The Secret Service is overseeing the inaugural security plan, working with 57 other federal and local agencies. Twenty-three subcommittees are focusing on issues ranging from explosives to civil disturbances to the airspace.

D.C. and federal officials have provided varying estimates for the anticipated size of the crowd that will turn out for the inauguration of the nation’s first African American president. Lately, they’ve settled on between 1.5 million and 3 million. Predicting the turnout is difficult because of such unknowns as the weather.

Using a Homeland Security grant, the D.C. government is installing a $350,000 set of special loudspeakers, which use sonar technology, along Pennsylvania Avenue and the Mall, according to District officials. Dozens of prerecorded messages will be ready to play for the crowds.

I can’t help but love every minute of all of this. I’m addicted to the coverage. To me, all of this inauguration planning and reporting is akin to listening to a really horrific traffic report while sitting on the couch with a beer; I’m sure glad I’m not sitting in that mess!

I’ve been involved in large-scale event planning on behalf of clients before. Long time readers will remember my posts as I worked this year’s Papal Visit. Planning for the inauguration is no doubt up there with the Pope. Maybe even more so in terms of just raw number of spectators. I have a real appreciation for the hard work being done right now across the city by thousands of elected officials, council members, security personnel.

In spirit of being a pure non contributing bystander, I’m launching a series documenting D.C’s efforts to generally spruce up the place before nine gazillion people show up. I’m calling it Inaug-Apocalypse – a reflection of the coming event and DC’s hysteria surrounding it and my zero percent role in all of this.

(courtesy of Zyphichore via flickr)

For the first post, I’ll look back over the last few weeks, highlighting the hang wringing. In no particular order, here’s a scan of what’s been in the news lately:

– DC MetBlogs gave us the heads up on the No Camping Out on the mall rule, adding, “it seems as if walking is the best way to get anywhere – even in and out of the city. I can see it now, a scene straight out of Cloverfield, thousands of people trying to find an open bridge to walk across to escape DC.”

– Travel Blogger, Gadling, tells us where to go if you have to go. Reminding us that “according to the statistics, there is one toilet for every 6,849 people.“

– Security Management News quoted the Secret Service as saying “We do not have the entire picture today..the entire plan is not completed yet.” Adding that the city’s bus and rail system expects “crush-load conditions…”

– Inauguration Survival Guide helps tourists read our parking signs, telling new comers “Interpreting DC parking signs is more of an art than a science.”

– DCist wonders why we’re looking for extra cops all the way over in LA. “…why is the city asking for help all the way from Los Angeles? Are there really not enough officers available closer by?”

– Local news radio station WTOP reports that the massive influx of visitors could “overwhelm cell phone towers and broadband service.”

– And finally, our second-tier hometown rag, The Washington Times, gives it to us straight in an article headlined D.C. Nightmare Looms for Inauguration “Restaurants can expect delays in food deliveries, hotel guests can expect slow broadband Internet service during peak hours, and tourists can expect to encounter crowds of evening commuters as they make their way to inaugural balls at rush hour…”

Now, over a month after the election, I still get emails from the campaign, but the communications seems to have shattered into a ten different directions. One email suggested a join a house party to “reflect on what we’ve accomplished and plan the future of this movement.” I’ve been to brainstorms with just as murky objectives so I had a feeling this collective “reflecting and planning” was going to be a waste of time.

A few days later, I received an email offering me an Obama wool hat if I donated 25 dollars to support the ongoing movement. Huh? I thought we already won, he’s soon to be one of the most powerful men on earth and he wants to sell me a ski hat? I seriously don’t get this.

I won’t opt out of the emails because I still feel part of the movement in a way. I just wish I knew what, exactly, we’re all apart of.

My favorite line comes about half way through when, in response to a woman complaining about a delayed cross country flight, he points out that it wasn’t ago that same trip would have taken a month.

Enjoy. And, if you’re on a slow connection, or your email froze, or that damn pinwheel is spinning- just take a moment to breath and relax. Humans have been through much worse.

I’ve found much of the casual word of mouth conversations that I have with friends tend to hinge on a sense of place. Everyone with an internet connection can pull up CNN to get the headlines, but with the local news, I mean really local, down the street kinda conversations – there’s a special, therapeutic quality. A shared sense of location.

“Do you hear about the pitpull that got loose and ran down 15th street?”

“What in the world are they building by the GW hospital?”

“How long is that jack hammering going to keep waking me up?”

This is the stuff of neighborly word of mouth and there is no greater web tool to fuel this type of dialog than Outisde.in. Simply throw in an address or zip or neighborhood and you’ll be plugged into hyper-local news – the pitbull on the loose kinda news. Content creators – register your blog and geo-target your posts.

I’m in the process of adding the widget on my own site.

Check it out, and I’ll see ya around neighborhood.

Courtesy of Slate.com (a daily must-read), this two minute video looks at the last 30 days of the Obama transition. Slate V – the video arm of the online magazine, created a few of these videos for the primaries and general election.

There’s something about the style of these clips that makes the whole process seem otherworldly and formulaic – I guess it’s the quick wit from the narration:

Obama elected president, historical, change we can believe in, et cetera

There were a few notable agency folks in room, as well as some really interesting communications scholars. I happened to sit next to PhD student Brian Smith, who’s studying the convergence of social media and public relations.

