Wired 12.01: How the Internet Invented Howard Dean

talkingpointsmemo has talked at various times about this phenomenon.
more interesting stuff if you click on action items.
fascinating to see how they’re pointing people to call talk radio, viral — using the internet to get folks to carry the message across to a different medium.

PressThink: Politically Significant Cluelessness
Bonus link:

I asked Mary Hodder of UC Berkeley, who has started a new blog on the napsterization of everything, what she knew about patterns in cluelessness. One of her explanations involved providers of a service that, once upon a time, people could not easily get elsewhere or create on their own. When that starts shifting because of dramatically lower information costs, the traditional suppliers are often the last to know. After all, they’re still offering the same "essential" service at the same quality.

Sounds like Hodder should be on our wishlist.

More Than Ever, the Internet Gives People a Connection — and a Voice — in Campaigns

After a few half-assed attempts to make FOAF files and read up on the enthusiasts of this genre, I got lost in the thickets of RDF or otherwise distracted and waited for someone to build a nice interface ontop of these useful personal triplet schemas.
Looks like someone did.
Someones rather. So, the second I get a moment free (ha!) I’ll go back and start re-reading the documentation and the available wisdom, and reviewing the FOAF explorer site and other people’s uses of and extension for FOAF and try to get with the program.
We don’t need no stinkin’ Friendster!

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