While writing a book about ACORN, I got to know Wade Rathke, spending dozens of hours hanging out with him, interviewing him, e-mailing back and forth, interviewing friends and enemies, and literally following Rathke as he worked. In an age of stylish cynicism, whatever else you might say about Wade, he believes in the basic goodness of people, our capacity for empathy, kindness, and caring. These traits are expressed not only through individual acts with his family and friends; but also with strangers, especially those who inhabit the squalid urban communities across the globe–the people ignored by the public officials and exploited by the rich and powerful.

Long before she wrote Share This!: How You Will Change the World with Social Networking, Deanna Zandt was my social networking guru. Of course, I had the benefit of being her friend, so I was privy to her frequent and useful insights on the value of joining Twitter, Foursquare and Facebook, and the most effective ways to use these technologies to promote my ideas and my activism. It was Deanna who convinced me that it benefits your activism to humanize yourself on social networks, and even that you can really spread information far and wide 140 characters at a time. So I have to start off by saying: you rule, Deanna! Your guidance has been invaluable to me.