Culberson, Capuano, and the Struggle for Relevance

Jul 11 2008 Published by under Bloggers, Congress, Craziness, Government, The Internet, Web 2.0

Shelbinator has a ridiculous little post up defending Rep. Capuano’s braindead attempt to regualte YouTube for political speech.  Patrick Ruffini at The Next Right has a good post up calling out the frightening number of Dems trying to make this about partisanship.

The fact is the whole thing is stupid.  Capuano’s argument for why he is doing this, Nancy Pelosi’s defense of him in her letter to Boehner, and Shelbinator’s defense all come down to the same lame argument.

In order to keep up with the “decorum” of the House, they ought to find a way to do so that doesn’t get too tangled up in commerce or political campaigning due to free market forces (i.e., if you watch a Representative’s “official” YouTube video, it might be unbecoming if the three “related” videos that pop up in the YouTube player after it’s over were a racist anti-Obama ad, a pitch for Viagra, or candid footage of Britney Spears’ crotch). Not unreasonable suggestions, I think.

I left a comment on Shelby’s site, but I think it bears repeating here.

If these rules are so critical to protect us from unrefined content that might accompany “official” communications, why hasn’t the Franking Commission required newspapers to print any columns submitted by Members on facing pages with no advertising, comic strips, or campaign news?

If this is such a reasonable request, why hasn’t the Franking Commission required TV news programs to not bookend Member appearances with commercials?  Why don’t they have rules for what other stories can appear in the crawl on the chyron?

The fact is Capuano is ignorant of the equivalence between offline and online communications.  He clearly doesn’t use, know, or understand the area over which he is attempting to exert jurisdiction.

Honestly, the idea of franking dates back to the 1600s.  The entire concept of the Commission is a joke in the era of the Internet.  With newspapers losing subscribers, TV losing viewers, and every other aspect of society being radically changed, Capuano’s action is nothing but a desperate attempt to remain relevant in a position that is growing obsolete by the second.

When Micah Sifry and I were in London in April, we had many discussions with the academics there that felt they could just watch the Internet change everything else on the planet, but somehow they would be excused from the Internet Age.

Congress is now making the same mistake.  They’re attempting to ignore the flames around them and keep playing their fiddles as the US burns.  They’ll continue looking for ways to apply 17th century standards of decorum to 21st century communications technology.  It’s frightening that our institiutions are so far behind the world around them.  But that’s what you get with bureaucracies…

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The McCain Girls Hold America Hostage for J-Mac

Apr 08 2008 Published by under Candidates, Craziness, John McCain, Marketing, Miscellany, Politics, The Internet

Back in the 1980s, Weird Al Yankovic appeared on the scene and convinced every schmuck with rhyming ability that they could make millions by bastardizing pop tunes. I know, I was there, and I lyrically destroyed more than a few tunes while drinking with friends.

Unfortunately, not everyone outgrew that fad and now a fearsome threesome have decided to make truly horrible remixes of old tunes to promote the candidacy of one John Sidney McCain.

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In the case of the McCain girls, I think they have the right idea, but the wrong marketing. They’re trying to help McCain, but going about it the wrong way. What they really need to do is release something that looks like a terrorist hostage video. They would have a big map of America and hold a knife up to it.

The audio would feature the McCain girls pledging to release one music video a week between now and the election unless two demands are met. First, the Democrats must immediately concede the election to J-Mac. Second, five million dollars must be deposited into a Cayman Islands account.

I guarantee you, by the time July or August rolls around, if they keep making these god awful videos, five million bucks and the presidency will feel like a small price to pay for not having to watch them anymore.

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The New BarackObama.com

Jan 28 2008 Published by under Barack Obama, Candidates, Democrats, Elections, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Politics, Republicans, The Internet, Web Reviews

I’m a bit late to the party on this, but hopefully it’s fashionably late, and not like the guy that gets there after everyone has gone home and wants to sit and chat despite the fact that you’re dropping hints for him to get out. I thought I’d take a closer look at the new BarackObama.com. I still think, despite all the prognostications that Hillary has it locked, that he’ll pull this out and be the eventual nominee – even if it takes a floor fight.

This started as a review of the recently revamped website, and became sort of a hybrid post about the site and some general issues with online campaigns in general. I have to be honest; I began from the point of view that I don’t really get why they changed the site at all. The vast majority of voters is still tuned out, probably had not been to the site, and therefore wouldn’t really be sick of it. However, I realize that the staff probably was, the hardcore supporters probably were, and since Obama believes that change is good, well…

If the post gets kind of disjointed about halfway through, that’s because the review also coincided with an interview I did with Jose Vargas and some questions about how campaigns should be using their site to engage voters in states where they may have little to no time to campaign as a result of the compressed primary schedule. After that call, I began to look at Obama’s site through that prism, and specifically began to compare it to other sites through the same lens.

In other words, I wrote half of it when I was with Linda, and half of it after we broke up. And I should warn you I was listening to the Cure a lot.

