Andy Boyer

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Category: Politics (Page 6 of 7)

Is Google trying to Affect Politics?

October 11, 2007 /

So, here’s an issue that only matters when you are a company serving 40% of the ads on the Internet.

According to an article written by someone named Robert Cox, founder of the Media Bloggers Association, Google is not allowing a Republican senator to run ads that denounce MoveOn.org. 

According to the article, the banned advertisements said, “Susan Collins is MoveOn’s primary target. Learn how you can help” and “Help Susan Collins stand up to the MoveOn.org money machine.” The ads linked to Collins’ campaign Web site with a headline reading “MoveOn.org has made Susan Collins their #1 target.” The Collins Web site claims that MoveOn has contributed $250,000 to her likely Democratic opponent and has run onine ads against her costing nearly $1 million. The Web site also displays MoveOn.org’s controversial “General Betray Us” ad.

So, is this paranoia?  One one hand, a company should be able to run whatever ads it wants.  But on the other, if you are the ad serving technology running ads on millions of blogs and web sites, doesn’t the line get blurry if you are banning ads you may not agree with?

Google uses the argument of, "You don’t have right’s to MoveOn’s Trademark so you can’t use it in an ad."   But that’s a pretty slippery slope, and I’d be shocked if every other ad in Google Ad Sense avoids using an unlicensed trademark.  In fact, the article states, "Google routinely permits the unauthorized use of company names such as Exxon, Wal-Mart, Cargill and Microsoft in advocacy ads. An anti-war ad currently running on Google asks “Keep Blackwater in Iraq?” and links to an article titled “Bastards at Blackwater — Should Blackwater Security be held accountable for the deaths of its employees?”"

If Google’s not careful, long term these kind of issues could turn into a reason for the DOJ to start looking into whether Google is a monopoly that needs to be broken up, using the same logic they used on Microsoft a few years back.  Exept this time it’s not a piece of software Google isn’t allowing to be distrubuted, it’s censorship of speech. If a single entity that controls 40% of the online ads decides to censor those ads to affect public policy, even the non-paranoid might get a little spooked.

Targeting the Young (and Single?) Voter

September 27, 2007 /

Young crowds, a charasmatic performer, a lot of hype, affluent people – it has all the makings of an event or concert designed to drive single people to a bar or show. 

But this is not a bar promotion, it’s a polical event.

If you believe the New York Daily News, there are more than a few undertones from the Barack Obama campaign team that Obama rallies have become the new *it* scene for young single people tired of the bar scene, office romance or match.com.

According to the article, "Like-minded city singles are looking to tonight’s Barack Obama fund-raiser as more than just a politically charged soiree: It’ll be a raging pickup scene."

With a web site featuring social networking (complete with photos), events that seem to purposely weed out the old and stodgy, and a candidate that can almost be described as "hip and cool," it’s hard to think this is an accident.  It seems like the campaign team developed a smart strategy of, "Smart single people don’t have a great outlet for meeting other smart single people.  Let’s have our campaign be their meeting place." 

If it works, it won’t be the first time someone used sex to sell a product, but it might be the first time it was done for a political campaign.

Do Protesters Need Image Consultants

August 27, 2007 /

So President Bush visited Seattle, or more accurately, Bellevue, this afternoon for a fundraiser for Congressman Dave Reichert.  I happened to be driving by the hotel a few hours before the President’s appearance, and was surprised by the hundreds of protesters gathered on street corners around the hotel.

As I drove through this collection of people, I was struck with a thought. Just based on their appearance, I don’t know if I could ever agree with them.  They were ragged, dirty and unkempt.  I found myself wanting to disagree with whatever their signs said, just so I couldn’t be classified with them.

It made me wonder whether protesters could be more effective if they spent a little more time tuning their message to the mainstream, rather than preaching to the fringe.  How many worthy causes are derailed by failing to observe basic tenets of marketing and public relations?  Furthermore, if a protester’s goal is to sway and persuade, and their actions instead make me sympathetic to the cause they are protesting, shouldn’t the protester stop attending events?  Isn’t in the protester’s best interest to evaluate the effectiveness of his campaign?

