MCS in Mass.

Political viral videos have become, like it or not, a large part of Election 08.' Take a look at this Top 20 chart of virals, some impressive numbers. Yes We Can, boasts nearly 14 million views, thats more people than the combined populations of Massachusetts and Maryland. With estimates ranging from 10,000 to 65,000 videos posted each day, how does a certain video become so popular. Virals like one featuring Jack Nicholson in support of Sen. Hillary Clinton, doesn't seem all that compelling, but has more 1.5 million hits.---people are watching. 

In an post on techcrunch.com, Dan Ackerman Greenberg, co-founder of the viral video marketing company The Comotion Group, detailed how videos becomes more than just a needle in a massive haystack of content. Greenberg doesn't charge customers of his company unless he can get their clip 100,000 views---basically the man's viability depends on making sure videos gain viral status. He gets the first 50,000 views by using the combined forces of paying "relevant" bloggers to embed their video, linking the video in forum threads and comments sections on often viewed websites and exploiting MySpace and Facebook sharing options. Get one buddy to post to the video to his Facebook, he gets his girlfriend to posts to her MySpace, etc. Once its out there, hope the beast(viewing public) feeds on it over and over until the content starts attracting parodies...than you know you've gone viral. Ok, so I expected that. Money, market flooding, using your friends, but this I didnt. Number six on Greenberg's list of suggestions for viral video success:

6. Commenting: Having a conversation with yourselfEvery power user on YouTube has a number of different accounts. So do we. A great way to maximize the number of people who watch our videos is to create some sort of controversy in the comments section below the video. We get a few people in our office to log in throughout the day and post heated comments back and forth (you can definitely have a lot of fun with this).

Everyone loves a good, heated discussion in the comments section - especially if the comments are related to a brand/startup. Also, we aren’t afraid to delete comments – if someone is saying our video (or your startup) sucks, we just delete their comment. We can’t let one user’s negativity taint everyone else’s opinions.What? Doctoring message boards, isn't that some kind of violation against 1st Amendment rights or the market place of ideas or even the human conscience?

A comment in response to Greenberg's post may have summed it up best:

Morality is not an issue anymore, especially [sic]on the internet...

Not sure how I missed this, but here are the McCain Girls...really?

Ceena Ford is a senior in high school. A few days ago she decided to skip out on school to go see our former President, Bill Clinton speak at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Penn.  Like most teenage girls, Ceena Ford brought her cell phone, a cell phone that also takes pictures. She got this one.  The picture was sent to CNN and Top of the Ticket blogged about it, heres what they had to say:

 If you possess or get any such photos of you or friends or family with candidates during this important political year, be sure to e-mail that photo to Your Scene here at latimes.com. And they’ll post it to make you famous.   

However tongue-in-cheek the above excerpt is trying to be is lost the undeniable truth of this smallish story…Journalism is changing, make sure you have a camera.

Yesterday three political reporters, Jill Lawrence of USA Today, Mark Stencel of Governing Magazine and Mary Carey of The Daily Hampshire Gazette spoke to a crowd of mostly Journalism students and faculty at UMass-Amherst. The discussion focused on the coverage of the current Presidential race and the continued evolution of political coverage in recent years. Here are some of points made by the panel over the course of the discussion:

• Jill Lawrence talked about the ”firehouse” effect of today’s political coverage—there’s a ton of content out there. How are to we know whats newsworthy and whats not?

 ”Step back once in awhile,” said Lawrence, “turn the firehouse off.”  She suggested reading foreign publications of American politics to recenter your focus to what’s newsworthy and what’s not.

Mark Stencel, formerly of the Washington Post’s online publication and currently of Governing magazine, talked about the current campaign,the increased technology in web coverage, and the good and bad that goes along with it.

• Stencel talked about the reasoning behind Obama Campaign’s success, “[The Obama Campaign] lets their supporters drive their campaign.”
• He talked about some of creative and informative ways online news has reached out to specific communities on the election process, like The Christian Science Monitor’s new online endeavor.
• Stencel discussed the challenge behind of political coverage to remain accurate but also relevant on the speedy web. “Everyone is in the breaking news business,” but ultimately, Stencel said, “We rather be right than first.”

Mary Carey talked about the perception of candidates, and what the public views as “robotic” or “authentic.” She talked about the local angle of a small paper in a big time campaign, and the hesitancy of a small papers to blog because of the conversational tone and its possible threat to objectivity.

Gov. Elliot Spitzer of New York offered a public apology for “violations” of his family and the public, although specifics were not mentioned. According to the New York Times Gov. Spitzer has allegedly been recorded arranging a inappropriate meeting by federal investigators. The original New Tork Times story is written on one anonymous source, nevertheless cable news, radio, newspapers, and bloggers across the country have reported the story–a textbook demonstration of pack journalism and the snow ball effect in media coverage.   

 It may be fun to speculate on what Gov. Spitzer is apologizing for, but it’s journalistically unethical. There has been no arrest or verification that “Client 9” is Gov. Spitzer. Report on what we know rather than what we think.

A few of side notes from the Spitzer story:

• At 2pm today Fox News anchor, E.D. Hill reports “Gov. Elliot Spitzer is thinking about resigning.”

One more time….

• A Media Mishap, according to Businessweek…Fox News Channel erroneously reported early in its coverage Monday of New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s alleged involvement in a prostitution ring that the governor had resigned. Shepard Smith reported that Spitzer had announced his resignation during a brief media statement, but the governor had made no mention of the possibility.

• Salon.com says…Sadly, the emperor had no clothes. New York’s first-term Democratic Gov. Eliot Spitzer turned out not to be the model of rectitude that he seemed.

Is that first sentence a Hans Christian Anderson reference? Impressive.

• AP–quoting Rep. Peter King, “I never try to take advantage or gloat over a personal tragedy. However, this is different. This is a guy who is so self-righteous, and so unforgiving.”

I wonder if they were friends.

…and of course how will we spin a Sen. Clinton/Sen. Obama story off this one:

• One Huffington Post Blogger had this post up. The title, Why The Spitzer Scandal Should Work For Obama. Another had this one, Don’t Buy It: Inevitable Comparisons Between Spitzer and Obama.

As soon as the public reads/hears/sees the Spitzer story why will we inevitably draw that parallel?

After Texas, Ohio, Vermont, and Rhode Island Sen. Clinton’s net gain was 12 delegates according to the AP and four according to The Number Guy at the Wall Street Journal, here’s the arthimetic. After those twelve delegates(well,10 after Wyoming) candidate delegate count total varies depending on the source, with a consesus margin of Sen. Obama leading by roughly 100 delegates.

If the race remains tight and a nominee has not been selected by time the Democratic National Convention rolls around in late August, Mich. and Fla. may have to find their way into the proceedings, according to DNC Chairman, Howard Dean…remember “The Scream”?

Both states delegates were disqualified from the nominee process after moving up their Primary dates against the DNC’s demands. The Primiaries were held in defiance and Sen. Clinton won both, although her name was the only one to appear on the Michigan ballot.

However, Dean’s words seem for naught, as of Sunday the DNC canceled the Mich. delegation’s hotel reservations for the Convention in Denver. Florida was never even assigned accommodations. Ouch.

In the coming weeks Spin Alert has been elevated to the color Red, Sen. Clinton’s reasoning behind counting these delegates should be just as compelling as Sen. Obama’s reasons for leaving them out in the cold. Then again, come August Denver’s weather can be awfully nice.