Inside Web White

1
Inside Web White BlueAn online public service
model

• Presentation by Steven Clift
• WWB Project Coordinator
• clift_at_publicus.net
• http//www.publicus.net

2
Overview

• Web View
• Purpose and Quick Facts
• Internet and Politics Community
• Online Public Service
• WWB Site Recruitment
• How it worked

• Content Links
• User Survey
• Site Statistics
• Public Comments
• Lessons
• Questions to Consider
• Conclusion
• Stay in Touch

3
Web View
http//www.webwhiteblue.org
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Purpose and Quick Facts

• Purpose
• An online public service campaign for easy access
  to 1998 election information.
• Online
• http//www.webwhiteblue.org

• Quick Facts
• 1300 Participating Sites
• 80 important charter Participating Sites
• WWB Day on October 7
• Extensive Press
• Estimated one-half million users Oct. 7 - Nov. 4

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Internet and Politics Community Pre-1998
Civic Non-Profits
Candidates
Political Online Consult
Govern. Online
Academic Research.
Political Portals
Interest Groups
Major Portals
Political Parties
Online News
Jumble of politics online practitioners and
experts with informal connections especially
between DC consultants and candidates, political
parties, and interest groups.
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Online Public Service

• Net Era Principles for Community Efforts
• 1. Provide balanced presentation to end users
• 2. Complement other's work, avoid duplication and
  extensive content development
• 3. Promote others work toward public goals
  through directories, dont compete as a
  destination site
• 4. Enhance other's return on content development
  through icon efforts, banners ads, and other
  efforts
• 5. Enable cooperation while raising competition
  level
• 6. Host important events or items that would not
  happen otherwise
• 7. Focus on core mission and realistic
  expectations

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Internet and Politics Community Post-1998 Goal
Cross-sector connections and awareness within
politics online community growing and
expanding. Still very informal and concentrated
in few locations. Challenge is to move from the
jumble toward sustained relationships on a more
nation-wide basis
Candidates
Civic Non-Profits
Govern. Online
Political Parties
Formal/Informal connections through WWB and
other efforts.
Online News
Political Online Consult
Major Portals
Academic Research.
Political Portals
Interest Groups
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WWB Site Recruitment

• Shorenstein Internet and Politics June session
  participants
• Markle Foundation approached July
• Site recruitment for major sites August 15 -
  September 15
• Time crunch

• Charter sites legitimized post-Sept. 10 general
  recruitment
• Over 1200 sites signed up via web
• Sites downloaded icon for Oct 7 WWB Day and kept
  up through election

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How it worked

• 1. Extensive online and offline outreach brought
  people to recruitment site.
• 2. Web site provided full details on the project.
  See the About section.
• 3. Participating Sites filled out web form and
  joined e-list.

• 4. Sites placed icon with link to WWB on their
  site.
• 5. Some sites ran WWB banner ads.
• 6. Icons were up Oct 7 WWB Day through election.

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Content Links

• Process
• Survey of Internet and Politics contacts about
  100 sites
• Development of internal content link policy
• Careful review
• Non-profit site focus
• Commercial sites were charter Participating
  Sites

• Challenges
• Legal issues with foundation and voter
  registration
• No direct links to parties, advocacy, candidate
  or voter sites geared toward an issue or audience
• Fair and objective presentation key
• Next time ...

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User Survey

• Preliminary highlights
• 1000 volunteered responses
• Asked the right questions, but need to compare
  with scientific surveys of the general population
  and Internet users
• 81 respondents said first time they used Net for
  election information
• Users were very pleased with WWB site
• Why they visited? Political interests 41,
  seeking election information 25, just browsing
  19...

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User Survey

• Highlights continued
• Election sites in general - quite or extremely
  Useful 77, Informative 93, Trustworthy 76
• How they discovered WWB? Icons 30, banner ads
  18, online news 18, offline means 22
• Internet was the primary election media source
  for for 21, second source for 27
• 64 expect the Internet to be their primary media
  source for election information in 2000
• Most have used the Internet to express a
  political opinion (polls, e-mail, newsgroups,
  web, chat)

13
WWB Site Statistics

• Site traffic
• 500,000 accesses on home page to Nov 4
• 110,000 on October 7 WWB Day
• Your State most popular with 140,000 accesses
• 7,800 joined e-mail announcement list

• Content Traffic Out
• Your State non-profit links benefited most
• Election Results directory popular
• Some reported strong increase, others sent more
  traffic than returned
• Description and navigation needs

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Public Comments

• Positive Comments
• An excellent way to help people become more
  informed voters.
• I was overjoyed to see a compilation of election
  info in one neat place!
• This is what IT is all about. Please keep it
  up!!! Getting in touch with our government is
  too old, too slow, enraging to most citizens. I
  will e-mail all I know with this site.
• To be able to link to all the pertinent topics
  from one site without doing an interminable
  search is a great idea!
• The concept of Web White Blue would seem to
  open the door of politics to the general public
  primarily because of convenience regarding time
  and place of participation.

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Public Comments

• Balance Extremely Important
• The public needs a reliable, non-partisan source
  of info, and hopefully, this will be that
  source.
• "Long over due. Please do not become biased in
  your opinions like the print and televised media
  has done.
• "You need a BALANCED perspective. Your sources
  are pro-leftist.
• " Much of the information is Republican only
  opinions are conservative and right-wing.
• "I found many of the linked sites to be biased to
  one political side of an issue.

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Lessons

• People want a neutral democracy portal(s)
• People want interaction, future directory
  challenge
• Geography matters
• WWB Day specifically and the icon awareness
  online public service concept worked
• Extensive outreach required to generate online
  traffic
• Promoting others content and avoiding
  competition with others was essential to success
• Major commercial and non-profit site
  participation essential, need to deepen all
  participation, especially government election
  sites and high traffic non-political/news sites

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Questions to Consider

• What about 2000? Where do we go next?
• What can be done as the politics online
  community that would not happen otherwise?

• What should WWB or community efforts NOT do?
• How do we leverage election interest into ongoing
  online citizen participation?

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Conclusion

• Lets not wait until late in 2000 to start online
  public service election efforts.
• The Markle Foundation is actively reviewing
  options and encourages to your input and
  suggestions.
• Thank you for your participation in 1998!

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Stay in touch

• Visit us on the web
• http//www.webwhiteblue.org
• http//www.markle.org
• Join our e-mail announcement list
• Send e-mail to listserv_at_webwhiteblue.org
• Message body sub wwb-announce

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Get Connected

• Join Democracies Online Newswire
• Send e-mail to listserv_at_tc.umn.edu
• Message body sub do-wire Your Name
• Archive from
• http//www.e-democracy.org/do(An independently
  moderated e-mail list with 500 democracy online
  leaders from around the world. Moderated by
  Steven Clift ltclift_at_publicus.netgt, WWB Project
  Coordinator)