On a July evening in 2003, over 100 people attended a meeting at a brew pub in Alexandria, Virginia to support Howard Dean's candidacy for president of the United States. Normally, a meeting like that would not be merit inclusion in a national paper. Yet, USA Today found the meeting worth writing about as part of their article "Online, off and running: Web a new campaign front." The reporters pointed out that the meeting was newsworthy on three accounts. First, it was set up using the social networking site Meetup.com. Second, the social networking-based meeting was being replicated in over 300 cities nationwide. Finally, all of the sessions shared a member-generated project, writing to potential voters in the upcoming Iowa primary. Dean's campaign was clearly ahead of the curve for mobilizing people using the Web. His bid for the democratic nomination, was not, however, successful. He did not fair well in the primaries and his campaign imploded in part due to the Web and his infamous "Dean Scream" following the Iowa Primary. The scream quickly began circulating online. It was reused, remixed, and repurposed (okay, I couldn't resist the alliteration)--it was even added to Dramatic Prairie Dog. This is in addition to being parodied on television.
The 2004 election was not, however, the first time the Internet had played a role in a national election. According to the USA Today article mentioned above, Jerry Brown used email to help with fund raising in 1992 and credits former professional wrestler Jessie Ventura's 1998 election as governor of Minnesota to the Internet. By the 2004 presidential campaign, the Web and the Internet were clearly playing a major role in politics. Of the$36 million John Kerry's campaign raised in June 2004, $12 million came from online donors. Overall, 80% of donors age 18-34 donated online. As the 2008 campaign moves into high gear, the candidates are clearly taking advantage of the Web, and particularly Web 2.0. Senator Hillary Clinton, and most others running for president, maintains both office and campaign Web sites as well as sites on MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, flickr, and eons. Visitors and supporters are encouraged to start their own blogs, buy Hillary paraphanaelia, watch "HillCast" (see the video section), and of course contribute. Having visited the Clinton campaign site (and using her site as an example should be construed as an endorsement), check out the sites of the some of the other candidates. Republican presidential hopeful Ron Paul is seen by some pundits as this year's Howard Dean (in a positive sense), leveraging the Web, and particularly Web 2.0 technologies, to garner national attention, though not, as you will see in the article, without some criticism.Even the debates have taken a Web 2.0 turn, particularly through YouTube's YouChoose channel. The Democratic debate on YouTube was met with mixed reviews. The Republican debate is scheduled on November 28. Even Second Life has become a political venue with virtual offices staffed by volunteers and the occasional virtual appearance by candidates--not to mention the virtual defacement of virtual campaign offices.
Needless to say, blogs are playing an increasing role in the campaigns, as are podcasts. If you have any doubt about podcasts, just do a search on iTunes--in fact do a search on iTunes and report back on what you find. Pick a couple to listen to. Wondering about blogs? Etalkinghead provides a great list of blogs sorted by type. The question is, of course, how and if this will change the political scene. If you took EM&C 3300, you may remember some discussion on cybercascades--the idea that sites dedicated to a cause tend to only link to sites that have similar views. People both in and outside of academia have raised a concern that blogs and the Web in may lead to a fragmentation of American society, others have argued that while the bloggers may make a difference, they tend to follow rather than lead. So what do you think? How do you see the move to new media campaign tools changing politics in the United States and why do you think it is changing or not changing? Is it something we should be worried about? Is there a direction you think we should be heading in but are not?*Apologies for not having flyovers in this weeks blog. Google Docs quit working as I was finished this and I had to relink everything again.
12 comments:
I think it is a great idea to use these new methods to get their word out. They chose to use a medium that their target audience is on everyday and I can see it being effective for those that use it well. Hopefully though, there will not be online voting or anything like that because that is more of a security risk. The only bad thing is the anonymity. Just like the virtual defacement described, anyone that is online can have a bad impact on a candidate if they choose to because it is open to anyone.
I think that Washington has finally decided that one of the best ways to reach the new generation of voters is through the web because of how much it is used in society today. The freedom for response and reaction to the posts is nice to have because i think it gets more people's word out. Their actions seem to be moving in a good direction, but I feel like most people are not as impacted by what they read online or in a newspaper as by what they see in real life. I wish the politicians would make an effort to go more places, cities, schools, etc. so that there would be more opportunities to really learn what each candidate is like through a first-person point of view. Can't they spend this money they are raising on the travel expenses? I understand that they are reaching mass amounts of people through the internet but I think the audiences that are actually viewing these blogs and videos are made up of the people who already support the candidate. Most people I know will only visit sites of candidates with views they already agree with and already think they will vote for because they want to learn more about their guy or girl they decided they're voting for. This allows the public to receive one-sided information. I think that could lead to a lot more problems of people being uneducated. And personally, I think an uneducated vote, is as bad as not voting at all.
I think the presidential candidates mentioned are very smart for using the internet as a primary medium in order to accumulate supporters. Personally, i feel that these new media campaign tools wouldn't change politics much. I believe that these new media campaign tools are used for positive purposes. For example, presidential candidates are trying to get there name out there and gain supporters for what they believe in. With today's technology and interactive media, candidates are able to diffuse their campaign out through the use of the internet.
