The Art of Online Persuasion

Lately I really have been enjoying our readings and discussions for Media, Politics, and Power. We’re past the technical stuff (which was cool in its own way) and are now diving into the politics of it all. Specifically, we are looking at how various campaigns have used digital media extensively and have gotten pretty significant results. Obviously we have discussed the most well-known cases of online political strategy, the Obama campaigns of both 2008 and 2012, but some of the other ones are clever too, and have got me thinking about how media strategy really can be a …(I hate this phrase but can’t think of another)…”game changer.”

We read one article on Senator Harry Reid’s re-election campaign, and in it one of the primary players behind the success candidly lays out exactly how they executed their online campaign strategy with great results. You can read that article here. Some parts of the article reminded me of The Triangle, like when the author talks about “layering.” It’s not just online media strategy that makes a difference; combining it with other, more traditional forms of campaign advertising like mail and television works best. He also explains how they kept flash ads and banner ads concise and crisp, with images that would stick with viewers (usually negative about the other candidate) to ensure maximum persuasiveness. As someone who can be overly verbose at times, I appreciate the effectiveness of a few cleverly placed images and strong words…this is key, because if someone is online, they are online for a purpose, so your advertisement isn’t really going to capture much of their attention. If you make it stand out, though, even on the periphery it may be effective enough to the degree that you need it to be.

The fact that I find this stuff fascinating now is kind of funny, because I had the chance before to hear from someone very involved in online campaigning but didn’t, at the time, quite grasp its coolness. In 2009 I lived in a row house near Capitol Hill with two other gals, both of whom were intelligent, accomplished, and courteous housemates to live with – in fact, it was the best living arrangement I ever had in DC, largely due to their collective awesomeness.

Anyway, one of them worked for Blue State Digital, which had run Obama’s 2008 media campaign (and she subsequently went on to work for Obama’s 2012 campaign in Chicago). Though I remember at the time thinking that was cool, I specifically remember hearing her once in the kitchen talk about how they were also doing some online media campaign-type thing for Vogue magazine. That immediately caught my attention, and all of sudden she became the coolest person in the house! Why I got more excited about her stories of doing online strategy for Anna Wintour and crew than I did about how she helped elect the President is beyond me…okay, actually, I’ll admit, I love fashion, and had recently seen both “The Devil Wears Prada” (Anna Wintour, Vogue editor-in-chief, is said to have inspired the character of Miranda Priestly) and “The September Issue” (a great documentary on how Vogue produces their biggest issue of the year). But seriously, if I could go back in time I’d hit her up for more stories about the specific online tactics BSD used during Obama’s 2008 campaign, maybe even how one could use such tactics outside of the political arena (as I might plan to do sometime in the future). Thanks to social media, we are still Facebook friends, so I was able to reach out to her a day or so ago to say hello and to give her kudos for her contributions to and participation in the realm of online media campaigning. Maybe one of these days we’ll be back in the same city and we’ll be able to catch up over coffee, and I’ll get that the chance to pick her brain again on this cool new art (or is it a science?)…

The Triangle and the Tea Party

In one of my earlier blog posts, “Power to the People,” I discussed a paradigm shift in power thanks to the internet and the capabilities it provides the masses, and one aspect I touched on was that of bloggers and their new-found influence.

But this week we read about the power of political blogging and how it measures up to, or rather, works with two other major elements within the political construct to form what Peter Daou refers to as the Triangle. Before explaining the Triangle, I’ll mention that Daou first defines political influence as “the capacity to alter or create conventional wisdom;” in other words, when something or someone has political influence, she/he/it can help shape our thoughts and beliefs, which can lead to action.

The Triangle, boiled down to the basics, is the idea that in the political realm, three entities that together can create conventional wisdom are bloggers (Daou uses the term “netroots”), the political establishment (party bigwigs) and the media. Daou gives examples of how political blogging in and of itself is not really powerful, but when woven into a strategy within a party, effectively utilizing the establishment and the media, well, now we’re talking business. I’ll stress that doesn’t mean political bloggers aren’t powerful – they just need to be supported by the media (or, as we saw in the Trent Lott case, getting the media to push a story) and they need to have the party higher-ups on board echoing similar sentiment.

Daou wrote this article in 2005, and at the time he was more critical of the Democrats and their dysfunctional triangle than he was of the Republicans (he criticized them too, but also gave them credit for having a more solid framework in which all three legs of the triangle worked together, and as such appeared more politically influential at the time).

Fast forward eight years and here we are, in the midst of a government shutdown, with the blame game in full swing. This time, the Democrats seem to be holding up well, but what the heck is going on with the Republicans? Two words: Tea Party. With the stunts they’ve pulled leading up to and during this crisis, those clowns have really turned the DC circus into the Greatest (political joke of a) Show on Earth!

