Comparing Obama and Wikipedia

When we look back at the historic presidential campaign of Barack Obama, one aspect that sticks out was his ability to network. After watching the news for the past few days after the election, many stations are complimenting Obama’s campaign team, including the general public that volunteered to help him out. There was a lot of social networking on both the internet and in real life. Obama had roughly 1.5 million American volunteers doing everything from door-to-door campaigning to calling cell phones. The relationship between Obama’s campaign and Wikipedia is the voluntary services. The idea that both parties, Obama and Wikipedia, would be unsuccessful if it wasn’t for the help of the general public is true in this sense.

Wikipedia slowly grows, by roughly 7% a year, because of its volunteers. Members of the website have the ability to create new entries as well as edit existing ones. If it wasn’t for the enthusiasm of the Wikipedia volunteers to take pride in what they do by helping maintain a very popular online referencing website.

The Obama page on Wikipedia was updated the day after elections. I remember looking at it on Tuesday just to see what it had to say about Obama and they had already written him in as President-Elect Obama. He has quite a page with a lot of his history on it. The volunteers that made this page are a good example of the relationship between Obama and Wikipedia. As far as we know, the page could have been created by someone from Obama’s campaign, again reiterating the public’s enthusiasm of both working for Obama and Wikipedia.

The recent and fast growing birth of Web 2.0 has really opened the doors for all types of people and businesses. The ability to socially network millions of people through the use of one webpage can help spread the word for any situation. Whether it is a presidential campaign or just a simple advertisement for a company, Web 2.0 helps everyone out. Obama was smart about taking advantage of the internet by spreading the word of his campaign, using blogs to get people talking and interested, and many websites that encouraged people to vote by setting up easy to use voter registration techniques. For the 21 months that he campaigned, starting in Feb. 2007, Obama networked as much as he possibly could. Once again, the volunteering of the public to help create something shows great success if we look at Wikipedia and Obama’s campaign.

Obama and Wikipedia

When thinking about the Obama campaign, the first thing that stood out to me is that the people played perhaps the largest role. By people, of course, I refer to the general population, his supporters. Unlike virtually every other campaign in history, Obama's grassroots campaign was run much like wikipedia is run: by the community. Without the community, Wikipedia would have virtually none of its entries, it would be unnoticed and unappreciated, and probably wouldn't be even thought about today.

Obama's campaign relied on its community to fund it, as well as spread its message. Through the small, though numerous donations, Obama really didn't have to worry about the cost. Additionally, a large part of the campaign was done by the community itself, which is of course, free. The ability to utilize youtube, blogs, internet news sites, social networks, and the rest that web 2.0 has to offer revolutionized Obama's campaign.

In response to the second question, I believe that Obama can use sites like Myspace and Facebook, blogs, youtube, and the like to hear the voice of the people. Listening to the people and identifying with them is one of the things that helped Obama the most this election. If he can use these tools to get a grasp of the public's opinion, I think he can really help the public shape the country. Additionally Obama can use these tools to reach the public as well. In an age that is growing further away from the TV set and newspapers, the traditional media of the past, the internet will arguably be Obama's greatest tool during his term.

Obama and Wikipedia: The Connection

What does Wikipedia have in common with the Obama Campaign?
Wikipedia, like the Obama Campaign, really portrays themselves as being ‘for the people’. They are different from anything else out there, they are innovative and the focus is involving people.

I think that really made Obama successful was how he focused on involving the people. He managed to raise the most money of any Presidential candidate by appealing to the people instead of large contributors. In turn, he received donations from all across the United States.

Likewise, instead of relying on a few “scholars”, Wikipedia has opened its doors to anyone and everyone. By lifting the restriction of who can and cannot participate, Wikipedia has created a new type of intelligence – a collective intelligence that relies on every day people to pool what they know together and in doing so, they spread the information to countless others.

What can we draw from the material we've been studying in class that could help Obama as he moves forward with his goal of building a participatory USA?
I think Obama’s campaign had it right the first time – it’s all about the people. In order to get the people involved, he needs to meet them on their level.

His original campaign was brilliant. He (and his campaign) really focused on bringing in the interest of those who felt like they did not have a voice - mainly, today's youth, to the forefront. By putting himself on popular sites like MySpace and Facebook, he got his message out there. He started a completely new way of running a campaign.

