So Sandy kicked our ass when our back was turned, so what. One of the great things about being Long Islanders is that we don't take crap from anyone about anything, and we always take care of our own.

This week in the aftermath of Sandy, while we clean up our own houses, take stock of what we've lost and what we've gained through this experience, please keep the lesson of LITweetup Helps in your heart. A lot of people, making small efforts to help other people create big results.

Yes, give to the Red Cross and give to Island Harvest and do that as soon as you can and as much as you can. But I want to urge you to think much more local and much more micro as well. You and your neighbor both had to empty your fridges out as you hit the 3rd and 4th days of no power; does your neighbor have enough money to replace all that food for her family? Can you help there?

Maybe all your neighbors are in good shape right now. Is there a neighboring community that got hit harder and can you band together with your church or synagogue, or a group of neighbors, or friends in the office, and together help them somehow? Find out what they need and find an agency that's trying to get those services to them and donate what they need.

One example (and if you're in the area I invite you to join us): My church is adopting two locations; a neighborhood in Long Beach where residents have lost everything and are literally freezing at night because all their clothing is soaking wet and 2 buildings in Island Park where nearly 80 families (many with very young children) are without heat, power and food and other aid hasn't reached them yet. Want to help with this micro-effort?

1. Drop off warm clothing donations at 1 Norwood Ave, Malverne, NY (or text Jeff at 516-882-7712 for alternate drop offs)
2. Donate money at TheBridgeLI.com

The big agencies are doing miraculous work in enormous ways, but these micro-efforts by citizens and communities will fill the gaps for people that might otherwise have to wait. Want more ideas? In Brooklyn, Tony Bacigalupo of New Work City is coordinating NYC techies to help anyone who needs tech help after Sandy. The Business Corners in Hauppauge is offering free space to people who need somewhere to work for the rest of the week. Can you offer someone your skill or share your physical assets (maybe be a recharging station for people)?

Find a way to help your neighbors, LITweetup, there's no one better on the Island at it than you, and Long Island really needs you now.

I'm very sorry for the recent spam posts and an extra apology for those of you who subscribe and got to experience it in your email!

The problem was that someone (@namnum, but don't tell anyone) accidentally made the default registration level "author". A spammer figured that out and went to town.

The back door has been closed and locked and no information or emails were compromised.

Sorry again for the screw up and I hope to see you tomorrow night for Social Media Day LITweetup.

Tomorrow night, Thursday 12/8/11 at The Business Corners LITweetup-er Basil Puglisi (@basilpuglisi) will be hosting a Holiday Networking Event.
With tons of great food, an awesome location (we've done LITweetup events at the The Business Corners before) I was surprised when Basil told me it was free, but he was able to pull it off. The only thing he's asking is please bring along a donation for our friends at Island Harvest so we can help them feed our neighbors during the holiday season.

I'll (@namnum) be there helping out a bit, so hope to see you there if you can make it. RSVP on Facebook here.

Yeah I know, a little dramatic on the title, but hang in there, this is not a rant or a depressing story.
In wrapping up this year's LITweetup Helps campaign I couldn't help but think about the fact that it was both an Epic Win and a Tragic Loss and it's important to us as a community to discuss them. Both are hugely telling about who we are and the impact we can have and tell a positive story about where we're going. That said if you only want to know the date of the next LITweetup, feel free to cheat and scroll to the end.

In keeping with the theme, please enjoy the dramatic subtitles

Of Tragic Loss

So you would think the tragic loss would be our much lower results this year than in previous years but that's not really it at all. I am disappointed that Helps didn't collect as much food to feed our neighbors as we historically have, but really this was a totally new direction for the campaign with awesome brand new partners, so it makes some sense that there'd be growing pains.

The tragic loss in this case was me (@namnum). And not in the "Oh whoa is me, I'm such a moron" kind of way but in the "if only I had remembered what makes LITweetup work so well" kind of way. I forgot that what has always made our endeavors succeed is the community coming together. We each do a little part or add a little bit and that makes the event/project wholly amazing.

