News & Updates: March, 2005

Dear Friends & Colleagues,

It's been another exciting month here and we've got several announcements we'd like to share.

Introductions: Zanon & Geiger Join the DIA Team

We're excited to announce that Jason Zanon has joined our team this month as Director of Outreach and Development. Jason comes to DIA with, in his words, "the zeal of the converted." Working with the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty - a DIA client - he was able to see firsthand how much our services can mean to a nonprofit organization and he's excited to help other organizations realize the same benefits.

Drop him a line and say hello! jason at democracyinaction.org

In our planning process, we surveyed our users regarding their needs, analyzed the market, reviewed our strengths and weaknesses; and assessed optimal strategies moving forward. We're now in the process of outlining a strategy designed to significantly increase our impact, empower many more organizations to engage in effective citizenry, and generate earned revenue to sustain us moving forward.

Featured Campaigns

A preventable humanitarian crisis, affecting more than two million people, is raging in the Darfur region of western Sudan. Please take action now at SaveDarfur.org. Or watch this Fiore flash animation and spread the word.

Over the weekend, Sojourners marked the 2-year anniversary of the Iraq war by hosting hundred of events around the country. We were proud to support their efforts with our distributed event tool. Over 850 events were planned in all 50 states.

DIA finds Permanent Home

On March 1st, we moved into our new home -- a great new space on Dupont Circle! We're sharing space with the gang at Free Range Graphics -- a cutting-edge socially conscious design and communications strategy firm. We're excited both about the space and the synergy with Free Range. Be on the lookout for some great joint projects! Please make a note of our new address (and feel free to drop by and say hello!)

1605 Connecticut Ave, 3rd Floor
Washington, DC 20009

Events We're Attending

Come out & join DIA staff and clients at the following events:

Group Training Scheduled: Thursday, April 21st 3-6pm

For those in the DC area, please join us for our monthly training session from 3-6:00pm. This is an excellent opportunity to meet folks from other organizations using DIA services, share best practices and be part of a growing community. Then join us for happy hour at Biddy Mulligans (Dupont Circle) immediately following the training.

New Projects Launching Soon!

As many of you know, innovation is central to our mission at DIA and we're excited to start beta-testing two important new developments in the coming weeks.

DIA @home is all the features of the DIA platform wrapped up and ready to install on your local machine.@home combines a web server, an email server, and a member database to create everything a nonprofit needs to get started... at a price every nonprofit can afford. Read more here....

In coordination with several leading progressive networks, DIA will be launching a downloadable progressive toolbar.We can change the way we "do politics" and engage people by putting the individual, the member, the activist in the driver's seat.

The toolbar will give individuals a gateway to their very own personalized advocacy experience. After downloading and setting preferences, the toolbar will automatically display an individual's personal profile, customized news, actions, their elected officials and local events and information. Users can specify which organizations they are members of and which campaigns they'd like to follow. The toolbar will help individuals effectively manage their information and activism....
Stay tuned!