How To Use Web 2.0, The Ron Paul Way
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Technology
See that picture? It’s a screen capture of a Google Maps view of where Ron Paul’s Meetup groups are located. 367 so far, the most of any candidate, and the number keeps getting bigger everyday. Literally.
So then, what is Web 2.0? Well, it’s basically a term for all of these tools and technologies which allow people to share, remix, organize and host their content on 3rd party platforms. Think of MySpace, YouTube and Meetup as prime examples of this movement.
So it’s no surprise that the candidate of the internet crowd uses all of these almost exclusively as the infrastructure for his campaign. That’s right, not just as add-ons, but as the very infrastructure.
The Paul website itself essentially consists of a homepage, an issues section, a bio page, a donation form, a sign up form and a blog. Interestingly for the social candidate, his blog doesn’t even allow comments. Instead, it encourages visitors to discuss/interact with the blog content on social sites like Digg, del.icio.us, StumbleUpon and Facebook. He seems to deliberately avoid building a community on his own site. Due to this, supporters have no choice but to organize elsewhere.
This is a brilliant strategy because it means that all support for Paul has to be expressed publicly. You can’t help but be exposed to his libertarian message, and more younger internets
This is a glimpse into what his organization looks like…
(1) Videos are entirely hosted and served from his YouTube account.(2) Campaign news gathering and discussion of said news is done via Digg. Paul is the only candidate I’ve seen that includes a prominent link to a Digg search of his name right on his own homepage.
(3) Paul’s schedule is kept exclusively on Eventful.
(4) Supporters are encouraged to create their own events on Meetup.
(5) Campaign gear is sold exclusively through a store hosted by Cafe Press.
(6) All photos are on Flickr.
(7) Social networking occurs on Facebook and MySpace.
Mainstream candidates, take heed…you need to give away a little bit of control in order to build grassroots buzz. Dean learned that in 2003. Who will learn it fast enough to steal some of Ron Paul’s thunder?
This entry was posted on Monday, June 25th, 2007 and is filed under 2008 Election, Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
June 25th, 2007 at 9:48 am
Without a doubt, if votes could be cast from the internet, Ron Paul would be the next president. But ultimately, all this internet stuff has to translate into getting people physically into the voting booth. 20-somethings SUCK at physically getting into the voting booth (and usually that is a good thing), but in this instance I’m all for Ron Paul, so please go vote you stoned libertarian tacobell slackers. On behalf of Ron Paul, I am starting the “Vote and Get Laid” campaign or the “I Voted Drunk for Ron Paul” campaign (which will be easier for some than the first.)
June 25th, 2007 at 10:35 am
The Ron Paul internet phenomenon is amazing, but until it translates into something tangible I won’t be impressed. What his campaign has done is get me to see how useful many of these Web 2.0 tools are. Paul won’t make any political contribution to the race, but he will influence future net operations.
June 25th, 2007 at 10:55 am
Hey DosPeros,
Although I’m sure your message is meant to be motivating, it’s just annoying and ignorant. Yes, younger folks don’t get out to vote much, but it’s not only because we’re stoned (the only drug I use in caffeine â€â€?› so I can keep up with the other slackers at med school). I voted for Browne in 2000 & Badnarik in 2004, and what good did that do? It would be great if Paul got the republican nomination, but his real success is bringing new ideas about goverment and it’s limits to a disenfranchised populace. I’d rather let Obama & Clinton have the “Vote and get laid/drunk” campaigns.
Dr. Paul’s message of LIBERTY is powerful enough to stand alone.
June 25th, 2007 at 11:13 am
Ron Paul has already made a huge political contribution to the race, by bringing the issue of an interventionist foreign policy and its impact on our safety up for discussion, something none of the other candidates would have done.
And the second quarter fundraising numbers are going to show that Ron Paul’s use of the Web 2.0 networking tools has had a stunning impact on his own political (i.e. financial) contributions.
June 25th, 2007 at 11:39 am
Dr. Paul has already made a political contribution to the race. Many, many people, as evidenced by the map above, have become involved, who otherwise would not be. He has also influenced the other candidates. In the third debate, Guliani talked about how Vietnam is now a great trading partner. That is the point Dr. Paul made over and over again, prior to the 3rd debate. Dr. Paul’s presence is loud as a cannon.
June 25th, 2007 at 11:56 am
When the mainstream media received political pressure to skew or stop coverage of Ron Paul, his supporters decided to use the only other avenue available to them, which is the Internet.
