The Revolution Will Be Videoed

Besides reminding me of why I do not want Joe Biden to be president, this is pretty funny:

 

There is a whole lot of hoopla in the blogosphere and elsewhere about the recent so-called "YouTube Debate" (which is where the above video came from) in which people were able to send in questions for the Democrat presidential candidates via videos they uploaded to YouTube. Unfortunately I missed it, but I trust the judgement of blogging visionary Jeff Jarvis, who had these concise but devastating observations to make:

I am sorely disappointed.

CNN selected too many obvious, dutiful, silly questions.

Anderson Cooper didn’t pace the debate; he tried to trip the runners.

The videos were too tiny to be given justice.

The candidates’ videos were just commercials.

There were far too few issues.

There were too many candidates.

The candidates gave us the same answers they always give.

I have no doubt — no doubt — that we, the people, would have done a better job picking the questions than CNN did.

I have no doubt that we would have heard far more substance without CNN and TV cameras in this. This should have been a debate held online: candidates answering questions directly without the need for CNN, Anderson Cooper, or their questions.

We end with the usual horserace blather of the TV commentators.

A terribly wasted opportunity, this was.

Assuming that Jarvis' complaints are valid, I still think that the Republicans are making a grave error if they back out of the GOP version of the YouTube debates. Political people need to realize that video is the political future, and the party and the candidates that embrace it the best will ride that new wave to power. Locally, in Springfield we have two City Council candidates thus far who have videos as part of their campaign.

Now what we're looking for is videos created by the candidates themselves in the form of homemade campaign commercials. Anyone who is running for office in the Pioneer Valley who does not intend to make videos a central part of their campaign strategy is making a huge mistake. In the past for most candidates, especially challengers, it was way too expensive to put anything on TV. You could hand out press releases to the local media hoping for free coverage, but don't hold your breath waiting for anyone to print it or broadcast it, especially if you didn't have the backing of the local establishment. Of course it's still useful to put out a press release, but obviously its a holdover of fading value from the days when media was scarce and you had to beg them for access to their printing presses and broadcasting towers.

Those days are over. We don't need those fuckers anymore.

Thanks to YouTube and other internet technology, the barriers are down. The gatekeepers have been overthrown. Anyone with a couple hundred dollar video camera can make a statement and put it up for others to watch. Google will guide anyone researching your candidacy to those videos. A clever and interesting video can reach thousands of voters at a total cost to your campaign of zero. This is the tool we've been waiting for to blow the Valley's fossilized and corrupt political machines to smithereens. They can't stifle our voices anymore. In campaign 2007, any candidate that doesn't take full advantage of these new technologies deserves to lose - and probably will.

Speaking of political videos, activist Ben Duffy sends along this offering.