I think if he continues to use the internet and new media and new technology that might not have been available in the past, then he will be able to keep his finger on the pulse of the United States – and in essence, what the people want.

Wikipedia and Obama

Both Wikipedia and the Obama campaign use forms of participatory media and collective intelligence. Wikipedia needs people to participate and pool together their knowledge in order for the site to continue expanding. Something similar could be said of the Obama campaign. One form of participatory media the Obama campaign used was the debate that was set up similar to a town hall meeting. People were able to ask questions, make comments, and interact with Obama. It was more like a two way street. Instead of Obama just coming on stage and speaking, he was taking time to address their concerns. Another way the Obama campaign used participatory media was his blog. Not only could you read his "presidential campaign diary", but you could connect with others who are pro Obama in your community, donate, read articles and videos from his campaign trail, and comment. The Obama campaign relied heavly on donations from supporters, much like Wikipedia relies on people to continue adding information.

I think it would really help Obama to attain his goal of building a participatory USA if he continued to use the internet as a way to inform people about issues and bills going through his office. This way people can engage with each other through blogging and social networking sites. Maybe some of the responses on those issues and bills would get back to him and he could make a more informed decision on how the American people would react to them.

Obama Obama Obama

When you are running for president or any kind of political office, there is some basic information that any informed citizen should know. Like the candidates background, their stance on certain issues, and how to get involved in that particular candidates campaign just to name a few. The Obama campaign recognized the importance of the Internet and new media technologies and put them at the center of their campaign, by using the Internet to converge all of these topics on to their web site . Which in convergence culture everyone is a participant and in turn participation shapes our culture. Not only can you get background information on Obama, his running mate, and their family’s. You can also get information on their stance on specific issues and compare it to McCain’s stance. You can search for information by group like small business owner, environmentalists, and students or you can search by state. You can also sign up to receive texts updating you on the campaign or what I thought was really cool, pick out an Obama ring tone, there’s 12 to choose from.

Wikipedia is also in a scene like the Obama campaign. Wikipedia was built and is still run by a very large community of volunteers, who research, write, and police the web site. These volunteers, which could also be viewed as a form of participatory culture, use's collective intelligence, the idea that everyone knows a little bit about about a certain subject and pool's this knowledge together, to write and publish an entry. Volunteers in general play a major role in the growth and up keep of Wikipedia and with out them Wikipedia would not thrive as it is today.

 

The Obama campaign was run by volunteers or in a sense a different form of participatory culture and I do believe without this participator culture the Obama campaign could not have won this election. Volunteers played a vital role from going door to door, calling people, organizing rallies, passing out flyers, selling T-shirts, etc. His Campaign also shattered the record for the amount raised by a candidate running for office. Simply just by having people go to his web site and donating 5$. The Obama campaign also use's blogs and social networking sites as a form of collective intelligence. They use these sites to pool together knowledge like this unofficial think tank for not only his campaign but also his presidency. A think tank could also be thought of as an area/type of collective intelligence that keeps the campaign at a grassroots level and to also make it easier for the general public to voice there opinions or solutions bout certain issues. The use social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Digg, and Flickr just to name a few to gather together this type of collective intelligence to see what issues are important to a specific demographic.

For Tuesday

For Tuesday I'd like you each to write a post addressing the following questions:

What does wikipedia have in common with the Obama Campaign?

What can we draw from the the material we've been studying in class that could help Obama as he moves forward with his goal of building a participatory USA?

Please think back on the various concepts we have gone over in class including--participatory media, collective intelligence, the long tail, convergence, creative commons, horizontal organization, social networking and so on. I also strongly encourage you to read this great piece on the Obama campaign's social networking strategy for ideas and insight for this assignment. And please take care in writing your post--include links, proof read, and make it interesting for us all to read. And finally please read all of the posts and write thoughtful paragraph-long comments on at least 3.

Due up on the blog by Monday evening at the very latest!

My Election Day 2008

Yes, this was my first time voting and happy with my vote and the results of Election Day. I had a funny story because I registered to vote last year. Turned out I was never registered, what a joke. It was a good thing I went to the Denver Elections Building on Mexico because I could not remember what address I gave them when I registered. But everything turned out well and I voted at Halls which was convenient. I feel like an adult now and I was very excited that I was able to vote and let my voice be heard. Most of my friends i live with got there information and news from mainstream news and websites. Nobody I know really of information on non mainstream sites.