The Coming Digital Presidency

Ranjit Mathoda writes "Marc Andreeson, the cofounder of Netscape, met Senator Barack Obama in early 2007. Mr. Andreeson recalls, "In particular, the Senator was personally interested in the rise of social networking, Facebook, Youtube, and user-generated content, and casually but persistently grilled us on what we thought the next generation of social media would be and how social networking might affect politics — with no staff present, no prepared materials, no notes. He already knew a fair amount about the topic but was very curious to actually learn more." As a social organizer and a lover of new technologies, Mr. Obama could be expected to make good use of such tools in getting elected, and he has done so. What may not be as obvious is that Mr. Obama appears to have a keen interest in using such technologies in the act of governing. And whether Mr. Obama becomes president, or Mrs. Clinton or Mr. McCain do, these new tools have the potential to transform how government operates."

Added bonus

One nice effect of being a digital President: on the Internet, one rarely has to flee under sniper fire.

Digital Presidency

Dugg for education and healthcare policy.
Burried for tax hike

Yes, I'm looking forward to digital democracy.

The future of the online social president...

prez2008 has thrown a hamburger at you! Do you wish to throw one back? [yes][no]

Facebook Apps

John McCain has requested that you join the Sith in the Jedi Vs. Sith War.

What's the REAL significance of any of this?

My initial thought (however cynical it may come across?) is: Is this really just another plea of "Hey general public, I'm Obama and unlike the other candidates, I'm hip and in-touch with the current generation! Vote for me!" ?

The candidate I saw leveraging the power of the Internet the most, early in this election, was Ron Paul -- and it looked like most people just used it to smear the guy. EG. "Nobody but spammers and a few computer geeks with loud mouths care about him!"

Yes, the future of politics has much to do with the Internet as a communications medium. Unfortunately, the majority of people using it as a "primary" source of information and content is the younger generation. Folks (like my parents and all of their friends) who are retirement age voters, by contrast, generally pay NO attention to a speech given over YouTube, or what a candidate posts on a FaceBook or MySpace page. And the 40-something and 50-something crowd? It's a "mixed bag" right now. Some are very "net-savvy", while a good percentage of others write it off as "the computer stuff my kids are into".

I think you've got to let a few more election years come and go in this country before the MAJORITY of voters will really be "on-board" with the Internet as their information source, vs. traditional media like television, newspapers and radio.

Lessig on Obama; +, all politics is organizing

My initial thought (however cynical it may come across?) is: Is this really just another plea of "Hey general public, I'm Obama and unlike the other candidates, I'm hip and in-touch with the current generation! Vote for me!" ?

If you're wondering whether Obama's enthusiasm for the Internet and technology goes beyond "hip and in touch", you might consult Lawrence Lessig's endorsement of him [lessig.org]. And after reading Obama's tech paper, I can't say I think any other candidate's compares even in showing awareness of issues.

That said, the fact that I see the net strongly leveraged elsewhere -- including Paul's rather impressive campaign -- makes me *less* jaded about the increasing use of social networking. Nor do I think it's really surprising or affected: to some extent, all politics is (among other things) organizing. Real-world social networks were a huge part of politics before social networks came to the web, it's a completely natural fit now that's here. So to one degree or another, *everybody* is using it. I think part of the reason Paul stands out in his use is his unfortunate and somewhat unfair uphill battle in traditional media -- he really didn't have anywhere else to go.

Now, I'd agree it sometimes seems Obama is using this tool more heavily and talking more about his use of tools than anyone else in the field other than Paul. But I think to the extent that's true, it's largely because up until the last 4 years of his political career, organizing has been a big part of what he does -- his start, for goodness sake, was as a community organizer [edwoj.com]. It really does appear he has a philosophy that includes bottom-up organization as a component of well-balanced politics. And what the social networking tools do that's new to politics is increase the reach and efficiency of that kind of organizing. They only marginally bolster the traditional political networks, but they're a huge boost at the grassroots level, especially the more you know about grassroots organizing.

I also would agree that not all candidates are created equal on the tech-friendly front, however. In particular, McCain has some issues with not fighting the internet [oreillynet.com], and while Clinton might have some good progressive impulses regarding it, I don't trust her not to throw it under a bus if some other "expediency" arises.

