extensions

[Ed. note: This is my first attempt at writing a history of the relationship between Obama and the netroots." A couple notes: (1) It's a draft, still working on it, and would love comments re: what I'm missing; (2) There's a problem with the term "netroots," as there is no monolithic group -- they (we) don't all follow the great orange you-know-what. That said, until I figure out how to deal with that, I'm using netroots as a short-cut.]

The most significant event of this week was the culmination of what blogger Matt Stoller calls Obama’s “accountability moment“: his willingness to support the current FISA bill, and the blogosphere’s reaction to that statement.

The reaction in the press has been one of surprise — here is Barack Obama, the “online” candidate, facing backlash from the “netroots” (the left-leaning political blogosphere). The reason for this unexpected reaction is really the conflation of two aspects of the 2008 primary campaign: the continuing growth of the influence and power the netroots has within the Democratic Party, and the success of the Obama campaign using social networking tools effectively during the election. The two, though, are not the same, and a brief history of Senator Obama’s relationship with the political blogosphere can shed some light on the difference.

(more…)

I don’t really post about politics here; I focus more, instead, on my academic work, looking the culture of the blogosphere, etc. But I do follow politics (rabidly), and now have an outlet. It’s a new blog I am co-authoring, called “Obama Letdown Watch.”

To explain, it’s essentially a watchdog blog, and we’re hoping to make sure Senator Obama follows through on his promise of a “new kind of politics.”

Obama’s reaction to the FISA bill currently in Congress, and his willingness to vote for the bill when he previously said he would be against telco immunity, was really what prompted the creation of the blog. But what really solidified for me what I was doing with it, and why, was Obama’s reaction to the recent SCOTUS ruling on the death penalty. He agreed with the (conservative) minority of the court, stating:

I disagree with the decision; I have said repeatedly that I think the death penalty should be applied in very narrow circumstance for the most egregious of crimes…

The statement on FISA is a letdown — it’s definitely not taking a strong stand, definitely not a new kind of politics. The SCOTUS ruling, though, isn’t. Why?

Because Obama is not a liberal.

I know he’s being painted as one. The Republicans are calling him “the most liberal member of the Senate.” (Funny how whoever the Dems nominate to run for President turns out, coincidentally, to be the most liberal member of Congress…)

But Obama’s not a liberal. He’s a center-left politician. Which is fine — politics is all about compromise; there’s no room for expectations of purity.

But delivering on a new kind of politics isn’t a liberal thing or a centrist thing. It’s about being honest and transparent. And if Obama cannot deliver on that, well, it would certainly be a letdown…

OK, so that’s it for politics. Anything else, you can find on the Obama Letdown Watch blog. Hope you come visit.

I’m attending techPresident’s PDF2008, and what’s most interesting to me here is not really the content of the conference, although that’s the main reason I’m here. But it’s really the culture of the crowd in attendance that’s notable.

It’s the strange and unique mix of what I’d call TechnoPoliGeek culture. A mix of policy wonk, tech geek, and Web 2.0 venture capitalist crowds, all merging together to listen to 10 minute mini-lectures from some really smart people, like Clay Shirky, Lawrence Lessig, and Douglas Rushkoff.

What’s most apparent are the toys. I don’t know if I’ve ever been to a conference where it’s only a slight exaggeration to say that *everyone* is live-blogging and live-tweeting the event. Up in the rafters (where there are power outlets provided at many of the seats), there’s this undercurrent, a hum, a constant tap-tap-tap of the keyboards that’s playing like a white noise under all the speakers.

But it’s not only laptops; there are iPhone and vidcams everywhere.

There’s also an undercurrent of capitalist utopianism. Not so much by the folks who run this conference, but by many of the attendees and speakers. VC’s, you know who you are…It’s a strange thing — a push/pull between those who want to make a buck off our politics, and those who want to save our Republic. Not sure if the two are mutually exclusive…

Which was really the subtext of Johnathan Zittrain’s presentation earlier today — he pointed out the very tenuous nature of Web 2.0, stating that, for example, Wikipedia was always one hour away from complete meltdown (spambots, vandals, etc), and the only thing that keeps it floating is the hard work of dedicated individuals who feel they “own” Wikipedia. This hanging-by-a-thread-ness makes listening to the triumphilists an exercise in absurdity, as what’s need to make these technologies work is, in many cases, a “civic defense” team, like the wikipedians.