So if the time machine I started work on was finished, I'd go back to August-Septemberish when I realized I was way over-committed and one of a couple dozen LITweetup leaders or, even better, just email the LITweetup Helps coordinators from previous years. Then I would comfort myself that the process of curated crowd-sourcing that we've refined over the past few years would do it's work.

For anyone that was disappointed, I am sorry that I didn't do that. But for the record, I am not sorry that we went ahead with Helps even though I knew I was starting too late to do it the right way. I still believe that some help given to Island Harvest is better than no help.

Of Epic Wins

The much more funner-er section of the post to write. There are many wins from this years Helps: among them, we helped Island Harvest feed some people, some smart restaurants got some great pr by doing a good thing, a few of us were able to get together and great conversations happened. But I count 2 Epic Wins.

1. The Community Still Came Together. Despite the last minute craziness, despite the many challenges in the way and despite the short time frame to get the word out, when LITweetup-ers found out Helps was happening, they got to work. In order to feed people, many leveraged their networks, used their personal and professional resources and sacrificed their time and treasure to make sure that Island Harvest would get as much support as possible to feed our hungry neighbors. Maybe I should be used to it by now, but I am truly in awe of what you all are able to make happen. It is remarkable what concerned individuals can do when they work together to help people in need. You guys rock!

2. We Have An Amazing New Partnership. Again, thanks to an LITweetup-er we have an opportunity to multiply our efforts to help Island Harvest in 2012. Lindsey Myers (@LindseyeMyers) of Word Hampton PR created a partnership between the LITweetup Helps campaign and this year's Long Island Restaurant Week. Not only did they feature our efforts to help Island Harvest on the home page but Lindsey & crew found 5 participating restaurants to serve as food collection spots and to host impromptu LITweetup Happy Hours, and it was all done in less than 2 weeks!

Of Kicking Butt in 2012

As a community we have talent, passion, love, compassion and a shared interest in improving our little corner of the world. The big lesson that I walk away from the 2011 Helps campaign with is this: we have made a difference in Island Harvest's mission to end hunger on Long Island, in 2012 by learning from the awesome and the less than awesome, we will make an even bigger difference.

I would love to hear your comments, thoughts, questions and criticisms so please hit me up in the comments below.

I'll see you guys at the Social Media Club Holiday Party this week or at the upcoming free LITweetup event with SMCLI in January (info to come but save the date, it's on January 25th). You can count on the January event to be back to a traditional LITweetup, very loose in format and very tight in terms of quality conversations with passionate talented Long Islanders.

Our August meetup will be hosted by our good friends at Alure Home Improvement (@alure_home) at their showroom here: 1999 Hempstead Turnpike, East Meadow, NY 11554.

edit: We have a snack sponsor, woo-hoo! Scroll down to check them out.

How'd That Happen?

John Doyle (@14str8) has become a good friend to me and certainly is a good friend to the Long Island Social Media scene (most recently he spoke at FMC's Summer Social Media Boot Camp and 140conf Long Island). So when we decided to have coffee and chat recently I thought it was kind of weird to do it at his showroom, but hey I'm flexible.

It was actually really cool when I got there. It was like someone took the most comfortable part of a bunch of people' homes and stitched them together and put them in one building. It was remarkably comfortable. So when John told me Alure would be interested in hosting a meetup there I was very excited.

Agenda

As promised we will talk about Idea Sex, in particular we will talk about the future of LITweetUP and we'll put together our ideas and see what they do with each other. Other things we might or might not talk about:

• Nassau Coliseum vote, disaster or meh
• Google+, Social Media Nerd Playground or Revolution
• Social Media Camp 2.0, not happening until 2012 (here we go)
• Somebody's recipe for something delicious

We've Got Food!

A big thank you to the good folks at Roast Sandwich House in Melville for providing snacks for this event.  I would personally appreciate it if you'd go to their Facebook page and give them a like.

Pictures of Alure's Showroom