St Edmonds Lab

There is an old saying: “A week is a long time in politics”. As Australia embarks on it’s first “online” election, this is especially true. At the time of the last election in 2004, broadband penetration was in single digits and social networking was confined to the pub. And even though broadband penetration is still woefully behind the rest of the developed world, every move Kevin and John make is examined, torn apart and laid bare by a ruthless online community of eager political satirists…you and I.

Welcome to Politics 2.0

Every brand is currently trying to understand and harness the power of the social networks. The successful brands are having conversations with their customers via community sites, review platforms, forums, video links, bulletin boards, mobile threads and podcasts. Political ‘brands’ can converse in these ways, too. Except they have to achieve success in a campaign that is tantamount to a 6 week sprint. Sure, they can’t drop their online guard once the election is over, but miss this opportunity now and there is no tomorrow. Both Howard and Rudd have taken the admirable and inevitable step of launching an online offensive. In particular the Kevin07 collection of sites has done a good job of trying to pull a lot of the conversation together under one banner. But how do they manage the conversations that are going on in the rest of the blogosphere?

None of these conversations is new. They have been going on for centuries, but the real difference is the accessibility of the information, the speed of comment, and the impact on the brand. You don’t have to wait a week for the Chaser to broadcast its latest stunt, or as it was in my younger days, eagerly staying up on a Sunday night for the UK’s Spitting Image.

The Chaser : Kevin’s facebook friends turn up at his home

It is instant and it rarely holds any prisoners. And it’s ability to influence voters should not be underestimated. And if you think this conversation is confined to political sites, think again. One of the most popular threads on the insightful www.beaututes.com is currently a lengthy debate about whether you hate or like Kevin Rudd.These external influencers can be lumped into three groups:

- The facts

- The fiction

- The fantasy

The facts

Never have we been able to get our hands on the hard nosed facts faster than we can today: from the up-to-the-minute dedicated election sites of any of the mainstream media, through to the clever little Google Trends application that tracks each candidates’ mentions in the media. The ability to stay informed, if you so desire, has never been more widespread.

The fiction

And let’s not forget the ‘fake’ sites. Just a quick scan of Facebook reveals that there were at least five facebook profiles of John Howard and four for Kevin Rudd. And then of course there are the numerous groups ranging from the popular “Kevin Rudd looks like ice-cream” to the more single minded “I hated Howard before it was trendy to do so.” I’m not too sure what we can read into that, but the fact that people have gone to a significant amount of effort surely says something.

The fantasy

Political satire is not new. In fact it is one of the richest seams of raw comedy material there is. And there are plenty of well known online examples such as www.crickey.com.au and www.thechaser.com.au. But for every “official” satirist there are 100 unofficial ones ranging from John Howard’s diary at www.johnhowardpm.blogeasy.com through to the more bizarre www.101usesforajohnhoward.com .

But what influence do these sites have on voters and election outcomes? Are they just a bit of fun or do they have the ability to affect the result. As with most humour there is a serious side to it. Whilst many of the online chats and debates can trivialize politics, they are more often than not based on some fact, or at least a perception of fact. Politics is a serious subject and one’s political tendencies are formed from a complicated mixture of rational facts. The explosion of the citizen journalism has got the potential to sway opinion, particularly amongst a certain demographic, based on a more emotive set of values and they should not be underestimated. In the current US primary elections the video of “I’ve got a crush on Obama” has been viewed over 100 million times around the world. Whether we like it or not that has got to influence some people. What role will the internet play in

Andym

Check out these other blogs on the subject:

http://www.freedomtodiffer.com/onlinepolitics/

http://www.tamaleaver.net/category/politics/

http://www.digitalministry.com.au/component/option,com_myblog/Itemid,142/show,403/