Republicans still operate in a world of Web 0.5.

At least that’s what Republican Web strategist in Washington and former Capitol Hill press secretary, David All argues in The Politico this week. And I guess there’s no point for me to argue against that. While some attribute this disparity to activist energy on the left, a hatred of President Bush or even dissatisfaction among Republican supporters with their own stable of candidates, All offers another reason: Republicans have failed to place a premium on an effective Internet strategy.

So what can the Republicans do to close the digital divide and get from Web 0.5 to Web 2.0?

According to All:

“To head off electoral catastrophe, Republicans should take immediate steps to improve their technological game. They can begin by creating a nationwide network of state and local blogs. Democrats, after all, proudly tout their legions of "blogging boots on the ground," which feed political intelligence back to a central outlet. From that central feed, thousands of blogs throughout the nation echo the narrative, driving news stories and changing the political landscape. Republicans can and should do the same to better tap into niche markets of supporters who are willing to fight the battle -- wherever it is.”

“To better leverage the power of collaborative fundraising, Republicans should also follow the example of the left wing's ActBlue.com. There, Democratic candidates from City Hall to the White House can create an account to direct funds to their cause. ActBlue allows its users to find supporters wherever they assemble -- not just at the party's website.”

If you are interested in finding out more about the aspects where the Republicans are stronger than the Democrats online go read All’s excellent post in The Politicos.

Update:

Todd Zeigler offers an excellent contribution to the conversation over at The Bivings Report. Well worth a read!

Finally, some podcasts for me!

Longtime readers of this blog (are there any besides my dad?) will probably know that I've never been fully supportive of the podcasting format. A lot of this had to do with the fact that I didn't understand how much podcasts really differed from talk radio. A lot of it also had to do with the fact that until a few weeks ago, I didn't own an mp3 player. Big Mike Seaton's Client Side podcast (and accompanying blog) are always pretty good. Maybe I've just been sold on the most recent one because it features word-of-mouth hotshot Sean Moffit. He might not be a maven or a blogger extraordinaire, but I still think he's a pretty smart guy with something to say, and I'm sorry that I'll have to miss his Mass to Grass conference. Then again, I might just think he's cool because his other nickname is Agent Wildfire.

And of course, Donna Papacosta has always got something relevant to say on her podcast without jumping on any of the social media bandwagons.

Lastly, if you haven't heard Kasper Hauser, you're not living. Subscribe to them here. Better yet, check out their website and make sure you listen to the two American Life podcasts. They don't have anything to do with today's Social Media/Web 2.0/Marketing/PR clusterfuck, but they're hilarious, so who cares?

Strumpette sees the social media light?

Not quite, but in this recent post on her blog, she seems to finally have the good sense to take a look beyond the hype. John Paul Micek's piece on her blog says nothing new to those of us who have been advocating social media for sometime now. We've always known that its not "new" so much as it is an online mirror of the real world, to paraphrase Micek. I don't think that social media or Web 2.0 are going to bring about a revolution and change the world over night, but I do think that they are going to change a lot of businesses (and not just the PR industry) over the next few years. While I agree that we are still in a POG-like state of web-fads, things will settle down. Remember when e-mail was still new, and no one really knew how to use it? I feel like we are in that stage right now, with all these new web and mobile technology developments. In the meantime, lets see what it can do for us. Just look at Strumpette. If it wasn't for the blogosphere, she'd just be another frustrated PR girl with a diary.

For now, I'm going to go get ready for Web 3.0. That's a buzzword that'll really get you going!

Espen’s Update: Ahhh, now I get it, “POG’s” - like in the stupid game all the kids played in the early-to-mid 1990’s. Parker didn't think I knew what pogs were because I'm Norwegian, but he’s wrong, I just didn’t remember. If you have a memory as short as mine, you can read more about the interesting phenomenon of “pogs” here.

Got a question for Tony Blair? Unsure of how to reach him? - Through YouTube off course!

It seems like Tony Blair is following in the footsteps of Mitt Romney. Launching “Labour-Vision”, Labour Party's new "channel" on YouTube, Blair has taken the battle for votes further into cyberspace, reports Telegraph.co.uk this week.