So while I'm sometimes a bit disappointed we didn't get a race like Obama vs Paul -- one that I think would have essentially signaled a real end to business as usual and a significant shift to digital politics -- I still think Obama stands out as an evolutionary step in the right direction, if not the Paul revolution.

One other thing about a part of the premise of the post ("Hey general public, I'm Obama and unlike the other candidates, I'm hip and in-touch with the current generation! Vote for me!"). This isn't necessarily directed at the poster I'm responding to, but I'm noticing a high degree of frequency in attacks on Obama that are essentially "Sure he SEEMS great, but SEEMING isn't the same things as BEING great and we just don't know what's REALLY behind HIM!" To some extent, I don't blame people for thinking this way. We've been let down pretty severely by quite a bit of our political leadership recently. And it's hard to really know whether what you know about a candidate is image or fact.

But I also think the time for this kind of talk about Obama is past. He's been in the spotlight for a while, there's plenty of material available about him and written by him to get genuinely familiar with the substance of his history and positions. I don't have a problem with people arguing about what they don't like about Obama's stated policies, or a vote he made in the past. But at this point, anybody bringing up this kind of "we don't KNOW" or "he's all STYLE and TALK" r

Re:What's the REAL significance of any of this?

Ron Paul is a cautionary counterexample; It's all very well building up grassroots support on the Internet, but if your grassroots comprises a mishmash of troofers, stoppers, lunatics, antisemites, conspiracy theorists, naive libertarians, politically vacuous "fuck the system" types, and a spattering of basement-bound non-voting teenagers and various other subcultures and social outcasts entirely ill at ease with Middle America, then it's (as we kept trying to tell them) not going to be enough.

Pardon me, but I really must call bullshit on this characterization. I realize that this impression of Ron Paul's support is what you were SUPPOSED to believe, but having been a part of the revolution first hand, I'm here to tell you that it's all a bunch of crap. You'd have exactly the same level of accuracy by saying that all of Obama's supporters are teenage muslim fundamentalist spear-chuckers.

The truth is, the internet is simply far too easy to marginalize. THAT is the cautionary tale. To win in politics you need the support of CBS, Fox News, CNN, the New York Times, and the like. Forget YouTube. It may as well actually be a water slide for all the impact it actually has on anything - today.

The political realm is still well in the hands of the digital immigrants. Perhaps in another iteration or two we'll get to see the impact of what those digital natives can do, but I some how doubt it. Until the mass-media can find a viable way of controlling the tubes, they will always be dissonant against its message. And frankly folks, Joe Sixpack still doesn't trust what he reads about online more than he does the idiot box.

Moderation

A nice idea but to stop the inevitable trolling you're going to need some decent moderation. But then you'll probably get risk averse moderators taking down potentially inflammatory comments who will then be criticized for stifling free speech. And then when the people who might want to join in hear that free speech is being stifled over at opengov.com they'll come to /., and similar sites, in their hoards to moan about how repressive their government has become. Flame wars will be inevitable. /. will seize up, I'll have to go back to work. It's just another no-win situation.

We live in a Republic

I find the entire idea of creating a wired democracy to be revolting. The best government is seen in its effects and not heard. I don't want to think about government or politics in my day to day existence and would much rather just have the professionals that I elect get on with the business of governing competently. I don't want big crusades - I've had enough crusades with Bush. When I elect a President and a Congress, I don't want them asking me my opinion every 30 seconds. I want to know that they thought through the issues and made the best decisions they could, kept the army in powder, the navy afloat, the planes in the air, the satellites working, the bridges up and the roads in good repair. If it turns out that they do something that I politically don't agree with, I can -actually live with that-, so long as they bring a general air of competence to the table.

Making the body politic a mob.

This US is a republic, not a popular democracy. The American founders were well deeply concerned with the possibility of mob government - hence (for example) the Senate, the Electoral College, and our system of checks and balances. (Yes, a gross simplification, but this is my lunch break.) The Founders were afraid of the mob for good reason. So should we.

