BOTTOM LINE UP FRONT: Let's take time to think about how we can get ahead of the strategic curve in the long term while coming up with tactics to win in the short term.
"According to TNS Global, 74% of the world’s digital messages were sent through a mobile device in January 2009, a 15% increase over the previous year.
"As for developed countries, the PC e-mail remains the most popular message method, but its use is waning.
"In Japan, 40 out of 100 e-mails sent are from a mobile device. In North America, 69% of those using e-mail on their mobile phone use it daily, high compared with 43% worldwide."
I've written previously about the Pew Internet & American Life Project's "Future of the Internet Report," which has two interesting observations: (1) the mobile device will be the primary connection tool to the internet for most people in the world in 2020, and (2) the divisions between personal time and work time and between physical and virtual reality will be further erased for everyone who is connected, and the results will be mixed in their impact on basic social relations. The National Taxpayers Union put things to practice recently, launching a text messaging advocacy service, a creative tool to enhance that organization's grassroots operations.
Rebuilding our party doesn't only mean taking an inventory of every tool that's available and seeing how those tools fit campaigns and party organizations today; it also means seeing what the trends might be 5, 10 or 20 years from now and creating tools that can put us ahead of the curve. I do not have the proper fusing of sufficient technical skills with amazing creativity that many programmers and coders do ... which is why Code Red has been launched.
So despite my relative technical ignorance, I think a few observations need to be made about how campaigns might be affected, and where can campaigns might go, with increased use of mobile messaging. Yes, all parts of the campaign will be affected from communications on down. But increased use of mobile devices by voters to get most of their information will have a special impact on GOTV operations:
Voter identification, persuasion and GOTV efforts will have to be more integrated. With personal and work time being merged as well as physical and virtual reality, campaigns and party organizations will have to embark on a long term, on-going voter identification efforts to see when and how often they receive messages and Internet content.
With social networking sites and programs going mobile, GOTV messages will have to balance simplicity with engaging material. GOTV messages won't only come in the form of SMS and MMS. These alerts will come via Facebook and Twitter as well, where more and more this social networking activity takes place on iPhones and BlackBerries. Sending simple information on polling locations as well as early and mail-in ballot voting will have to become more easily searchable on any mobile device. Voters will also want a quick and easy way to engage with the campaign or party organization if they want to: a mobile version of an "action center" will have to be developed.
As more and more messages are sent via mobile devices, the tools developed by campaigns and party organizations might need to expand horizontally to include different versions for different devices. The Obama app for the iPhone has somewhat started this thought. As the web will play a greater role in helping campaigns organically enhance their grassroots activism, those with different devices will need different versions of tools to suit their personal needs when receiving GOTV messages and spreading those messages to their neighbors, co-workers and family members.
Those are just some of my thoughts. I may be right. I may be way off base. How do you think campaigns will change with increased use of mobile devices?
In the meantime, RebuildTheParty.com reminds us all about the basics of GOTV ... Go Tedisco!
This is another creative way to use technology to enhance grassroots operations, making activism into "insta-activism." A message to campaign managers for the 2010 cycle: build your own tools to organize voter indetification, voter communication/persuasion, and GOTV efforts. -Matt Moon
Last week, the 362,000-member National Taxpayers Union announced its use of an integral technology -- text messaging -- to activate concerned citizens nationwide on important matters of fiscal policy at the federal and state levels. Taxpayers can opt in to NTU's free service* by texting "FIGHT" to 54608.
It's no secret that the right is two steps behind the left when it comes to technological innovation. The most notable early-adopter of texting outreach was the Obama presidential campaign, which used it with great success to draw crowds, spread messages, generate new activists, and involve them in events. And although texting has been popularized elsewhere (i.e. the entertainment industry -- not that anyone at NTU watches or votes for contestants on American Idol), NTU is the first grassroots taxpayer advocacy group to use it on a national level. We see texting as a vital membership and community development tool to create a two-way dialogue with the nation's most important constituency: taxpayers.
Some numbers that most TNR readers are familiar with:
The typical American averages 357 text messages per month, but only makes 204 phone calls.
About 2.5 TRILLION text messages were sent last year alone, and that number is expected to grow to at least 3.3 TRILLION this year.
NTU has maintained a long and growing list of activists willing to e-mail their government representatives on specific issues -- something it will continue to do -- but employing mobile messaging technology puts NTU ahead of the curve when it comes to grassroots activism. Congressional offices inundated with e-mails can easily ignore those messages by hitting "delete," but nothing sends a more powerful message -- one that cannot be ignored -- than thousands upon thousands of phone calls that could shut down the Capitol switchboard, as was the case during recent bailout and stimulus votes. The same is true for State Legislatures across the country: A voice on the phone has infinitely more influence and immediacy than an e-mail.
We alert. You call. They listen. Text FIGHT to 54608 now!
*Other than the cost of one's text messaging plan.Subscribers will receive an automated confirmation message with more information and opt-out instructions.
Fiscal conservatives have reason to be alarmed leading up to November. The current political climate is such that populist Democrats are poised to make significant gains on Capitol Hill, while Republicans are frantically moving to the center in order to stay in office. This likely means an increase in your tax burden, and a perpetually expanding federal budget (which has nearly doubled since 1980).
It goes without saying that those in favor of pro-growth public policy, with low taxes and sensible government spending, will be furious if a merry band of tax hikers is sworn in to Congress and state legislatures nationwide next year. What is less certain is whether these candidates are aware of America’s preference for policymakers keen on allowing citizens to spend their own money, rather than insisting the government spend it for them.
To that end, the National Taxpayers Union has launched its “I Don’t Vote for Tax Hikers” campaign to mobilize the grassroots movement and present a formal rejection of the tax-and-spend policies that threaten to further inundate government at all levels. The logic behind it is quite simple: Politicians respond to the demands of voters. This campaign is an incredibly important way to remind elected officials that there is a coordinated taxpayer lobby – and we vote, too.
Last week, the 362,000-member 
