Obama did it. Clinton did it. Richardson did it too, and so did a candidate for Young Dems. What do all these politicians have in common? They all announced online!
Standing in the middle of a poor, primarily minority neighborhood in
Announcing over the internet provides a controlled setting. But it also goes along with the theory that it gives more people access to the candidate and to interact with the candidate. (See Personal Democracy Forum: The Flattening of Politics.) But is the accessibility provided over the internet really providing greater accessibility to the overall population or is it providing greater accessibility to a particular, self selecting, possibly elite group of individuals?
According to a Pew Internet & American Life Project Report, "[a]s of May-June 2005, 68% of American adults, or about 137 million people, use the internet, up from 63% [in 2004]. 32% percent of American adults, or about 65 million people, do not use the internet and not always by choice. Certain groups continue to lag in their internet adoption, including Americans age 65 and older, African-Americans, and those with less education. For example:
- 26% of Americans age 65 and older go online, compared with 67% of those age 50-64, 80% of those age 30-49, and 84% of those age 18-29.
- 57% of African-Americans go online, compared with 70% of whites.
- 29% of those who have not graduated from high school have access, compared with61% of high school graduates and 89% of college graduates.
- 60% of American adults who do not have a child living at home go online, compared with 83% of parents of minor children."
But the trend of internet usage by those with disabilities is more dismal. "In May-June of 2001, about 38% of adults with disabilities used the Internet" according to the National Organization on Disability.
The socio-economic divide cannot be ignored. Nearly 19 million Americans simply do not have access with nearly 4 million saying that it’s too difficult to get and another 3 million saying that it is too expensive. Of those that feel that they can afford internet, the type of connection that they have vary greatly and that in itself can effect how much access they truly have. 30% of adults, or over 60 million Americans, have a dial-up connection. Have you tried watching a video with a dial-up connection recently?
So does broadcasting over the internet provide greater accessibility to either the message or the candidate than an old fashion rally? That is unclear. An old fashion rally might get broadcast over the radio or on television. Access to both of those media types is much greater. However, many local news channels now carry clips of online videos and radio shows discuss the internet. But a greater number of people can see the announcement than would physically be able to at a rally, if for no other reason than size of the host facility.
The real question with these announcements is who the audience is and does accessibility matter? The target audience with Richardson, Obama, and Clinton, are primary voters. There are few, if any, studies on internet accessibility of primary voters or what percentage of internet users in American are US citizens and are eligible and registered to vote.
Primary voters, Democratic or otherwise, are in and of themselves, a select, elite group. By providing more widespread access to the primary candidates, the pool of potential primary voters is likely increased and therefore, potentially more representative of the
5 comments:
Very excellent blog. Broadcasting over the internet does allow for a candidate to reach that special audience, which allows for them to receive a more favorable response since they are hitting their target audience without the backlash of reporter's questions. I think there is also the factor that there is less "fuss" in announcing over the internet. You shoot and upload your video or write up your e-mail and your done, as opposed to the hassle and planning that goes into a full fledge kick-off event.
When John Edwards announced his candidacy for POTUS in Northern Nevada this year over 1000 people turned out to see him. Northern Nevada is a very rural and conservative area that mainly votes Republican. It took everyone by surprise that so many people turned out in the cold to see him, a Democrat, in this particular part of Nevada. This only adds to my opinion that I think that the actual public announcement is better. To me it shows that you are in-tune with average every day American, that you still hold onto your sense of community, that you made the time and effort to announce to the people who will cast a vote for you, and that you want the questions of the reporters because you want to give real answers. Most importantly, I don't think anything beats the thrill of having hundres or thousands of people come out and cheer your name because they believe in you - you don't get that over the internet.
Good point and good use of terminology -- accessibility. Being an advocate for persons with disabilities, I have found data from UCSF. Its a bit dated, but the general principle still applies:
See Disability and the Digital Divide by Stephen Kaye
(Abstract 22 July 2000)
As shown in Figure 1, just under one-quarter (23.9 percent) of people with disabilities have access to a computer at home, compared to just over half (51.7 percent) of their non-disabled counterparts. The gap in Internet use is even more striking: Only one-tenth (9.9 percent) of people with disabilities connect to the Internet, compared to almost four-tenths (38.1 percent) of those without disabilities.
Elderly people with disabilities are particularly unlikely to make use of these technologies. Among persons 65 years of age or older, only one-tenth (10.6 percent) of those with disabilities have computers at home, compared to one-quarter (25.3 percent) of those without disabilities. And only a tiny fraction (2.2 percent) of elderly people with disabilities use the Internet, a rate about one-quarter that of the non-disabled elderly population (8.9 percent).
Among the non-elderly (aged 1564), the gaps in access to these technologies are less dramatic but still pronounced: 32.6 percent of those with disabilities have computers and 15.1 percent use the Internet, compared to 55.6 percent and 42.3 percent, respectively, of their counterparts without disabilities.
Educational attainment
The more education a person has, the more likely he or she is to own computer equipment and to use it to connect to the Internet. But regardless of the level of educational attainment, people with disabilities have much lower rates of computer ownership and Internet use than their non-disabled peers (Figure 2).
Only one-eighth (12.7 percent) of people with disabilities who have not graduated from high school own computers. This figure compares with one-third (34.5 percent) of non-high-school-graduates without disabilities, almost half (46.5 percent) of college graduates with disabilities, and three-quarters (73.4 percent) of college graduates without disabilities.
Here's the link to the full study:
http://dsc.ucsf.edu/publication.php?pub_id=6
The primary system has always confused me, as well. Why is there a compelling state interest in funding and adminstering the process by which a theoretically independent political party selects its candidate?
Why do the primaries matter at all? I wouldn't read this as a question of elitism. The primaries only bring the smoke filled rooms of the old nominating conventions out into the light of day (at considerable taxpayer expense, I might add).
The punditocracy is almost too ready to make the internet into some kind of magic bullet for political success. The most ballyhooed Internet insurgency was Howard Dean's run for the Democratic nomination in '04. Revolutionary? certainly. But (now-Chairman) Dean ended up suffering a crushing defeat at the hands of his less 'net savvy opponent, who in turn was defeated by a Republican political machine that turned out real grass-roots supporters to cast ballots in boxes for their man.
The internet insurgency and the blogosphere continued to grow in influence, especially among other bloggers. The netroots were supposed to lead LaMont to victory over Lieberman in CT. But again, on election day, the DailyKossacks did not arrive.
The internet drops the cost of direct communication to nothing--this advantage is hard to overstate. But it is not as if voters are actively using the internet to discover things about candidates that they did not already know.
Indeed, for all their protestations of 'grassroots,' blue-state netrooters aren't much different from their red-state AM talk radio-calling counterparts: they're shouting in an echo chamber, amplifying their own voices, and gleefully ignoring anyone else.
At the end of the day, the only commentariat that matters--the electorate--is too busy voting to care. Of course, they're voting for American Idol, but hey, participation is important, right?
Okay, this was an outstanding debut post for this blog -- but you gotta keep it up now!
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