The Undecided Voter

With the conventions right around the corner, the polling and race for getting the voting percentage is getting tight.  So early.  VP candidates have not even been chosen yet and McCain and Obama are duking it out over the undecided votes.  I guess the early  bird does get the worm.  

In an Wall Street Journal Blog post, Quinnipiac University Polling Institute says undecided voters are concerned about the economy and homeland security.  This gives McCain and advantage, according to the blog posting.

This concept got me thinking (something I don’t try to do to often).  Does this mean that undecided voters are just careful decision makers?  Is it possible that decided voters make emotional decisions?  

In a series of Quinnipac University polls, it was found that “These voters, who make up about one-fifth of the electorate, think the Iraq war was a mistake for the U.S. — which is a cornerstone of Sen. Obama’s campaign — yet they are more comfortable with the proposed solution suggested by Sen. McCain.” 

Even this statement is full of uncertainty.  Maybe I should chose this guy because I think the war is a mistake, but I am concerned about my security and this other guy is with a party whom has protected us, or at least we have thought has protected us for the past 7 years.  

This tells me that the undecided voter is someone who doesn’t walk into a a car dealership and buy a car on the first visit.  Talk about micro-targeting! No wonder Karl Rove did so well.

Obama Travels. New Meda takes it and Runs.

Now, my headline might be a little bit misleading.  News organizations are running with this story as well.  Anytime a political figure heads to a war zone the public is interested.  However, Sen McCain the opposing candidate and other congressional leaders have spent a lot of time in Iraq and Afghanistan.   Why now?  Is this a political game? Of course it is.  All bets are off when it comes to a Presidential race.  

Today Obama met with the Iraqi Prime Minister, and is focusing the message on troop with drawl and even some what of a surge in Afghanistan. 

In an effort to counter attack media and blog attention from Obama’s travels, Sen McCain made the rounds on the morning shows and ended up making a big gaffe. 

There are certain dangers to aggressive media counterattack techniques.  The problem is before blogs these things wouldn’t have been posted too youtube in seconds and already circulating through out the blogosphere.  The speed of news is accelerating by the day. 

The interesting thing is while McCain’s gaffe on Good morning America is all over the Internet, video of Obama in Iraq has yet to be found.  I realize it it is only several hours later, but isn’t it interesting bad news travels fast? 

There is a Presidential race going on yes, but there is a much more important race going on simultaneously.  The race of media.  Who can get their message out the fastest, with out gaffes?  who can control the message?  And who comes out looking as if they are on top?

This is the real race.

Lessons From Blogging

There is a website entitled cyberjournalists.net.  Having read an article from the New York Times on up and coming blogs, I found this suggestion particularly interesting.  A website that addresses the issues / feud between the world of blogging and the world of journalism.  The site discuses inner turmoil of newsrooms and how each organization is handling the use of new media.

One of the more fascinating new phenomenons is the sharing of embed video.  Most news organizations are not sharing video due to various copyright and other legal issues.  MSNBC however has broken the mold.  Click on this site to watch President and Publisher Charlie Tillinghast discuss why they started allowing any user copy their embed code and use their videos.

In the video Tillinghast describes what used to be the way of the average youtube / blog user.   A user would TiVo or DVR a program such as a nightly news broadcast and use the finished product and post it on youtube in any fashion they wanted.  

By allowing users to copy embed code MSNBC is once again controlling the message.  TIllinghast discusses how often times the way a user records video depends on the quality of it, as well as the quality of the audio and video once it is posted to the web.   Using trained professionals who put the content together in the first place distribute the video via the Internet eliminates the middle man.  It also puts the power back in the hands of the news organization.

The more and more I have studied the concept of blogging it appears that bloggers are media’s watchdog.  Sites like cyberjournalists.net, mediabistro, and wonkette all exist to keep the media in check.  So stealing back the embed process might seem like a blessing for blogers, but perhaps in the end it is completely defeating the purpose.  The message.

Microtargeting

For this weeks class we read a series of politically based articles on the use of micro-targeting in political campaigns.  How fascinating.  Although, is it to elementary to think of voters as just consumers?  For that matter, why are we thinking of consumers in such a simplistic manner. 

For instance, as I was reading the New York Times Article on food consumption and political party affiliation, I happened to be drinking a Dr. Pepper (Red State sign) but conveniently in my drawer at work I have a stash of Bare Naked granola (so liberal).  For that matter, I happen to enjoy going to Whole Foods (again so democratic of me) as well as drinking a beer and having stuffed pizza.  

Does this mean I am a confused consumer, or a confused voter?  Perhaps both.  Those with the strongest ties to their political party tend to have very strong opinions.  They know what they believe.  To be honest with my huge blogging audience, I don’t.  So maybe Matthew Dowd has me pegged. 

