Obama's MySpace Drama 483
fistfullast33l writes "TechPresident, which is covering the use of technology by Presidential Campaigns for 2008, has a very interesting article on how Obama's MySpace page is currently the subject of an underground battle for control by the campaign itself and the volunteer who created it in 2004. Joseph Anthony worked with the campaign initially and grew the site to include over 160,000 unsolicited friends that the campaign could use to reach out to. It currently is the main Obama page in the Impact Channel on MySpace. However, as Obama's campaign became more centralized and formal, the decision was made to attempt to acquire control of the site from Anthony. They asked him for a price, which he offered up as $49,000 plus part of the $10,000 fee paid to MySpace for the Impact Channel. Obama balked at the price, and decided to start afresh rather than pay the money. The fight broke out into the open when Anthony posted a response on his blog to rumors that the campaign was spreading regarding him wanting to cash out. MyDD has more."
404 Not Found (Score:3, Informative)
Remember Obama (Score:2, Informative)
Definitely Not Scum (Score:3, Informative)
Read the techPresident link:
http://www.techpresident.com/node/301 [techpresident.com]
There is some sincerity. Everyone sees $49,000 and just jumps to conclusions. He's being asked for a number to give up 2.5 years worth of work. And he told the truth. Apparently the Obama team didn't even bother with negotiating at all. They ignored him and took the high handed approach. Very disrespectful.
His profile (Score:1, Informative)
If you read the mySpace terms of service, you can't pretend to be someone else.
Re:Bill Richardson (Score:5, Informative)
Richardson on some issues. [richardson...sident.com]
As far as Patriot Act: Governor Bill Richardson and Attorney General Patricia Madrid Oppose U.S. Patriot Act provisions [state.nm.us]
Prohibition? I am not sure what you mean there. Do you mean the drug war? Well he signed the Medicinal Marijuana bill in NM, and he has pushed for drug treatment before prosecution. But he has also pushed for minimum sentences for dealers, and supports parts of the war on drugs. So I guess maybe he is in the middle of the road with regards to the drug war.
I am not sure about IP.
This site has a lot of information, although I cannot say if it is to be 100% trusted as I didn't look too hard to see who funds it. On The Issues [ontheissues.org]. It also appears that some of their information is a little out dated.
Bill Richardson is the most qualified and most electable candidate we have at this time. Obama, or Clinton would be disasters.
Re:Flamebait? Come on (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Obama's Space Drama (Score:5, Informative)
Except your analogy is flawed because the "motorcycle" in question, a myspace.com profile, never belonged to this guy in the first place.
Everything on myspace.com belongs to NewsCorp, and they say so very openly. Taking the 30 seconds to register a username on myspace doesn't give you ownership of the page that is generated with that username in it anymore than registering a username on slashdot.org gives you ownership of slashdot.org.
Myspace.com has an established history of taking usernames that are the same as celebrity names and simply handing them over to the celebrities. The issue is even in their TOS.
Obama's campaign didn't steal anything here. It belonged to myspace.com all along, and myspace.com did what they did in every other case where similar thing happened. They took the famous name and gave it to the person who is actually named that. This dude just made the mistake of believing that his little piece of myspace.com was actually his, when it never was to begin with.
Re:Obama's Space Drama (Score:4, Informative)
Why make up data when you can find statistics? (Score:5, Informative)
Well, doing a quick Google search on 'myspace demographics' shows conflicting information. Some pages say that over 75% of the MySpace population is over 18 [1]. Meanwhile, another site is saying over half of MySpace is over thirty five [2]. Even pulling numbers out of my ass (much like you did) and assuming that a significant portion of of the people who show up as over 18 are lying, it still looks like much more than 25% of the "friends" from this page are over 18.
Likewise, looking at US census info shows just about 50% of 18-24 year olds were registered for to vote by November 2004 while around 40% actually voted [3].
So lets do some math with this new data. You said of the 160,000 friends this page had, only around 2500 will actually vote. Of the 160,000 around 120,000 (160,000*.75) are over 18. Of those, the national turnout (again, the US Census) was at around 58% in 2004. 58% of 120,000 is just under 70,000 people who, statistically, will probably vote. At the asking price of $49,000 for the MySpace page, that's less than a dollar a voter - a good buy for any politician.
But lets go a step further and look at just the 18-24 demographic (from links 1 and 2 somewhere around 18% of MySpace). So around 29,000 friends of the 160,000 are 18-24, of which around 40% will actually vote. So over 10,000 friends age 18-24 who will actually vote. That's still only a couple dollars per voter, not bad for a campaign, and ignores all the other voters who are over 24.
