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Reported today at Dean's official blog:
Recent meetups for Bush, Edwards and Missouri Rep. Richard Gephardt flopped for lack of interest. Carol Darr, a political scientist at George Washington University, says a study found 294 Internet political chat rooms about Dean, five times more than the other candidates combined.

"The Internet benefits insurgents," Darr says. "It is a way for candidates who can connect with people to make an end-run around the established process."
###

I think the last quote is misleading. It implies that Dean's online success is due to his being a voice of opposition. This isn't entirely true.

Any of the candidates, even George W., could be doing this. It helps if your message is consistent and strong. The difference is in the WAY Dean is doing it, or rather the way his campaign staff is doing it. This is a tactical matter. It could be Dean's doing or it could be Trippi's doing. The difference is that the Dean campaign provides the fuel and then gets out of the way. They let the fire burn rather than trying to control the fire.

Playing with Internet fire could be dangerous. It is yet to be seen how it will end for Dean. However, the method has been formed and well-documented over several years within the Internet marketing world. The power of the Internet is in getting constituents talking, not only with you but with each other. Once you get friends talking to friends you begin a chain reaction that can become enormous.

This works especially well if your product or message has a strong appeal. It cannot be faked. ICQ swepted the Internet world several years ago precisely because it was a great tool and because its creators built in easy ways to pass it along to friends and relatives. They launched a great product into the Internet community and then got out of the way (concentrating on staying ahead of the building volume of traffic on their servers).

So far, Dean's staff has done a good job of balancing the need to guide the chaos and the need to let the chaos just happen. They need to really concentrate on refining the message and the candidate. The Dean community will take care of deliverying the message and promoting the candidate.

The reason you won't find the other candidates capitalizing on the Internet is because they can't release their fates to their constituents. They want to control the campaign, control the message, control the election. Dean has tossed his fate to his supporters. He and his small national staff have offered themselves as enablers and servants of a larger movement. That's the story of the Internet. Be a servant of your community (market, constituents) and you can lead the world.


posted by Unknown at 12:17 PM