Real politics made for real people.
How do you make politics more real to the average citizen? Well, how about by combining public opinion and public radio. That’s exactly what happened in Exeter, New Hampshire. In the article, “Creating a Primary Place for Citizens Online” a local radio station created a website entitled Primary Place Online, as a companion to a year long radio series covering the residents of New Hampshire during the 2008 presidential primary allowing citizens to create a space to communicate with one another about their feelings on the race as well as the candidates.
In the small town of Exeter, with a population of only 15,000 the online space was used for residents to go to and express their thoughts and feelings on the race. By the end of the project there was 187 registered users with 72 of them posting at least once. This gave the followers of the campaign a chance to contribute to the ongoing coverage as well as use it as a supplemental source of traditional media enabling many individuals who do not watch traditional medias to follow the election to be an active participant as well as an opinion leader within the community.
Moving from the grassroots up, Primary Place Online became a respected source of presidential coverage within the community. One individual was quoted as saying he used the website to guide his decision on who to vote for. The project was labeled as a three fold project, reason number one being to show the rest of the voters in the country what goes on during the New Hampshire Primary. Second the give Greenburg (the brains of the operation) insight into what was going on when he wasn’t there documenting the process, and finally to give the residents of Exeter a fuller sense of what it is like to participate in a democratic process. It was designed to give residents to communicate and give feedback with their friends, neighbors, and families to see what was going on within their own points of reference.
The greatest thing that seemingly came out of this project that was quoted over and over again was that it gave real feelings to real people and allowed the primary to be a real process to those who had never had a chance or possibly had an inclination to participate beforehand. People were able to see beyond the perfectly articulated media messages and see the expression of real people, and in short put a face on the politics that are often times obscured by false messages and media fluff.
PPO allowed for people who weren’t necessarily experts to give feedback. Although the initial fear for the general public to lend opinions about an issue they may not be within their “expertise” is to resist and not become active, which many people and organizations did do, PPO also gave others an opportunity to lend their voices and opinions and connect with others within the community to guide or influence decisions.
- Why is their a resistance by some to participate in online groups such as PPO?
- What are the benefits and drawbacks of creating a space that relies solely on public opinion? and how do you believe an organization such as PPO would function in the greater Seattle area?
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This is a really interesting post! I think, judging by the success the people in Exeter saw, that this is something that would be beneficial for people in every state and maybe even on a country-wide level. With the decreases in voting numbers, this appears to be a great way to boost people’s enthusiasm for elections. Did you find any information on whether sites like this have been created on a larger scale and if they have seen success?
I believe this more interactive way of becoming involved in politics is going to become a more mainstream type of media as the years pass. Concerning your first discussion question I must admit that I am one of those people who would resist participating in an online group. Not because I am not Internet-savvy, but because I do not hold enough sufficient knowledge on the subject. Sure, I have my opinions on the environment or education, but I know that politicians and the government have legit reasons for instituting a certain statue. If I were to register for this online group, I would mostly just use it to observe what the people around be believe and to perhaps gain some enlightenment on the subjects that would indirectly effect the city.
I am also still unsure of who “Greenburg” is ….
I’m curious, though, about how many of those 15,000 citizens had a computer in their home or were able to expend the energy and log into the Web site. What if they didn’t listen to the public radio station, or if they weren’t computer-savvy – how would they know how to log in? In today’s highly-driven media society, we just assume that everyone knows how to turn a computer on or “log in,” where in reality, this is probably not as prevalent as we think.
That is a very interesting piece of information! I think PPO is an excellent way for people to engage and be active citizens in the political process.
I think one of the things that keeps many people quiet in the process is that they are afraid of making comments that they themselves are not sure about and thus don’t want to influence others decision based on their comments. Also people may not be aware that such a website existed. Were there any such websites before PPO? Do you know how they promoted this website?
It would be great if such websites were to open for all state or for the entire US. It would encourage a lot more people to be active in the political process and have the power to voice their opinion.