Color Scheme and Appearance

Honestly, I’m not a big fan of the glowing blue ethereal cloud look. It’s a little too artsy for me. You can’t really make it out in the screen grab above, but they also have a mesh effect oddly reminiscent of the background on dollar bills behind the sign up option. When they continue the flowing blue angel effect into the headline, as they did above, it makes the whole page a little overbearing. It’s way too blue, and feels like I have died and Obama is the maker. I can’t imagine that’s the look they were going for.

On a whole other level, the site also contradicts one of the things so many people credit him for – his speech at the 2004 Democratic Convention. Wasn’t it he who spoke of no liberal America and no conservative America, but only one America. Didn’t he challenge the idea of pundits dividing us into red states and blue states? Yet he seems to be sending a signal that he is the bluest of the blue.

I don’t know if that was their intention, but as a Republican, it was the first thing I noticed. It’s very, very, very blue.

The other big problem the site has is readability. With the text and background colors they have chosen, large chunks of the site become almost entirely unreadable. Take these two examples:

I’m no expert on graphic design, but I like to think I have a pretty good bead on what does and doesn’t fly on the web. I also have a pretty good feel for what is and isn’t W3C Compliant. Both of the examples above fail that test. The choice of grey text on white also causes readability issues throughout the site

Now I freely admit that I’m one of the older dogs in the online politics game. I’m knocking on 38 and most of the people I work with on campaigns are just out of (or still in) college. I suppose it’s possible that Obama’s website is kind of like the mosquito ringtone – only those under 30 can read it. If so, that might explain the huge advantage he enjoys with young voters.

Unfortunately, it causes a significant number of others to have a heck of a time working his navigation. Where I am from, that’s a bad thing.

The Action Center

I continue to be a big fan of Obama’s action center. Since the last time I spent time exploring his web presence, not much has changed as far as functionality with the exception of the online phone bank. One thing struck me about that tool, however. The Bush campaign referred to its online phone bank as Neighbor to Neighbor and under the larger umbrella “Personal Precinct”. Mitt has “Call from Home” Thompson had “Phone for Fred”, and McCain calls his, simply, “Online Phone Bank”. These are less than clever names to be sure, but I do think these tools need to have a brand that conveys a) exactly what’s expected and b) how simple that is. Obama calls his “Peer Contact”. If I saw that as an uninitiated volunteer, new to the process, I would have no idea what it was. Even “Make Calls for Obama” would be better than “Peer Contact.”

One problem Obama shares with his chief rival Hillary Clinton is a limited implementation of their calling tool. When I log in to Obama’s application, I have the three options to make calls with two of those being into New Mexico. Hillary’s, on the other hand, has only one option to make calls into California regarding absentee ballots (aren’t there other primaries coming up?).

(note: the screen grab above was taken after the post was drafted. When I logged back in, I only had two options, but originally had three.)

I’m not sure if any of the Republicans are any better at this. I can’t log in to Romney’s TMAC, McCain is focused solely on Florida (as he should be), and Rudy doesn’t seem to have such a tool (at least, not that I could find quickly, and on the Internet if you can’t find it fast, it may as well not be there at all). I tried signing up for a Team Rudy password, but ten minutes later have not received my confirmation/validation e-mail.

Looking just at the Dems, though, at least when I click on Obama’s, I get people and a script. When I click on Hillary’s, I get a message indicating that “no callees are available”. Huh? Are you kidding me? You can’t find anyone in California for me to call? What about those other states? You know, the ones voting next Tuesday. With Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado , Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Utah all picking their nominee next week, you would think the two campaigns would have some folks to call.

States

Obama does make good use of a tactic we tried with the Bush campaign in 2004 – creating state specific pages with content relevant to the specific location. The bad news is the New Mexico page, a week before their election, is broken (pictured at right). The other states voting next week seem to be fine and contain interesting content. For instance, Obama has done a good job of including the ads they’re running in the states. Many campaigns run ads only in one location to talk to specific segments of the population. Pre-YouTube, these ads were often never seen by people in other states. Obama has provided them on a state by state basis providing some nice transparency.

Campaigns can leverage those state urls in ads and drive voters in each state to specific information about the candidate and activities available to help. While campaigns are getting better at including their url in their ads, it can still be a tough sell to get the leadership to include them throughout the entire ad.

In 2004, Kerry’s team did a great job of getting the campaign to understand the value of driving traffic with an ever-present address. The GOP still doesn’t do that in most cases. They see the url as a distraction from the message. I’d like to see a campaign like Barack’s employ not only a steady state url, but also make it specific to the state. An ad with the address BarackObama.com/NewMexico is more likely to grab my attention than simply BarackObama.com. I’m more likely to come back. As long as that ad is running, the state page should also feature more information specific to the ad in question.

The one thing missing

The one thing I really don’t see on Obama’s site is Obama. I see his picture up top, and I see clips of his speeches in their video content, but I don’t see a lot of him making a personal contribution to his site. I’d really like to see him posting regularly, or doing some candid video. I’d really like to see him being as active in his community as he’s asking us to be.