I’m not sure if technology can save our Republic. If it can create transparency, if it can enable civic defense technologies, if it can connect people, and inspire them to get involved, this crazy scheme just might work.

Strange Internet meme:

I am aware of all Internet traditions.

John McCain campaign, today:

John McCain is aware of the Internet.

Strikingly similar, no?

Apparently the MSM is eager to turn the 2008 election into another authenticity contest.

Well done, Time and AP.

Apparently, right now on the House floor, two members of Congress are having a debate. Not unusual, you say?

They’re doing it on Twitter.

See techPresident for more.

It got me thinking, what if the Founders had twitter?

ThomJeff “When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which hav…” FUCK ran out of chara… 7 minutes ago from web

Yeah, probably wouldn’t have worked out so well.

The McCain campaign’s approach to blogs:

The McCain campaign in late May launched a new blogger outreach section on its website that encourages supporters to lobby for their candidate across 94 blogs that range in political bent from far left to far right.

The campaign arms the blog-raiders with one of McCain’s speeches on the need to transcend partisan politics to deal with the problems that the nation faces.

As the Wired article notes, an initial attempt at this over at the left-leaning Daily Kos was spotted and called out within four minutes. It’s a terrible approach, because it misses an essential aspect of understanding blog communities: the anonymity-pseudonymity continuum.

This is the “no one knows you’re a dog” problem. Bloggers, working within a text-based medium, only have their words to represent them; there are no visual or non-verbal clues, so essential to “real life” communication for filling in what we know (or think we know) about each other. For bloggers, trust and credibility can only be built up over time, through their words, through their actions, through becoming valued and trusted members of the community, and this applies as much to a group blog (such as Daily Kos) as it does to a gathering of commenters (like you see at sites such as Swampland, or Firedoglake).

When we first create an account on a blog, we are anonymous — nameless, faceless, no credibility. Over time, as others get to know us through our comments and blog posts, we slowly move along the continuum . At some point, our anonymity fades — our anonymity becomes pseudonymity. The distinction between these two aspects of blog identity is described in this post by blogger Marcy Wheeler, who writes under the name “emptywheel”:

Pseudonymity is the maintenance of a consistent identity, one to which credibility–or lack thereof–attaches just like it does to the name Bob Cox or Marcy Wheeler. Anonymity is something different, one that doesn’t exist in any fully formed blog.…pseudonymity is one of the most important aspects to retaining the vitality of the blogosphere.

This “constant identity” is reinforced through the day-to-day engagement within the community of a blog. There is a “getting-to-know-ness” about blogging as a social practice, as, over time, bloggers learn more and more about the real-life situations, attitudes, personalities, and politics of others in the community. Reputation and standing within the blog community is based entirely on the history of one’s comments (sometimes called “mojo” or “karma” on blogs) built up over time. Anonymity is fleeting, while pseudonymity is rooted in real world social relations.

All of which is to say that the idea of McCain supporters posting Republican talking points on liberal blogs like Daily Kos is ridiculous, not because of ideology, but because of trust. There’s simply no reason to trust someone who signs up for an account on a liberal web site and argues from the right.

The point may be a bit subtle, and should not be confused with what Ethan Zuckerman has written about homophily; that is, how “birds of a feather” tend to blog together. Or confused with Cass Sunstein’s sharper critique about group polarization; that is, how after deliberation, people tend to move in a more “extreme” position.

While both of those ideas may also be true, I think, in practice, McCain’s blog strategy won’t work, not because liberals won’t listen to conservative ideas, but because his supporters will simply be perceived anonymous bloggers (in fact, his supporters may have trouble getting their points across on moderate and even right-leaning sites, too). His swarm (if it amounts to that…) of supporters, creating accounts on blogs and posting away, won’t take the time required to move across the anonymity-pseudonymity continuum, in order to cultivate the trust needed to bridge the gap between the noobs and the community of bloggers and commenters already present.

PA is tomorrow. It was time to move on about three weeks ago.

The use of new media has been flourishing this campaign season, as digital tools, platforms, and social networking sites have increasingly opened access to our political discourse. “Obama Girl” might be the most notable, but much has also remained somewhat under the radar (or, at least, off network television). Nancy Scola, for example, recently posted about Obama “folk art” that has been popping up.

