Consumer Guide for Today's Media

Wheel of Fortune has been a mainstay in that block of time between the 6:00 evening news and the start of primetime at 7 for 25 years. Hardly a blockbuster for ratings compared with the shows that come on after it, but according to new data from the ad wizards over at TNS Media ol' Pat and Vanna have been dubiously kinged the top show for the three major 2008 presidential candidates to spend advertising money on. So far, Obama tops the pack with a little over a million dollars spent during Wheel. Hillary Clinton trails only slightly with $815,000 spent and McCain comes in at $185,000.

It definitely seems like an odd choice but realistically, it's quite a buy for the candidates. The ad spots are cheap and there is bound to be a viewer who isn't fast enough to change the channel after the news, or one that jumps the gun before Deal or No Deal or Dancing with the Stars. Also, because the premise of the show is puzzle work, how could the audience not be engaged? If you get that first spot in a commercial break chances are the audience would still be watching.

Unless of course this type of incident just occurred before the break, it might make folks at home talk amongst themselves:

Everybody knows that technology is changing how people talk politics. Websites like YouTube gives anyone with a video camera the chance to express their opinions. Of course, visitors to the site don't have to watch every video that is uploaded. Starting last week though, if you've got some cash you can get your own homemade political advertisement onto television and make everybody see it (well more than on YouTube at least) with the help of WideOrbit. The ad company launched the nonpartisan Website VoterVoter.com to help those not familiar with the TV advertising world get their message out. WideOrbit does all the hard stuff like identifying where in the country your advertisement would best fit based on demographics and filing the paperwork with the Federal Election Commission. Of course it's ultimately up to the television stations to decide if your ad is acceptable and can run though.

However, what's acceptable is still nothing I'd like to have to watch over and over. Remember the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign ads against John Kerry in 2004 that constantly ran on TV? Those were made by a 527 group. These groups exist to try and get their candidate elected, but really all they are doing is playing dirty politics and slinging more mud. Something that every Tom, Dick and Harry doesn't need to be doing.

Most of my blog entries on Election and new media to this point have focused on a particular issue in regards to how the new media has changed the way the election process works in America. However, this time around I thought I would just take a look at how many different places the people running for president have information. A quick look at the front page of Hillary Clinton's campaign site links people to Hillary's MySpace, YouTube channel, Facebook, Eons pageFlickr gallery, and Twitter. While it may seem excessive to try and tap into six different social networks, it pales in comparison to what Barack Obama is doing on his front page. Under the section titled "Obama Everywhere," there are links to each of his pages for the same social networks sites as HIllary, plus links for his pages at Digg, Eventful, LinkedIn, BlackPlanet, Faith Base, Glee,MiGente, MyBatanga, Asian Ave/a> and DNC Partybuilder.

Phew! Clinton and Obama must have full time staffers whose entire jobs are to seek out social networking sites that they haven't tapped into and reach the people on them. It's hard to blame them for wanting to reach as many people as possible, so maybe the problem is that there are just too many social networking sites on the internet!

One of Barack Obama's biggest claims since starting his presidential campaign is that he doesn't take money from lobbyists/. Despite not taking money from lobbyists, Obama has been extremely successful raising money for his presidential campaign, and has consistently out-raised his opponent, Hillary Clinton, who does accept contributions from lobbyists.

So how has Obama been able to rake in the funds at such an alarming rate without the help of deep-pocketed lobbyists? I think Obama's innovative personal fundraising page may have something to do with it. The site gives users the opportunity to not just make a donation to the campaign, but create their own fundraising drive, encouraging their friends and others to make contributions and reach a goal. In other words, Obama's system encourages individuals to band together and make big donations, thus taking the place of lobbyists.

Apparently, it's working.

The possibility of four dollars for a gallon of gas, rising food prices, the home foreclosure crises, wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq. These are all central issues facing America today. You'd think that in a nationally televised debate to become the next Democratic presidential candidate these would all be covered relentlessly. Well I guess that just seemed too hard for ABC News two days ago.

Instead of asking tough hitting policy questions, moderators Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos lobbed in some real gems like asking Senator Clinton, "do you think Senator Obama can beat Senator John McCain?" And asking Senator Obama "Do you believe in the American flag?" Finally, after more than 45 minutes some actual policy issues were raised.

Why the abandonment of traditional hard hitting journalism for ABC News? Could it be that the network took a page out of the play book from any of the cable news channels? It seems that you can't tune your TV into one of these networks without hearing about near meaningless issues surrounding the candidates. The thing is though, these channels get good ratings, there are people out there that will listen to talking heads go in depth about what Obama/Clinton/McCain had for lunch yesterday.

This debate was not only a trivial event, but a sad statement on the current state of journalism in the United States. A journalists first duty in a Democracy should be to the citizens. By ignoring real issues, the network successfully alienated voters still trying to determine what candidate to support. So, Charlie drop the entertaining, ask some real questions and please quit pretending that you were surprised when audience members booed you at the end of the "debate."

