A social media experiment with an agricultural event will be conducted this week when the Texas Cowboy Crossroads Gathering takes place Feb. 3-6 in Van Horn, TX. Bob Kindord, The Bovine Blog, wonders if all the efforts we’re putting into social media to tell the farm story is reaching consumers and having an impact. Good question and one that a lot of people are pondering.

Here’s an excerpt from a recent post of his on the subject.

The next question is, can we come up with an agricultural event that is educational, yet entertaining enough for the average person to attend? If we can come up with such an event, do we wield enough social media clout to make an event go viral? Could we get an event to trend on Twitter, or spread on Facebook enough that it would possibly make national news? It would be an interesting experiment on the power of social media, and one we could do fairly easily.

February 3rd through the 6th I put on the Texas Crossroads Gathering, a small cowboy poetry gathering in Van Horn, Texas. There are a few things about this event which makes it unique. First, we actually live-stream video to the internet. Second the entertainers are not paid (the event is a small, but growing talent show.) Finally, all money raised from this event is donated to the local 4H Club and Christian Homeless Shelter.

So Bob suggests following @TexasCrossroad on Twitter and the “near perfect” hashtag #kamikazecow as well as #agritainers. You’ll have to read his blog to understand the hashtags. They’ll be live streaming from the event too.