[Editor's Note: Brian Reich is the editor of Campaign Web Review,a blog examining the use of the internet during the 2004 election cycle. Reich also authors the weekly Webwatch column for National Journal's Hotline. EchoDitto is pleased to welcome Brian to the discussion evolving here.]
Ok, I get it.
White House West, the three-minute minimovie featuring veteran Will Ferrell in a reprise of his Bush impression from Saturday Night Live, is funny.
And, the Jib Jab short, which a cartoon John Kerry ("a liberal wiener") and a cartoon President Bush ("a right-wing nut job") trade insults in a campaign parody of "This Land is Your Land" is popular because it skewers both candidates equally.
But what impact are these highly touted web movies having on swing voters in this ultra-tight election year?
Nielsen/NetRatings reported that JibJab.com attracted over 14 million unique visitors in July, and AtomFilms, the creator of the parody, drew another 13.7 million unique visitors during the same period. A contact of mine over at America Coming Together, the ultra-Democratic 527 organizing machine who created White House West, says their parody was downloaded 3.5 million times so far in August, and they are now seeing about 100,000 downloads a day. (Note: My ACT contact also suggested "the 30 million number for jig-jab is a bit of smoke-and-mirrors.").
The Pew Research Center found that 22 percent of Americans went online in 2002 for information about the elections, up from 15% in 1998. So 30 million people viewing some silly political sing-a-long shouldn’t seem that extraordinary, right? But consider this: only 28.5 million people tuned in for the Vice Presidential Debate between Dick Cheney and Joe Lieberman in 2000, and the Commission on Presidential Debates estimates viewership for the three Bush vs. Gore Presidential debates ranged between only 37.7 million and 45 million. That’s still a lot of people – but don’t you think a 90-minute discussion of healthcare, education and foreign policy is more important for voters to see than a faux American Idol showdown?
Stephen Colbert, a correspondent for the Daily Show ("America’s Leader in Fake News") put political humor in context, noting:
I wish we had an effect on the way people think about politics, but I don't think we do. I see the show as a relief from the political process, especially now, when so much of politics is built on the idea of fear. We're about falling down and going boom on camera.
He was talking about television, of course, but you see the point. And besides, its not like television commercials are working any better:
"All told, the two campaigns and their allies have spent more than $250 million in ads thus far in an election cycle that features unparalleled intensity, unusually early. And in the end, all this message-mongering sways very few votes."
(Thanks to PoliticalWire)
So what effect does it have? A recent article argued that “The popularity of both these movies has raised the visibility of the genre,” which is true. But, there are hundreds, maybe thousands of animations posted on the Web, some funny, some lame. I won’t list them all, or even try to claim which are my favorites. But if you are curious, take a look at Flowgo.com, MadBlast or Miniclip.com. Some movies are posted by amateurs and other professional cartoonists. You could literally spend hours watching.
The two presidential campaigns seem to think there can be some message behind the medium. The Bush campaign re-hashed its’ “for-against” label for an issue-packed Flip Flop Olympics highlighting the Democratic nominee’s perceived back-and-forth on some key issues. While just a few months earlier, the Kerry Campaign struck fear into the hearts of families everywhere with its interpretation of Bush's Middle Class Squeeze. Meanwhile, the Democratic and Republican parties must think you can learn something from these webisodes. That would explain why the DCCC created an elaborate Republican Survivor Game, to discredit high-profile Republicans including Katherine Harris and Tom Delay. And how the GOP managed to find that John Kerry has a few things in common with the cicadas (those little flying, plant-sucking insects who were swarming the nation’s capital during the Spring).
But the question remains, are the right people watching? Hard-core Democrats are watching anti-Bush shorts like they are going out of style, while die-hard Republicans trade Kerry parodies like baseball cards. But whether or not any undecided Ohioans, Michiganders, Minnesotans or Floridians are spending their time looking online for these shorts is unknown, and probably unlikely. Even if they did, would they really have any sway over their opinion of the candidates? Do we really want the opinions of our swing voters tilted by the content of an online parody?
My point is this: while both the Jib Jab and ACT ads are among the best political ads of the year, high traffic does not guarantee to reach key undecided voters. Credit goes to the Intern from Slate who put it in the simplest of terms:
Online ads may be the funniest, coolest things in the world, but they don't reach the massive, diverse audience of a television commercial. In the end, the only ones who watch are those who want to click.
I think it is unlikely the films are helping swing voters to make their final decision on who to vote for. And for the record, I think that is a good thing. I would rather have undecided voters -- maybe even (gasp!) all voters, watch a head-to-head debate between the real candidates, not their online counterparts. These ads are funny. And they are certainly effective at generating excitement (and fundraising dollars) from political loyalists. But they should not be considered tools for persuading voters (pass them along for fun, not as defense of your argument for or against a candidate, please). And they shouldn't -- in most cases -- be counted on for their factual content. The rest I leave up to you.
