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Once Barack Obama started Twittering, John McCain created a MySpace page, and Hillary Clinton joined Facebook, it became apparent that the 2008 presidential election was relying heavily on social media. But now, a Pew survey has the numbers to prove it, concluding that 46 percent of Americans have used the Internet for politics so far this election season, with topics like Obama and online videos taking a front seat.

The poll, conducted by Pew Internet and American Life Project, was based on information provided by Princeton Survey Research Associates.

Earlier this spring, the surveyors contacted 2,251 Americans to find out how they are using the Web to investigate and communicate about the election. The survey results found that almost half are turning to the Web to get information about the presidential race. That's a significant jump from the spring of the 2004 election, when only one-third of adults said they looked online for election news.

Several of the conclusions show numbers doubling or tripling from the last presidential election season. One of these was in the area of online political videos. In 2004, only 13 percent of adults said they watched online videos concerning the election, but this year, already 35 percent use sites like YouTube for partisan information. And people aren't just watching campaign ads, but seeking out primary sources like recorded speeches.

Young Democrats and Obama supporters reportedly lead the wave of political blogging and researching, with 74 percent of Internet-using Obama supporters logging on to follow the campaign, compared with Clinton's 57 percent and McCain's 56 percent.

And young voters are using the Web in different ways than other generations. The study found that young voters are consuming more political online video than older adults, while creating their own political commentary with posts, e-mails, text messages, and social-networking sites. One-third of all 18- to 29-year-old adults used a social-networking site for political activities like adding candidates as their friends.

Despite the statistics on increasing Internet usage, the Pew study concluded 74 percent of users said they would be just as involved in the campaign without using the Internet, a result that was also highlighted in a Pew report this January.

The Federal Election Commission's headquarters in Washington, D.C.

(Credit: Declan McCullagh/mccullagh.org)

A few years ago, the Federal Election Commission ruled that bloggers are eligible for the same exemptions from campaign-finance law as mainstream media outlets have enjoyed for decades.

But the FEC's membership will change over time, meaning that the beliefs of the commissioners are likely to change as well. So a future FEC could rule differently. That's what concerns Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas), a longtime proponent of extending campaign-finance laws to the Internet.

His answer: On Thursday, Hensarling introduced a four-page bill he's calling the Blogger Protection Act of 2008.

Hensarling intends to enshrine into U.S. law two components of what the Federal Election Commission decided in March 2006: namely, that when political bloggers and other Internet users write about candidates' positions, link to candidate Web sites, send or forward campaign-related messages, and create or host campaign-related Web sites, they generally need not report their activities to the government as "contributions" or "expenditures" on behalf of a candidate. A second section dictates that "any Internet or electronic publication (including a blog)" will be considered exempt from campaign-finance rules.

"Regulations can be changed without congressional action, and there's no telling what a future FEC might decide to do," the Texas congressman wrote in a recent letter to his House colleagues seeking co-sponsors for the measure. "Furthermore, the FEC is currently defunct because of vacancies and a lack of quorum."

Previous FEC rules have run into court trouble. In 2004, a federal judge threw out the regulators' attempts to exempt Internet political ads from campaign finance law, forcing new, narrower rules to be crafted.

The FEC, for its part, has already applied its rules to at least two specific cases involving allegations that political blogs ran afoul of campaign-finance laws. In both situations, which involved the liberal blog DailyKos and a blog that advocated the defeat of California Republican Rep. Mary Bono, the FEC ruled in a way that suggested political blogging was exempt from normal campaign-finance obligations.

Hensarling's bill doesn't appear to affect other portions of the existing FEC regulations, though. They require, among other things, that candidates, political parties, and other campaign organizations report any paid political advertising that appears on someone else's Web site and report any payments to bloggers or online commentators.

Carly Fiorina, the former head of Hewlett-Packard, is stepping into a high-profile role in Republican presidential hopeful John McCain's campaign.

The Republican National Committee on Friday tapped Fiorina to be chairman of fundraising for get-out-the-vote efforts and a leading surrogate for the campaign, according to the San Jose Mercury News. She'll apparently be touring the country in an effort to get folks to rally behind McCain and his economic policies.