In a recent video Blair encourages viewers to post questions that he will respond to in YouTube, April 23. The questions he chooses to respond to will be hand picked by himself and journalist John O’Farrell, a long time supporter of the Labour Party. Telegraph.co.uk claims that Blair’s online effort is an attempt to catch up with Conservative leader David Cameron, who has been making his cyber-pitch to voters at www.webcameron.org.uk for quite a while now.

"A slightly uncomfortable-looking Prime Minister who is famously not at ease with computers or new technology" said to Telegraph.co.uk that: "The purpose of coming into the YouTube channel is to enable you to hear unmediated, fresh, first-hand, what it is we are about".

Blair’s video has so far been viewed 28,004 times, received 207 comments and a couple of video questions.

Good effort, Blair!

Good effort Mitt!

Presidential hopeful, Mitt Romney, has posted this video on YouTube: [youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=c70pGVmh5IE]

I think it is a good effort by Romney to make use of social networking tools, to reach out to a broad audience, and to at least pretend he is interested in engaging voters in a conversation that can change America.

Personal Democracy reports that other bloggers feel otherwise:

It looks like YouTube's new "Spotlight" feature and it's first entry, a video from Mitt Romney, are hits. Some bloggers were underwhelmed by Romney's question ("what do you believe is America's single greatest challenge, and what would you do to address it?"). After viewing Romney's video, Steve Bryant at NewTeeVee wrote, "Wow, color me disenchanted already, Mitt. You’ve somehow managed to take the most interactive platform in the world and simply repeat bland politico-speak." Another viewer commented, "The questions for these political YouTube videos need to be more specific. General topics leave no room for addressing specific problems in a specific way." Nevertheless, the video has garnered over 110,000 thousand views, 573 text comments, and 27 video comments. Sarah Wheaton at the  Caucus has a roundup of some of the comments, from both supporters and detractors. People are certainly responding to this direct approach, so chalk up one for YouTube and Romney.

Do we (bloggers) need a code of conduct?

A proposed code of conduct for bloggers has been drafted by Tim O’Reilly, the man that came up with the term Web 2.0, and Jimmy Wales, creator of Wikipedia. The draft can be viewed on O’Reilly’s blog.

Computer Active reports that the code of conduct aims to stop harassment and crudity in language often found in blogs by giving bloggers the right to delete items that could be deemed as libelous or false or any content they feel misrepresents another person, without facing allegations of censorship. Those who post such blogs could also be subject to legal pursuit.

O’Reilly and Wales suggest that implementing the codes of conduct would be up to each individual blogger - those intending to exclude abusive comments on their blogs would include a logo reading "Civility enforced", while uncensored blogs would bear an "Anything goes " label, Computer Active reports.

The question is: Do we really need a stipulated code of conduct?

Most of us already work under the norms that O’Reilly and Wales have drafted - so will anyone bother to link to them, as the two masterminds suggest we should do? Don’t get me wrong, the draft is good and the norms and ideas are what we all should follow if you ask me, but regulated blogging… I am not convinced yet.

There are off course some organizations that are extremely critical to the whole thing, like the Cyber-Rights and Cyber- Liberties which see the code of conduct as an “infringement upon freedom of expression” because it suggest that anonymous comments should be banned, reports Computer Active.

What’s your take on the topic?

Who's winning the Internet primary so far?

I obviously missed an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal last month discussing the following question: Who's winning the "Internet primary" so far?

The question has been asked by other journalists and bloggers before, but to me this is one of the most interesting questions to be brought up about the campaign so far. The reason - it brings up another interesting question: How do we measure successful electioneering via the Internet?

Unfortunately neither this article answers my question, but it does present an interesting image of an Informal Survey conducted by DailyKos asking readers how candidates perform online.

Here's the standings so far:

A conspiracy theory

It already has launched one candidacy, helped to raise record amounts of money and prompted fears about a new breed of anonymous political attack ads. But as a force in the 2008 presidential race, the Internet is just getting started. A good thing, too; with more than a year and a half to go before the actual election, the country is going to need all the help it can get to escape burnout.

