I don’t know if Larry Quinn is ready to rename the Broadcasters Letter, the New Media Letter, but new media is slowly but surely making its way into the USDA Office of Communications strategy. For example, I just recently met Amanda Eamich online via email. I was intrigued by her title, “Director of New Media (Acting).” Now that’s progress.

So Amanda was gracious enough to take a few minutes to speak with me by phone about her job and what’s going on with new media and USDA.

The mission of the Office of Communications is to provide leadership, expertise, counsel and coordination for the development of communications strategies which are vital to the overall formulation, awareness and acceptance of U.S. Department of Agriculture programs and policies, and serves as the principal USDA contact point for the dissemination of consistent, timely information.

Amanda is from Virginia and was working for the Food Safety Inspection Service. She’s really excited to move up from the agency level to the department level. She says USDA communicates with so many different communities and they’re trying to figure out how to interact with them by engaging them in interactive multimedia ways. One of my favorite quotes from Amanda when talking about using new media is, “It’s really just us having a conversation with a guy down the street.” Now that’s what it’s all about!

I asked her to provide a few links for us:

USDA YouTube
FSIS Twitter
USDA Recovery Map
USDA Podcasts

This week’s program ends with music from the Podsafe Music Network. It’s a song titled, “Too Much Pork In My Stew”, by Lazy Poker. I hope you enjoy it and thank you for listening.

You can download and listen to the ZimmCast here: ZimmCast 221 (19 min MP3)

Or listen to this week’s ZimmCast right now:Interview with Amanda Eamich - ZimmCast 221

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