Since her stormy reign at HP, Fiorina has been slipping further into the political realm. During her lecture series in the San Francisco Bay Area last year, her discussion veered swiftly from business-related matters to political rhetoric, including the U.S.' role in Iraq and what she called the government's risk-aversion.

Fiorina reportedly has been a longtime backer of McCain, as has Cisco Systems CEO John Chambers.

Fundrace 2008

(Credit: Huffington Post)

The Huffington Post's new "Fundrace 2008" feature allows you to see who the big donors are in the 2008 presidential race campaigns, with a Google maps mash-up that lets you search by region, donor name, party affiliation and donation amount. It's a light-hearted but also serious look at who the big donors are (it mostly tracks donations over $200) and, in some cases, you can see who's playing "both sides". They also track donations from employees at specific companies. For example, Microsoft and Google employees have primarily given to Democrats by over 2:1 ratios.

A great example of using technology to bring greater transparency to the democratic process.

Presidential hopefuls, take note: America's high-tech workforce would generally prefer that government keep its hands off the Internet, privacy matters included.

That's the message contained in a recent poll of 600 "information technology" workers (click for PDF) released Tuesday by the Computing Technology Industry Association. CompTIA's members are generally smaller tech businesses around the world.

The poll, conducted in August and September by the firm Rasmussen Reports, is billed as the first in a series of steps the association plans to take in an attempt to amplify the views of tech-sector workers among the 2008 presidential campaigns.

Here, in brief, are some of the findings:

-82 percent said the government should not "regulate the Internet like telephone and TV." CompTIA said this figure indicates IT workers are far more hostile to regulations than the American public. They cited a recent Zogby/463 poll of the general public that found 29 percent supported TV-type indecency and obscenity regulations for the Internet, and 25 percent thought a ratings system should apply.
-Just 12 percent of the IT workers surveyed said the government should play a role in protecting consumer privacy on the Internet. Sixty percent said they believe individuals should bear the primary burden, and 19 percent said "businesses that provide Internet services" should hold that responsibility.
-On intellectual property, there was a greater diversity of responses. About a quarter of the respondents said the government should be doing less to protect intellectual property, while another quarter said it should be doing the same amount. About 39 percent said the government should be doing more, and 10 percent said they weren't sure.
-More than 50 percent of the respondents said either "terrorism" or "the war in Iraq" is the most important issue that the next president will face. The next biggest share went to the ecomony, at 19 percent.

For a more detailed breakdown among income, age, gender, and education levels, check out CompTIA's full report. (For the record, 77 percent of the respondents identified themselves as male, with the remainder being female.)

CompTIA, for its part, said it doesn't necessarily endorse the survey respondents' stances, but there does appear to be a good deal of common ground. After all, one of the policy statements at its Web site reads: "In a young, global and dynamic medium like the Internet, normal government regulation is often not the most effective means to protect consumers' overarching privacy, security and safety interests."

Readers who work in the tech sector, where do you fit in?

It's not everyday you witness a shotgun-wielding young man sidle up to a politician running for president and ask him at a formal debate, point blank, how he feels about gun control laws. Oh, and follow up by loading the rifle for emphasis and quipping, "Don't worry, you can answer however you like."

And I can't quite picture a typical moderator asking a question as direct as, what is your favorite make, model, and caliber of weapon, or do you believe every word of the Bible?

Yet a virtual version of those encounters is precisely what unfolded at the second iteration of a presidential debate jointly sponsored by CNN and YouTube. There may not have been an appearances from any talking snowman concerned about his snowchild's fate in global warming this time around, but the quirky new format seemed to work as well as the Democratic flavor this summer.

And to think--just a few months ago, it was looking unclear how many Republican candidates would show up, prompting online pleas from young sympathizers to mount a grassroots "Save the Debate" campaign. Sure enough,all eight Republican candidates parked behind podiums on a stage in St. Petersburg, Fla., as a characteristic star-spangled, logo-embossed red-white-and-blue mosaic glowed behind them.

