Campaign 2008; How the Internet has Made Supporting a Candidate an Interactive Process

Based on view counts, most shared, most discussed, top rated and general popularity, the Top 10 Videos of 2007 was released by YouTube this past December. Among the videos, one in particular, achieved over 7 million hits for a music video revering a democratic candidate.

“I Got a Crush on Obama” is an amateur produced music video, created by the group, Obama’s Girl. While the video is unique, in that it portrays a girl who has fallen for Sen. Barack Obama, it is not the only politically based YouTube video that has gained mass popularity. In fact “three of the dozen most popular videos on YouTube this month [March] are about Barack Obama, not Paris or Lindsay or Britney,” reports David Carr in a New York Times article, “More Than a Sound Bite, This Clip has Some Teeth.”

While many YouTube videos reflect issues in popular culture, politically focused videos that have gained popularity over the past year reflect the use and role of the internet in the 2008 political election.

Specifically, the advent of the internet has revolutionized the ways in which we collect information with regard to news. News is no longer limited to specified morning and primetime timeslots, or even the morning paper; the public is provided with a variety of news sources ranging from constantly updated news websites such as CNN and  The Times, in addition to user generated sites such as blogs, YouTube and social networking sites. This is particularly important in terms of understanding the internet’s role in the 2008 campaign.

A study conducted by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, entitled The Internet’s Broader Role in Campaign 2008, revealed that nearly a quarter of Americans have indicated that they learned something about the campaign from the internet. This is approximately double the percentage of those who learned something from the internet about the 2004 campaign.

However, one of the most striking findings of this study revealed that the internet has become a leading source of campaign news for young people. Over 40 percent of individuals between the age of 18 to 29 revealed that they learned about the campaign from the internet, which is double the percentage of young people who said that learned about the campaign from the internet in 2000.

A brief look at voting practices amongst youths ages 18 to 24 over the past several years reveals that voting decreased after the Vietnam War; however voter participation increased from 36 Percent in 2000 to 47 percent in 2004, says Susan Milligan of the Boston Globe in the article, “Youth Voters a Force in ‘08 Race.”

In the past, young voters have played a “marginal role in electoral politics,” Milligan says. However, “they have emerged as a powerful new force in the 2008 elections and are poised to determine the next president as a result of an explosion in political activity among youth.”

Milligan suggests that increased young voter participation may be attributed to the advent of the internet, which has provided young people with a “cheap and efficient tool to organize rallies, recruit volunteers and exchange information about candidates.”

Similarly, an article written by Brian Stelter in the New York Times entitled, “Finding Political News Online, the Young Pass It On,” reveals that the internet has made the political process into a “social one.” He suggests that “according to interviews and recent surveys, young voters tend to be not just consumers of news and current events, but act as conduits as well — sending out e-mail links and videos to friends and their social networks.”

In an effort to clarify his point, Stelter quotes the director of Pew Internet and American Life Project, Lee Rainie, who suggests “They [young voters] read a news story and then blog about it, or they see a YouTube video and then link to it, or they go to a campaign Web site, download some phone numbers and make calls on behalf of a candidate.”

As a result, the internet has transformed the way we gather political information. We are no longer forced to serve as passive observers of the political process. The internet has provided us with the opportunity to gather as much or as little information needed to shape our political perceptions, a medium to communicate with others who share similar political views and even a way for voters to communicate directly with political candidates.

Making its debut in the 2008 presidential election campaign is WikiCandidate, a site that allows users to contribute to a campaign site for a hypothetical presidential candidate. The site displays a user-generated biography of Maria Montoya Correa, a native New Yorker of Catholic descent. Theoretically, WikiCandidate should portray what the public would like to see in a presidential candidate.

From the wire service to the blogosphere: How the public gets its news

New media, specifically the blogosphere, proves to be a unique news media outlet in that it does not subscribe to traditional journalistic standards of unbiased reporting. As newspaper sales continue to fall, more and more people are turning to the internet as their primary source of news. From the far left to the far right — and everywhere in between — the internet is teaming with bloggers and news junkies who are reporting the news in unprecedented ways. Today, the news media is becoming freed from its traditional emphasis on unbiased reporting, with amateur media production continues to blur the line between fact and opinion.

On the left side of the spectrum is Daily Kos, a blog that was started in 2002 by Markos “Kos” Moulitsas, when “an oppressive and war-crazed administration suppressed all dissent as unpatriotic and treasonous.” Kos, a war veteran, currently serves as a writer for the site that averages over one million hits per day and has a staff of over 20 writers and editors.

Daily Kos does not shroud its inherent political bias behind a veil of political correctness. Instead, it analyzes the news in a manner that makes its views and opinions clear and it seems as though its readers are walking the same line. According to a Daily Koss poll that asked readers about their willingness to vote for Sen. John McCain in November, 50 percent, or 6,555 voters, stated “You could not get me to vote for McCain even if you staked me out on a fire ant hill and poured honey on my privates.” Trailing behind in second place, with 23 percent of the votes, was the response “Short of torture, I would not vote for McCain.” Only one percent of voters said that they thought McCain would make a good president.

The Huffington Post exemplifies how technology has influenced the news media. HuffPost, which describes itself as “the internet newspaper,” has an obvious political slant, yet advertises itself as an outlet for news about politics, media, business and entertainment. On May 13, HuffPost ran a post entitled “Pentagon Propaganda ‘Analysts’ Made 4,500 Media Appearances,” which cited that members of the Pentagon media analyst program appeared on television news stations as retired military “media analysts” over 4,500 times. HuffPost editorializes the story most perceptibly by putting the work “propaganda” in the headline. Additionally, the post criticizes the news media, stating that The New York Times, which initially broke the story, “has done little to advance its blockbuster story since it was first reported.”

Towards the center of the spectrum is The Caucus, a blog where the political staff of The New York Times follows the 2008 presidential election campaign trail. While loyal Times readers may be inclined to say that the paper is in favor of Sen. Hillary Clinton — who received support from the paper’s editorial board — The Times’ blog generally veers away from making any outwardly editorialized statements. What differentiates The Caucus from other political blogs such as Daily Kos and HuffPost is the users who generate the sites’ content. Daily Kos and HuffPost can be classified as amateur blogs, in that content is produced by people who have no affiliation with the professional news media. On the other hand, The Caucus is written by the staff of The Times, a corporation whose reputation is dependent on their claim to report unbiased news content.