Electronic Communication During Elections

“Political candidates’ Web sites function as news sources for a variety of information and news items that might not easily be available on a consistent basis through more traditional media such as newspapers and television.”

This quote is about internet communication regarding the 2008 presidential election. I found that this form of communication was very important during the election. Regardless of which candidate was using it, it became a resource of communication throughout the election. The Obama campaign used their website to try to fight against possible erroneous information. The McCain campaign used their website to try to show the positive information about Sarah Palin. Both campaigns had to fight against information that other media sources were reporting. Regardless of truth, the campaigns had to find a forum to combat information that would hurt the campaign. Communication of the truth became a full-time job for both campaigns. As very interested voters, my wife and I used these websites to help us as volunteers.

As the internet evolves, we have seen campaign websites become more important to voters. The websites are used for videos of the candidate communicating to voters, money donations, and fact checking. It was obvious at times during the election how important the communication to voters was. In fact, many people thought the reason the Obama campaign won was because of the ability for voters to communicate through the website. It offered ways for other voters to communicate through the website to get together. Phone call gatherings were done through the website using the internet to further connect people trying to communicate with other voters. The most interesting aspect of this type of communication was the information we received on Election Day. The campaigns were actually receiving up to the minute information about who had voted and who had not. This allowed the campaigns to try to get the voters out to the polls and all of this communication was done with the internet.

In the end, it is obvious that people are using the internet to communicate, learn, and decide on political campaigns. Whether or not people are deciding on who to vote for based on the internet is debatable, what is not debatable is that the internet is a huge source of communication from the candidates to the voters. When we look back someday, I am sure in will be obvious that these were the beginning days of something much bigger. I think that in the future, we will use internet communication more as a rule and less as a format of basic written communication. As we have seen with social websites, connecting people together is the next realm of the internet and communication and this is sure to become the future of the internet.

References
Pollard, T., Chesebro, J., & Studinski, D. (2009). The Role of the Internet in Presidential Campaigns. Communication Studies, 60(5), 574-588. doi:10.1080/10510970903260418.