James, Damien Mulley poses an interesting question/challenge to politicians in Ireland. It might be worth your while heading over there to share your views.

Point taken about Obama, but the question is would he have been successful if he had not used the Internet in the way he did – raising buckets of money from individuals and getting his own message directly to his audience? I think Obama would acknowledge that the Internet played a huge (but not the ultimate) part in his success.

As Mark Putnam concurs in that article you reference we are at the point of convergence of old and new media. The tipping point in favour of new media has not yet been reached but the US presidential election is perhaps the catalyst for acceleration in that direction.

Irish politicians would do well to study the Obama campaign’s approach. My own view is that Irish politicians who do not engage with voters online are missing a huge opportunity. And that opportunity is getting bigger and bigger. Will the local elections in 2009 be a tipping point in Ireland? Let’s see.

Obama’s online success was undoubtedly testament to his campaigns understanding and advanced use of such tools but crucuially and this will hold across every sector, they won because they had quality product. Obama was quality. It was his oratory, power to inspire, and word made flesh of the american dream that sold. The web sold the product because the product was good, the channel alone cannot confer greatness. Of course a sense of ownership and peer connectivity played a part. In political terms persuasion occurs on TV (states) or personal contact (Ireland), mobilisation is the online follow-through, the sale has been made, online marks the delivery. (More here http://politicsmagazine.com/top-story-slideshow/slide-02). There is also a tabloid danger that voters (consumers?) feel informed because of continuos exposure to related content if not the right content and thereby forego more ‘authoritative’ content sources.

Anyway getting off-topic but I guess what I’m saying is the old rule of quality over quantity will still hold, perhaps increasingly so in an inundated internet world.

And by the way happy new year!