This is a complaint that I have of almost all the campaigns. In most cases, the url for these sites is the candidate’s name, but that’s about the only thing on which they have left their mark. The sites still feel corporate. They still feel more like the website for IBM. Some sort of connection with the candidate is why people are coming to the site, yet the site is often the last place you can find the candidate’s imprint.

Below Average

Overall, I’d give the makeover a “C-”. I was a fan of the old site, and just really think they took this in the wrong direction. I didn’t test it with a screen reader for 508 compliance, because it was hard enough to read without a screen reader. I can’t imagine that would make it easier. The contrast is way off, making a lot of the text hard to read. However, at least that takes your mind off the overwhelming blueness of it all.

The tools he provides are quite good, but the implementation is a bit off. I’d like to see more call opportunities in states voting next week. If there is still no clear nominee next Wednesday, it will become increasingly expensive to run in every state. The Internet could be a powerful tool for both communicating to the states where financial limitations make door-to-door campaigning hard. They can empower their people to be the force multiplier (as they should be doing for next week).

Unfortunately, nobody seems to be doing this, so at least Obama doesn’t stand out.

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Unattractive Geeks (and Robin Hood) for Net Neutrality

Nov 29 2007 Published by under Craziness, Miscellany, Net Neutrality, Technology, The Internet

I have no idea how this escaped my attention. It’s clear that between the day job and all my extracurricular activities I am not spending nearly enough time surfing for obnoxious advocacy materials. This one really takes the cake (video included below if you don’t want to click through).

If this thing gets enough circulation it could singlehandedly derail Net Neut by scaring away all the straight, normal people in the US.

Aslo, please note the titular reference to unattractive geeks is not meant to be an attack on either the unattractive or the geeky. Being a proud member of both camps, I would never slam my homely, technologically inclined brothers and sisters that way. I’m simply stating the theme of this particular effort. I also have to give kudos to the guy in glasses – the Tron outfit rocks.

You need to a flashplayer enabled browser to view this YouTube video

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The Digital Divide

May 07 2007 Published by under Technology, The Internet

Generally the digital divide refers to the gap between those with access to information and digital content (Internet access, digital media, etc) and those without. That’s not how I’m using it here, though. There is an increasing gap in the way people think of the creation and distribution of digital content.

I’m at the Cable Show in Vegas all week. The annual Cable-fest brings together folks from across the industry to talk about everything from next generation interactive applications developed on the OCAP standard and the latest programming options for cable systems to developments in network management and policy issues affecting the industry.

I have found it interesting how much of day one brought up the same issues again and again. Digital rights management; the role for user generated content in promoting adoption of wireless technologies and broadband adoption; and the challenges of distribution of content over different platforms (to name a few) are challenges not for anyone who uses traditional media platforms to carry a message.

Oswin Eleonora, Senior Vice President for LogicaCMG Telecommunications made perhaps the best point I have ever heard at one of these conferences. He said, and I am paraphrasing because I didn’t have a recorder but was taking notes furiously, there is a huge difference between entertainment and communications. Most cable companies think of these technologies as entertainment driven.

The entertainment model assumes the user will be consuming the material in a sender/receiver model. The decisions they make regarding what to deliver over their networks (be it mobile or landline) are based on the idea that people come to a site or content channel, and consume what they are given.

The reality is all of these models are becoming communications media. People are using the Internet, wireless services, etc to communicate with one another – whether that is in the form of an e-mail, cell call, or video posted to YouTube.

Much of the discussion at the iHollywood Mobile Bootcamp was about the challenges faced in delivering existing programming to a small screen. Oswin pointed out that the European model is as much about allowing users to upload content as opposed to simply consuming what the provider decides to dole out. It’s a fundamental difference and part of the reason for greater consumption of these services overseas.

A fascinating statistic to support that idea was quoted, attributed to Michael Dell’s CES Keynote – YouTube consumes as much bandwidth today as the entire Internet consumed in 2000. That is a fascinating stat. That is a fundamental difference in how we use the Internet today.

The amount of content that is being generated – and consumed – by entities outside the normal content distribution channels is growing. Clinging to outmoded ideas that people want to be talked to, and don’t want to say anything themselves, is simply not going to work.

On of the other panelists suggested that digital rights management, and having to purchase content on a per platform basis was the biggest hurdle facing media distribution services. I’d suggest he’s wrong. having to grapple with a shifting media environment – one that sees many of your consumers becoming producers – is the biggest hurdle.

The same speaker went on to say that there is little reason to change the sender/receiver model because there are few instances you can point to where interactive media has really demonstrated its viability (his example was American Idol). It is really sort of a misguided notion. Arguing that the model is sound because there have been few successful models to prove otherwise is, historically, a specious argument.

When people who built horse drawn carriages heard about the experimentation with something called an automobile, they likely felt the same. “Well sure,” they must have said, “but there have been so few successful examples of a person getting from point A to point B with a motor car. The belief that these will someday replace carriages is simply wrong.”

The media companies need to understand that there is a new way coming. They’ll need to empower and enable it, or be made obsolete by it.

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