Fact: In four out of the past five presidential campaigns, Nickelodeon viewers have correctly chosen the President of the United States in their “Kids Pick the Prez ” online poll. With a record-setting number of votes cast this year, Senator Obama received 51 percent of the vote while Senator McCain came in at 49 percent.
Why does this matter? Because young people are influencing this election in unprecedented ways -- and this group isn't even old enough to vote! Imagine, then, the significance of such participation among young voters who CAN pull the lever come election day.
Indeed, perhaps it’s a combination of keen interest among young people and campaigns who are utilizing the kinds of electronic tools familiar to today's youth that has political pundits and pollsters alike preparing for a historic turnout of young voters. The old notion that young people are impossible to reach because they don’t have landlines, don’t show up on mailing lists, and just don’t care is soooo 2004.
Instead, we have facebook, myspace, mobile phones, unlimited texting, youtube and other tools to keep us connected and engaged this election season and beyond. Today I became the 8,717th person to “donate my status” on facebook as part of a new Election Rally Application that will encourage my online friends to get out and vote in next week’s Presidential Election.
A few minutes later I received an email about a different application, this time for my phone. So, I uploaded the Google volunteer voting tool which allows you to type in the home address of any registered voter and let them know where need to show up to cast their ballot next Tuesday -- a great tool for anyone going door to door, making calls or otherwise involved in GOTV efforts this final weekend of the campaign.
Then there's Twitter Vote Report , which we featured yesterday. And ThinkMTV just announced that youth voices from across the country will converge next week on ChooseorLose.com , with a real-time TwitterVision map of the United States. The map will feature a running display of election-related content including Twitter messages from young people, SMS messages from viewers, messages from the 51 Choose or Lose Street Team citizen journalists, video Blog posts and more. Also, it's not to late to upload your video or written questions for Senator Obama to be shown live on, "Ask Obama," airing Monday (November 3) on MTV.
With just a few days to go, young people have already proven to be an important political force in the 2008 election. And, there's no question that changes in technology are enabling them to get involved in politics in new and interesting ways. But, the real question is whether or not the excitement and energy that young people have had leading up to Election Day is enough to be sustained beyond November 4th when the real action must take place.
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