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Candidate Ads, Coming Soon To An Inbox Near You
ooby writes "MSNBC reports that Bush and Kerry plan to shoot off a million or so emails to their closest friends. By using the Internet to distribute ads, presidential candidates believe they can reach more people using less money. I guess that's why they wrote that loophole in that awesome new spam law."
And unlike those TV ads, the videos that appear on the Internet face none of the content regulations of the 2002 campaign finance law, including the statement by the candidate of "I approved this ad" that has given some campaigns pause before launching negative political ads. Web videos have the potential to be nastier than the typical TV ad.
I don't think either campaign will be able to avoid the tempation. I also don't think the virus writers will be able to hold back either...
Happy Trails!
Erick
http://www.busyweather.com/
With all this talk about how much everyone hates spam, even legislation supporting this idea, why would a candidate want to even come close to looking like they are spamming?
i ng-the-latest-penis-enhacement-pills crowd. It almost makes sense when you consider it that way.
It seems like it's too dangerous. Although, I guess there is a reason why spammers continue to spam. They really want that walking-around-in-their-underwear-at-walmart-scop
Which would you prefer:
1. Junk mail, which has a realworld cost (printing paper means felling trees); or
2. An email, which has negligible cost and is easily disposed of by deletion?
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
In fact, it was the first thing I thought of! How will I know whether the email I got was really from the candidate who supposedly sent it?
I've made up my mind and now I've got to lie in it.
It only refers to their respective rank-and-file, I guess these people have signed up on some list to receive them.
Once again, Slashdot hypes and puffs something up to be more than it really is. No need to get worked up over "Your Rights".
Slashdot Moderation: From positive to terrible in 2 "insightful" posts.
Spammers don't need you the way a candidate does. Most spammers have already annoyed most people, and expect that their emails will get deleted/filtered by 99% of people. Candidates need a large percentage of the population to support them, so campaigning in a way that loses you more people than you gain (such as spamming them) is not a Good Thing (TM).
Thank God Australia hasn't gotten this far... yet...
Slashdot - News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters, in ISO-8859-1 Has just realised that beta makes this signature redundant
Despite the fact that the current office holder has been mildly to outright friendly to the goals of us geeks
My goals are environmental protection, government regulation of corporations, universal healthcare, and civil rights.
I don't think his voting record looks that bad.
When you say "us geeks" I think you mean "me".
Funny. You'd sort of think all of their "close friends" already know that they're running... This will be used to drum up new contributions. It's political spam, pure and simple.
The Mongrel Dogs Who Teach
And thanks to that mentality we will ALWAYS have a 2 party system in the US, which is little better than an Oligarcy. It is my personal belief that If all Americans voted for the candiate they truly want in office elections would turn out much differently. Unfortunately the media has brainwashed us all into believing that only the Dems and Reps matter. How often do you see any Newspaper or news show interview anyone from a non Dem/Rep party? And I'm not talking about Ross Perot, Ralph Nader, or Jesse Ventura, the only reason they were given media attention was because of their fame and their novelty, not because anyone cared to see them elected (and when the Ventura thing backfired and he DID get elected look how they treated him). People simply MUST start voting whats in their hearts and more importantly, LEAVE THE FUCKING HOUSE AND VOTE. As a Libertarian I see some problems with mandatory voting but its looking like the only way to get a real change here at home.
I think email campaign ads are a great idea from an environmental perspective. Imagine if your candidate of choice could say that he had saved 10,000 more trees than Pres. Bush--and all because of email. While I hate spam as much as the next guy, a nice, polite email from a candidate sent from a valid address would be great. I'd be more likely to vote for a candidate who spammed me (and let's be honest, this isn't really spam) than one who wasted paper on mass-mailings.
Email costs significantly less than physical mailings and is a heck of a lot easier on the environment. Seriously? Would you *rather* get a piece of card stock over an email? As an added plus, maybe this could even out unbalanced campaign contributions?
"As much as I might like that sentiment, assuming Kerry gets the democratic nomination, who are you going to vote for?"
Howabout whoever your conscience tells you would be the best person for the job?
"There's no one else to vote for who would even stand an outside shot at winning the election."
It's thinking like that that has gotten us into this mess. Voting isn't about voting for the guy you think has the best chance of winning, voting is about voting for who you think is the best person for the job.
" Basically my question boils down to, if their choice wont make or break my vote for them, is there anyway to get politicians to make a stance on something short of having lots of money for campaign contributions?"
yes, vote your conscience. Until everyone votes their conscience, we'll be stuck in this dead end game of "lesser of two evils" every time. You can write letters, have demonstrations, etc... As long as they can get elected because you'll vote for them out of fear of someone else winning, they're not going to listen to you. Why should they? The money comes from their corporate masters, I mean backers, and your vote comes from your fear of the other candidate.
I'd rather vote my conscience and see four years of some guy I think is awful, than legitimize the election of someone I think is less awful by voting for them.
Think for yourself, destroy your television.
I'm not excited about spam, but politics by email seems like it is leveling the playing field a bit.
Someone who isn't a rich, "preapproved" canidate can stand toe-to-toe in emails.....well, at least come closer to it.
Steve
If enough people just don't vote for either of the idiots, then maybe the people running the parties will work harder to find decent canidates however in a typical election the number of people that don't pick one of the two major parties is so small it doesn't matter.
Good point. I seriously think that today's political climate is designed to drive people away. For simplicity's sake we'll neglect the electoral college in this example. If only 10% of the electorate turns out and canidate "A" receives a majority of the total votes cast (which would be >5% of the total electorate) then canidate A wins. There is no incentive for change because someone will always win. Forget the fact that our government derives their legitamacy from the people. Most people I find aren't really aware of that and feel it is their duty to vote and support the system no matter what they're given to choose from.
In case you're wondering, I openly advocate not voting in the hopes that the current political climate will "go away" (not exist because the people no longer recognize it) and we can start with a fresh system. We did that once before remember... Think of it as a total scratch rewrite. :)