About 5,000 submissions poured in before this round, CNN host Anderson Cooper announced before the games began. That's about 2,000 more than for the Democratic presidential debates, although time could be a factor: The cable network and the Google subsidiary gave only about a little more than a month's notice of their plans before the Democratic debate in July.

All told, the Republican candidates had to grapple with 33 video questions, although very few were answered by a majority of the candidates. Not once did Cooper press for a raise of hands or a quick yes-or-no response, although he did occasionally interject with his own queries.

From the very start, the two-hour event had fireworks, first ignited by a question from a "tough-talking" Brooklynite. He asked Rudy Giuliani whether he planned to "continue to aid and abet the flight of illegal aliens" into the United States if elected president, prompting a fiery back-and-forth with former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney that left Cooper struggling to move the conversation along.

Perhaps the second-most-heated exchange occurred between Rep. Ron Paul and Sen. John McCain, who assailed the Texas congressman's belief that bringing American troops home from Iraq is akin to the "isolationism" that "allowed Hitler to come to power" and "caused World War II."

It would be inaccurate to say the user-generated format was directly responsible for all of the excitement--after all, the Iraq war and immigration have been known to ruffle a few feathers, regardless of who's doing the asking. The tense McCain-Paul tiff, for its part, was actually a diversion from McCain's response to an unrelated question from an animated Uncle Sam, who wondered which contenders support eliminating the federal income tax.

Still, the two-hour event was peppered with moments when user-generated videos added an extra something to the endless stream of early-stage soapboxing on the same major policy issues.

A California guy who appeared to be in his 20s chowed down on an ear of corn and questioned the need for continued federal farm subsidies. (None of the candidates who responded was willing to give them up). A young Texas man gestured to a confederate flag displayed prominently behind him and asked the candidates what they thought of the controversial symbol. (No one was willing to endorse it).

Some of the videos were nothing more than a man or woman seemingly speaking into a basic Webcam from his or her office or apartment, but the delivery of the questions occasionally stood in for less-than-exciting scenery.

A young African-American man from California asked, "Why don't we vote for you?"

In a brief video, one young Indiana man asked of the death penalty: "What would Jesus do?"

The question prompted considerable bobbing and weaving from the two candidates who elected to answer--Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Rep. Tom Tancredo of Colorado--even after Cooper intervened with, "The question was, what would Jesus do? Would Jesus support the death penalty?"

One of the more poignant moments of the night arrived when YouTube video-maker Keith Kerr of California, a retired Army brigadier general, asked the candidates to explain why the candidates seem to believe "American men and women in uniform are not professional enough to serve with gays and lesbians."

This question was unique because Kerr, clad in a red button-down shirt, was actually present in the studio audience as well. Duncan Hunter, Huckabee, Romney and McCain each thanked him for his service before defending the policy. Cooper then gave Kerr the chance to respond to their positions. "With all due respect, I did not get an answer from the candidates," he said, his voice quivering and eyes appearing to water.

(Update at 10:42 a.m. PST Thursday: Kerr, it seems, is a member of Hillary Clinton's steering committee on lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender issues, according to a press release at her Web site, which has drawn accusations that the retired officer was a "plant." Clinton's campaign denied any connection in an interview Thursday with the Wall Street Journal.)

As has come to be somewhat of a given, the debate was light on science and technology issues, although one Denver man put together a montage of sorts, imploring the candidates to divulge their "vision for human space exploration"--and whether they'd commit to sending an American to the surface of Mars by 2020.

Once again, Huckabee and Tancredo were the only two candidates who answered the question, and they weren't particularly committal.

If we do send a human to Mars, Huckabee joked, "maybe Hillary can be on the first rocket." The red-state-sympathizing crowd went wild.

And when one video submitter asked whether the candidates planned to rely on their vice presidents as extensively as President Bush has relied on Dick Cheney, McCain suggested he might seek his No. 2's "expertise on telecommunications, on information technology, which is the future of this nation's economy." (McCain, for the record, currently sits on the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee, which deals with both of those issues.)