The idea of using Facebook, MySpace, and Digg as instruments of government is, in some ways, breathtakingly foolish. Reading the content on Digg - full of conspiracy theories, slander, and bigotry - seems reminiscent of the chants of a mob, not the (theoretically desired) reasoned vox populi.

The anonymity of the Internet, combined with the speed of activity on the Web, seems to lead in many cases to an amplification of our baser instincts. Do we want our political leaders receiving input from commercial Web sites, with no means of identifying who or what is promoting certain causes?

For months Digg was filled with article after article promoting the merits of Dr. Ron Paul, the coming Messiah who will Redeem America. After Dr. Ron Paul, savior, left the race we have the new and exciting stage of articles promoting the merits of Senator Obama, the Messiah who will Redeem America. True, their could be an upswell of support from individual users, but are we perhaps seeing an organized campaign(s) manipulating Web 2.0 sites for their own purposes? With anonymity of site users, who can tell?

I've watched as the social media sites race to extremes. The load, most obnoxious writers gain the most attention; well reasoned arguments are often more dull and are ignored. Debates on sites such as Daily Kos revert on a daily base to name calling, ad hominen attacks, and sheer bloody-mindedness. Is this how we want our leaders to be influenced? In many cases on Daily Kos you'll see the same author online throughout the entire day, every day writing "diaries" and defending their positions. Who the hell are these people? How can they afford to avoid work to write their blog entries? Are those who use FaceBook a representative sample of the population, or the young, hip, and independently wealthy?

Social Media sites dramatically lower the costs of individual citizens involvement in the political process. That's a Good Thing. Yet if we don't anticipate and accept the manipulation of those sites by external agencies and those with far too much time on their hands, we're bloody damn fools.

Re:A bit presumptuous, no?

Pretty silly to impute the remarks of another onto a candidate. Do we even need to look at the things the religious right has said that John McCain embraces? Remember back in the last election when McCain wanted nothing to do with them?

Re:A bit presumptuous, no?

I was thinking the exact same thing. The only problem is, what is everyone else's reaction?

Personally I think nothing has changed. Almost everyone who liked Obama before they heard the preacher still likes him. And everyone who didn't like Obama before still don't like him. I doubt a huge segment of the population has changed their minds about any of the candidates.

Re:A bit presumptuous, no?

Very interesting defense of Rev. Wright from Mike Huckabee

"[Y]ou can't hold the candidate responsible for everything that people around him may say or do," Huckabee says. "It's interesting to me that there are some people on the left who are having to be very uncomfortable with what ... Wright said, when they all were all over a Jerry Falwell, or anyone on the right who said things that they found very awkward and uncomfortable, years ago. Many times those were statements lifted out of the context of a larger sermon. Sermons, after all, are rarely written word for word by pastors like Rev. Wright, who are delivering them extemporaneously, and caught up in the emotion of the moment. There are things that sometimes get said, that if you put them on paper and looked at them in print, you'd say 'Well, I didn't mean to say it quite like that.'" Later, he defended Wright's anger, too: "As easy as it is for those of us who are white to look back and say 'That's a terrible statement!' ... I grew up in a very segregated South. And I think that you have to cut some slack -- and I'm gonna be probably the only conservative in America who's gonna say something like this, but I'm just tellin' you -- we've gotta cut some slack to people who grew up being called names..."

Re:A bit presumptuous, no?

Even if it didn't absorb into your psyche, and you truly weren't racist, why would you continue to attend the church? It would be like not being racist, but attending the KKK meetings because you liked the way you looked in the uniform. I really don't see any reason for attending a church where you don't agree with their philosophies. Attending a church that tells you to hate whitey every week when you actually aren't racist wouldn't be all that enjoyable.

Re:A bit presumptuous, no?

You mean like all the Catholics who are uncomfortable or downright unhappy with the Catholic church's stance on contraception (including condoms in AIDS-ridden Africa), homosexuality, and protecting child-molesting priests through many decades of the 20th Century? While I've known some who left the church, I have also known some who stayed despite their personal disagreements with church policy because they didn't want to leave the community of the church. Heck, I wouldn't be surprised if there are a high proportion of people who were molested as children by Catholic priests who are still members of the church in spite of being molested, and yet who don't feel that doing so supports child molestation. Should Ted Kennedy or other Catholic congressmen be expected to support child molestation, abstinence-only STD prevention, and other stupidity because the head of the Catholic church has, either explicitly or tacitly, condoned the same?

