Viewers build own debates online
Candidates, questions at users' whim
Voters began creating their own mix-and-match Democratic presidential debates yesterday in one of the most extensive hands-on experiments yet to fuse politics and the Web in the 2008 campaign.
In the first-of-its-kind "Democratic Candidate Mashup," Web surfers could choose as many candidates as they wanted, then pick a given topic - Iraq, healthcare, or education - and put the elements together like video building blocks. Later yesterday, they were also given access to the raw footage so they can splice the videotaped answers with their own audio and video additions to produce their own creations.
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Organizers said they hoped the heavily promoted mashup would attract voters who are turned off by traditional televised debates.
"Unfortunately most people who are not engaged in politics are not going to sit down for an hour and a half to watch a debate," said political commentator Arianna Huffington, cofounder of the Huffington Post. "We don't want to give up on these people, and we want to allow them to participate in the way that they want to participate. With a little luck, they'll become engaged."
In a telephone interview, Huffington said she had in mind young people like her two teenage daughters, who she said do everything online, including watching favorite TV shows.
Researchers and bloggers who closely follow the influence of technology on electoral politics praised the experiment yesterday as a creative and convenient way to allow voters to explore candidates' views.
And like the July Democratic debate on CNN, with questions posed by voters via YouTube videos, it is further proof of the imprint video and the Internet are making on the campaign.
But some questioned whether such efforts will really inspire disengaged young people to get involved in campaigns or to vote.
"I don't think a 16- or 17-year-old who doesn't watch debates on television is going to say, 'Oh my God, they designed this just for me,' " said Andrew Rasiej, cofounder of techPresident.com, a blog about the election and the Web. The site is working to set up its own presidential debate. "The problem is so few young people are being asked what they want. It's what adults think they want."
All eight Democrats in the race participated in the mashup, and they did make some news.
Clinton revealed that she will release the final component of her healthcare plan, proposals to ensure universal coverage, on Monday.
"I hope the headline is that, you know, Hillary is back, and we're going to get it done this time," she said, referring to her failed reform plan as first lady in 1993 and 1994.
She also rejected criticism from Democratic rivals Barack Obama and John Edwards for taking campaign contributions from lobbyists, saying it's "a little inauthentic," because they accept cash from the family members and from people who work for the companies lobbyists represent.
On the same topic, Obama acknowledged accepting contributions from people who work for insurance or drug companies. "Money is the original sin of politics, and when you're running for president, you're going to do some sinning when it comes to raising money because otherwise you can't compete," he said.
Maher asked a series of provocative questions, a different one for each candidate, but didn't always elicit particularly spontaneous answers. Referring to Clinton's vote to authorize the war in Iraq, he asked the New York senator, "Why should Americans vote for someone who can be fooled by George Bush?"
She gave a long, hearty laugh, but then offered a stock answer about how she consulted many experts before the vote and hadn't wanted a preemptive war.
Users are also being asked to vote for their favorite candidate. Though the voting will be open until next Friday, late yesterday Obama was ahead with 37 percent, compared with 32 percent for Clinton and 12 percent for Edwards.
Organizers would not say how many people participated in the mashup's first day, though hundreds posted to linked message boards. A Yahoo! executive did say that a Republican mashup will be scheduled as soon as all the candidates respond to the invitation.
John Palfrey, executive director of the Berkman Center for the Internet & Society at Harvard Law School, said the mashup, along with other more grassroots experiments on the Web, offer "a real possibility for strengthening democracy" by making campaigning more interactive, but he said research suggests technology itself doesn't bring young people into politics.
James Kotecki, who graduated from Georgetown University in May and became an Internet sensation with his video blogging on politics, praised the mashup for making information about the candidates more accessible.
But how much did he enjoy the debate himself?
Not so much. The answers, he pointed out, were often two to four minutes long, longer than in the usual televised debate.
"I have a fairly short attention span," he said. "I just thought, 'Boring!' and turned it off."
Marcella Bombardieri can be reached at bombardieri@globe.com. 