's Day I strongly recommend reading Tim Russert's book, "Big Russ and Me." However, if you don't already own it I'm afraid you're probably going to have a hard time finding it ... at least if you're in the DC area. I heard at Barnes and Noble yesterday that as soon as the sad news of Russert's death spread the books went flying off the shelves and no one has any.

Now that I have my weekends back to me I've been catching up on a bunch of books I've wanted to read. The latest is Groundswell by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff with Forrester Research Group. While it has many of the same stories at Radically Transparent I think it's a better first book for executives or managers to read who need a better understanding of social media. Radically Transparent gives more of a practical how to. They'd compliment each other well in a classroom setting. In the end, if you're an online operative, you should give Groundswell to your boss and Radically Transparent to your staff.

Earlier this week I finished reading the expanded edition of Wikinomics by Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams. It's all a part of me trying to learn more about how corporations are using new media, the successes and failures they've had and how I can use those in my job.

If you're already an internet guru the practical lessons in this are going to be ones you already know and the wealth you'll find in this are the case studies you can use when making that argument to your boss or client that they shouldn't ignore new media. The book can get repetitive at times and you'll find yourself saying, "Yeah, I get it." But soldier (or flip) through for the examples.

If you're not an internet guru, but know that the internet is something not to be ignored and aren't sure how to start. This book is a good one to add to the reading list. It's more conceptual than the book Managing Your Online Reputation, so it's not going to give you step by step instructions on how to do things. But Wikinomics will give you a good idea of the steps companies are being forced to take to compete and stay ahead of the curve these days.

I just finished Friday Night Knitting Club by Kate Jacobs (which explains why I'm just getting on the Internet now today). It's a good book. Not one that makes me stay up until 3 am finishing it, but I really liked the background of it all (a regular knitting group who doesn't always knit but is more about friendship. Reminds me of my mom's friends at Kendra's Stitching Bee in Wisconsin.) The lessons in it are ones you can never get enough of (at least me) and it's given me an itch to start knitting again. Though first I should finish this cross stitch pattern for my future nephew. :)

Enough of my rambling. But bottom line, if you're looking for a semi-quick read with a good story, good lessons and some twists and turns this is for you.

As someone who works day in and day out in the online world and consistently works to find better ways to give people a comprehensive online strategy to managing themselves or their issue I'm always on the lookout for good books to help me.

A few weeks ago someone recommended Radically Transparent by Andy Beal and Judy Strauss. It is absolutely excellent. I finished it yesterday and it really helps give some organization and structure to managing online reputations. It pointed me to some new tools I didn't know about like Copernic.com to track changes to web content and boardtracker.com to track conversations in forums. It also gave a lot of good corporate case studies of how companies who at first ignored the online world -- to their own peril -- and now have embraced it to much success. (think Dell, Pontiac, Kodak or most recently Starbucks)

These stories are going to be key in my job when we try to convince clients they need to join the online community not embrace it. Whether you're an online professional or just an avid user of Facebook, this book is definitely worth a read to managing reputations online.

Being from Green Bay and having once lived at the corner of Lombardi Ave and Ridge Road it is no surprise that I am a certified, cheesehead wearing, Packers fan. I am also a HUGE Brett Favre fan. I grew up with him as the quarterback and while I think it was time for him to retire and for the Packers to start rebuilding, it was still sad to see him go. This week Sports Illustrated came out with its tribute book to Favre, which I got on Friday. It's a great collection of stories from Peter King and other SI writers as well as photos from throughout Favre's career. If you're a Packers/Favre fan it's definitely worth checking out.