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Presidential Hopefuls Reveal Their Favorite Tech Toys

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Dec 21st 2007 at 3:04PM

Presidential Hopefuls Reveal Their Favorite Tech Toys
We all know our presidential candidates must be carrying some serious techage with them. The Associated Press, of course, just simple had to know, which candidates prefer which gadgets.

But leave it Asylum to try and figure out what it all means. Mike Huckabee, former Republican Governor of Arkansas, prefers his bass and amp? Well, that means he could never be President. Asylum asks: "Can you imagine a President John Paul Jones or Bill Wyman?" Clearly the answer is no. And what of Hillary Clinton's choice of the iPod? It's a safe and middle of the road choice, just like everything else she does!

The survey of 12 to 17 year old boys and girls turned up some shocking information -- teens still prefer a good Joking aside, those menchildren over at Asylum might be on to something here. What does it mean that New Mexico Governor and Democratic hopeful Bill Richardson gave props to his "Crackberry?" Does it mean that Mr. Richardson is more current on his tech news and jargon? And what of Rudy Giuliani's response? The former mayor of New York City loves his CD player. Does that mean that a Giuliani presidency won't be able to acknowledge technology that came out after 1999?

What do you think? Can the candidates responses to the favorite gadget question give us insight into how they and their administration would be run?

From Asylum and the Associated Press

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How Presidential Candidates Are Using the 'Net

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Aug 4th 2007 at 4:02PM



This election cycle is becoming the year politics go super-digital. Take a quick look at any of the candidates' websites -- each one reveals a host of buttons linking to the various candidates' digital outposts on various social Web services. Each site has a blog, a MySpace page, and a YouTube channel. Each one also provides tools to help supporters organize.

This is not just the result of the growing popularity of online services and the success of the Dean revolution from 2004, masterminded by Joe Trippi, but a necessity of the compacted primary season. Candidates can't be everywhere at once, especially those who still have day jobs as Senators and Governors. With 23 states holding their primaries or caucuses by February 5th -- representing slightly less than half the delegates -- a strong online presence and enthusiastic grassroots organization is essential to staying in the race.

We've taken a quick look at what the major players in the race are doing and how they stack up against each other.



Hillary Clinton

Hillary is probably the least tech savvy of the major Democrats in the race. She has the requisite MySpace and Facebook (26,000+ friends) pages, a YouTube and Flickr channel, and has even unveiled a text-messaging initiative not too long ago. Hillary's attempts so far, however, seem too safe, the old guard adopting the new media without understanding how it works.

Her text-messaging service seems to be primarily a way to put out announcements while her MySpace page forgets that the social web is about being, well... social. She is well on her way to 123,000 friends, but Clinton's top 15 are all photos or logos of her and her campaign. There isn't a single regular supporter in sight, and the content is written in the third person, betraying what we all know anyway -- that Hillary didn't write this. The same goes for Clinton's YouTube channel, where clips you see are primarily things like her quip from the last debates about sending Dick Cheney to other countries "hardly being diplomatic." It screams "look at me! Aren't I funny!?!?," which misses the whole point.

Her one experiment that sort of succeeded was an opportunity for Hillary supporters to choose her official campaign song. People logged on and voted for their choice. The winner was revealed through a video with hubby and ex-pres Bill that spoofs the ending of the Sopranos.

Geek Gifts for Bush's Birthday

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jul 6th 2007 at 11:48AM


Franklin Speaking Language Master Believe it or not, President George "Dubya" Bush turns 61 years young today. And just in case one of his pals/cronies is stuck on what to buy him, we've made a few suggestions.

Franklin's Speaking Language Master

One bit of information that we picked up early in the president's career -- he's not too proficient with his native English language. Sure, it makes for good late night TV jokes, but the poor guy has got to be a bit embarrassed. At last, he can find the words he needs and have them pronounced for him phonetically before a big speech -- now no one will ever misunderestimate him again.

The Battle Over ObamaSpace

by Terrence O'Brien, posted May 3rd 2007 at 3:17PM

Barack Obama MySpace Banner
If you're both politically minded and MySpace obsessed, you may have noticed that presidential hopeful Barack Obama suddenly has fewer friends than he had a few days ago. What's going on? Until very recently, the page that sits at www.myspace.com/barackobama wasn't directly connected to Obama. After the 2004 Democratic National Convention keynote, volunteer Joseph Anthony of Los Angeles took it upon himself to put together a profile of the then future U.S. Senator. Since then, Anthony had spent a couple of hours each day accepting friend requests, answering e-mails and sprucing up the unofficial Obama page.

By the time Obama's run for the White House kicked off, Anthony's page had tens of thousands friends (not to mention the highly desirable 'www.myspace.com/barackobama' address). Rather than start from scratch, Camp Obama simply threw its lot in with Anthony's. And when MySpace launched its politically-themed Impact Channel to feature each of the candidates' official profiles, the Obama people opted to use Anthony's volunteer-built page as their representation.

But then Anthony asked to be compensated in some way for his work on the profile . . .

The campaign deliberated on whether to hire Anthony, take him on as a consultant, or simply to buy him out. It chose to buy him out, but when the "How much?" conversation rolled around, Anthony asked for in excess of $40,000. Having none of that, the campaign shifted into hostile takeover mode and asked MySpace to cut off Anthony's access to the site. MySpace complied, citing that the official content posted on the page and the URL gave Senator Obama rights to the profile.

But not so fast. Instead of simply handing over Anthony's page to the campaign, MySpace forced Obama to start fresh -- instantly slashing the friend list from 160,000 to zero. (In three days, the campaign had reconnected with more than 20,000.)

As for Anthony, he can have his profile and friends back once he settles on a new URL.

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