In the article Political Candidates Have Invaded the Web And Tamed the Blogs Lee Gomes of the Wall Street Journal sums up the Internets role in the 2008 campaign so far. It doesn’t contain any spectacular revelations, but serves as a good summary for you new to the phenomenon.

However, Gomes writes:

The 2006 election is remembered as the "macaca election," for the YouTube video of a now-former senator making a racially insensitive remark. As a result, campaign managers all across the country advised their candidates to never do or say anything in public that they wouldn't want to see one day on YouTube.

The season of user-generated political videos has begun anew. Last month, a reworking of Apple's famous "1984" Macintosh TV commercial, with Hillary Clinton subbing for Big Brother, appeared online. It had been made on a Sunday afternoon -- on a Mac, of course -- by a now-former employee of one of the Obama campaign's contractors.

The ad came to the attention of political reporters (them again) as well as the Drudge Report and as a result, millions saw it. So now there is a new concern: that the Web will be home to similar kinds of video hit pieces for which no one will claim sponsorship.

This got me thinking: Did Apple have anything to do with the Hillary Clinton "1984" video, or am I just being a conspiracy theorist?

Will we see companies try to place their brand within the campaign in the moths to come - as a result of the attention the video received?

Whooo, I never saw myself as a conspiracy theorist. I guess I am.

New STUDIES Point to Web Prominence for 2008 Election

“MOUNTING EVIDENCE POINTS TO THE Web as a critical communications and educational tool for the 2008 Presidential election. Indeed, voters are relying on the Web more than any medium to research candidates and their positions, according to a new study from online ad network Burst Media,” reports MediaPost Publications this week.

The survey revealed that the Internet is more important to likely voters than TV, newspapers, radio, magazines, or direct mail.

By surveying 2,100 online users who are likely to vote in the 2008 Presidential election (likely voters), Burst found that:

• over 20% of likely voters have already visited a presidential candidates website; • one quarter of likely voters have clicked on a candidate or advocacy groups online advertisment; • likely voters are willing to watch a presidential candidate in an online video clip, and listen to a candidate in a podcast.

“One-quarter of likely voters cited the Internet as the best place to research candidates' positions and general election issues, according to Burst. By contrast, about a fifth--21.3%--cited TV as the ideal source of election information, while 17.3% said newspapers were their key source of information. Trailing, just 6.9% cited radio, 4.4% said magazines were best, and 3.3% cited direct mail,” reports MediaPost Publications.

In a comment to the study Bill Hobbs points out that (via TechPresident):

"Another interesting stat: Only about four in 10 survey respondents who said the Internet is the best place to gather election information have visited a candidate’s website - that means six in 10 are gathering information about presidential candidates from websites and online sources the candidates don't control."

"Message to candidates: Great campaign websites stuffed with video and blogs and podcasts aren't enough. To engage voters, you have to reach them in the wider - and wilder - world of blogs and YouTube and other social media."

But the Burst survey isn’t the only recent study to point out the impact that the web is expected to have on the 2008 Election.

PRNewswire reported yesterday that a Gomez Survey reveals that many web-savvy voters believe the candidate with the best performing web site will win the oval office.

“Nearly half of theparticipants in a nationwide survey plan to visit at least one of the 2008 presidential candidates' web sites during the campaign and, within that group, more than half are current or potential online donors. The survey, commissioned by Gomez, Inc., the leader in web application experience management, was designed to assess the impact of the performance of the 2008 presidential candidates' web sites on their race to the White House.”

“Of the 43 percent of survey respondents who have already visited or who plan to visit one of more of the candidate’s web sites, 58 percent believe there will be a correlation between the candidate with the best performing web site and the ultimate winner of the presidential race.”

So, there we have it, the political world IS changing, as David All of TechPresident reports.

I do not doubt the Internet will, and are all ready have/having a significant impact on the 2008 Election!

A parody of democracy ...or?