The mainstream offline polls were skewed as well. Ron Paul wasn’t included in many of the offline polls conducted. These are the same polls the mainstream media uses to determine if a candidate is “credible” or not.
Other candidates will try to copy Ron Paul but this will prove a waste of time since these same candidates are supported by the mainstream media (to be more specific, those who have controlling interests in the mainstream media).
June 25th, 2007 at 12:53 pm
I’m an independent going over to the GOP so I can vote for the good doctor.
Ron Paul R[evoL]ution!
Ron Paul 2008!
June 25th, 2007 at 1:01 pm
#s 2, 3, and 6 are patently false.
Other candidates have DIGG on their sites, the schedule is on the main site, and he has photos on WMUR TV Manchester NH’s slide shows for candidates — with his being the most popular.
Paul has already made a huge contribution to the race…he’s brought it up above the usual level of beauty contest and shallowness of the American public.
Finally there are those of us who operate within the regular circles of the GOP who don’t solely use Meetup groups for our support…although they are great volunteers.
June 25th, 2007 at 1:12 pm
Have you guys ever actually been to one of his meetups? i keep hearing all this talk about how none of his internet support is translating to physical support, the last meetup here in kansas city something like 127 people signed up on meetup.com to show, guess how many really showed up? something like 700
http://blog.ronpaul2008.com/ron_paul_2008/2007/06/ron-paul-in-kan.html
June 25th, 2007 at 1:36 pm
This is almost silly. The reason why the other candidates don’t have such attention is because they are media shills. No one really wants them personally, they are just told they are good. When you realize you want a certain candidate you will fight for them. No one is going to fight for Obama, but they will fight for Ron Paul because he means a change to gov’t from top to bottom. He wants to change the way you look at gov’t.
Who is saying that they want the federal system to revert back to the states? No one.
June 25th, 2007 at 1:44 pm
Myself, I think these Ron Paul people are nothing short of “INTERNET TERRORISTS”. They’ve somehow discovered a way to manipulate ALL the numbers across the board, from YOUTUBE, where Ron Paul is approaching 18,000 subscribers (next closest candidate is B.O. – Barack Obama with just under 8500). And the fact that Ron Paul led the Fox News’ text message poll nearly the whole night as being the winner of the second debate signifies that this INTERNET TERRORIST effort is now transcending the boundaries of the internet into the arena of “TEXT MESSAGE TERRORISTS”. I think all Rudy’s supporters lost their computers in the 9-11 attacks, so please, oh please, help Rudy get his YOUTUBE numbers up (he currently only has 1,583 subscribers and 100,989 views to Ron Paul’s 17,780 subscribers and 1,200,325 views). I hope that all these INTERNET AND TEXT MESSAGE TERRORISTS don’t register REPUBLICAN and VOTE for RON PAUL in the PRIMARIES – this could get UGLY!
June 25th, 2007 at 2:10 pm
To leverage the Web 2.0 capabilities, we should not forget Web 1.0 techniques, like email and URLs. You want people to know who Ron Paul is? Send everyone in your addressbook an email (preferably using bcc) telling them to email all their friends. Include his “Brief Overview”, a URLs to his web site, and your favorite Ron Paul YouTube video. Tell them to buy a bumper sticker and stick it on their car. Email chain letters can cover a lot of ground. The next poll will reflect it. It can be done without the mainstream media.
June 25th, 2007 at 2:16 pm
There is no doubt that Ron Paul’s internet strategy is raising awareness.
Most believe that he cannot win the primary, and it’s easy to believe that, considering the small amount of coverage he receives via the mainstream media. Rightly so though, we all know that his online popularity is a complete fabrication not worthy of prime time television……of course I am just kidding.
It is interesting that every time his message his heard by the masses, through debates, he gains considerable online popularity compared to the other candidates. Tracking trends using Alexa.com it is easy to see how people respond to his message.
I did an article that includes a graph showing how Ron’s internet traffic is on upward trend since the debates, while all of the other major candidates are on a downward trend with the exception of Hillaries “Soprano’” spoof that went viral and gained her a temporary bump in traffic. http://www.jarrodhunt.com/ron-paul-still-growing-as-most-popular-presidential-candidate-online/
June 25th, 2007 at 3:48 pm
People who make predicitions tire me out. Pretending to see the future is pretending. The internet is new on this planet. Ron Paul’s message is new to the majority of government-educated voters. The government is obviously accelerating into the irrational and corrupt and the growing awareness that something is terribly wrong with government is accelerating even faster. And some fools want to tell us all just what is going to happen next? Amazing blowhards.
