Daily Digest: Palin's Emails Breached, Broadcast

The Web on the Candidates

• Nominee's Emails Go Public: You might have heard that Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin's Yahoo email account was violated and its contents -- including family photos and contact information -- splayed across message boards, gossip blogs, and elsewhere across the web. Our own Micah Sifry spotlighted the breach yesterday afternoon. Wired's Kim Zetter has been tracking the ins and outs of the story, including the news that some of the breached emails were from Palin's spokesperson, chief of staff, and other staffers. The McCain camp responded by branding the incident "a shocking invasion of the Governor's privacy." The FBI and Secret Service are reportedly now on the case. Related: Nancy Scola (me) looked at what public officials using private email accounts means for transparent government. #

• Updating Debating: Does this count as strange bedfellows? The Commission on Presidential Debates and MySpace have gotten together to spawn MyDebates.org. Starting with next Friday's matchup, MyDebates.org will pull together streaming video, live polls, forums, and other social tools. It's a place, in other words, where voters can watch the debates alone together. And as Kate Phillips of the New York Times notes, the site is where you want to go if you're interested in submitting a question for Tom Brokaw to throw at the candidates during the Oct. 7 debate. #

The Candidates on the Web

• McCain Explains Nuances of Your Local Voting Rules: It turns out that in my home state of New York you're eligible to vote absentee if, on November 4th, you'll be in prison on a non-felony offense. Where'd I pick up that little nugget of election information? From a smart email now being sent out by the McCain campaign. The notes urge early voting and are customized for each recipient. And as absentee voting laws can be quite confusing and vary a great deal from state to state, the McCain camp's concise breakdowns of local election rules and restrictions is immensely useful. #

• Palin's Powerful Online Pull: The web analytics firm Compete has been keeping a close eye on how the Republican and Democratic tickets are faring online. And Compete's Matt Pace now reports that Sarah Palin's Wikipedia entry was the single most visited page on online encyclopedia in the month of August -- a statistic made all the more remarkable by the fact that Palin's candidacy was announced with just three days left in the month. Also of note: in Compete's analysis, traffic to JohnMcCain.com has upticked from 48% female to 52% female since Palin joined the ticket. #

TechCongress and Beyond

• Spotlighting the Cash that Goes into the Sausage: The House Committee on Financial Services recently considered the Credit Cardholders' Bill of Rights, a bill opposed by commercial banks, local chambers of commerce, and others in the financial industry. So it just might be interesting to know how much money those interests where kicking into the coffers of the members of Congress vetting the bill, right? That's precisely what you can do with Maplight's remarkable new congressional committee tool. By way of example, with just a click you can see that those urging a nay vote chipped in some 34 times the cash to Democratic Chairman Barney Frank's campaign account than consumer protection groups and other bill supporters. (No matter, though -- Frank and the rest of the committee approved the measure.) #

• techEnemy: You know who isn't doing so well mastering the Interweb: Al-Qaeda. Wired's Noah Shachtman reports that its once robust organizing and propaganda network has been sputtering of late. #

• Video Games and Civic Life: Are teenage video gamers anti-social or civically-engaged? That's the question explored in "Teens, Video Games and Civics," a new report just released by Pew Internet and American Life. And while much more research needs to be done, the study uncovered a few provocative facts. Nearly all American teens play some kind of video game. Many gamers report that political questions come up in the course of play. And those who engage in what Pew calls "civic gaming experiences" -- like organizing World of Warcraft guilds or assisting newbies -- are much more likely to be politically active away from the computer. Pew's report deserves to be chewed over, and we look forward to hearing what smart-folks who study the field have to say. #

• From: E-Democratists, To: The Future: One Web Day is an annual event, held every September 22. But the celebration coming up this Monday has a special political twist: an e-Democracy Time Capsule. What will go in the capsule? Description of e-government tools, letters on e-powered politics, notes on Internet policy issues, and more. You've got four days to contribute. For our part, we've kicked in a copy of "Rebooting America." #