A social media-based group of Latinos is getting serious about influencing politics, online and off. Latinos in Social Media (LATISM) will hold a tech conference at Google's New York offices in June, and will give the White House a town hall style forum at its annual conference in October.
"It's the epicenter for all the Latinos in social media," said Elianne Ramos, vice-chair, marketing for the group [photo left], describing the LATISM 2012 conference to be held in Houston, Texas.
The three-year-old organization, which has 150,000 U.S. members, also plans to host John Berry, director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, during one of LATISM's weekly Twitter chats to discuss federal opportunities for Latinos. Weekly chats focus on subjects like the economy and jobs, the environment, and cultural issues.
And the group recently held an event for Latina bloggers in Washington, D.C. that included a briefing at the White House.
"It's time for Latinos to become more active in the civic life of the United States," Ramos told ClickZ News during an April interview.
The White House's director of social media was at LATISM's annual conference last year, she said. Ramos stressed that LATISM is non-partisan and doesn't accept money from political entities. The main goal of the group's government interactions is to help people register to vote and give members a platform to communicate messages important to Latinos directly to the government. READ MORE
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