I managed to corner Brian with a flipcam before the keynote and he talked about his research on the receptiveness of corporate messages, as well as his advice for college students preparing for a career in PR agencies. And yes, in fact there was an earthquake during the first 15 seconds, which explains both the jerkiness and my rambling intro.

Check out Brian’s blog for an academic’s take on social media and for perspective on peer review researched in our field.

(This post first appeared on the Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence blog)

It’ll be great to be back on campus and to meet with former professors, other agency folks, and UMD students.  I’ll bring a flipcam with me, so keep an eye out for interview footage post-event.

If you’re craving video content right now, then head over to the blog that receives much more of my attention – 360 Digital Influence, for a collection of four videos from last week’s Social Media Club event in our Ogilvy office.

I buy eggs in the Watergate Hotel. No, that’s not some secret Deep Throat code, I actually go grocery shopping in Watergate. Okay, it’s really the Safeway that’s under the hotel. But, on a map, I stock up on the same dot that marks one of the most infamous American crime scenes of the 20th century.  Washington residents often face these stark contrasts, the somber faces of American history looming over us as we hurry out to buy batteries.

History aside, the Watergate Safeway really had to earn me as a (reluctant) customer. Here are the battles I had to win on their behalf in order for me remain a Safeway customer:

Negative Reputation

Safeway has a dubious reputation in DC. A fact well documented by one of colleagues last year. Each Safeway store in DC seems be especially handicapped in one particular area. It’s as though all the Safeways got together and divvied up their shortcomings:

“Ok, 17th & Corcoran, you guys be sure to only put out rotting produce. Wisconsin & 34th, I want you guys to take all the wheels off your shopping carts. Ready, break!”

Competition

When I told friends where I was moving – 21st and I street – the first reaction was typically, “Oh, that’s so close to Trader Joe’s!” Indeed, a few blocks up Pennsylvania Ave is a Trader Joe’s. Had I been from another city altogether, I might have assumed that Trader Joe’s was the only store in town based solely on these conversations.

Location

Real estate is a hot commodity in downtown Washington and D-level grocery stores like Safeway often get stuck with cramped quarters and poor visibility. Such is the case with my neighborhood Safeway. Since Safeway has chosen to adopt the large, faceless model of communications, I was forced to turn to user generated content for help in locating the infamous store…

Here’s the faceless model:

And here’s where I had to turn to get help after an unsuccessful attempt to find the store:

“This store is very hard to find. It is located at the Shops at Watergate and is not visible from the street. You have to take the escalator,” the first description reads. Thank you Safeway Google Map Reviewer. I found it after reading this.

What do these three battles have in common? They are all won and lost on the Word of Mouth battlefield. In the first two points, WOM pushed me way from the brand and toward a competitor. In the third example, ironically, it was user generated content (a helpful review) that won the day.

Safeway would be well advised to put an ear to the street in this city and listen to these already existing conversations, both good and bad.

And, while they’re at it. Why not…

..Aggregate the Google map reviews into the Store Finder on the corporate site so that people can get directions from their neighbors and not a useless corporate map? Who cares if the descriptions claim your store is hard to find? It is. At least proper directions will help get customer in the store.

..Latch onto the novelty of the locations and tell customers a story. You’re selling lettuce in the Watergate. Build a narrative. Other brands have much done more in this department with much less.

…What else? Grab a Marker.

I’ll continue to shop at Safeway for some generic staples, but I predict the majority of my grocery shopping will shift over to Trader Joe’s. I hear there’s one just up the street…

With a little over 30 days until the election, I don’t think it’s too soon to wonder how social media will spill over to the next presidential term.

Wired Magazine, as you expect, is a popular reading choice for many of us in 360 Digital Influence and they started thinking about this in their recent cover story, 15 People the Next President Should Listen To. One of these 15 brilliant thinkers, Ellen Miller suggested that Washington become more like the web.

Her proposal would take the web’s best attributes – transparency and collaboration – and apply them to a traditionally close-door Congress. One of the sites she references is OpenCongress.com.   This network allows users to track bills, comment on pending legislation and debate congressional issues in the forum section.  The site also aggregates user-generated content from around the web.

As a result, I’m able to fire up OpenCongress.com, read a profile of my local representative.  From there I’m easily able to explore the blogs and message boards talking about my congressperson, local bills, or issues such as habeas corpus or gun control.  This helps bring together traditional Washington insiders with social media’s democratizing ability to speak truth to power.

CPSAN also just launched it’s new Debate Hub site. Wait!  Don’t fall asleep! It’s actually really exciting.  The site takes the form of a debate dashboard of sorts, featuring transcripts, video, and, of course, twitter and blog coverage.  One of most interesting features will be a real-time word tree allowing users to track the number of times each candidate references, say, “Iraq” or “Economy” over the course of the debate.
Read Mashable’s Debate Hub write up here.

It’s great to see the election transformed by the web but I’m curious to see how this momentum carries into the next presidential term.  Do you think Congress and the White House will continue to adopt this spirit of transparency and collaboration long after the as the dust settles on the campaign?