This will probably mean that future associations will look very different than they do today and operate on a very different business model. They may be a lot smaller and more niche focused. The may offer specialized sections for different member-types (internalcoms vs. external vs. marketing vs. PR vs. corp vs. agency, etc.) and or some other model.

One thing seems clear, associations like IABC, PRSA, CPRI, AMA, etc. are going to have to really understand the new world order and recognize the benefits and opportunities advanced technology offers instead of ignoring it in favor of the status quo. This was, perhaps, a misguided luxury in the past but the handwriting is on the wall.

For example, in the mid-90′s I created an online accreditation study group and program for IABC members and ran it through Compuserve’s Public Relations and Marketing Forum. It was well attended and one member, who lived 300 miles from the nearest face-to-face study group, credited it as the only way she was able to get her ABC.

Since the program/idea was a successful proof-of-concept I shared my notes, lessons learned, suggestions for organizational structure, etc., so it could be formalized as an association program. But the association was decidedly cold and uninteresteed in the idea – except to list it in the annual report to members and claim it as their own (without attribution, btw) – because, IMHO, they didn’t understand and were uncomfortable with online technology.

To be successful in the future, however, associations are going to have to get in step with the times.

Lee, you are bang on. We won’t learn without conversation. Of course, it has to be courteous and avoid personal attacks. But I think we’ll have to keep working on that one, because emotions all too often bubble over…

MyRagan and their ilk offer an alternative to the IABC, PRIA and other ‘membership’ sites like ‘the Hub’ wherein it is free to participate — at the expense of the freedom that one has in one’s own publishing empire (i.e. one’s own blog and/or static website, flickr account, podcast, twitter, second life space, inter alia).

Like I said in my post about this, the rules are still being written about Web2.0 and none of us has the ‘right’ answer for every occasion. And indeed it may well be that Mark has done us a great service: he has engendered a conversation about what the rules ‘should be’ in such a situation. By such discourse do civilizations form…