Given Romney's sordid comments about the animated snowman at the Democratic debates (in short: not his cup of tea), I halfway expected the final question to come from to come from that infamous character. But instead, CNN and YouTube opted to end on another unorthodox note.

"Giuliani," a seemingly breathless Chris Krul of Bonita Springs, Fla., barked into his Webcam, "could you explain why, being a lifelong Yankees fan, that you rooted for the Red Sox in the post-season?"

A coalition of entertainment and publishing industry heavyweights would like to see the 2008 presidential candidates champion "meaningful copyright protection" in their policy platforms.

The requests came Tuesday in the form of a letter (PDF) and a questionnaire (PDF), dispatched by the Washington-based Copyright Alliance to 17 candidates vying for Democratic or Republican nominations next year. The group has requested responses to its questionnaire by early January of next year and plans to make the answers public.

The alliance's 44 members include the Recording Industry Association of America, Motion Picture Association of America, Association of American Publishers, Entertainment Software Association, Business Software Alliance, as well as companies like CBS, NBC, News Corp., Microsoft, Viacom, and Walt Disney. The same group, which formed earlier this year, staged a Capitol Hill expo last month aimed at educating staffers and politicos on its stance.

Each of the five questions rests on the premise that copyright protection is vital to the U.S. economy, and they're clearly worded with an eye toward eliciting a certain response. (As one reporter on a conference call about the announcement remarked, the approach seems a bit like asking the candidates whether they like Mom and apple pie.)

One question, for instance, asks: "How would you promote the progress of science and creativity, as enumerated in the U.S. Constitution, by upholding and strengthening copyright law and preventing its diminishment?"

Others ask how candidates would "protect the incentive to create by committing sufficient resources to support effective civil and criminal enforcement of copyright laws domestically and internationally" and "ensure inclusion of copyright protections in bilateral, regional and multilateral trade agreements to protect creators and foster global development."

"The future of our creative output in the United States is at stake in the 2008 presidential election," wrote Patrick Ross, the group's executive director. "It is critical not only for members of the creative community but also for the U.S. economy to ensure that copyrights are respected and piracy is reduced. We are asking you to let us know what you would do to help preserve one of America's greatest strengths, its creative community."

In a conference call with reporters Tuesday afternoon, Ross said the group also intends to hold briefings with presidential campaigns about its copyright priorities, but it's not "in the endorsement game," although individual alliance members may choose to take that step.

The heads of the RIAA and MPAA both heralded the importance of the contenders' intellectual property views in posts at the Copyright Alliance's Web site on Tuesday.

"While national security and health care have dominated this season's campaign dialog, a key issue for the 2008 presidential candidates includes their commitment to recognizing the critical importance of intellectual property rights," wrote MPAA chief Dan Glickman.

RIAA chief Mitch Bainwol put it this way: "When Americans vote, they are making decisions about the values important to them. And one of those values must be a commitment to creativity. For some, that commitment will be a function of the economic significance of intellectual property. For others, that commitment will be about the power of the ideas our content spreads throughout the world. But the commitment to intellectual property rights, whatever the motivation, is what we must look for."

Just in time for a Wednesday visit to the Googleplex and other Silicon Valley outposts, Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama plans to take the wraps off his technology platform.

Obama's agenda (PDF), which numbers nine pages, isn't limited to the usual talking points, although they're in there, too: enacting Net neutrality rules, speeding next-generation broadband deployment to all corners of the nation, improving math and science education, beefing up federal research spending, letting in more foreign tech workers, and making the research and development tax credit permanent.

Barack Obama

(Credit: U.S. Senate)

His plan also includes a number of technology-laced provisions aimed at making government more transparent--with the goal of counteracting what he calls "one of the most secretive, closed administrations in American history" under President Bush.

To do that, he would appoint a "chief technology officer" charged not only with making sure all federal agencies' computer systems are up to date, but also with making sure government agencies make their electronic records as open and transparent as federal law requires. The CTO would also oversee construction of a nationwide wireless network for use by public safety responders, as recommended by the 9/11 Commission.