The last two Popes' actions and words have been responsible for numerous deaths and broken lives, something that I doubt can be said for the Reverend Wright. Both have also been responsible for some good works.

I might be cognitive dissonance: you wind up ignoring the bad things about someone because they don't match up with the world view promoted by the good things, and you prefer to trust in the good things. Or it might be the crazy old uncle who becomes more intolerant over time who you vehemently disagree with but choose not to upset too much because he was good to you when you were younger. In the end you have to judge Obama by what he does and says rather than what one or two individuals around him say. Should Jesus be judged by Judas' actions?

Re:Meeting Wright != 20 Years of Mentorship

Why do you see experience as such a positive? Almost no one was more experienced than Dick Cheney and members of the cabinet. Where did that get us?

Intent is far more important than experience. A good leader will bring people into his or her circle who are more knowledgeable and more experienced. They are then leveraged to make intelligent choices. Obama's lack of experience in the Senate has almost nothing to do with how well he will run the office of the President.

Fuck.

Exactly. The blowing up of this by the media, and the subsequent word-of-mouth, is fucking bullshit. I watched the entire sermon in which those things were said, and taken in context, it was a good message and, while maybe not family-friendly in language and content, was an appropriate underlying lesson to hear at a church. If I remember correctly, the right to speak out against (or even act against) unjust acts of the government was one of the founding principles of this country - this is all Rev. Wright was doing. I'm white, I'm American, and I have no problem with what he said - seriously, just go watch the whole sermon, it's on YouTube.

Just because an older black man who grew up having to sit at the back of the bus still has the mindset that America is racist against blacks (and yes, it still is, but obviously not like back then), and speaks his mind about it, he's racist against whites now? And because he condemns the acts of the Israeli government against Palestine he's an anti-semite? People need to do their research and stop listening to Rush Limbaugh (he actually has the audacity to call Wright a "racist, poison-spewing hate-monger" when he has to have seen the whole sermon.)

What the hell is wrong with people? They don't want a president who's willing to listen to the views of someone who thinks there's some problems with racism in America? They don't want a president who's willing to listen to the views of someone who's not totally happy with everything in America, and says something about it? Remember, he repudiated Wright's more abrasive comments, but in a show of good character, didn't abandon the man. And I believe one of the founding fathers said something to the effect of, "the greatest patriots of this country are those who are willing to question it." (I don't remember exact words or who it was, that's a paraphrase.)

Re:Fuck.

I think what it comes down to is that Wright went on the record saying that 9/11 was the result of America's actions around the world. That is the political third rail. You can't talk about what really caused 9/11. You can't talk about the root causes of terrorism. You have to toe the party line on that one and Obama can't associate himself with anyone who is saying that 9/11 is the result of bad American foreign policy.

Re:A bit presumptuous, no?

Not really. Robertson and Falwell seem to have a lot of sway with many high ranking Republicans. And they actively and successfully affect policy. Farrakhan and Wright have had little or no affect on policy. They also hold no influence within the Democratic party. At worst Wright might affect one Democrat, while the religious right affects the entire Republican party.

Re:A bit presumptuous, no?

Do you really think Wright "spews it every day and with clear design"? Many of the most damning quotes attributed to him have turned out to be taken out of context [cnn.com].

I'm not saying he hasn't said some bad things, but Wright's views have been heavily exaggerated for political reasons.

Re:A bit presumptuous, no?

I agree, it sure looks to me like McCain is going to be our next president. Obama's preacher is a racist, a white person voting for him would be like a black person voting for a white man whose preacher is a Klansman

Agreed! There is no way in hell I would vote for Obama's preacher for President.

He's Not a Racist

Obama's preacher isn't a racist. He went too far with "God damn America" (in one speech), but what he said was "God damn America so long as it's killing innocent people all the time", which is actually what any decent preacher who believes in damnation (they're all supposed to) would have to say. Because that's what the religion says.