Now, I know, I've made a lot of assumptions doing this back-of-the-envelope math: all the data (both about MySpace and about US voters) is accurate, all the MySpace users are in the United States, and trends will continue like they did in the 2004 election. But for all the assumptions that my estimates are high, you could make an equal argument that they're low. That is, you could argue that people registered as friends of Obama are more likely to vote than the population as a whole.
My point is, your original guess (about 2500 who are 18+ and will actually vote out of the original 160,000 friends) seems to be off by 65,000 voters (not registered voters, but people who will vote). In fact, there are more voters out of those 160,000 who are 18-24 than your original guess for all people over the age of 18.
Feel free to correct my math or my assumptions. I had fun doing this, but would someone else come along and correct me than let something incorrect stand.
-Trillian
[1] http://blogs.zdnet.com/ITFacts/?p=11967 [zdnet.com]
[2] http://www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?press=1
[3] http://www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/voti
Why make up data when you can find statistics? (Score:4, Informative)
From allison
Well, doing a quick Google search on 'myspace demographics' shows conflicting information. Some pages say that over 75% of the MySpace population is over 18 [1]. Meanwhile, another site is saying over half of MySpace is over thirty five [2]. Even pulling numbers out of my ass (much like you did) and assuming that a significant portion of of the people who show up as over 18 are lying, it still looks like much more than 25% of the "friends" from this page are over 18.
Likewise, looking at US census info shows just about 50% of 18-24 year olds were registered for to vote by November 2004 while around 40% actually voted [3].
So lets do some math with this new data. You said of the 160,000 friends this page had, only around 2500 will actually vote. Of the 160,000 around 120,000 (160,000*.75) are over 18. Of those, the national turnout (again, the US Census) was at around 58% in 2004. 58% of 120,000 is just under 70,000 people who, statistically, will probably vote. At the asking price of $49,000 for the MySpace page, that's less than a dollar a voter - a good buy for any politician.
But lets go a step further and look at just the 18-24 demographic (from links 1 and 2 somewhere around 18% of MySpace). So around 29,000 friends of the 160,000 are 18-24, of which around 40% will actually vote. So over 10,000 friends age 18-24 who will actually vote. That's still only a couple dollars per voter, not bad for a campaign, and ignores all the other voters who are over 24.
Now, I know, I've made a lot of assumptions doing this back-of-the-envelope math: all the data (both about MySpace and about US voters) is accurate, all the MySpace users are in the United States, and trends will continue like they did in the 2004 election. But for all the assumptions that my estimates are high, you could make an equal argument that they're low. That is, you could argue that people registered as friends of Obama are more likely to vote than the population as a whole.
My point is, your original guess (about 2500 who are 18+ and will actually vote out of the original 160,000 friends) seems to be off by 65,000 voters (not registered voters, but people who will vote). In fact, there are more voters out of those 160,000 who are 18-24 than your original guess for all people over the age of 18.
Feel free to correct my math or my assumptions. I had fun doing this, but would someone else come along and correct me than let something incorrect stand.
-Trillian
[1] http://blogs.zdnet.com/ITFacts/?p=11967 [zdnet.com]
[2] http://www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?press=1
[3] http://www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/voti
since you may not read ACs (Score:3, Informative)
The unofficial one is the second one down, with 160,000 friends. (If you search for Barack Obama) Currently it can be accessed here [myspace.com].
Re:Foolish (Score:5, Informative)
Guys, step back and read the actual text
This whole "Anthony is a greedy schmuck" and "the Obama campaign tripped up" debate is a bunch of malarky. Read what was actually written:
(1) Campaign staffers had become concerned about the currency and accuracy of information on the site.
(2) Anthony was overworked and suggested that they should make him a consultant.
(3) They said they would rather have a one-time transfer, and he should name a price.
(4) He picked a number. They said no and went to MySpace management for resolution.
(5) MySpace came up with an eminently equitable solution. Mr. Anthony has been given the opportunity to build the site again with a different URL and full transfer of his friends list.
It's as simple as that. He's not a greedy bastard. They asked him to pick a number. Obama staffers are not bumbling idiots; they tried a couple of approaches, things weren't working out, and ultimately they decided to run the site themselves.
MySpacegate, indeed. Surely we can focus on the actual issues, and not this cyber-distraction?
Re:404 Not Found (Score:3, Informative)