“The blogosphere, in short, is a reliable vehicle for the coagulation of opinion and the poisoning of debate. It is a fact of civic life that is changing how politics is conducted - overwhelmingly for the worse, and with no one accountable for the decline.” At least these are the words of Oliver Kamm, author of Anti-Totalitarianism: the Left-Wing Case for a Neoconservative Foreign Policy.

In his op/ed A parody of democracy in the Guardian this week Kamm writes:

“Blogs are providers not of news but of comment. This would be a good thing if blogs extended the range of available opinion in the public sphere. But they do not; paradoxically, they narrow it. This happens because blogs typically do not add to the available stock of commentary: they are purely parasitic on the stories and opinions that traditional media provide. If, say, Polly Toynbee or Nick Cohen did not exist, a significant part of the blogosphere (a grimly pretentious neologism) would have no purpose and nothing to react to.”

“The great innovation of web-based commentary is that readers may select minutely the material they are exposed to. The corollary is that they may filter out views they find uncongenial. This is a problem for a healthy democracy, which depends on a forum for competing views.”

“In its paucity of coverage and predictability of conclusions, the blogosphere provides a parody of democratic deliberation. But it gets worse. Politics, wrote the philosopher Michael Oakeshott, is a conversation, not an argument. The conversation bloggers have with their readers is more like an echo chamber, in which conclusions are pre-specified and targets selected. The outcome is horrifying. The intention of drawing readers into the conversation by means of a facility for adding comments results in an immense volume of abusive material directed - and recorded for posterity - at public figures.”

Interesting way to see it – Though, I must say that if blogs can encourage more people to become involved in a democratic “conversation” and change power structures by giving more people a voice, we have no reason to worry yet.

Daniel Finkelstein,Stephen Pollard and Norman Geras has also criticised Kamm for being wrong in his claims.

The Decoy Effect – Why we seek simple answers and third candidates matter

Mankind = simple. There, I said it. But didn't we fly to the moon and invent paper towels? Agreed. But after reading this fascinating piece from the Washington Post you feel the legacy of the caveman within you.Ok, let's say someone gave you the choice to go to a nearby three star restaurant or to a five star gourmet temple that's far away: An inhumane brain-torturing dilemma – because the our brian, never mind Apollo Missions, seeks easy answers. But then a third option shows up: A four star restaurant that's even further away than the five star one. All of a sudden the five star gourmet temple looks quite attractive – it's better and closer than the third option. Now replace restaurant/ gourmet temple with Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and John Edwards:

What the decoy effect basically shows is that when people cannot decide between two front-runners, they use the third candidate as a sort of measuring stick. If one front-runner looks much better than the third candidate, people gravitate toward that front-runner. Third candidates, in other words, can make a complicated decision feel simple.

Let's say you are a centrist Democratic voter who cannot decide between Clinton and Obama because you want a candidate who is strong on national security but also someone fresh. You like Clinton on one measure and Obama on the other. Enter Edwards, whom you see as more dovish than Obama but part of the same establishment as Clinton. Obama looks better than Edwards on both counts, whereas Clinton beats Edwards on only the national security issue.

What do we learn from that? By drawing attention to the qualities of the third candidate that make your front-runner look better you can turn him into your wingman. Also: Life can be so simple. Or made simple for you for that matter. Back to the caves!

via Seth's blog

Who keeps saying that newspapers are dead?

How long has it been since people started talking about the death of newspapers? I know its a hot topic these days as blogging goes mainstream, wireless internet is everywhere , and laptops are increasingly affordable, but that doesn't mean that people will stop reading newspapers. Or maybe they will, but I certainly don't look forward to replacing the Globe and Mail with my laptop during a leisurely breakfast. I like getting crumbs all over the paper, setting my coffee down on a section I've just read, letting the pages take up the entire table. If I spill some ketchup, the paper just soaks it up.

Plus there is the whole appeal of reading on the printed page rather than a computer screen. I recently heard Tod Maffin talk at an IABC breakfast in Toronto, and he said something about how people read less efficiently when light is projected at them (as in a computer screen) versus when light is reflected off what they are reading (as in a newspaper or book). I can't remember the exact reason (and if anyone wants to fill me in, it would be much appreciated) but I think it had something to do with the fight or flight response hardwired into our brains.