As a journalist, I have learned that the more you find out about people, things you would think would ever be important, i.e. where they live, how many kids they have, shampoo they like, the more you can understand who these people are. 

So maybe the Bush campaign in 2004 took it to an extreme, but they were on the right track.  They were doing what any good politician should do, their homework.   In journalism, we always want to know who are audience is, so maybe we shouldn’t blow off where they shop and what they consume.  

The real question is what do you do about those voters who like Bare Naked and Bourbon?  (Hopefully they don’t mix together) Is it worth the while of a campaign to change their taste buds or just bend their ear?

What’s the point of the widget?

Which one’s will stick around? After receiving the requirements for our blog entries, I started to begin to add some bells and whistles to my blog. Tags here. Links there. Blogstorm. Clouds. Etc.

It seems that a lot of these new bells and whistles won’t last. The useful ones will obviously stay. I.E. linking. However, when it comes down to items of the 2.0 generation that won’t last there seem to be some obvious widgets that get in the way of the media consumption process.

One widget in particular has stopped me a time or two. The scroll over function in which as your mouse scrolls over a link it pulls up a preview of what the page will look like. This function has interupted my reading a time or two, and sometimes gets in the way of the blogging process instead of enhancing the viewing pleasure.

And what is the point of the calendar? Will these widgets last?  During technological progression there is always an invention that might seem as though it had staying power but do not pan out.  If bloggers had a glass ball in order to look into the future which parts of generation 2.0 would still be there.  

Video has become one of the biggest successes on the Internet.  The connection it brings to the consumer is invaluable.  Is there enough space for these videos to last?  I think so.  The blog roll while interesting, may change.  I think it doesn’t quiet have the practicality it needs to make it to the next generation.  

As technology changes on the Internet certain functions will be adapted or left in the dust, can’t wait to see what lies ahead.

Was or Is James Kotecki a Journalist?

Not in the traditional sense, but then again if you compare Chris Matthews to Walter Cronkite, I am sure you see some changes in the industry there as well. 

This is not a slam against either Chris or James, but rather a mere observation that over the years with changing technologies there has been a blurring of entertainment and journalism and entertainment.  There was never a rule book that said that journalism could not be entertaining. 

Kotecki is referred to as a pundit in the interview with Garrett last year. 

In fact not only is he a pundit, according to Washingtonian magazine, but he is the top pundit in his ”niche” of youtube and politics.

Kotecki, at the ripe age of 23, understands the repetitive nature of present day media and has decided to come up with his own hybrid form of journalism.

Above is a video giving a brief history on how is blog postings came to be.  We have discussed repeatedly in class the use of edgy behavior and language when bloging.  Kotecki takes this idea to a new level.  In the most recent post he spent the last 33 seconds of the video blog quoting the 1996 movie Independence Day.

One of our journalism professors in this program told our class once that our mission as journalists is to tell a good story and tell the truth.   If this is what definines journalism, than what are the limits? 

Obviously, how we get the message across to the general public is subject to change based on the changing technologies.   Kotecki is now optimizing on the changing medium of online video programing. 

Because the medium of which the message is being transmitted is changing, so is the message to adjust to the audience.  In recent years we have found that more and more news consumers are getting their news from comedy news sources such as The Daily Show or The Colbert Report. 

So yes journalism is changing because of the new mediums on which it can be presented.  Does that mean Kotecki is a journalist?  Possibly, I think we will have to wait it out and let history decide.

Bloggy Blogs vs. News Blogs

In class, we have discussed the top political blogs and their role in the 2008 election.  Recently, I was thinking about the model of a blog and what it’s role will be with in the next five to ten years.  Right now there appears to be a great divided in the progressive technological world of journalism. 

It is though when blogging first emerged a style was formed and developed for citizen esque journalism.  One person could be a reporter, a publisher, an oped columnist and a web developer.  Once major news media outlets started catching on to the web based reporting phenomenon they started having their own reporters feed the beast of the blogging world. 

So, where is the divide?  It is between the journalist turned blogger, and the blogger turned journalist.  There is a clear difference in technique, standards and etiquette. 

Top Blogs                                                          Top News Blogs

1. Buzz Machine                                                1.  Political Punch

2. Daily Kos                                                      2.  The Fix

3. Huffington Post                                            3.  The Swamp

 If you read these blogs on a regular basis you tend to notice some key differences in style.  The news blogs tend to be story or even driven, and the strictly politically based blogs tend to use events to drive a political message. 

This appears to be the core difference between the two types of blogging.  A lot of the blogs we have been asked to read in class have the new short format.  If you look at Daily Kos’s most recent blog it is all about previewing Monday and pushing for Obama supporters to donate.  This is a platform for rallying supporters. 

News blogs would never venture in these territories, although they all have ventured off course.  A perfect example of this is the Mother Theresa blog post done by the New York Times which we discussed in class. 