Webcasts of congressional proceedings are already abundant, but Obama proposes providing live Internet feeds of executive branch meetings as often as possible as well. He also wants to make government data available in universally accessible formats, allow the public to comment on nonemergency legislation at the White House Web site for five days before it's signed, and enlist blogs, wikis and social-networking tools in an effort to promote communication among government employees, both internally and across agencies.

The San Jose Mercury News first reported on the agenda early Wednesday morning.

Obama's plan may sweep in a broader set of issues than some of his rivals, but his isn't the first high-tech platform to emerge from a presidential candidate.

Arguably his biggest rival, Hillary Clinton, released a the text of her plan about a month ago. Her "innovation agenda" overlaps in may ways with a Democratic congressional plan of the same name

Among Clinton's ideas are offering tax incentives to providing broadband in underserved areas as part of a platform called "Connect America," doubling the budget for research at federal science and tech agencies, making the research and development tax credit--much beloved by Silicon Valley shops--permanent, and creating a $50 billion "Strategic Energy Fund" partially financed by oil companies and aimed at investing in clean, renewable energy sources.

If elected president, Barack Obama plans to prioritize, well, barring broadband providers like AT&T and Comcast from prioritizing Internet content.

Affixing his signature to federal Net neutrality rules would be high on the list during his first year in the Oval Office, the junior senator from Illinois said during an interactive forum Monday afternoon with the popular contender put on by MTV and MySpace at Coe College in Iowa.

Sen. Barack Obama

Net neutrality, of course, is the idea that broadband operators shouldn't be allowed to block or degrade Internet content and services--or charge content providers an extra fee for speedier delivery or more favorable placement.

The question, selected through an online video contest, was posed via video by small-business owner and former AT&T engineer Joe Niederberger, a member of the liberal advocacy group MoveOn.org. He asked Obama: "Would you make it a priority in your first year of office to reinstate Net neutrality as the law of the land? And would you pledge to only appoint FCC commissioners that support open Internet principles like Net neutrality?"

"The answer is yes," Obama replied. "I am a strong supporter of Net neutrality."

He went on to explain the issue briefly: "What you've been seeing is some lobbying that says that the servers and the various portals through which you're getting information over the Internet should be able to be gatekeepers and to charge different rates to different Web sites...so you could get much better quality from the Fox News site and you'd be getting rotten service from the mom and pop sites," he went on. "And that I think destroys one of the best things about the Internet--which is that there is this incredible equality there."

Obama added that companies like Google may not have gotten started without a "level playing field" and pledged to make sure Net neutrality "is the principle that my FCC commissioners are applying as we move forward."

Obama's revelation wasn't exactly jaw-dropping. After all, when debate over enacting Net neutrality laws was raging in earnest last summer, he devoted a podcast to touting the need for regulations and denying the Bells and cable the ability "to change the internet as we know it." He also signed on as a cosponsor of legislation proposing Net neutrality regulations for broadband providers.

He's also not the only presidential candidate to voice support for the rules. On the Democratic side, so have Sens. Joe Biden (D-Del.), Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.), former Democratic senator John Edwards, Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio), and Democratic New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson.

Among the Republicans, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee has also reportedly given a thumbs up to the idea, although some opponents of Net neutrality laws contend he was blindsided in a conference call with bloggers and questioned whether he was familiar enough with the issue to take a real stand. With only a few exceptions, however, Republicans have generally rejected proposals for Net neutrality regulations, arguing the market should be left to sort out complaints of discrimination and that new regulations will stifle investment in new broadband networks.

If nothing else, Obama's remarks are noteworthy because they seem to affirm that Net neutrality is alive and well as a political issue. His decision to promise "concrete steps," as MoveOn.org called them, at a public forum could create a ripple effect, eliciting similar pledges (or opposite ones, as the case may be) from rivals and becoming a defining issue in the campaign.

Still, I don't know about you, but as polarizing as the proposed regulations may be, I'm just not sure I can picture Net neutrality becoming a make-or-break issue akin to healthcare, immigration or the Iraq War.