The Kids Aren't Alright

I figured I would join everyone else in the class and comment on Nielsen’s Usability for Teenagers. I guess it might be different if you were concerned about non-profits, but in a campaign, teens just don't matter. They can't vote; also in federal elections they can't donate. Now if there was a greater trade off, I might be more opposed, but in general I don't think there is much use in spending too much time making a campaign website appealing to people under 18. It just doesn't strike me as an efficient use of time. I think there’s really only 3 things a website can get you, votes, volunteers or dollars, and teens could only be volunteers and I think that is unlikely to happen. Any Teen actually interested in volunteering would not be discouraged by something not 100% teen friendly. Considering how tuned out they are already, it would be quite a level of interest for them to be involved either way.

Creating Internet Evangelists

I'm reading Creating Customer Evangelists, which is about creating word of mouth buzz and the authors include their six tenants, and I thought they were exactly the type of things we have been talking about all semester. Despite this not being part of the reading, I think it is highly relevant to the course.

1. Customer Plus-Delta: Continuously gather customer feedback.
2. Napsterize knowledge: Make it a point to share knowledge freely.
3. Build the buzz: Expertly build word of mouth networks.
4. Create community: Encourage communities of costumers to meet and
share.
5. Make bite-size chunks: Deliver specialized small offerings to get
costumers to bit.
6. Create a cause: Focus on making the world, or an industry,
better.

I would add more insight, but I think it pretty much says it all.

Message Problems

After watching most of the online videos from the campaigns and national committees, they seemed to follow the theme of the campaign, the DNC ones were better, but the RNC ones were constantly on message. The ones from RNC hit on two consistent themes; Kerry is an aloof flip flopper, that's it. The DNC ones attack Bush on, the economy, the environment, his military record, Halliburton, well basically everything under the sun. It was just like Kerry's campaign, no focus, the DNC is just attacking on so many fronts that it is too weak for anything to stick. Moral of the story is you need a message, and you have to carry that message to the Internet.

Responding Inkind

One of the big rules of political advertising is to make sure no attack goes unresponded to on the same medium. Online videos and viral marketing can make that tough to do. In the factcheck on the Bush online video attacking Kerry shows the problem. The Bush campaign sent a misleading video to 6 million, then add to that the number of times the video was forwarded, and its even more. How does Kerry respond? He can't respond because he doesn't have Bush's list and he doesn't know who it was forwarded to. He could send it to his list, but there is probably very little overlap between the two. Beyond that, there is no accountability, sure there is factcheck.org, but it's a small site, if it was a TV ad, the mainstream media would be all over it, but now its just on the Internet. Using online videos and viral marketing you can attack your opponent basically without consequence and fear of retaliation in-kind.

Online Videos

I just read the article on Online Videos and was very interested. Online videos have a lot of potential, and almost anyone can do it now because of the available technology. For better or worse they could really be more dangerous than the 527 ads now. A guy in his basement can splice together a few TV appearances of a candidate and whatever else he likes, go to a large blog like dailykos and post it and lots of people are going to see it. Those people are going to pass it on to other people and then maybe it finds its way into the news. All from one guy, who may remain completely anonymous, and wouldn't have to file any sort of record. With everything being so accessible, streaming video of c-span, being able to transfer tivoed shows onto your computer, transcripts of talk shows, lexisnexis, for even an amatuer it would be pretty easy to get what you need. Politicians beware.

Oh Yes

I am sitting outside in what has to be the most perfect temperature ever, drinking beer and listening to some sweet 97 phunky ass Phish. Translation, I'm the happiest man alive.

Do We Really Need An Influentials Strategy?

This may seem counterintuitive to a lot of people, but reading the article I came at it from two different angles. First, when reading the tactics for engaging the influentials online, it wasn't anything we hadn't been talking about using all along. My second point is, with 70% of people engaged in online politics being influentials, why should our online campaign be geared towards anything else? Ultimately it comes down to the fact that we don't need to have a separate influentials strategy, we just need to call it what it really is, our Internet Strategy.

