YearlyKos Is a Labor of Love
By Heidi Genoist -- Tradeshow Week, 6/12/2006
Las Vegas—Lots of conventions rely on the service of volunteers to keep things running and to add a high-touch feel. But how many are launched and organized completely by volunteers, who don't put one single penny in their pocket, strictly for the love of the cause they support?
At least one: YearlyKos Convention 2006, June 8–11 at the Riviera Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas.
And that's not the only remarkable feature of this first annual gathering that took its name from Daily Kos, a Web site for liberal activists. YearlyKos was the first national face-to-face gathering of a group with roots in the blogosphere.
Expected to draw about 1,000 attendees, the gathering had a small exhibition for sponsors like the Intl. Brotherhood of Teamsters, ePluribus Media and the Internationalist magazine, as well as booths for political candidates' campaigns.
But the real strength of the convention, organizers believe, was its speakers, which included U.S. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer, Democratic Natl. Committee Chairman Howard Dean and Gen. Wesley Clark, in addition to dozens of other liberal politicians and intellectuals.
A group equaling less than 10 full- and part-time staff organized the entire event, yet there was not one paid employee among them — not even Gina Cooper, the executive director of the nonprofit organization YearlyKos, set up for the purpose of continuing the convention.
"Gina has been working 16-hour days around the clock on this, all unpaid," said volunteer Jon Shiffman, a New York attorney in private practice who writes for Daily Kos in his spare time. He said the convention has become like a second job for him, too.
When asked why he and others would give their time this way, Shiffman said, "It's something people really care about, the public policy affecting the conversation and the process in America."
He added that YearlyKos would allow many who'd only known one another by screen names to meet in person — and see live the leaders they admire.
Cooper, Shiffman and other readers and writers of blogs like Daily Kos conceived the idea of a national convention in the fall of 2004. They'd been getting together informally in urban hubs like New York and San Francisco and found the face-to-face meetings rewarding.
As the idea gained momentum, a nucleus of serious devotees took the lead.
"A lot of people thought (Cooper) was nuts," Shiffman said. "We had no money whatsoever, and none of us had organized anything larger than a dinner party."
With the endorsement of Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas Zuniga and his popular blog's branding, the convention quickly took off.
"It's the highest-traffic political blog on the Web by far," said Shiffman. "It's a very widely read journalistic product, period. So, if you're able to put up a story saying we're doing this convention, and tens of thousands of people see it, you can get really high profile names."
As for the venue, Shiffman said the organizers had bids from Chicago, San Francisco and other cities, but "Vegas gave the most economically friendly deal," including the most reasonable hotel room attrition clauses.
He also noted that Nevada is a swing state, so "in terms of changing the political conversation, doing it there made sense. There are a lot of people to sway."
Organizers don't expect the convention to stay in Las Vegas. Although future plans are still in the works, they'd like to see YearlyKos rotate around the country, or perhaps take place in regional hubs.
As for whether the amateurs will continue their labor of love, Shiffman said they would consider turning over management to professionals, on one condition: "We don't want it to become so expensive that the types of people we want to give the opportunity to be there can't afford to be there."
Most people, he said, had to take vacation time to attend, because it was not a professional convention.
