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The experiment showed that video was a poor choice for Obama. Images worked better for him. However, I do not think anyone should generalize from this example.

The experiment showed that video was a poor choice for Obama. Images worked better for him. However, I do not think anyone should generalize from this example. Obama was supported by specific demographics. The poor and working classes favored Obama to a disproportionate degree. These are the people most likely to still be on dial-up Internet connections. There are the people with the least access to broad band. Therefore, these are the people for whom video would be a poor choice.

colinplamondon 16y ago
A majority of folks earning 200k+/year went for Obama, as well.
- lkrubner 16y ago
  How many people in the USA make over $200k a year? And how many people in the USA can be classified as poor or working class? If you make $200K a year, then you are in the upper 1% of income in the USA. When I said "poor and working classes" I was thinking of the bottom 2 quintiles of income distribution. I think this is a fairly common reference. Certainly the usage is common in articles that write about the demographics of elections. You realize there are more votes in the lower 40% than in the top 1%?
lkrubner 16y ago
I wonder why this was downvoted? What part of this do people disagree with? I made 3 main points: 1.) Obama had disproportionate support from the poor and working classes. This is easy to verify, there were many news organizations that covered this. Here is one example: http://geocommons.com/overlays/6095 http://geocommons.com/overlays/6095 2.) The poor and working classes have less access to broadband Internet. Is anyone seriously going to dispute this? 3.) Therefore video was a poor choice for Obama, since many of his supporters lacked broadband Internet access. My friends, instead of downvoting, why don't you explain what you are thinking? Does someone disagree with my thesis? I feel like I'm stating something fairly obvious here.
- anthuswilliams 16y ago
  I didn't downvote you, but I do think you're mistaken. 1) Your source cites the November 2008 exit polls. The campaigning mentioned in the article was being done through 2007, when Hillary Clinton still had her hat in the ring. Now, it's hard to use campaign donations as a gauge of support for presidential candidates (particularly among people who are too poor to even afford broadband). However it's easy to point out that Hillary Clinton's platform was more beneficial to the working class, whereas Barack Obama's vague Yes-We-Can appealed more to broadband-connected hipsters like me. As you can see from About's (pro-Clinton) US Liberals blog[1], half of the Obama campaign chest going into 2008 came from individual donors, whose email addresses were harvested on websites just like the one described in the OP. 2) I'll also dispute the claim that the poor have less access to broadband, having grown up so debilitatingly poor myself. In America, internet access is cheap, and even for the poor, the value of a fast, reliable internet connection far outweighs the cost. Those who are remain on dial-up connections are residents of low-density rural areas where broadband is unavailable. These people are a) unlikely to have been Obama supporters, and b) unlikely to have gone around donating campaign money on the Internet. 3) Barack Obama's was the most Internet-connected campaign in US history. If dial-up users were as large a chunk of his support base as you say they were, he would have spent a lot more time going door to door in Des Moines, and a lot less time on YouTube. [1] I wanted to link to the New York Times article, but it's probably more informative all around if I just link to a blog which quote-mines it. At least About.com doesn't make you log in. http://usliberals.about.com/b/2007/07/19/hard-truths-about-democratic-2008-fundraising-results.htm http://usliberals.about.com/b/2007/07/19/hard-truths-about-d...
  - lkrubner 16y ago
    This is not a subject where anecdotal information reveals much, because the USA is diverse and few of us understand what all of the different population segments face, in terms of information access, or Internet access. According to Wikipedia the digital divide still exists, and income plays a role: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_divide http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_divide While it admits to several definitions of the divide, it mentions broadband access as one aspect of the problem. My original point remains: Obama had disproportionate support from those population segments that were likely to have limited broadband access, therefore video would be a poor choice for him. The larger point is that you can not generalize from this one example, mentioned in the originally linked article. Video was a poor choice for Obama, but might be a good choice for a new web startup that is pitched to a demographic where broadband access can be assumed.

colinplamondon 16y ago

A majority of folks earning 200k+/year went for Obama, as well.

lkrubner 16y ago
How many people in the USA make over $200k a year? And how many people in the USA can be classified as poor or working class? If you make $200K a year, then you are in the upper 1% of income in the USA. When I said "poor and working classes" I was thinking of the bottom 2 quintiles of income distribution. I think this is a fairly common reference. Certainly the usage is common in articles that write about the demographics of elections. You realize there are more votes in the lower 40% than in the top 1%?

lkrubner 16y ago

I wonder why this was downvoted? What part of this do people disagree with? I made 3 main points: 1.) Obama had disproportionate support from the poor and working classes. This is easy to verify, there were many news organizations that covered this. Here is one example: http://geocommons.com/overlays/6095 http://geocommons.com/overlays/6095 2.) The poor and working classes have less access to broadband Internet. Is anyone seriously going to dispute this? 3.) Therefore video was a poor choice for Obama, since many of his supporters lacked broadband Internet access. My friends, instead of downvoting, why don't you explain what you are thinking? Does someone disagree with my thesis? I feel like I'm stating something fairly obvious here.

anthuswilliams 16y ago
I didn't downvote you, but I do think you're mistaken. 1) Your source cites the November 2008 exit polls. The campaigning mentioned in the article was being done through 2007, when Hillary Clinton still had her hat in the ring. Now, it's hard to use campaign donations as a gauge of support for presidential candidates (particularly among people who are too poor to even afford broadband). However it's easy to point out that Hillary Clinton's platform was more beneficial to the working class, whereas Barack Obama's vague Yes-We-Can appealed more to broadband-connected hipsters like me. As you can see from About's (pro-Clinton) US Liberals blog[1], half of the Obama campaign chest going into 2008 came from individual donors, whose email addresses were harvested on websites just like the one described in the OP. 2) I'll also dispute the claim that the poor have less access to broadband, having grown up so debilitatingly poor myself. In America, internet access is cheap, and even for the poor, the value of a fast, reliable internet connection far outweighs the cost. Those who are remain on dial-up connections are residents of low-density rural areas where broadband is unavailable. These people are a) unlikely to have been Obama supporters, and b) unlikely to have gone around donating campaign money on the Internet. 3) Barack Obama's was the most Internet-connected campaign in US history. If dial-up users were as large a chunk of his support base as you say they were, he would have spent a lot more time going door to door in Des Moines, and a lot less time on YouTube. [1] I wanted to link to the New York Times article, but it's probably more informative all around if I just link to a blog which quote-mines it. At least About.com doesn't make you log in. http://usliberals.about.com/b/2007/07/19/hard-truths-about-democratic-2008-fundraising-results.htm http://usliberals.about.com/b/2007/07/19/hard-truths-about-d...
- lkrubner 16y ago
  This is not a subject where anecdotal information reveals much, because the USA is diverse and few of us understand what all of the different population segments face, in terms of information access, or Internet access. According to Wikipedia the digital divide still exists, and income plays a role: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_divide http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_divide While it admits to several definitions of the divide, it mentions broadband access as one aspect of the problem. My original point remains: Obama had disproportionate support from those population segments that were likely to have limited broadband access, therefore video would be a poor choice for him. The larger point is that you can not generalize from this one example, mentioned in the originally linked article. Video was a poor choice for Obama, but might be a good choice for a new web startup that is pitched to a demographic where broadband access can be assumed.