Move Over YouTube, Here Comes YouBama
By Jose Antonio Vargas
Never mind YouTube. Now there's YouBama.
Yesterday, Stanford grads Chris Pedregal and Erik Park launched what amounted to their winter-break project: YouBama, a hub of a pro-Obama videos which users can vote up and down, Digg-style. Most of the videos are culled from YouTube. At the moment, the top video is of George Clooney's interview with Charlie Rose in which the Oscar-winning actor calls Sen. Barack Obama "the best candidate I have ever seen."
The Barocket, as Obama's Web presence has been dubbed, continues to take off.
While Sen. Hillary Clinton has consistently led national polls, she's well behind Obama when it comes to online popularity. On Facebook, Obama has more three times the number of Clinton supporters -- 299,000 to 83,000. Obama counts 240,000 MySpace friends to Clinton's 171,000. And according to TechPresident, the bipartisan group that covers online campaigning, Clinton's videos have been viewed more than 5 million times, about 8 million behind Obama's. He's become a YouTube sensation. On Monday, Obama's nearly 5-minute video response to President Bush's "State of the Union" address became the most viewed video in the world, now seen 600,000 times. Today, his is the most viewed channel on YouTube, ahead of channels that feature Super Mario Bros. games and goth girls. He's possibly the first politician to hold that top channel distinction, Steve Grove, head of news and politics at YouTube, told The Trail.
"An Obama video becomes an automatic hit on YouTube when it's uploaded," Grove said.
Exactly what all online enthusiasm amounts to is difficult to measure. What is clear, however, is Obama's candidacy has mobilized a new generation online.The creators of YouBama said they simply wanted to provide a space where undecided voters can watch Obama supporters explain why they're voting for the Illinois senator. "Help add to Obama's momentum as we go into Super Tuesday!" Pedregal and Park wrote on the homepage. Videos are titled "Obama's not bought out" and "Experience v Unity."
Tech entrepreneur Craig Newmark, the Craig of Craigslist and an Obama supporter, uploaded a video yesterday, saying "If we work together and communicate and get Obama elected, we can help restore what this country was about."
"We didn't build this site to make money. It's an experiment. We support Obama, and we just wanted to be a part of this online movement," Pedregal, 21, told The Trail.
Posted at 6:06 PM ET on Jan 30, 2008
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Posted by: Martinedwinandersen | February 2, 2008 10:17 AM
Barack Obama's questioning of the relevance of Hillary Clinton's type of "experience" in confronting the new challenges the United States faces receives validation from an interesting case in American history.
It also points to why Obama's outsider status might actually be just what is needed to successfully restore the U.S. to international political creditworthiness.
Lincoln biographer David Herbert Donald showed how what might have been perceived as the Great Emancipator's serious shortcomings as a war president and commander in chief actually turned out to be some of his greatest assets.
Remember, Lincoln came to the presidency having only meager experience--much less than Sen. Obama's--in public office, let alone experience in the Executive Branch. (Lincoln's experience in the military was limited to little more than two months service during the Black Hawk War.)
According to Donald, Lincoln was also fortunately unburdened by convention, precedent, and standard operating procedures in facing war's challenge. (The parallels with Obama kind of leap from the page, no?)
However, Lincoln was also a quick study who grew into greatness through trial and error in pursuing the most significant of his goals.
Lincoln also knew democracy's ancient lessons. When Cicero finished speaking, the people said, "My, how well he spoke." But when Demosthenes finished speaking the people said, "Let us march!"
"Public sentiment is everything," Lincoln noted. "With it, nothing can fail, against it, nothing can succeed. Whoever moulds public sentiment, goes deeper than he who enacts statutes, or pronounces judicial decisions. He makes possible the enforcement of these, else impossible."
Martin Edwin Andersen
Churchton, Maryland
Posted by: Martinedwinandersen | February 1, 2008 10:17 PM
It's really fun to feel like you're able to contribute to a campaign and this is one way to do it. I put up a site called www.Obama4Change.com where people can upload photos related to the Obama campaign and it's been great to see people, from all around the country, respond by posting photos of themselves, their kids, and their license plates!
Go Obama!
Posted by: mail | January 31, 2008 12:50 PM
Obama's response to the SOTU is now up 700,000 views. It was only 300,000 yesterday.
Posted by: newfapalooza | January 31, 2008 12:08 AM
Obama does give people hope. He gave many of us a voice when we needed a leader to stand up and speak the truth. People can belittle hope all they want.
I have felt helpless for 7 years. Do you rememer after 911? For years it was like slamming my head on the wall. It was a nightmare. GW and Cheney bulldozed over every democrat and demonized us if we did not support the war.
Obama was one of the only people who gave me a voice in that awful time.
I have not forgotten.
Some people like to reduce him to happy happy joy joy sound bites.
I don't know... I figure at some level.. some people feel threatened by him.
They are afraid... to allow themselves to hope.
The devil they know...
It's the security vote.
Fear.
It rules us small animals. So prone we are to playing it safe...
It's so watership down.
Change is scary... because of the unknown.
Sometimes though... you have to be brave.
Posted by: catwoman2 | January 30, 2008 11:46 PM
The comments to this entry are closed.
Susan Eisenhower, Caroline Kennedy, the liberal Los Angeles Times, the conservative Boston Globe, Ted Kennedy, Oprah Winfrey ... People from across the political spectrum are craving authenticity and an old style commitment to public service. Experience counts, when it is the right kind of experience. That's why America is rallying behind Barack Obama !!!