With my laptop, I feel like I'm working, like I've got a million things that I should be doing and I keep opening windows to get them done while engaging in online conversations. With the newspaper, I know that the only thing I've got to do is read the next section. If its the sports or real estate section, I can let it pass. When I'm finished reading, I don't feel like I've missed anything.

Anyone else feel the same way?

(note: I was going to link to the Globe and Mail website, but that would sort of defeat the purpose of this post, wouldn't it?)

Josh Wolf released after 226 days in prison

He's free. Finally. For more information check Wolf's blog.

Postmodern media-spheres: The wisdom of crowds hits the campaign trail

Tired of modernist nagging? Having the suspicion that the Frankfurt School became old school decades ago? Sick of your parents complaining that the world is going down the drain because they're not able to press a button on a joypad (= are not media literate)?! I have the balm for your tortured soul: Postmodernism media-spheres. While doing research for my thesis I came across this little piece (Cunningham, Stuart: "History, Contexts, Politics, Policy" in Turner, Graeme; Cunningham, Stuart (ed.): The Australian TV Book, Allen & Unwin, 2000):

Traditional concepts of influence came from a time when old media were new and people were trying to grasp on what they might mean for society. Now there is widespread media literacy and... [it should be] acknowledged that media content is simply part and parcel of the landscape and that it matters less for what it can do to people than what people can do with it (get jobs, find self-expression and community and cultural expression, communicate globally etc.). This view radically flattens the topography of the haves and have-nots and renders issues of ownership and control of marginal significance.

For anyone in doubt: Check the latest HuffPost project. Working with Newassignment.net they are recruiting large groups of citizen journalists from around the country to cover the major presidential candidates:

Each of these volunteer reporter/bloggers will contribute to a candidate-specific group blog -- offering written updates, campaign tidbits, on-the-scene observations, photos, or original video... Each offering a wide variety of voices and perspectives on the campaign they are following. These group blogs will also be a compendium of useful information about each candidate, including their latest speeches, upcoming appearances, new videos and ads, recent news articles and more.

Our citizen journalists will be independent -- focused on their piece of the puzzle, and not what everyone around them thinks. They will be decentralized -- spread across the country, with no one on high giving them their marching orders. And they will be as diverse as possible -- a mix of campaign insiders devoted to their candidates, neutral outsiders, passionate partisans and steely-eyed observers. The mosaic of their perspectives will add a varied portrait to the traditional coverage of the candidates and their campaigns.

Goddammit, you gotta love postmodernism!

Influential technology, Filthy politics – Cambodia 2007

This makes me sick:

“If You Think Mobile Technology Does Not Influence Elections then consider why in the days leading up to the national elections in Cambodia SMS / text messaging was turned off. Apparently, the National Election Committee of Cambodia has asked that SMS be shut down from March 31 to April 1 at 3pm, because "it can be used as a tool for election campaign by political parties".” (From TechPresident).

Though, having traveled through Cambodia and seen the things the regime is capable of doing, this does not surprise me at all.

Obama's online fundraising strategy

Here's a lesson from the Obama Campaign: From Mydd's post People make the Campaign.

Here's something original from the Obama campaign, and it's smart too. Instead of showcasing the financial amount raised, they are showcasing the number of people that have contributed to the campaign. I went back to put the number in perspective, by comparing it with Dean's 2003 numbers. And in comparison with Dean's 1st quarter results, the number is absolutely astounding.

Jerome Armstrong points out in his Mydd post:

What Obama is doing with this metric that's smart is setting it up as a parallel process number to the total amount raised in the quarter. They know that Clinton is likely to raise a lot more money than Obama will, perhaps $40 Million? So even if Obama gets half that, he has the number of contributors to point toward as a people-powered marker in the process.