Yesterday, though, something a bit different happened. Spencer Ackerman, a political blogger who uses music lyrics for his blog’s headlines, posted video from a speech where Obama “brushed” Hillary’s attacks off his shoulders. Ackerman connected the dots, and titled his post “You Gotta Get (Get) That (That) Dirt Off Your Shoulder,” referencing a Jay-Z lyric, calling it “perhaps the coolest subliminal cultural reference in the history of American politics.” Eight hours later, the mashups began, and Ackerman posted one, and then another video from YouTube. [Note: both videos removed subsequent to writing this for legal reasons.]

Why is this significant?

Because, as Ari Melber points out in his post on these mashups, Barack Obama is a Jay-Z fan.

The term “fan culture” is used by MIT’s Henry Jenkins to describe what was often formerly seen as the “reception” side of cultural production. Studying fans allows us “to understand ways that new media can be used to transform our relationship to mass media.” It is the convergence of the passion of fans with new, digital media tools and web sites that has created a more “participatory” culture.

In Barack Obama, then, we not only have a Presidential candidate, but we have a fan. A fan who responds to what happened in a Presidential debate with a sly Jay-Z reference (caught by a blogger), which, in turn, encourages more fans to create mashups of Obama’s speech with Jay-Z’s music.

There is a certain reciprocity here, between Obama and his “fans,” a subtle message of both sincere fandom on Obama’s part, and an “I get it…” nod to his (often young) supporters.

This is certainly more than we’d ever see from either John McCain or Hillary Clinton — it’s definitely a function of “the age thing.” And it’s not a pander; at least I don’t read it that way.

It’s a gesture from a fan, something only a fan would do. And it’s something we’re likely to see more of, as people steeped in today’s participatory culture rise to positions of power.

Can an official Jay-Z Presidential campaign theme far behind?

[Update: Videos available at this Daily Kos post.]

I’m generally more interested in following politics via the blogosphere, rather than commenting directly, but, you know, David Brooks’s post last night was kinda stunning:

I understand the complaints, but I thought the questions were excellent. The journalist’s job is to make politicians uncomfortable, to explore evasions, contradictions and vulnerabilities.

Is that really the job of the journalist? To be sure, I double-checked with the Society of Professional Journalists, who publish a Code of Ethics. From the Preamble:

Members of the Society of Professional Journalists believe that public enlightenment is the forerunner of justice and the foundation of democracy. The duty of the journalist is to further those ends by seeking truth and providing a fair and comprehensive account of events and issues. Conscientious journalists from all media and specialties strive to serve the public with thoroughness and honesty. Professional integrity is the cornerstone of a journalist’s credibility.

Nowhere I can find does it talk about making people feel “uncomfortable.” Now, what Brooks is getting at is that journalists should ask tough questions — of course. No one disputes that.

The issue and disconnect, I think, is the topics covered in those questions. Because a journalist could spend 10 or 15 minutes of a debate asking Obama over and over to prove he is not a terrorist — making him “feel uncomfortable”? Yes. “Exploring vulnerabilities”? To the extent the Republicans might somehow use this tactic against Obama, perhaps. In the public’s interest?

I don’t think so.

And “public enlightenment,” which appears in the first sentence of the Code, is what seems to me to be paramount here. Leonard Witt, at the Public Journalism Network, comments on this, referencing something Brooks mentions, a tour of flag factories during Bush v. Dukakis:

Gee David, you forgot to mention that while H. W. Bush was touring the flag factories during the 1988 election the Republicans were also running the racist Willie Horton ads. In fact, it was exactly the very trivia and sleaze that David Brooks thinks is good journalism that led to the public or civic journalism movement. …he thinks manipulative questions are good journalism.

Which really gets at the heart of this problem: The journalists job at a debate isn’t making politicians feel uncomfortable or explore evasions and vulnerabilities — it’s to moderate the debate.

Moderate: “to preside over” (m-w.com).

The center of attention at a debate should be the candidates. But journalists, and we’ve seen this from others besides ABC last night (ahem, Tim Russert), put themselves in the center. By pursuing the frivolous. By avoiding issues important to the Democratic Party’s voters. By reducing our politics down to “10 second answers” and a “show of hands.”

Because, surely, if a show of hands is good enough for kindergarteners choosing between chocolate and vanilla cookies, it’s certainly good enough for a Presidential debate.

Update: Highest rated debate of the entire primary so far. Only reinforces what happened: ABC is only giving The People what they want, no?