Obama vs. McCain: The First Networked Campaign

Back in 1960 the skills required to become President of the United States changed forever.  That was the year that John F. Kennedy debated Richard M. Nixon on national network television for the first time.  When reminiscing about Kennedy's win, pundits love to cite that he was tanned, good looking, had great hair and had his make-up professionally applied, while Mr. Nixon appeared pale, had a nervous demeanor and sweaty brow.  They say that Nixon won on the radio but Kennedy won on TV.  1960 ushered in the era of the Network politician.  For better or for worse, after the 1960 debate, not only did every politician have to have video skills, they had to have expert ones.

Today, aside from video, Senators Obama and McCain are going to face off across several digital consumer touchpoints including: the web, short form video, the blogosphere, time-shifted television, social networks, SMS, ringtones, mobile applications, even wikis.  2008 will usher in the era of the Networked politician.  For better or for worse, not only will every politician need to have advanced media skills, they are going to need expert ones.

I know it's early days for the national race, but - just for fun - let's have a look at how the candidates are handling the transition from Network to Networked campaigning.

JohnMcCain.com is a very conservative website (pardon the pun). It feels old and clunky. To find some online video you must click "News & Media," then click "Multimedia" and when you finally get to the page, you find the blip.tv player a page full of single line descriptions and links to videos and branded links to YouTube and Veoh.  There is no "multimedia," on the page - just short form video. The presentation is fairly disjointed.  Actually, it looks like video is simply bolted on to the site and there is no context of any kind.  There is nothing best practices about the implementation or the messaging.  Anyone who is "in the culture" would view this part of the site as a hodgepodge of disparate content and know it was not for them.  On the other hand, anyone not "in the culture" would immediately be put off by the complexity.  One wonders who this part of the website is for?

At BarackObama.com you are greeted by a best practices, embedded video of Senator Obama welcoming you to his site.  The link to his media area clearly defines Barack TV, which opens a well stocked Brightcove video player; a flickr-based photo page; a downloads page complete with everything a web-savvy digital native might want to download (including buddy icons) and a mobile page with Barack ringtones and SMS alerts subscription opportunities.

If this is the first Networked campaign, Senator McCain is looking like a digital tourist and Senator Obama is looking like a man who knows and respects the conventions of digital life in the 21st Century.

One might argue that Senator McCain's base is not really the "online crowd."  For example, John has 53,381 MySpace friends and 136,793 Facebook friends.  Barack has 386,341 MySpace friends and 894,666 people have friended him on Facebook. Barack twitters http://twitter.com/barackobama following: 37,151; followers: 36,101; updates: 129, John does not.

Senator Obama has video channels on a multitude of social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, flickr, digg, twitter, eventful, linked in, blackplanet, faithbase, eons, glee, mi genti, asian ave, dnc partybuilder and mybatanga. In fact, Barack even has his own social network site http://my.barackobama.com/.  Senator McCain ... not so much.

McCain's largest youtube count is 1,846,797 for a video called "John McCain's YouTube Problem Just Became A Nightmare".

Senator McCain's presence on YouTube is mostly spoofs and negative user videos about him. His biggest YouTube moment was when a supporter was filmed asking "How do we beat the bitch?"  On the other side, Obama has an insane online video following with offerings like Obama Girl and will.i.am's "Yes We Can" video with over 8 million views.

Not to put too fine a point on it, Obama raised more than $200 million from more than 1.3 million people (most of it online), announced his candidacy via a web video (so did Senator Clinton) and his campaign used wiki's to organize campaign managers.

I think it's fair to say that Senator Obama is the clear leader in the transition from Network to Networked candidacy. The big question is: "Will it matter?"

Like I said, it's early days in the first broadband presidential race.  Will the reach of network television still be the deciding factor or, will advanced media's ability to cater to a fragmented base of single-issue voters and niche constituencies win the day?  My guess is that it will be a sophisticated combination of both.  The winner of this particular election will have demonstrated (one way or the other) the value of their particular brand of message management.  However it unfolds, from a media perspective, it is sure to be the most interesting campaign in history.

Shelly Palmer is the host of MediaBytes a daily news show featuring news you can use about technology, media & entertainment, Managing Director of Advanced Media Ventures Group LLC and the author of Television Disrupted: The Transition from Network to Networked TV (2006, Focal Press). Shelly is also President of the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, NY (the organization that bestows the coveted Emmy® Awards). He is the Vice-Chairman of the National Academy of Media Arts & Sciences an organization dedicated to education and leadership in the areas of technology, media and entertainment. Palmer also oversees the Advanced Media Technology Emmy® Awards which honors outstanding achievements in the science and technology of advanced media. You can read Shelly's blog here. Shelly can be reached at [e-mail]

Follow Shelly Palmer on Twitter: www.twitter.com/@shelly_palmer

Comments

[jamalystic]

From all indication, it now seems the internet has drastically change the political landscape and any candidates who ignores its real impact will be doing so at a great loss. But the real question will be how 21st century politicians evolve with the revolution of information technology and certainly candidates like Barack Obama is adapting to the changing political scene brought about by the internet and reaping the benefits of that. So how would these politicians graple with the internet was the centre piece of a provocative blog: Will the internet recreate politicians

[RowanBerkeley]

I have finally found the site on which Joe Lieberman endorses McCain for presnit:
http://citizens.johnmccain.com/
It's pretty unambiguous, isn't it?

[MPeter]

Obama marches with the times. He is as digital as he is down to earth. He is just brilliant.

[Angelus2007]

I don't think these thing matter too much. If they did, Ron Paul would be our president. Also this fits into who will vote for each candidate. We know Obama has the young crowd and McCain the older. My parents and grandparents probably don't know what MySpace, Flikr, Facebook or Youtube are, much less care.

[Mojane]

Whoa Nellie. I'm a 65-year-old boomer with grandkids who may have to help me with text messaging (big deal), but, there are millions of us 55-plus out here regularly checking blogs, checking YouTube, etc. Do not underestimate the power of this generation. We voted for RFK.

[libbygirl]

Don't count the "older" crowd out. I'm 61 and very current with what's on the internet....I know and care. And I've also been an Obama supporter since the beginning. Just because we're older doesn't mean we are antiquated.

[Angelus2007]

I agree with you and Mojane, but I think you are in a minority of 55+. While there are many under 35 who don't pay attention online either. I am 32 and read political blogs, because I am a political junkie, but other than a quick view of the candidates websites (during primary season, and from a style standpoint I liked Huckabee's the best) I haven't been to them much. I have yet to checkout a facebook or myspace site for any candidate, and no youtube videos either. And I don't know what twitter is. I am also very computer literate, just those things don't interest me, but I am in the minority among those my age.

[pikaomega]

Hot damn.

Laura Bush offering a tepid, but unexpected nod to Michelle Obama.

Compassionate conservative...must be why they keep her quiet.

[robynuva]

I have always thought that during the primaries, those with high speed internet access were
for O--ba-ma, and those without were for HC. (older women, folks making less than $50K, etc.) I would love to see a poll about that.

[closetodemfection]

I've thought that too...