About TechPresident | TechPresident

Contact us:

techpres AT personaldemocracy DOT com

Press inquiries:

Andrew Rasiej:
andrew AT personaldemocracy DOT com

917.359.2426

TechPresident was started by Andrew Rasiej and Micah Sifry as a new group blog that covers how the 2008 presidential candidates are using the web, and vice versa, how content generated by voters is affecting the campaign.

The 2008 election will be the first where the Internet will play a central role, not only in terms of how the campaigns use technology, but also in how voter-generated content affects its course. TechPresident.com plans to track all these changes in real-time, covering everything from campaign websites, online advertising and email lists to the postings on YouTube and who's got the fastest growing group of friends on MySpace.

Our team of bloggers is made of veterans of the 2004 and 2006 elections, ranging across the political spectrum. Their expertise covers everything from website design to the latest in mobile tools and social networking sites. And we'll look closely not just at what the campaigns are or are not doing, but what voters and activists are doing online to independently affect the election.

In addition to the Personal Democracy Forum editorial staff (Editor Micah Sifry and Associate Editor Joshua Levy) the contributors to TechPresident.com include:

Morra Aarons, Internet communications consultant, former Director of Internet Marketing for the Democratic National Committee and Kerry-Edwards '04; political director of BlogHer.org. You can visit her at www.womenandwork.org.

David All, former communications director for Rep. Jack Kingston and former communications director for 2006 Senate candidate Mike Bouchard and owner of the David All Group

Michael Bassik, VP of MSHC, expert on online political advertising

Tom Belford, aging political and advocacy marketer, now writing The Agitator

Roger Craver, aging political and advocacy marketer, now writing The Agitator

Chuck DeFeo, General Manager of Townhall.com

Colin Delany, online communications consultant and web designer since 1997, currently Online Communications Manager at the National Environmental Trust, writing at epolitics.com.

Philip de Vellis , viral video producer and Senior VP of New Media at Murphy Putnam Media

Mindy Finn, director of Finn Enterprises, former director of e-Strategy for Mitt Romney '08, former Director of New Media & Technology for Rick Santorum, former RNC eCampaign Deputy Director, and former Deputy Webmaster for Bush-Cheney '04.

Steve Garfield, Video-blogging pioneer

Matt Browner Hamlin, Writer and political consultant. He was the Deputy Internet Director on Chris Dodd's Presidential campaign. Before moving to work in American politics full-time, he worked for Students for a Free Tibet and helped turn the SFT Blog into the 21st Most Powerful Blog in the World.

Lynne d Johnson, Senior Editor, FastCompany.com

Zack Exley, Director of Online Organizing and Communications, Kerry/Edwards '04

Dan Manatt , Political Web Video professional since 1999 and Executive Producer and founder of PoliticsTV.com and CapNews.Net, a web video news service that covers the U.S. Congress.

Jack McEnany Editor at LostNation.TV

Luigi Montanez, Web developer and consultant for Democratic campaigns and progressive organizations. While working at Democracy for America in 2005, he built DFA-Link, one of the first social activism networks on the Web. He now works with WebStrong Group, and specializes in Ruby on Rails development and Salesforce.com implementations.

Justin Oberman, MOpocket.com, expert on mobile phone use in politics

Spencer Overton, George Washington University law professor, co-founder of blackprof.com, author of Stealing Democracy, and former member of DNC Presidential Nomination Scheduling Commission

Chris Rabb, Publisher, Afro-Netizen

Alan Rosenblatt, Associate Director of Online Advocacy for the Center for American Progress Action Fund and Executive Director of the Internet Advocacy Center

Patrick Ruffini, former eCampaign Director for the Republican National Committee, webmaster for Bush-Cheney '04, and former Giuliani '08 advisor

Tracy Russo, President of Russo Strategies, an online communications and strategy firm; former Chief Blogger and Deputy Online Communications Director for the John Edwards campaign and former director of Online Outreach for the Democratic National Committee.

Liza Sabater, Publisher, CultureKitchen

Nancy Scola, former internet organizer with Mark Warner's 2008 presidential campaign

Ruby Sinreich, expert on network-centric advocacy

Fred Stutzman, Ph.D. student and social networks researcher at UNC-Chapel Hill's School of Information and Library Science.

