"Best-laid plans: Media beat Obama to the punch"

[GreenPartyVoter]

WASHINGTON - Sen. Barack Obama's pledge to supporters that they would be the "first to know" his running mate turned out to be a brilliant but unworkable communications strategy.
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The Democratic presidential candidate got scooped by the media on his own announcement, done in by dogged reporting, loose-lipped party insiders and the limits of technology.

But all was not lost. He amassed a huge database of cell phone numbers and e-mail addresses for the fall campaign.

Obama's plan to use text messaging to announce his choice was a first in politics. He had promised supporters that by providing cell phone numbers and e-mail addresses they would be "part of this important moment" — the revelation of his choice for vice president.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080823/ap_on_el_pr/cvn_anatomy_of_a_text_message

[Az]

1. Na... the media played itself

In a desire to out do Obama and "scoop" him they gave him more attention than he would have gotten on his own. Who cares who got to announce it first? What matters is getting the name Obama in front of the people's eyes as often as possible. And the media handed him a ton of air time in trying to beat him to the punch. If thats beating us to the punch then more power to the media.

[GreenPartyVoter]

2. There is that. LOL Not bad considering the Olympics are going on and all.

[blondeatlast]

14. Precisely. Even if they didn't count on the way it turned out (and I think they didn't)

it was all Obama for 24 hours.

The m$m got punked, but of course they will spin it in their favor.

[wishlist]

3. Some in media had nerve to imply that Obama broke his promise!!!

As if Obama had full control over the media's scrutiny of the VP choice and could have somehow guaranteed no one would know before the text message went out

[Az]

7. The MSM is not the official spokepeople for Obama

And the first official announcement to the public came by means of the text messages and the web site. Just because the media actually did some investigative reporting and figured out something before it was official doesn't mean a promise was broken.

[Thrill]

4. If the secret service didn't have to protect Biden. Their plan would of worked

[vaberella]

6. The plan did work. They screwed the media and garnered immense publicity. Mission complete.

Added to all that they gained a database of millions of emails and cell phone numbers. It's ingenious really.

[vaberella]

5. Fuck CNN and all MSM!!!

All morning I've been hearing bloody CNN say, "they've broken the story first" or "Obama's plan backfired and we pinpointed the candidate"---> Whatever!! They still had to wait until the announcement was official before anything and Obama basically told them one by one who it would be when the rejects got the call they were rejected from the short list.


The fucktards think they're always selling that they're ahead of the game when they were played for fools. In the end he had tons of cell phones and emails and he managed to play the media like a fine tuned harp.

[GreenPartyVoter]

8. They had to spin it in a way that would make themselves look good. No way they

would sit there and say, "Well, we got pwned yesterday."

[EC]

9. Are they kidding?

Obama's name was mentioned every 10 minutes on every cable news channel all day...that's the accomplishment...for a change it wasn't all negative McCain talking points, just "we're watching to see who he picks" etc....Ha, Ha....played them like a fiddle...


And Obama's supporters still got their text message to wake up to. It was only nuts like us that stayed up to watch, the rest were in bed by the time the news leaked out....

[matt819]

10. Not sure, but I think it involves adult diapers (nt)

[blogslut]

11. Except, here's the thing

The "media" was so busy making false predictions, they ended up looking totally unreliable and silly.

[GreenPartyVoter]

12. That's becasue they no longer report the "news," they just speculate and make it up.

[beachmom]

13. Actually, my phone received word at 3:40 AM. I hadn't turned on TV

or the computer when I woke up this morning, so the text message was where I learned who the VP was. It worked for me!