Charlie Gibson: Acting 101

While perusing the New York Times Web site I came across an interesting happening that I missed in the campaign world. Here's the story: An average Joe (pardon the pun) named Joe Anthony registered the myspace URL myspace.com/barackobama as a way to promote senator and encourage him to run for president. When Obama decided he would indeed run for president the myspace site grew in popularity, causing Anthony to spend a lot of time on the site. Eventually, Obama's campaign decided they wanted control of the site, so they entered into negotiations to bring on Anthony to help run the site under the direction of the campaign. The two sides couldn't come to an agreement, so Obama's campaign got myspace administrators to step in and get the site's control switched to the Obama campaign.

I've got mixed feelings about the whole situation. First of all, taking the myspace site from Anthony was a pretty poor PR move. This is especially the case because Obama does so well with potential young voters. By alienating Anthony and the reader's of the site under Anthony, Obama probably cost himself some support. Young people can be a sensitive bunch. If I had to guess, I would suspect that the comments portion of the Obama myspace was filled with lots of negative comments toward the Obama campaign for taking the URL with force.

Taking the site from a common guy also seems to go against a lot of what the Obama campaign has been about. Obama has created a campaign centered around individual voters. Obama has preached a grassroots campaign funded and fueled by common Americans, rather than the elite. Most of his contributions have been in the form of donations under $50. Alienating one of these common people may have undermined this key platform of Obama's.

On the other hand, I really question Anthony's motives in not giving the site up to the Obama team. Anthony clearly made the site to help Obama's cause, so when Obama became popular enough to need the site for himself, Anthony had already fulfilled the reason he registered the site. By keeping the site for himself, and demanding compensation from the site, Anthony comes off as selfish and calls into question his actual dedication to the Obama campaign. Obama also has a right to the URL since it features his name.

This is just another example of the exploration of new situations that would have never been considered in the campaign world prior to the internet.

This run of primary elections featured an interesting trend in the world of political races: The draft craze. It started as a group of people interested in encouraging Illinois Senator Barack Obama to run for President. So Ben Stanfield, one of those interested in Obama running for president, started draftobama.org/, a site completely dedicated to encouraging Barack Obama to run for President, and for citizens to support Obama. The site featured a petition for supporters to sign, as well as information about Obama and how volunteers could help. When it launched in late 2006, it seemed like a long shot, because Obama had already announced that he wouldn't be running for President in 2008. Somewhere along the line, Obama's line of thought changed, and he's now sitting as the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination for President.

While it's unclear whether the efforts of draftobama.org directly affected either Obama's decision to run or his success in the primaries, the site gained notoriety and many similar sites began to appear across the interwebs. There's a Draft Hillary site, a Draft Ron Paul, a Draft Sarah Palin for Vice President site, and even a Draft Mitt Romney for Senatesite, dedicated to encourage the former Massachusetts Governor and Republican presidential candidate to try to unseat John Kerry as Senator of Massachusetts. And of course there are a few others, too.

First of all, I don't understand the purpose of the Draft Hillary site, since it was a foregone conclusion that she would run for President. The purpose of the draft site is to encourage someone to run for President, since the person cannot actually be drafted to be President, just to run. Stanfield addressed this on the front page of Draft Obama when he said Our work here on Draft Obama is over done, but the work to elect Senator Obama is just beginning. Second, I highly doubt these sort of sites have a large effect on candidates' decisions on whether or not to run. While it may be reassuring to see a group of people gathered to support said politician, internet support can be skewed. As we've seen with Ron Paul, widespread support on the internet doesn't always transfer over to widespread support among all citizens. Though it may have appeared to help, the creation of Draft Obama and Obama's current success probably aren't related. While there are certainly more useless sites around, the draft politician craze seems to be pretty insignificant in the grand scheme of things.

I'm in my last few weeks as a college student here at KU. While I'm excited about punching my ticket out of here there's another big hullabaloo that I'm ready to be done with too, the news coverage for the election.

Now hold on Sam some might say, this topic is at the very core of your blog beat this semester, which you volunteered for. Why did you choose something that doesn't interest you? Well, to take a title from another assignment for this class, when I chose my blog beat that was then, this is now. Yes, thinking back to cold, dreary February when we chose our beats, I was excited to hear all the latest news on upcoming caucuses, speeches and gaffs that would come up then blog about them. Heck, I even was pumped up enough that I covered both the Democratic and Republican caucuses.

However, today, three months later, I find myself not even wanting to turn on cable news or checking out the nation and world section of the local paper because I know it will be loaded with stories that are outlandish and not central to real issues in the campaign.

In a campaign that had its earliest start ever it could be presumed that the anticipation would build up hype and make people more politically active than ever. That may be true for some of the more die hard politicos out there, but for myself and plenty of other Americans that don't eat, breathe and sleep Obama/Clinton/McCain it's tiring. Personally, I have made my decision in what candidate to support in November, and it would take a major fault on his/her part to sway my vote to another candidate. I'm certain that the media coverage now is only a taste of what's to come after the conventions this summer. So break out your earmuffs folks, it's going to be a long winded road to the White House.

The progression of Sam's interest in the media's coverage of the 2008 Presidential campaign.