There's absolutely no equation of Obama's preacher to a klansman. Klansmen are sick bastards joining a secret society with an unbroken tradition of universal hate (except for worshiping an imaginary idol of a White supremacy that almost ripped the country in half and destroyed it). Klansmen are murders, arsonists, rapists, and traitors, who demand the genocide and enslavement of the entire world, except a few people who look like them (but women are property).

Obama's preacher is a guy who sometimes shouts about racial and social injustice, and demands... that America stop killing innocent people, stop persecuting the Black community, face the fact that Hillary Clinton isn't in touch with the hardest problems many Americans face because of their race. Sure, he can get jerky and obnxious about it, and even be wrong about some of the injustices - and even more wrong failing to admit how much persecution of American Blacks is perpetuated inside the Black community, not by "Whitey". But he's got a right to be wrong. Hell, he's a preacher - he stands up every week to insist people do things because an imaginary supernatural force says so - his whole gig is unprovable, so he's going to be wrong sometimes. But what does he demand we do about it? He demands that we are compassionate, that we take care of one another, that we're honest about how we hurt each other, and that we do better.

Not what we reject from klansmen, even if we disagree with him, or offended by him.

Meanwhile, George Bush has sent us to war in Iraq and against "Terror" by invoking his own crackpot Christian ideas of Israel's sacrificial role in the "Rapture". He claims "God" told him to invade Iraq. He's actually lying, stealing and killing people in Jesus' name. McCain has relentlessly sought the endorsement of some of the most sick "Christian" preachers in America. Like Jerry Falwell before Falwell just died, even though McCain had earlier rejected Falwell as a crazyman when Falwell was endorsing Bush against McCain. But after Falwell and Pat Robertson blamed "gays, feminists, abortionists, the ACLU" [youtube.com] for making "God" send us the 9/11/2001 attacks, McCain eagerly pursued their endorsements and kneeled at their feet. McCain went after endorsements [google.com] from "reverends" John Hagee [google.com] and Rod Parsley [google.com], who preach crazy "Left Behind" hatred of anyone not fitting their definition of "Christian" - like Catholics, whose church he says is a "whore", a direct agent of the devil. Hoping for those other people to burn alive in the streets, endorsing the widespread massacre of "sinners" by gangs of "Christians" trying to score their way into heaven when the Rapture leaves them behind for not having been sufficiently hateful in the "near-End Times". These people want global murder, actual apocalypse, and will pressure a president who listens to them to hand out nukes to maniacs in the Mideast to "bring it on".

Even the popular Billy Graham, who's had the ear of every president since Nixon, is a racist and antisemit who used to laugh it up with Nixon (and surely the rest, but off-tape) about what to do about the "problem" with those non-WASPs.

Clinton isn't much better, worshiping for years with "The Fellowship" (or "The Family") [google.com], a gender-segregated prayer group that's mostly secret, but includes some of

Re:Digital Presidency? more like FARKING SPAMMER

You have GOT to be kidding. You're actually using a Google search of news.admin.net-abuse.email for "barack obama" as some kind of "evidence" of something? news.admin.net-abuse.email is the preferred home newsfroup of every k00k, forger, impostor, sock-puppet and whack-job on Usenet. It's the home of countless flame-wars, ridiculous accusations and general raving stupidity. My god, I wear a tinfoil hat AND a condom when I read that group. If that's the best you've got, then you should just go back under your bridge, troll.

Re:Digital Presidency... HA!

My thoughts exactly. We need a real president with real priorities. While Obama was playing around with his Facebook page, Hillary was low-crawling through a hail of sniper fire, on a tarmac halfway around the globe. I heard that she was dragging along an 8 year old girl while signing an autograph with her other hand.

Re:That's cool, and yet not

On the other hand, I really don't like the idea of whitehouse.gov becoming a government-run myspace which encourages people to give the government even more personal information about themselves.

How about one which encourages government officials to give people information about themselves? [slashdot.org]

He's talking about doing basically the opposite of what you (and others) seem to be assuming. And it is one of the cooler ideas I have seen in awhile -- one which none of the other candidates seem to have caught on to.