How to become a President...

It’s a new day and age for politicians everywhere. John F. Kennedy explored the world of television when he was running for president and the millions of television watchers followed him into the oval office. The same can be said for the present President, Barack Obama, in which he used the internet to propel his candidacy. Author, Henry Jenkins, argues, “The new media operate with different principles than the broadcast media that dominated American politics for so long: access, participation, reciprocity, and peer-to-peer rather than one-to-many communication.” (pg.208)   The two presidents both used ground breaking tactics involving new media at the time and both have become president because of it.

                New York Times published an article regarding, President Barack Obama’s use of the internet in his election and how it changed politics for the future.  Within the article it compares the current president, Barack Obama, to John F. Kennedy who previously changed the way politicians went about their elections by introducing a television campaign. The television campaign of John F. Kennedy and the successful internet use of Barack Obama were both ground breaking innovations in the political world.  Howard Dean’s presidential campaign of 2004 had the first use of internet within it. He used the internet to gather small amounts of money from thousands of people in order to pay for main stream attention, but his downfall was the internet too.  Jeff Trippi, former coordinator for Howard Deans campaign in 2004, talked about Barack Obama’s use of the internet by stating, “The tools changed between 2004 and 2008. Barack Obama won every single caucus state that matters, and he did it because of those tools, because he was able to move thousands of people to organize.” Later in the article it brings up the fact that Barack Obama used, YouTube, as free advertisement. The President used the tools of the Web 2.0 to perfection which to many put him into the white house.

                The use of internet by President Barack Obama was exactly what the electronic-savvy culture wanted. With television beginning to become a burden because of all the advertisements and lack of control of when your show is on. President Obama used the internet which allows the media culture to access his campaign whenever he or she wants. The use of YouTube allowed media participation and encouraged users to become well acquainted with Mr. Barack Obama, himself. It is also important to note, that with the use of YouTube, when the doubters kept bashing Obama, liberals could watch the Presidents speeches over and over again because of the constant access that YouTube allows. In the future as Jeff Trippi says, “Just like Kennedy brought in the television presidency, I think we’re about to see the first wired, connected, networked presidency.”