Smith-Mundt Fails to Protect Americans from Fake News

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Public affairs and public diplomacy blogger Matt Armstrong discusses U.S. Public Diplomacy, repairing America’s image abroad, and whether or not the U.S. Department of State will ever be adequately resourced to lead the nation’s global online public affairs efforts through social media.

Mountain Runner is a blog on the practice and structure of public diplomacy, public affairs and public relations. It is read by senior government officials, practitioners, trainers, academics, and analysts from the U.S. Department of State, the U.S. Department of Defense, the United States Congress, related institutions, think tanks, and government agencies around the globe.

1:46 – How an online newsroom can help public relations firms increase their news media coverage for clients.

2:09 – Public diplomacy definition from Mountain Runner blogger Matt Armstrong.

4:05 – Why social media is critical to public policy, public affairs, and public relations.

4:54 – How public policy can be used to dispel inaccurate information being promulgated by extremist groups online by highlighting the differences between what an organization says and what it does.

6:06 – Matt Armstrong gives his report on how the U.S. Department of State is doing in the area of social media engagement and web-based communications relative to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Department of Defense and what could be done to improve the State Department’s global engagement strategy.

8:20 – Matt Armstrong opines on how the U.S. Dept. of State is using Dipnote as an extension of their public diplomacy, public policy and public affairs efforts.

9:30 – Matt Armstrong shares has strategic communications approach to Facebook for U.S. Embassies.

10:31 – Matt Armstrong talks briefly about Exchanges Connect, which the U.S. Department of State set up on the Ning white-label social networking platform.

13:54 – Matt Armstrong advises Secretary of State Clinton on how the U.S. Department of State can effectively achieve global electronic engagement in the age of social media, cutting the red tape between public affairs and public diplomacy and the problem with the Smith-Mundt Act.

17:18 – How the U.S. Department of State International Information Program website America.gov defies the Smith-Mundt Act, according to Matt Armstrong.

18:15 – Why broadcasting in Spanish in the United States is one of the easiest, most effective ways to convey public policy and conduct public affairs with Latin America by leveraging foreign nationals and foreign media operating within the United States.

21:25 – Why are open and honest online communications that acknowledge bad news as much as good are the only way to win what Presidents Truman and Eisenhower called the “struggle for the minds and wills” of global audiences?

21:47 – The origins of public affairs, public diplomacy, and public relations, and why openness, honesty, and the frequency of engagement are even more critical in online communications and social media. Why web-based communications frustrate segmentation.

24:25 – Social media engagement for government communicators debunked by Matt Armstrong.

26:40 – Whether or not the U.S. Department of State will ever be adequately resourced to lead in global engagement online. Matt Armstrong grades the performance of senior advisor on innovation to Secretary Clinton Alec Ross and the institutional hurdles that the U.S. Dept. of State will need to clear to practice successful global engagement in the social media age.

29:10 — End