I agree that using the Internet as a platform to stir discussions among citizens is an excellant way of making them involved in the elections and how their country is governed. This form of online community discussions integrate people together in a convenient and informal setting. And this may be the solution to reduce political apathy in the young generation The online medium is hip and attractive to them and helps them to participate in politics in a medium they are accustomed to.
In response to the second question, an opinion leader may dominate the discussions on the online community and have heavy influence on the community and their voting decisions. This may result in a “groupthink” mentality when it comes to which candidate to vote for.
Thank you all for your comments. You all definetly brought up some great points. To respond back to the comment that mentioned the fact that not all people may have access to a computer to visit sites such as PPO that is definetly something that if this project were to be initiated in other states could be taken into consideration. Along side of creating the space online, a physical space could be created alongside with computer labs included to give access to those who are unable to get it any where else.
Also, to add some feedback, the general consensus looks like the PPO website is a great idea to get voters involved. As Whitney mentioned, the number of people voting is on the decline. I heard a statistic somewhere that more people vote for American Idol than they do for the Presidential office. Although group mentality can follow, this does not have to neccessarily be a bad thing. For those who know little about the election process it can be seen as a source of information gathering where people they respect (neighbors, family, friends) can give important information as well as personal opinions.
I may not have clarified well enough who exactly :”Greenburg” was in this article, but he was the brains behind this opertation alongside the radio program Greenburg was the man who got this idea out there and moved it from the grassroots up.
Thank you all for your responses! PPO is a great way to gear up citizens to get engaged in the political process and should definetly be considered by other states.
The American Idol voting process should be implemented for our elections – it would be so much easier for everyone to just grab their phones, dial 1-888-PRESIDENT, and press 1 for Obama, 2 for Clinton, 3 for McCain, 4 for Nader, 5 for the Communist presidential choice, etc. Then debates about hanging chads won’t be an issue anymore. I’m being facetious here, but the way elections are proffered will need to change as technology changes. Because using pencils made of lead (Bad) from trees (even worse) and writing on paper (from trees, bad for environment) is just not politically chic anymore!
I agree that groupthink mentality is not necessarily bad as research has shown that opinion leaders have a greater influence than mainstream media or politicians in advocating an idea. What I am concerned about is whether this groupthink mentality will be a double-edged sword. It can be a good way to get opinions from well-respected people, it may also lead to barriers to other forms of opinions as everyone think alike or fear to voice out against the common opinions, which ultimately goes against the goal of an online community-which is to allow a platform for discussions.
I think this could be a great way to get more people involved in the voting process in the U.S., especially as a way to get people away from voting for American Idol and instead voting for the American President. The PPO seems to be to a sort of online caucus where people can talk about their opinions and why they are voting the way they are. The only problem I forsee is that people tend to focus on emotions more in a caucus (at least the ones I’ve attended), is this something that is necessary in a blog or is it just taking up space? Furthermore, Is there really any way to get rid of the more ‘emotional’ side of politics and focus only on the issues?
A creation of a new physical space using computer labs is an interesting thought. Although there are internet cafe’s around, I feel like they aren’t being utilized by a larger amount of the population. But it all comes down to people who are willing to take the time and effort to participate PPOs and if American Idol incites them more, one needs to come up with a strategy to get that target market interested in PPOs. Since texting is one way to gather votes on the show, maybe PPOs should have a SMS application?
Thanks for the clarification!
Lorin — that’s a really interesting idea to have something like the American Idol voting system. But, I am not sure how fair that system would be if it is through phones. People can own multiple cell phones and can vote for the same person many times. This doesn’t seem like a fair voting system. However, if this kind of voting system was online it could work. They can ensure only one vote is being casted per IP address. But again, if there are multiple people residing in a home that would not seem fair either.
This brings me to the post I recently made about the codes and other laws in cyberspace (http://khairup.wordpress.com/2008/05/22/code-and-other-laws-of-cyberspace/) where the author suggested that we have digital ID’s. I think that would ensure a fair voting sytem online.