I wonder if the power of Freedom of Speech is diluted by zealots and  loonies who use it to push people away.  From a marketing perspective, how do you control your zealots, and make them unharmful to your cause?  If you were the Prius Marketing Manager, and someone started a blog campaign asking people to send in pictures of where they get stoned in their car, how would you react?  In today’s internet where everyone can be heard, how do you control your fans that can do harm to your ability to market to the mainstream?

 

Politics 2.0

July 11, 2007 /

So, Hillary Clinton received much press and fanfare for allowing her supporters to nominate what should be her campaign song.  The theme of that seemed to be, "Hillary really connects with her supporters."

So then what do you say about Mike Gravel, a much smaller budgeted candidate who is really using User Generated Content as a way to get his marketing materials produced.  From his MySpace blast:

Please send your Gravel 2008 Flyers, Banners, and Graphics to submissions@gravel2008.us. We will be posting the best ones on the main website for others to use. Please feel free to be as creative as you’d like. Thanks to all of you for your support!

Maybe the Internet can equal the playing field a little.
 

Launch of MyElectionChoices.com

July 9, 2007 /

MyElectionChoices.com%20logo.gifAfter a few weeks of tinkering, we’ve launched the 1.0 version of MyElectionChoices.com.  The site will continue to evolve, but in its current form, visitors get to choose topics they care about in regards to the 2008 Presidential Election, then select positions they agree with from various candidates. 

At the end of answering a few topics, visitors then find out which Presidential Candidates they share political views with.  Since we have statements from 17 candidates, there’s bound to be a couple people that you’ve never heard of.

There are still plenty of improvements to be made, but give it a whirl and let me know what you think.  There’s a Groups option at the end to make it easy to invite others and compare how certain groups compare aggregately to National Averages.  And there’s a survey at the end as well that will help us shape the constant revisions.

Supreme Court Ends 96-Year-Old Ban on Price Floors

June 28, 2007 /

I haven’t seen too much of this floating around the blogosphere yet, and maybe it’s my paranoia kicking in, but this morning’s Supreme Court ruling piques my curiosity.

From the New York Times: The Supreme Court on Thursday abandoned a 96-year-old ban on manufacturers and retailers setting price floors for products.  In a 5-4 decision, the court said that agreements on minimum prices are legal if they promote competition.  The ruling means that accusations of minimum pricing pacts will be evaluated case by case.  The Supreme Court declared in 1911 that minimum pricing agreements violate federal antitrust law.  Supporters said that allowing minimum price floors would hurt upstart discounters and Internet resellers seeking to offer new, cheaper ways to distribute products.

So, why is this interesting to the Internet and Ecommerce world?

What’s unclear from the article is how far the price floor extends.  Let’s use Harry Potter books as an example.  Even though the franchise sells more books than anything else being published, retailers actually don’t make that much profit on the sales.  Thanks to major chains like Wal-Mart and Amazon selling the book at discount as a way to get people into their stores, the retail price hovers below other books. 

But now it seems that the Harry Potter Publisher could set a minimum price if it wanted, effectively stopping Amazon from pricing below the competition.

This has further reaching effects if you start taking into account all the Amazon Associates and Ebay sellers out there.  These companies have done a great job creating as close to a free market economy as you can get.  Now, the law looks like it’s going to allow the stifling of that free market, putting the power back into the hands of producers, who can now decide the prices before they even reach the market.  And I don’t have any idea how this affects the secondary market for items.

Another example is a widget system like Mpire.com whose whole reason for being is to help consumers find the lowest prices on items being sold on the web.  Well, if this "lowest" price is being set by the manufacturer, how does any small discount retailer make any noise to grab a customer?

Unless I’m reading into this wrong, this appears to be a strike at Internet Ecommerce.  Manufacturers don’t like when there is little surplus in their supply and demand graph, and have now artificially manipulated the system to get that surplus back.  I’m sure there will be more to come on this.

When You Start to Believe We Are Not Surrounded By Lunatics, Please Refer Back Here

June 10, 2007 /

I’ve been doing some political research for a little project that I hope will launch very soon.