Meanwhile, Ron’s message grows more popular every day: government is the problem, freedom is the solution. You can bet that a large portion of the dismsissive and condescending blowhards who just know how its all going to turn out are government employees. Their predictions are nothing but hopes.
June 25th, 2007 at 4:17 pm
If the other candidates used Web 2.0, they would still be wack.
Ron Paul, baby! That’s who is rallying everyone.
June 25th, 2007 at 6:44 pm
I met with other local Ron Paul supporters at a Meetup not long ago, and another is scheduled for tomorrow night. The focus of these independent meetings will be ways of spreading the Ron Paul message to more than just the internet savvy. Leaflets and cheap DVD distribution, I anticipate, will be a focus of this door to door effort at least in my hometown of Evansville, IN. It is notable that the Ron Paul campaign has caught onto this and offered up suggested templates for flyers on its own website.
This is a movement that will require an investment of time and energy from the ’slackers’ if they want to see America returned to honest leadership in its lifetime. So, like another commenter said, slackers, get off your collective rumps and start knocking on doors! Make your own cheap Ron Paul t-shirts and wear them everywhere. Make or buy an inexpensive bumper sticker for your car. Use your technical savvy to make DVDs of important Ron Paul speeches and distribute them widely!
The message should be clear… Either do something or get ready for more of the same. Most of the slackers are young and very ill-informed by the education systems in this country. They enjoy the bread and circus of American life without realizing that the whole thing teeters on a very thin line which stems on one side from the Federal Reserve System and on the other side by corrupt and uncaring politicians who’d sell their own mothers for a buck.
So, for just a little bit, please, put down the beer, put down the bong, clean yourselves up and do something to HELP YOURSELF!
June 25th, 2007 at 7:39 pm
Tangible? Join a
*** RonPaul.meetup.com ***
group and you will experience “tangible” first hand.
This candidate is the first real person not already bought and paid for to run for President in a very long time.
His meetup groups are a blast!
JOIN US NOW! RON PAUL 2008!
June 26th, 2007 at 6:31 am
Excellent (if over-brief) piece of writing. Dr. Paul’s internet campaign director is definitely on the ball, and kudos to Paul himself for listening to those who know.
Regarding Mr. Hackbarth’s assertion that “…Paul won’t make any political contribution to the race…” – I strongly disagree. For example: When Dr. Paul said 30 years ago that he’d get rid of the IRS & all income tax, people said he was crazy. Then Perot said it a 2 decades later, and now a few of the republican candidates have even (quietly) warmed to the idea. He still points out that personal income tax only accounts for 1/3 of government revenues, and spending-wise, such a decrease in revenues only takes us back to spending levels of the year 2000. Does anyone REALLY think we can’t return to circa-2000 spending levels?
That’s the sort of thing that is getting forced on the table by his presence – and only his presence – in the 2008 race. His Libertarian supporters and all the fiscally conservative republicans and all the anti-war republicans across the nation are waiting to hear meaningful responses from Giuliani, Romney, & others to the issues Paul puts on the table, and this completely changes the profile of the race.
June 26th, 2007 at 8:33 am
Can Ron Paul get support from Christian groups? I would appreciate any comments on this article (Mine. It’s a spoof, but raises some topics I’d like to hear your opinions on.). http://www.thespoof.com/news/spoof.cfm?headline=s2i20989
June 26th, 2007 at 9:59 am
[...] From the blogosphere Donklephant looks at some ideas around Ron Paul’s Web 2.0 strategy. [...]
June 29th, 2007 at 4:55 pm
Think on this. Dr. Paul is THE candidate that has; Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians, consitution Party, indipendents..etc… coming together. These people who could not agree on lunch are coming together, working side by side to see Dr. Paul Elected to the oval office.
I am the founder of the Shelby County Conservative Republican Club, The Coalition of Conservative Republicans, and now owner / publisher of the only midsouth constitutional patriotic newspaper “THE MID-SOUTH PATRIOT”. I have fully endorsed Dr. Paul, right here in FRED THOMPSONS’ back yard!
July 1st, 2007 at 10:20 pm
Let’s get more of these newspapers rolling.
One in every town in America!