Though the Internet has long been a place to find free porn and music downloads, it has recently been used for a quite different reason and having an increasingly strong influence on the government and mainstream media.
Groups and individuals online are affecting-sometimes unintentionally-the way political candidates campaign and communicate with supporters.
For example, the Web site Meetup.com has been an incredibly successful medium for politicians organizing their voting base, as Howard Dean proved last spring during the Democratic presidential primary. The site coordinates meetings for individuals in a certain area regarding a specific topic. Though politics is one of the strongest categories in the system according to Meetup.com spokesperson Myles Weissleder , its political influence has been a surprise even to the creators.
\It absolutely was not part of the plan. We built this service to help pug lovers or knitters find each other,"" Weissleder said.
Blogs, online journal entries traditionally used for posting personal information, have also become increasingly more political and are gaining acceptance and credibility among political pundits. No longer are these Web journals an exclusive outlet for nerds spouting off about casting decisions in Star Wars prequels. Many political blogs are drawing attention from both politicians and the media.
John H. Hinderaker, a Minneapolis lawyer who blogs under the name ""Hindrocket"" and writes for the popular conservative Web site Powerline.com, says the site receives between 100,000 and 150,000 hits per day. He estimates the site also has as many as 150,000 regular readers.
""That's a pretty good number of people and a relatively influential group of people. People who read blogs tend to be much better informed and more in touch with politics than the average person. Within their own communities, they tend to be opinionators, so there's more influence there than raw numbers,"" he said.
When Dan Rather reported there were significant gaps in President Bush's National Guard service record according to documents CBS had obtained, it was bloggers who came to the president's rescue.
Some sites initially reported the documents were forged based on the capabilities of typewriters regarding fonts and keystrokes in 1972, and the information spread quickly. These revelations led mainstream media to look further into the story. Rather later admitted the mistake on the air.
Score one for the bloggers.
""Mainstream media know there are people like us looking over their shoulder who not only have the ability to research and critique what they're doing, but to get the word out to a broad audience,"" Hinderaker said.
They have indeed taken notice. The Washington Post, the paper that took down the Nixon Administration in the Watergate scandal, currently is offering an online contest where people can vote for their favorite blogger.
But politicians are also trying to grab the reins and harness the power of the Internet. During the battle for the Democratic presidential nomination, Howard Dean took a surprising lead in the polls thanks to creative Internet campaigning. Deaniacs used the web to organize flash mobs, quick congregations in public areas promoting their candidate. He was the first to organize supporters through Meetup.com, creating a grassroots campaign that was quickly imitated by the likes of John Kerry and John Edwards.
Though the company and the service it provides are intended to be impartial, the two parties have not utilized the site equally up to this point, as the elephants lag behind the donkeys.
""We don't pick any sides, but it's definitely noted that Democrats have gravitated towards Meetup.com much quicker and in greater numbers than Republicans have,"" Weissleder said.
However, a politically conservative section called Townhall.com has one of the strongest followings on the site, according to Weissleder , but not enough to even out the political scale on the site.
""In certain respects it has become stigmatized, but we can only go on as a company and state again and again that we're non-partisan and we don't pick a side in this.""
The Internet has seen a huge spike in interest for Web sites dealing with political content.
For the upcoming elections, Meetup.com has created hostings for every senatorial, congressional and gubernatorial candidate, and allows for local organizers to set up the meeting times. The site will most likely see a drop in activity once the election concludes.
""If it weans after 2004, which it probably will, so be it. But that wasn't our core to begin with,"" Weissleder said.
This election year has undoubtedly seen the greatest use of the web for political purposes for several reasons, according to Hinderaker.
""Obviously the fact that it's a hotly contested election revs everything up, but I think at the end of the day it's the growth of the Net as a medium,"" he said.
Hinderaker writes with two other lawyers on his Powerline.com Web site. He and his co-writers have to be constantly up-to-date on political news, but he doesn't like to be called a political junkie.
""It's like gambling. They say the best thing is gambling and winning but second best is gambling and losing. There are some people who just love politics and if they weren't a Republican the next best thing is to be a Democrat. We're not junkies in that sense. We come at it out of a philosophical conviction,"" he said.