Michael Tate, sophomore at the University of Pennsylvania, Communications Director for Penn College Republicans, former Director of Online Communications for Tom Tancredo '08

Zephyr Teachout, Visiting Assistant Professor of Law, Duke Law School, former Director of Online Organizing for Howard Dean and former National Director of the Sunlight Foundation.

Mike Turk, former e-campaign director of the Republican National Committee and Bush-Cheney 2004

Michael Whitney, progressive Internet strategist and web producer.

Organizational references are for personal identification purposes only; comments posted by our bloggers reflect their own personal views only and should not be taken to reflect the positions of the organizations they work for.

TechPresident.com also includes several innovative features for tracking the 2008 presidential campaign online [some of these are still in development]:

Press

The 2008 candidates are running 'e-lection' campaigns, USA Today, 4/4/07
Who's the Most Web Savvy '08 Candidate?, ABC News, 3/20/07
Which 2008 Candidates Are Most Web Savvy?, Newsweek, 3/5/07
Myspace race on the campaign trail, Chicago Tribune, 2/26/07
Presidential candidates ramp up web presence dramatically, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 2/18/07
TechPresident: Tracking Candidate Use of MySpace, YouTube, AdSense, TechCrunch, 2/14/07

News Briefs

RSS Feed thursday >

"Power Politics in the Age of Google"

TechPresident's editorial director, Micah Sifry, will be speaking this afternoon on a panel at Harvard University called "Power Politics in the Age of Google," alongside Susan Crawford, Nicco Mele, Elaine Kamarck and Alexis Ohanian. The panel will be moderated by Harvard Shorenstein Center Director Alex Jones, and will be live-streamed here. GO

House Republicans Get a Jump on the Budget

Via Politico's Mike Allen, the House Republicans are out with a video — this one attributed to Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy — getting the drop on President Barack Obama's next federal budget, expected Monday. GO

Mittbucks.com Lets Voters Compare Their Paychecks With Romney's

What would it take for Mitt Romney to be able to relate to the average American's daily economic life? He'd have to pay $1,208.09 for a gallon of gas, according to Mittbucks.com, a web site recently created by Adam Rosenscruggs and his wife Danielle in Washington, D.C. The eye-popping figure results from an annual income that I plugged in ... GO

What Twitter Won't Tell You About the Election

A new study released on Tuesday by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press on Tuesday offers the opportunity to get real about what the political conversation on Twitter and Facebook can — or can't — tell you about the progression of the 2012 political campaign. Pew has found that even among users of Twitter and Facebook, a paltry percentage of people use social networks to get news about politics: Only 24 percent of Twitter users in the sample and 25 percent of Facebook users said they "sometimes" got campaign news through that network, while a full 40 percent of Twitter users in the sample and 46 percent of other social media users reported "never" getting campaign news through either Twitter or Facebook. GO

Navigating New York's "Road Map for the Digital City," One Year In

In May 2011, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg revealed a "Road Map for the Digital City," a plan to use technology to make city government more and participatory, and to leverage the city's tech sector for economic and civic gains.

New York City Chief Digital Officer Rachel Sterne will join our editorial director, Micah Sifry, on a conference call this Friday afternoon to discuss the progress on that road map so far. The call is free and open to anyone to join. You can sign up here.

tuesday >

Pete Hoekstra's Campaign Website's "Offensive" Source Code Changed After Outcry

As if "chop suey fonts" and obvious graphic allusions to the stereotype of the Chinese as the Yellow Peril weren't controversial enough, the group that created an incendiary microsite for former Rep. Pete Hoekstra's campaign has managed to further fan the flames with what it's calling a mistake in its code. GO

Fidel Castro Loves the Internet

“The Internet is a revolutionary instrument that permits the receiving and transmission of ideas, in both directions, that is something we should know how to use,” Fidel Castro told a crowd of supporters on Feb. 4, according to the state-owned Cuban newspaper Granma International. Castro, who made his first public appearance since April 2011, launched his two-volume memoir, “Guerilla of Time,” and took the opportunity to discuss issues of importance to him. Earlier this week, Miranda Neubauer reported that one of these topics was the need for the Internet. Castro has been a proponent of the Internet as a tool for the exchange of ideas since 2003, but the average Cuban citizen faces great difficulty getting online. GO

Claire McCaskill Hires Blue State Digital's Alex Kellner As Digital Director

Missouri's senior Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill has hired Blue State Digital's Alex Kellner as its digital director. GO

Hip or Hype?

Debates 2.0

GOP 2012

SOPA/PIPA