Daily Digest: 4/11/07

The Web on the Candidates

• A new site called QubeTV sees itself as a conservative alternative to YouTube. “It won’t be easy to compete against a giant like YouTube, but if enough conservatives embrace the idea, it could become the go-to place for conservative video on the Web,” said Robert Bluey, director of the Center for Media & Public Policy at the Heritage Foundation. The site was started by two former aides to Ronald Reagan, Charlie Gerow and Jeff Lord. “Conservatives now have the opportunity to be in ‘Web 2.0’. Our goal is to make QubeTV the dominant social network site for anyone who is right-of-center and to have the best in online video, especially online video related to the campaign of 2008,” Gerow said. Check out Wonkette's snarky take on the site.
• Two surveys have been released that show an increased reliance on the web for information related to the 2008 election. A Word of Mouth Marketing poll found that "Forty-two percent of Americans say they will get more pre-election information from the internet in 2008 than they did in 2004," and online ad network Burst Media found that one quarter of likely voters think the web is the best place to research the candidates, making it the most popular source of information for 2008. The Burst study also found that more than 20% of likely voters had visited a candidate's web site, and almost half would watch online video of a candidate.
• The Blogometer weighed on the ongoing disagreement between techPresident's Mike Turk and Giuliani advisor Patrick Ruffini about whether or not the Democrats own the web ("they do!" "no they don't!" "yes they do!" etc.) with a salient obsveration: "We highly respect Ruffini and Turk but argue their analysis of the issue may be too colored by their backgrounds as party and candidate staffers. Too often in their analysis they ask what should the RNC or candidates be doing to better engage activists online. We think this misses the impetus behind the power of the netroots. The DNC did not dream up Atrios, and Howard Dean did not create Daily Kos. While the netroots strongly identify themselves with Dems, they are a separate movement formed after years of frustration over Clinton's impeachment, Gore's loss in FL, and the Iraq war. The Blogometer argues that the GOP is not going to see a potent online force until it spends a similar journey through the wilderness."
• Jeff Jarvis continues his excellent coverage of the 2008 race with a post about the discrepancy between actual public opinion about Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, and media coverage of the two candidates. While recent polls show Hillary continuing to dominate -- a recent Gallup poll gives her twice the support as Obama, which Ben Smith at the Politico sees as a sign of a plateau -- Obama completely dominates in mainstream news coverage and among the netroots, and John Edwards was far and away the winner of a recent MyDD straw poll. "Boy, those results don’t look like those from Gallup — from the real voters," Jarvis writes.

The Candidates on the Web

• If he blogs, is he running? Fred Thompson, the Law & Order star and conservative fave who may or may not run for president, has been blogging at RedState. In the post he tackled Iran and it’s willingness to “kidnap British citizens, subject them to brutal psychological tactics to coerce phony confessions, finagle the release of a high-ranking Iranian terror coordinator in Iraq, utterly trash the Geneva conventions and suffer absolutely no consequences.” (via Beltway Blogroll)
• Seven Democratic candidates participated in a virtual town hall hosted by Moveon.org last night. Check out a video of the event and the unfolding conversation from both sides of the aisle.

In Case You Missed It…

The McCain messaging triangle
Today at 11:30 AM, John McCain will live-stream his speech regarding Iraq at the Virginia Military Institute. David All has personally been emailed by two senior officials on the campaign about the speech (so will likely watch), has been sent an early copy of his remarks (as prepared for delivery), and will be on another bloggers conference call with John McCain today at 1:30 PM. Stay tuned...

Tunisia 1984 Video Mash-up
Blogger and human rights activist extraordinaire Ethan Zuckerman has a fascinating post up about a Tunisian version of the 1984 Apple ad video mash-up that predates the now famous "Vote Different" Hillary 1984 video by three years.

Newt and John: Keeping debates alive
David All takes a look at yesterdays debate between Newt Gingrich and Sen. John Kerry "on Global Climate Change, specifically carbons in the atmosphere," in the Russell Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill.

John Edwards in Second Life
Ruby Sinreich visited the new John Edwards Campaign Central in Second Life, located at the relatively bucolic and PG-rated Laguna Beach, far away from the vandals that plagued the previous location.

Upcoming Events:

This Friday:

Democratization and the Networked Public Sphere

Panel Discussion with danah boyd, Trebor Scholz, and Ethan Zuckerman

Friday, April 13, 2007, 6:30 - 8:30 p.m.

The New School, Theresa Lang Community and Student Center

55 West 13th Street, 2nd floor

New York City

Admission: $8, free for all students, New School faculty, staff, and alumni with valid ID

This evening at the Vera List Center for Art & Politics will discuss the potential of sociable media such as weblogs and social networking sites to democratize society through emerging cultures of broad participation.