Just how big a part did Youtube play in the election?

[polly7]

n Obama-McCain Race, YouTube Became a Serious Battleground for Presidential Politics
By Nikki Schwab
Posted November 7, 2008

"Unlike normal campaign advertising, online video was often more persuasive because it was passed virally from person to person. One video that helped shape the campaign dialogue was created by director Robert Greenwald's Brave New Films, a progressive Web video making outlet, called "McCain. Mansions: The Houses That Greed Built." This video circulated the Web even before McCain flubbed a question about how many houses he owned. "Initially there was not a lot of evidence that people would watch serious political messaging. There was clear evidence that they would watch naked ladies fall down in showers and cats playing the piano, but there was not a lot of evidence for what we wanted to do, so it's been very satisfying," Greenwald says."

http://www.usnews.com/articles/news/campaign-2008/2008/11/07/in-obama-mccain-race-youtube-became-a-serious-battleground-for-presidential-politics.html?PageNr=2


I was amazed at all the really great videos made by everyday people. Every message board I visited contained thread after thread of posters recommending videos and sending links. Obama's campaign was brilliant to recognize how important this was ...... I don't think McCain's was prepared for it at all.

[galaxy21]

1. youtube has ruined Palin's political career

[crossroads]

4. You betcha! Nothin like watchin her blunders over and over...heheh

[galaxy21]

7. And in years to come people will still be watching it!

[polly7]

5. I sure do hope so! :)

[Lumpsum]

2. It wasn't just Youtube, it was the internet in general.

McCain and his campaign's complete lack of internet outreach is one of many reasons he lost.

[HowHasItComeToThis]

3. BINGO, CITIZEN

[patrice]

8. And wifi things like text broadcasting and camera phones.

When we saw Obama here, I was 50' from him and when he took the stage, there was a literal forest of phones as far as the eye could see in that crowd of 75K.

[patrice]

9. My hypothesis for why: On an average they're less literate, ergo less capable of persuading the

undecided, or motivating the decided. They're not as good with words as Obama supporters are! Smarter candidate --> Smarter supporters!

[patrice]

6. As they like to say around here, it was HUGH !!!!!!1... Made it possible to see speeches & debates

when you missed them. You could stop and replay as many times as it would take for you to figure out what was being said. Sharing speeches and debate points with others so you're "on the same page". Much More. A genuinely profound change in how things have been done politically.

[NYC_SKP]

10. seven

That is how big a part YouTube played. Seven, pretty significant.

[HughBeaumont]

11. Huge.

Let's remember YouTube was formed in February 2005. Granted, there were other video channels existing in a small sense back then, yet there was never one so giant and widespread. Hatred existed in droves at the Bewsh rallies, mind you. It just never ended up on the net in all it's sick splendor.

With the advent of internet video channels, we saw the hatred in all it's ugly glory, causing many conservatives (especially the Eisenhower conservatives) to be ashamed of their own party. The word "Republican" is MUD, and in this election, we got the added bonus of something other than the Failure Fuhrer's lousy performance to make it such.

Even some candidates running for Congress and State Senate, as pointed out in another thread, called themselves "Independents" on their websites. I feel that America; good thinking Americans, that is .. . were getting bored and sick of this regressive and vile side of our country. It represents something that needs to be buried in the past, and we all know it.

Remember that Monkey Man, Crazy-Eye Soccer Mom, "He's an Arab!" Crone, "Commie Faggots" guy, Burnt-ear Bill and the like that we all saw in the rural and suburban McCain/Palin hatefests would probably be the same people at the Bewsh rallies in 2004, were they videotaped. Sure we had Fat Pat Peale (the Texas Delegate purple heart band-aid sporting slob with the white cowboy hat), but mere pictures didn't do their hatred justice. Their statements on video turned out to be the other "gift that kept on giving".

[eridani]

12. I think that YouTube was critical. See the following link--

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=7818476&mesg_id=7818476

[AmericanUnity]

13. BarackObamaDotCom at YouTube was a welcome refuge for me. Watching speeches kept reminding me of

what I was doing as a volunteer and donor.

Also, early on, during the Rev. Wright period, the TrinChgo site (Trinity Church) was a good place to get
videos of Rev. Wright (who is less emotional than my childhood white evangelical preacher) to send to people to quash all that bullshit and show what he'd been preaching the last several years. All intelligent, tame sermons.

[jules1962]

14. Hugh.

[Kahuna]

15. Massive. You tube (a News Corp asset I believe), allowed us a vehicle

to do an end run around the M$M. You tube forced them to report stories they would have otherwise ignored, once they found out those stories of interest were going "viral" without their coverage.