How did the Democrats beat the Republicans in the technology battle?

[Brad Chang]

From everything that I have read, Obama bought the presidency with ($650 million) and one of his keys to his success was his use of technology like the internet and twitter. He successfully tapped into a generation of kids that don't normalkly vote or have any interest in politics.

On the other hand McCain was asleep at the wheel. Everything about his campaign strategy, his use of technology and the internet were antiquated and naive. Where talk radio once ruled, the internet has now taken the lead... and the Dems cleaned the Repub's clocks on this front.

People who were thirsty for real time news and personal connections to politicians (through vehicles like Twitter) went with Obama and his cronies. There was no real content or real issues brought to bear and we know less about this president than any other in history... but he connected with people who didn't care and only wanted immediate gratification.

I would love to hear your opinions on this... but judging at the amount of traffic on this forum, I better not hold my breath...

Brad

[Ron Wright]

Brad -

RTC is just building so yes, limited traffic on the Ning Social Network. More on LinkedIn and Facebook. We all just need to spread the word more and bring more folks into the network. Please send out invites.

As for Obama's tech lead and McCain's less than stellar effort, first consider that the "young voter attraction" difference between Obama and McCain (a big difference) translated into a larger technically sophisticated population interested in the Obama candidacy. And also remember this was a GOP candidate with limited experience and interest in computers or oriented towards new media technology (unless you are discussing defense and weapons related technology).

From first hand knowledge, I can relay that the Campaign made a policy decision early on (before the primaries) to not entertain the use of new internet technology and build the standard website. Funds were going into traditional media, field structure and GOTV efforts but not using the internet to enhance these efforts.. The internet activity was sub-contracted to an outside firm (which was managing several campaigns and not solely focused on the McCain effort) and never received the same priority that the Obama campaign management stressed in their effort. I think it would be interesting to see a break down of how much money Obama spent compared to McCain on their internet / new media efforts. When McCain ran into financial difficulty in the summer of 2007, this area was cut back significantly.

If one does not plan and execute a strong new media / internet strategy very early in the campaign cycle (and fund it accordingly), I believe it is hard to play catch up especially if your opponent has made it a top priority and is pouring funds into the effort.

I believe the Republicans need to track and invest in the new technologies and not just wait for the Democrats to demonstrate the useful applications of new technology each campaign cycle.

Thanks
Ron

[Brad Chang]

Amen brother! The Dem's ran circles around us with technology and the "cool" factor... and now we're paying for it.