Political Blues

Politicians have to reach out to the masses. Over the years, different forms of medium played different roles in helping politicians reach out to the people and garner support. After radio, after televisions, the Internet, if used efficiently, has the ability to help politicians along in their quest in campaigns.

“Were it not for the Internet, Barack Obama would not be president. Were it not for the Internet, Barack Obama would not have been the nominee,” said Arianna Huffington, editor in chief of The Huffington Post.

Here, is a politician who knew how to make use of a new medium to reach out to the masses and secure his own route to the white house.

The main advantage the Internet has over other mediums is the ability to reach out to the masses, people who voluntarily go around seeking for information, and people who unwittingly stumble on information whilst surfing online. Obama's efficient usage of the Internet helped him mobilize and organize his supporters, provide him with free advertising, drum his words and speeches into the ears of the public, and maintain a form of constant contact with potential voters.

Obama made use of his website to organize supporters, advertise to voters, defend against attacks and communicate with constituents.


On his website is also a link to a wide variety of website accounts of Obama, from popular websites like Facebook and Twitter, to other less known sites. All these sites are there to serve one purpose, to reach out to the masses, keeping the public in the loop and in the know.

Anyone can add Barack Obama to their friends list on facebook and keep themselves constantly updated with the political scene.

Obamas youtube page also serves as a form of free advertising for Obama. All videos related to Barack Obama's campaign can be found in this website to be viewed and reviewed by Internet users. According to a political consultant, Mr Joe Trippi, on New York Times, “The campaign’s official stuff they created for YouTube was watched for 14.5 million hours. To buy 14.5 million hours on broadcast TV is $47 million.” My lecture mates and I can probably resonate most with this when an assignment we were given a few semesters back consisted of listening to Barack Obama's speech on race, A More Perfect Union, again and again on youtube just to pick out its main points and arguments for extra credit.



The downside to the prevalence in the Interenet's ability to aid in political campaigns would be that the Internet immortalizes everything. Every little mistake politicians make, every wrong move, every wrong word they say, will be logged somewhere on the Internet, to be viewed and reviewed by Internet users, to be broken down, analyzed and criticized. Also, the Internet reaches out to a certain audience demographic, excluding voters or potential voters which do not have Internet access or regularly use the Internet to acquire sources of information.

The Internet is thus a double edged sword which politicians can wield to their advantage, if wielded correctly, yet they should always be aware of the different repercussions and negative traits associated with every medium they try to use for their purpose.

Resources: http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/07/how-obamas-internet-campaign-changed-politics/