Well, I must say that I do think this could change the way that the "politics game" is played. I do see there being a much more video oriented campaigning. There is also the potential for a more niche guided campaign, recording or blogging about topics that you think the target audience might like. On the other hand I think that people need to be responsible in what gets posted. And since we have proven that we can't do that, I see that it could get dirty. One side blaming another for false statements, ect. There is no way to really stop this from happening either. Without regulations of politics on the internet, there are no fair time restrictions so It could be the cheapest medium to use , not to mention almost completely unanimous. It will be interesting to see where Internet Campaigns will go...
I searched iTunes’s news and politics section for campaigns expecting to see Ron Paul heading up the popularity ranking and surprisingly I see Barack Obama, not once, but three times. The top four section, the area with podcast icons, are of Obama, the fourth is Times. This didn’t make sense considering all the news I read about Ron Paul making the most of the Internet as a campaign tool. That is until I came across the story “WEB 2.0 MEETS CAMPAIGN 2008.” Within that story is a link to listing of Web traffic among candidates, Paul isn’t even listed because his sample size isn’t large enough, not surprisingly though, Obama is leading the pack for February traffic, the latest month. In retrospect, the only real surprise is why Obama was the only major candidate to appear on the iTunes listing, it might have been a search parameter mistake, but I’m not sure.
As far as the impact that Web 2.0 could have on politics, interactivity is definitely the main change. Television and other non-interactive media forms will continue to lose appeal when it comes to getting a message across. The people now receiving, remixing and repackaging the message are average citizens. As an article put it, there are only a few Americans who can donate $2,000 checks when compared to the vast middle class. The smaller donations of the larger middle class are adding up fast for candidates who know how to take advantage of this opportunity.
That same article, for the life of me I can’t find it, said something else that was even more interesting. When a politician is no longer beholden to a few key donors and fulfilling promises made in return for their contributions, a new method of politics emerges, one that does a better job than our current one for representing the people, that some say is controlled by lobbyists and other influential parties.
I think the best that could come of candidates who courted people directly, is a person who could vote directly for the candidate. Abolish the Electoral College and allow people to vote for their president, that would be the ultimate form of interactivity.
Reaching out to people online is a good way to campaign. I know personally, I spend hours on the web daily. Between classes, at work, for my own personal use. A lot of times I find myself googling pointless stuff, and it makes me feel a little more accomplished when I do something productive like read about candidates. Certain websites offer a non-biased opinion on candidates. I think these websites are most beneficial to the everyday working man.
Let's face it, the internet makes most sense when it comes to campaigning. It's cheap and effective. I do think that politics should end at campaigning on the web rather than pursuing anything like voting.
I'm glad to see that Washington is being smart about trying to reach the public through a new and faster medium. This is a great way for candidates to reach the college age demographic. There are obviously positives and negatives to using this medium. The positives are that it is a fast way to put out information to mass amount of people and that using sites like Facebook attract a young adult type of crowd. Especially with all of the political applications that Facebook offers, it is a cool way to reach out. The negatives are that information that the candidate may not want released can spread quickly across the net. Also, something like the Howard Dean incident, could end a candidate's campaign. Dean was mocked so horribly for a speech that was cut and edited to exaggerate the intensity of his "scream." Overall, I'm looking forward to seeing how the net and Web 2.0 will affect the 2008 election.
I believe this new approach taken by political candidates is a great new way to get their messages into the minds of young voters. This style of presentation is cost-effective and quick, thus allowing a greater degree of retention.
This is the first election that I've used the web as my primary method of research on. It's always easier to tune into Fox News or CNN to hear what someone has to say, but the problem I had was that they weren't always talking about the issues I was concerned with, and if they were it was likely tainted by the channel or broadcaster. I've used the different blogs and presidential myspace pages to get what I feel is an accurate gauge on all of the candidates. In the end, what this process does is create a much more informed and educated voter, which in turn creates a more balanced society in which we can all prosper.
I can always enjoy some good Howard Dean screaming! I like the way it was teamed up with the psycho prarie dog. I think its pretty cool how candidates are using the web and how the web can potentially influence and win and election. I had no idea Jesse Ventura won because of the web. I didnt know he utilized the web in such a way! It makes sense to have online donating. I have seen Hillary all over the web. I first noticed her about a month ago on myspace and heavily on YouTUbe. While I wont comment on her, I will say her campaign is thoroughly impressive with their use of new media and the web as a medium to get more facetime and attention.
I agree very much with the use of the Internet for this particular purpose. More people are able to hear about issues that perhaps were not able to be reached before. For example, public libraries provide internet access to those who may not have it at home. As far as online voting goes, there will always be problems with security and fraud. I'm not sure how that will be solved, but I do agree with Kristen when she mentioned that people are more so affected by things they "see" versus "read".
However, using Web 2.0 with politics opens a lot of doors. Although candidates can help themselves, other parties can just as effectively have a negative impact on that candidate. It all depends on how the govt. plans to regulate things, if it's even possible!
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