visit site
Henry Jenkins and many others see 2004 as a flashpoint. It's the year that extreme media phenomena associated with social networking emerged to deeply reshape the process of electing a President in the United States.
In a chapter entitled "Photoshop for Democracy," (Convergence Culture: where Old and New Media Collide), Jenkins says: "...with the 2004 election, we can see citizens starting to apply what they have learned as consumers of popular culture toward more overt forms of political activism.... we will see a number of ways that the campaigns were learning from fan culture. Meetup.com founderScott Heiferman wanted a way to trade Beanie Baby stuffed toys with other collectors, and its power was first demonstrated when The X-Files (1993) fans used Meetup.com to organize an effort to keep their favorite series on the air."
Moveon.org uses social networking media forms and devices (nationwide vigils, flckr photo galleries, house parties organized through "meetup.org"-type invitations create "virtual town halls, DIY video production contests for political ads and micro-documentaries). Blurring the social, the political, and popular culture entertainment, moveon.org generates powerful and influential political networks.
In "Photoshop for Democracy," Jenkins argues that the "culture jamming" we experienced in the Adbusters capsule is fundamentally different from new forms of social agency now made possible by "blogging." He sees culture jamming as "a political tactic that reflected the logic of the digital revolution" (where media activists use new media to assert a counterperspective on mass media). It's a concept that, he suggests, has outlived its usefulness.
"The old rhetoric of opposition and co-optation assumed a world where consumers had little direct power to shape media content and faced enormous barriers to entry into the marketplace, whereas the new digital environment expands the scope and reach of consumer activities....In effect, blogging is a form of grassroots convergence. By pooling their information and tapping grassroots expertise, by debating evidence and scrutinizing all available information, and, perhaps most powerfully, by challenging one another's assumptions, the blogging community is 'spoiling' the American government. We might draw an analogy between the fan community going on location to find more information about the Survivor boots and the blogging community poling its money to send independent reporters to Baghdad or the party converntions in search of the kinds of information they feared would be filtered out by mainstream media... In some cases, the bloggers, like the spoilers, are tracking down information about events that have already unfolded; but in many other cases, unllike the spoilers, they are attempting to shape future events, trying to use the information they have unearthed to intervene in the democratic process."
The 2008 Presidential Election is already being shaped by blogging in the ways Jenkins foresaw. Afronetizen.com is one prime example.
In February 2007, the Personal Democracy Forum launched a project: techPresident. com
techPresident was started by Andrew Rasiej and Micah Sifry as a new group blog that covers how the 2008 presidential candidates are using the web, and vice versa, how content generated by voters is affecting the campaign.
techPresident's slogan is “How the candidates are using the Web, and how the Web is using them.”
The New York Times covered its launch.
techPresident's manfesto highlights a number of the arguments that Jenkins makes in Convergence Culuture:
Personal Democracy Forum: Manifesto
Democracy in America is changing.
A new force, rooted in new tools and practices built on and around the Internet, is rising alongside the old system of capital-intensive broadcast politics.
Today, for almost no money, anyone can be a reporter, a community organizer, an ad-maker, a publisher, a money-raiser, or a leader.
If what they have to say is compelling, it will spread.
The cost of finding like-minded souls, banding together, and speaking to the powerful has dropped to almost zero.
Networked voices are reviving the civic conversation.
More people, everyday, are discovering this new power. After years of being treated like passive subjects of marketing and manipulation, they want to be heard.
Members expect a say in the decision-making process of the organizations they join. Readers want to talk back to the news-makers. Citizens are insisting on more openness and transparency from government.
All the old institutions and players-big money, top-down parties, big-foot journalism, cloistered organizations-must adapt or face losing status and power.
Personal Democracy, where everyone is a full participant, is coming.
The Personal Democracy Forum is your place to meet the people who are making that change happen, discover the tools powering the new civic conversation, spot the early trends, and share in understanding and embracing this dynamic new force.
In May, 2007, EContent Magazine reviewed techPresident and its place in the broader context of internet-based social networking: E Content Magazine's coverage of techPresident
In August, 2007, techPresident was named one of 10 finalists in the Knight-Batten Awards for Innovations in Journalism.
One of techPresident's projects is to track the candidates’ use of MySpace, YouTube, Google and Yahoo! ads. Their big question with this project: whether candidate postings on the site are a useful viral marketing tool for generating publicity, campaign contributions, and ultimately votes. This has led them to a study by Bentley College professors Christine Williams and Jeff Gulati that looked at how Congressional candidates used Facebook to reach supporters.
Here are some insights generated by Williams, Gulati, and techPreside, as they address the question of just how much and what kind of social agency is being generated by media-based social and political networking?
"Does Facebook Support Generate Votes?"
techPresident on Facebook Supporters