Time for a switch

It’s late summer and change seems to be in the air. Perhaps it’s that students are heading back into classrooms, or that my European friends are coming back from month-long vacations, or that in America, the baseball season will soon give football season. (Go Sox! Go Pack!) Or maybe there’s just a wave of creativity passing through the blogosphere, inspiring people to break away from their ordinary blogging behavior.

Deborah Elizabeth Finn, a prolific and talented blogger who focuses on non-profit and social change organizations, is organizing a non-profit blog exchange. She explains the root of the idea in a post titled “A Bully Pulpit Exchange”, referring to an old North American custom where religious leaders trade congregations for a week (and to former President Theodore Roosevelt’s observation that the presidency is “a bully pulpit”.)

Basically, the non-profit blogger exchange invites anyone who “works for or with mission-based organizations” to trade blogs with another blogger focused on the “third sector” for the day. I’m joining in, and hope other folks who blog and work with nonprofits will join in as well. The exchange starts on September 12th, but the deadline to register to participate is August 31 – if you’re interested, visit the site and put your name in the hat – you might become the first ever guest author on this blog.

August 31, in most of the world, is written as 31/08. If you’re an Israeli blogger (with bad handwriting?), 3108 might look like the word “blog”, and you’d be inspired to start World Blog Day, a simple project that encourages bloggers around the world to link to five blogs they haven’t linked to previously. Ideally, people will go further and link to blogs from countries they don’t know much about and will learn something about in the process of choosing and linking.

Unsurprisingly, we’re hugely supportive of this idea over at Global Voices. David “El Oso” Sakasi’s recent post gives some hints for places to look for great global blogs as well as a bit of background on the idea.

If you’re intimidated by the idea of finding five blogs from countries you know little about, don’t be. We’ve spent the last six months making it easy for you over at the Global Voices BridgeBlog index. While there aren’t blogs listed for every nation, dozens of nations have long, rich lists of great bridgeblogs. Or you could read Ndesanjo Macha’s recent post and find new voices just within the Tanzanian blogosphere…

Again, I’m in. Visit the World Blog Day site to learn how you can participate as well.

The switch where David Ortiz starts at guard for the Packers and Brett Favre is the new closer for the Sox? That one I’m less enthusiastic about…