The Internet is carrying the campaign strategies of all three major political parties in the run-up to next month's Ontario election, albeit in different ways and to varying degrees. In Part 3 of our Ontario Politics 2.0 analysis, Toronto-based writer Lydia Perovic examines the usefulness of Web 2.0 features and, if any, for whom exactly are they most beneficial.
The Ontario New Democratic Party site has an important feature that calls for involvement in the "Take Action" section: Visitors are invited to "Speak Out" by telling their personal stories about long-term care, job protection and education, to be shared with the public via the Web.
There is not a single testimony posted so far. This is a good example of a feature that is only formally there, but that effectively isn't.
The current Progressive Conservative campaign Web site (www.leadershipmatters.ca) - the same one that is winning accolades in formal availability of "Web-ness" - also has a "Share Your Story" feature. It's prominently displayed, but there's still no page where the contributions are published.
On both party sites, the actual use that citizens have of this feature is nil. The Liberals have a section called "Your Say," but it consists of videos of (apparently) actual people engaged in commercials about the achievements of the Liberal government.
Whether they were paid for their services or not, it is obvious that these are not grassroots-created videos, so the "Your Say" title here does not mean direct participation and citizen-produced content.
This is the next level of examination of Web campaigning practices and features: do they really do what they purport to be doing? How much is there of informing and how much of propagating in the Info and News section? Do interactive features really invite interaction?
The standard dynamic on campaign and even incumbent sites is the one between controllable, on-the-message content and broader and more participatory content that is sometimes only indirectly campaign-related.
There are two schools of thought among (American) campaign managers in this matter: some argue that forums and real-time publishing, even if overseen by an editor, have tremendous potential to undermine campaign communication strategy, while others believe the Web 2.0 wave is already making it impossible not to incorporate interactivity in campaign Web sites.
With regards to the issue of creating Web sites that would be more like centres of a movement than traditional campaign sites, the more cautious side is obviously prevailing, but there are always exceptions. For examples in the U.S. from 2000 to 2004, see Web Campaigning by Kirsten Foot and Steven Schneider (MIT Press, 2006).
Portal or "movement" Web sites do not shy away from publishing content that expands the context of campaigning, whether by publishing issues-related content produced by other, allied organizations or by extensively linking out. Traditional campaign Web sites prefer internal linking (creating links that lead to other pages within the same site) and policy pages that are not too specific on the details.
At first sight, the Tories' campaign site is all participation. Just about every feature invites the user to undertake some sort of action. On closer look, there is not much citizen-produced content on the Web site.
The campaign blog is, understandably, written by the campaign team, and to post comments to those, one needs to sign in. There are very few comments on any of the blog entries: an indication of site traffic or the level of visitor engagement.
External linking is infrequent on this otherwise very dynamic site, apart from the links to the campaign's social media pages. The News and Media Room section consists mainly of the party's own press releases, but cosi fan tutte: both the NDP and Liberal sites have turned at least part of their respective News sections into a press release depository.
The NDP site does not link out to even its own positive or neutral publicity; while the PC site recently introduced some external linking to media coverage of an issue that is garnering much attention: faith-based school funding.
The Liberals are at this point doing the most external linking. They have placed their press releases under the somewhat more frank heading, "Campaign Central." On the "In the News" page, under the HQ menu on the home page, includes links to media news coverage. Although both parties link out only to positive coverage of their positions, this is a big step beyond tightly insular campaign sites.
Continued: A closer look at the individual candidates' Web sites
Related content:
Read Part 1: Politics 2.0: Web campaigning in the Ontario election
Read Part 2: Ontario Elections: An online kaleidoscope of campaign features
Political parties tap IT for election advantage
Gearing up for the Ontario election
Tory's Tories: The Ontario PC Party's Web sites
The Ontario Liberal Web site: Kodachrome or black and white?
Election? What election?: The Ontario NDP Web site
Would-be Toronto mayors reaching new voters with YouTube
Ryerson students leverage YouTube popularity
Toronto elections campaigning for transparent funding
Liberals (e-)challenged
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