But the lesson doesn't stop here. Here's what one of Mydd's readers had to say about the campaigns fundraising efforts:

I recieved a phone call yesterday evening at around 7:30 pm. The caller identified herself as being with the Obama Campaign. She was very professional and courteous. She thanked me for my last donation and even stated the amout. Then she began telling me about this campaign and how we needed to reach the goal. I told her I actually donated as soon as it was posted and I also told her to keep up the good work and she said "Thank You". I was excited. She was excited. It was great.

Smart moves, both. Keep up the good work!

Blog PR Versus Mainstream Media PR

Although blogs are now pretty basic instruments in the media landscape, many PR people still don't know how to deal with them. They're either afraid of them, ambivalent towards them, or, they treat them like a high school newspaper. If that's how you're treating blogs, you're going to create trouble for yourself. Are you doing PR or political campaign work and don't quite know how to approach bloggers? Maybe this post can help you then.

It's a 'how to (and how not to) approach bloggers list' presented by PR Fuel. Well worth having a look at.

(via TechPresident)

Technicity and Second Life

If all journalists canceled their Second Life subscription, the virtual swingerclub would be an even lonelier place than it already is… Maybe 3D browsing is the future and SL the first step. But for know I have to wonder why anyone could be bothered to have a presence yet alone to do campaign work in an environment that looks like the abortion of a late 90s video game.While I was having these thoughts I stumbled upon Dovey and Kenneddy‘s "Game Cultures. Computer Games as New Media". In their book they introduce the term technicity, which they define as

that aspect of identity expressed through the subject‘s relationship with technology. Particular tastes and their associated cultural networks have always been marked by particular technologies. However, our increasingly intimate relations with and through digital media and communications technologies intensify the identity/ technology interface. Technicities associated with the consumption and manipulation of digital technologies become key characteristics of the preferred subject of twenty-first century capitalism.

We would argue that this notion of technical virtuosity, of a particular easy adoption of and facility with technology, is a fundamental aspect of the contemporary ideal subject within the technosphere. We want to insist, that this historical moment produces technological competence as a key marker for success as a participant in the modern culture.

Aha! Ideal subject through the manipulation of digital technology! Politicians need the cultural capital of the early adaptors, the cultural cool of their interns with their iPods and Myspaces and Youtubes. They need to appear as successful participants in modern culture, just like all these hip guys in the technosphere of the web (and not like your [grand]parents). Didn't we somehow suspect that? Anyways, now you got the words to show off with!

Numbers, numbers, numbers

This story finally reached Australia: Ghosts of blogging haunt net cemetery The Australian reports:

"Lohan's blog has since taken its place in the internet's fastest-growing graveyard - of an estimated 200 million blogs that have been started, then abandoned."

Here's the source for the story: Bloggers: All Typed Out? which reports:

Are you a blogger? if so, you're in good company. Blog search engine Technorati pegged the number of active blogs at around 56 million this past October. By January 2007 that number had grown to 63.2 million, with 175,000 new blogs begun each day.

Sounds like a big number, but it turns out that the graveyard of the blogosphere is even bigger. Half of all new bloggers abandon ship within three months, Technorati estimates. And last December, research firm Gartner calculated the total number of dead, abandoned blogs at more than 200 million. Gartner went on to forecast that the total number of active blogs would peak at 100 million in 2007 before dropping back and leveling off at around 30 million.

Here's my question: 200 million abandoned blogs? Where did they get this numbers from? I can't find the original source.

If ancient Rome had the Internet...

My first thought was online orgies and people getting confused with the websites of the People's Front of Judea and the Judean People's Front.Look at what the people at No man is an iland marketing blog have to say. My favourites:

- The soothsayer's "Ides of March" email fails to get Caesar's proper attention as it's inadvertently filtered into his junk folder. - The owner of hadriansucks.rome is compelled to hand over both the domain name and selected body parts by an independent domain tribunal chaired by...Emperor Hadrian. - Websites like handsome-literate-male-british-slave.com pollute the search listings thanks to generous commissions at the slaves.co.rome affiliate program. - Roman programmers moan about projects outsourced to cheap coders in Mesopotamia.

And now: Romani ite domum!