I will disclose that I am a registered independent – I really am, and though I get annoyed when my Democrat friends think I’m a Republican and my Republican friends think I’m a Democrat, I suppose that only proves I’m genuinely grounded somewhere in the sense-making middle. I usually shy away from making strong political statements and tend to keep my opinions to myself on politically charged topics.  But not now, not after having read the Triangle, which I think may be the key…wait for it….

The Republican Triangle needs to mobilize itself ASAP and create the conventional wisdom needed to separate itself from the Tea Party, an awful parasite that is driving middle-grounders away in droves. To be perfectly blunt, I can’t stomach the thought of politically aligning myself with a party that tolerates an intolerant, highly vocal and obstructive group of irrational fear-mongers, many of whom barely veil their racist and xenophobic undertones.

This is why I was so relieved to read David Frum on CNN essentially welcoming Tea Partiers to get the heck out of the Republican Party once and for all. Though just one brief article, it offered a glimmer of hope. Where are the other conservative bloggers? Come on, guys! Your party needs you! Much of the media has picked up on the lunacy of the Tea Party, but Fox News could do a better job of it (maybe they will if more conservative bloggers rise to the occasion). I think the most crucial side of the triangle in this case, the traditional Republican establishment, has been the quietest and the weakest, apparently terrified of the likes of Ted Cruz and Sarah Palin. Mainstream GOP leaders need to somehow find the courage to stand up to the Tea Party bullies to get their party back in line.

If the conservative triangle doesn’t gear up and fix this, the ramifications extend well beyond just the boundaries of the GOP.  As long as the Tea Party remains a fixture within the Republican Party, the GOP will remain a mess. That can only mean one thing for people like me: that our two-party system in actuality offers only one choice.

Wikipedia Review

We’ve now started to study the phenomenon known as Wikipedia. In addition to reading The Wikipedia Revolution: How a Bunch of Nobodies Created the World’s Greatest Encyclopedia, we have also been asked to create our own Wikipedia page, and to post an evaluation of any other Wikipedia page concerning something in which we have some expertise.  I’m saddened to have to admit that other than some work-related things I probably shouldn’t blog about, I don’t have much expertise in anything… besides maybe the various flavors at Yogurtland. Well, since I’m now living in the great city of Boston, I’m going to use this opportunity to critique the Wikipedia page of one of my all-time favorite movies: The Departed.  I’d say that since I’ve watched the movie countless times and own it on DVD, have much of the soundtrack on iTunes, and happen to be a huge fan of pretty much the entire cast, I could be thought of as an “expert” on it.

The Departed’s Wikipedia page overall is fairly comprehensive.  It begins by setting the premise of the film and by providing the basics, such as who directed it, who starred in it, when it debuted, and how many awards it won. It then goes right into the first section, a summary of the plot, which is clear, well-written, and accurate without being overly detailed.  The page also contains sections on the film’s cast, which is very thorough, with each actor’s name linking to his/her own Wikipedia page (except for two minor actors who apparently don’t have their own pages).

Once the page gets to subsequent sections on production, themes, and reception, the Wikipedia contributors start to include plenty of sources from various magazine articles published about the movie. They did a particularly good job of this in the section on reception, but though The Departed was indeed critically acclaimed, there were a handful of reviewers out there who were not as impressed as the majority of critics and moviegoers. Strictly reading this Wikipedia page, one would not know that (though they did include some lightly critical comments from those involved in Infernal Affairs, a movie made in Hong Kong from which The Departed was adapted). Obviously if I met anyone who didn’t like the film I probably wouldn’t like hearing their opinion either, so I understand why those who contributed to this article, most certainly Departed aficionados, would choose to not include them. Nonetheless, I’ll have to grudgingly knock off a few points in the neutrality department.

In the sections on themes and production, the article does a good job drawing from transcripts of interviews with many of the main players, like the director Martin Scorsese, as well as some of the leading actors, which give the readers good insight into what making the film was like from an insider’s perspective. Wikipedians here earn back a few points, again for thoroughness.

The article contributors also do a great job including peripheral elements of the movie, like a complete listing of the soundtrack and a quick blurb on Howard Shore’s excellent score for the film. In fact, they go above and beyond by addressing the possibility of a sequel centered on Mark Wahlberg’s character (spoiler alert: one of the only ones to survive in the movie). They even back this part up by sourcing an interview with Mark Wahlberg himself discussing sequel plans.

Overall, I’d have to say that The Departed’s page is well done, and it’s a good example of how astonishingly well Wikipedia works. But I do have to mention one other significant shortcoming of the page; there aren’t nearly as many pictures of Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, or Mark Wahlberg as there ought to be! But instead of knocking off more points I suppose I can just go into the page and add a few pics myself since I’m now a Wikipedian. 😉