Spoiling Elections

In his survivor chapter, Jenkins hints at the idea of the Internet and these newly emerging knowlegde cultures as having profound effects on the political envirnoment. He says that Pierre Levy puts forth the belief that this type of cyber interaction will bring us back to a true democracy. My mother is a Political Consultant by profession and a political junkie by trade. She has her hands in local, regional, state, and federal wide elections running her own political phone bank and consultant firm. She is well aware that her type of work is quickly going into the museums. Thus she is looking to the internet for the new wave of politcal data collection. The main focus in her work is polling. Twenty years ago she had some 15 operators using hand dialed telephones with paper and pencil marking down answers and so forth. Roughly ten years ago she upgraded to computer systems that can support hundreds of operators and that hold all the voter information, connect and disconnect the calls automatically, and record the survey data by use of a keyboard or mouse click. Now, no one answers the phone - especially if the caller ID does not show someone with whom they are familiar. My mother is now looking into ways to affectivly bring political polling to the internet. Collecting information on a voter's record, stance on issues, and support for specific candidates is much more accessible on the internet due to users' willingness to engage. When you call someone asking them to complete a politcal survey, they feel imposed upon; but, give them the option of taking a poll online and they feel that they are making their own desicion to engage in the process. My mother is one of those many political analysts who believe that the elections of 2008 - and most specifcally the Presidential elections - will predominatly be decided by internet campagining, polling, and voter turn out.