The big big question is where will the two meet? Or will they?  Could they end up in two separate categories?  Will big media companies eat small $15 a year run blogs? Or vice versa? 

Only time will tell.  (That’s what she said)

News Flash: Blogers Like a Technologically Savy Candidate

As we discussed in class, the political world of the Internet is overwhelmingly left.  That was according to a Pew report on the Internet usage and campaigns.   You can see this trend in the Personal Democracy Forum reports we were asked to watch this week.   As I watched each first person video report, I noticed that a majority of the speakers were heavily involved in technology including one of the inventors of the Internet who now works for Google. 

Vint Cerf “the father of the Internet,” talks about how far we have come technologically and how this needs to be interpreted and utilized in governance.   In fact a majority of the voices were all discussing the same thing.  Hmmm wonder why? (my bloggy sarcasm is becoming thick lately) 

I wonder if you had a gun owners forum to discuss candidates what they would say? Thoughts? 

On this point I started thinking about the McCain incident this past week.  Is John McCain aware of the Internet?  I mean really he is quite old according to this Obama spokesman in the video of the exchange.

 The interesting thing is the Senator is not that much older than Mr. Cerf “father of the Internet” him self. 

My question is has technology and it’s use become a symbolic form of liberalism just as the single issue of the second amendment has become associated with conservatism?

I think the answer is Yes.  Progression and liberal politics have always been associated together, just as tradition and conservatism.   As party lines and single issues have blurred labels of party affiliation over the past several decades this one school of thought remains the same.   And maybe, just maybe this is a good thing.  In a world so confusing that no one knows exactly what they are fighting for some form of values that bind a group of people together at the most basic level might help to form a clear message in a complex world.  I am just glad someone is aware of the Internet.

 

 

Voter Generated Content

Web 2.0 is about broadening communication.  New applications and widgets are meant to allow content users to be involved in the process.  So, why should we be surprised that this concept has been adapted to Vote 2008?  The short answer is we shouldn’t be. 

Just this year, Facebook, the social networking website played their own role in the news coverage of supper Tuesday.   As the night progressed, users would post their comments to a facebook page.  News agencies would then post what “voters” were saying. 

Personal Democracy described Voter Generated Content as less of a platform for the voting public but more of a business opportunity.   Duh. 

The following sites below all have their own Vote 2008 pages with interactive widgets.

1. Digg

2. Youtube: You Chose

3. Facebook: U.S. Politics

4. USA Today: Politics

It seems as though this form of media is designed around an election.  Is this not the point of a democracy?Now, we just have the technology to support the town hall forum. 

The last link is to the USA Today politics page.  Even major news media outlets are using their pages to give viewers more information than just news of day.  If you look through the links on USA Today’s page there are pages highlighting the major issues and discrepancies between the candidates.  This is all a form of Voter Generated Content.  Even with the news organization voters have the ability to write comments and discuss in a blog forum what their opinions are on politics.  

Long story short, web 2.O was built for voter generated content, except it is user generated content and in a democracy any voter can be a Internet user.  

The First Campaign

Having already read portions of The First Campaign last fall, it was interesting to see how much the election of 2008 had already changed due to technology.   One of the sentences that really struck me was an opening sentence about our world and how it has become a world “where not even the glaciers move at a glacial pace.”   It seems to me that new media has enhanced our living standard and raised expectations.  Whether these two ideas go together is another question.  

Predictions about youtube ads, online fund-raising, and social networking have all started to become a way of life for the campaign 2008.  The candidates even have their own pages on youtube where you can view all of their ads and messages. 

Here are some of the latest TV Ads from each candidate:

The campaigns have even figured out how to get their material aired. The know that television stations have the capability to download video via ftp as well as other large .mov files on the web. The campaigns utilize this idea by making their material easily airable and not costly.

I have to wonder though if The First Campaign is accurate, where will be on the next campaign. It seems to me like any sort of revolution man kind has experienced we are going to find a appropriate “workflow” usage for the internet. Right now, we are still in the stage as Zephyr Teachout describes as the inability to “mobilize the base.”  As the Dean campaign ran into in 2004, the internet is full of endless possibilities.  Know one quite knows what is going to stick. 

While the 2008 election has much improved on this philosophy, it seems as though we have a long way to go.  Campaign’s usage of the internet reminds me of those sticky hands you would get as a kid, they were rubber and when you flung it at the wall sometimes it would stick, other times it would bounce right off.  Often the more you used it and the more times you tried flinging it against the wall it would build staying power and stick.  

Yes, it is interesting that in this election Senator Barack Obama has been able to utilize online fund-raising, and it is interesting that candidates have announced their election via video online, but what I think is going to be the most interesting thing of all is how once one of these two candidates gets in that White House how they use the internet and how the public responds to that usage.  You never know what might stick.