Password Protected

I was reading the chapter on GOTV in the Winning Elections Online, even though I know it isn't part of this weeks reading, and I was very intrigued by the idea of distributing phone and walk lists through a password protected site. This was not because I had never heard of the idea before, but because the mention of disturbing phone lists gave me an idea. Now being vaguely familiar with CATI (computer assisted telephone interview) systems, it occurred to me that it could be set up in such a way that by accessing it would give the user the ability to use a similar system. Now this would allow the user a full interactive script to be able to use for more intensive voter IDing. That data could also go directly to the campaign's database. Now it might be able to go even further, while hooking up your home phone to the computer might be a hassle, but maybe not for your cell phone. My friend had just moved a new place that didn't have an Internet connection yet, her cell phone did. She was able to take her laptop and plug it into her cell phone and connect to the Internet. If you can do that, then surely you should be able to plug your cell phone into your computer and with a click of the mouse have it call, just like a real CATI system does. I think the possibilities with this could be great, not only could you do ID calls; you could have all the candidates issues scripted out and available at the touch of a button. There are just a ton of options that could make people anywhere are critical part of the campaign.

Every American heart feels for the British people

"Every American heart feels for the British people and the families of those killed and injured in today's horrific terrorist bombings in London. As a country which has also experienced tragedy at the hands of cowardly killers and which keeps faith with the special alliance Prime Minister Tony Blair reaffirmed on September 11th, our thoughts and prayers are with you.

"In addition to words of condolence and condemnation, America should offer every assistance to Great Britain in dealing with the aftermath of this tragedy and in hunting down and destroying those responsible. We must reaffirm that cold blooded killers will not for a moment stop the critical work of the G-8 nations in showing the world the strength of our shared values and our commitment to ending poverty around the globe. The terrorists should hear from all of us today: the future belongs not to fear, but to freedom. We must also be vigilant here at home to take every step needed to complete the unfinished work of homeland security, strengthening our port security, rail security, protecting chemical plants, and securing loose nuclear materials abroad. While these attacks remind us that the fight is far from over, they also strengthen our resolve to stand together for the right of free people to live in a peaceful world."

John Kerry's Statement on Today's Attack from LightUpTheDarkness

A Digital Divide?

Reading the chapter on Congressional websites there was one question bothering me, how do the characteristics of the district affect the Internet use? Are wealthier Congressional Districts more likely to have an excellent website than a poorer district? Does demand for a website affect the quality? With an incomplete dataset it would be tough to draw a real conclusion, but of the 10 websites cited, only 3 had median incomes below the national average and those same three were the only ones whose poverty level exceeded the national average. Together the ten averaged a median income of $46,000 and 11.8% below the poverty line. While it cannot be fully explored here, I would hypothesize that district wealth plays some part in the quality of a Congressional website.

The Irony

Reading Dennis Johnson's book and the chapter The E-Mail Overload the apparent effects of e-mail become ironic. While the Internet and e-mail have made contacting your representative much easier, at the same time it as pushed the representative further away from the contact. E-mail essentially made it too easy to contact your representative. With hill staffers already overworked and underpaid, representatives are forced to turn to even more impersonal ways to handle all of the correspondences. So in the end, the Internet has made contacting your representative easier, it has also managed to make it less effective.

The Dangers of Congressional Blogging

There is an inherent danger in blogging as an elected official because of the uncontrollable nature of the beast. A good example of this was a year or so ago when Kos posted something saying he didn't care about mercenaries who were killed in Iraq. The Republicans jumped on it and attacked every Democrat running for office who was advertising on his site, and most of them relented and ended up pulling their advertisements in protest to his comments. Just a side note, the NRSC was advertising on Free Republic at the same time this happened, and the level of venom spewed by the posters on that site is unparalleled by anything on the left, so there was a clear double standard. Blogging just has a certain level of uncontrollability to it that is going to scare a lot of candidates and elected officials, and the ones that aren't like John Conyers or Louise Slaughter probably aren't going to be hurt by anything said. It's a shame because the uncontrolled nature of blogging is what gives it so much of its draw.

Better Start Watching

With the surprise announcement of Sandra Day O'Connor today, there is an excellent opportunity to see politics and the new media in action. Both sides are going to be full speed ahead as soon as possible. I think what happens over the next 24 hours through the use of the Internet will be an incredible case study in the power of the Internet in politics. There is already a post at Daily Kos of ways you can get involved. Before the Internet the time it would take to mobilize would be exponentially greater. It is great, for observation, that this happened during the time we are all taking this class. It is especially interesting because of the rapid mobilization that will take place. A large part of the real battle will be how well the sides organize in the next 24 hours and the Internet will be critical to the effort.