But it’s given be the opportuity to read blogs written by supporters of particular candidates.  And every once in a while, I run across someone so out of touch with reality, you have to think they could bring down an entire campaign just by being a loud, lunatic supporter.  If you were a Brownback campiagn strategist, how do you approach this nut job and say, "Look, we appreciate the support, but Shut the Hell up!  You’re killing us!"

Here’s the loony in question.  Never have a I seen such a well thought-out and researched blog post that contains such ridiculous conclusions from the data in question.

The Danger Side of Decentralizing Your Campaign Supporters

May 27, 2007 /

Politics 2.0 is great!  Supporters spreading the word – for free!  Blogging all over the internet- for free!  Emailing their friends – for free!  Generating online campaign donations! Planning campaign fundraisers for both you and the opponent of someone in your own party….WHOA.  Hold on….

Turns out the Obama campaign is the first one to face the inevitable issues that are going to come from letting all the genies out of the bottle at once.  Originally published on Roll Call, but also found on Georigia Politics 101:

Alarm bells were sounded briefly within the Congressional Black Caucus this week when word spread of a fundraiser benefiting both the presidential campaign of Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and the Republican opponent of Rep. David Scott (D-Ga.).

What? Why would Obama be raising money with a Republican, and one who is seeking to knock off one of his fellow CBC colleagues to boot?

Turns out that the event, a 5K run/walk with a registration fee ranging from $30 to $35, was not sanctioned by the Obama campaign — which sought to put the kibosh on it as soon as the Senator’s advisers learned about it.  It was organized by a grass-roots supporter in Georgia, who also is a backer of Deborah Honeycutt (R), Scott’s challenger. The plan was that 85 percent of the proceeds from the event would go to Obama and 15 percent to Honeycutt, who garnered 31 percent of the vote against Scott in 2006 and is running again in 2008. The event was linked through my.barackobama.com, the campaign’s grass-roots networking Web site that allows supporters to share planned events…

"They’ve already asked them to cease and desist," Davis said. The campaign never received funds tied to the event, which was scheduled for a TBA date and location. "It’s not anything the Obama campaign had to do with," Davis added.

A relatively small deal, but when so much power is transferred from a central campaign headquarters to the blogosphere, well, look for a whole lot of interesting anomalies and headaches for the campaign team.  Just like anything, all the positives are going to come with a cost…

Incidental Marketing

May 16, 2007 /

Hot Tipper "G$" sends across this link about Incidental or "Accidental" Marketing.

The AP article entitled "Giuliani Apologizes to Farm Family"  chronicles the media debacle caused when a Giuliani staffer mistakenly accepted a fundraising opportunity from an Iowan farming family, the VonSpreckens, and then cancelled it when they realized it was going to be a waste of time.

In the end, Giuliani turned the negative into a plus, spending 2 hours with the farm family out in eastern Iowa.  The little weekly Eastern Iowan newspaper, the Anamosa Journal-Eureka, seems appeased as well.  So it now seems everyone in Mrs. VonSprecken’s sewing circle will go vote for hizzoner.

So a couple of angles to take here: 1) Interesting that the Anamosa Journal-Eureka could contribute to a national headache for a Presidential hopeful.  2) From a marketing standpoint, every negative PR opportunity is a chance for a greater positive one.  But I’m shooting for #3) Can we finally admit that Iowa has WAY too much influence in the presidential election?

Iowa is a non-border state that does not have any oil wells, coal mines, steel refineries, automotive factories, technology leaders, entertainment hubs, travel destinations, world reknown universities, innovative medical research facilities or major population centers.  It has corn and farmers – lots of both – so there is some impact on agriculture.  And it home to the evil insurance companies and a number of banks.  But if you had to pick the most irrelevant states on an influential level, I would have to throw them in the Top 2 or 3 along with South Dakota and West Virginia. 

So the fact that the Iowa Caucuses force a Republican hopeful to cater to the damn VonSpreckens of Olin, is a complete joke.  In the several thouand hours Giuliani has left to spend with influencers, I want him meeting with tech leaders, defense specialists, cultural experts, social welfare pioneers and economic visionaries.  I want him spending as little time as possible with Grandma VonSprecken and people who will vote for him because he’s a nice, honest young man. 

Let’s let influencers influence, and let the followers watch what happens on TV. 

 

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