RTNDF Political Coverage Project








		back to Publications Cyber Race by Tim Graham Reprinted from RTNDA Communicator, all rights reserved, © February 2000 Here’s a familiar scene: Some journalists get together at a seminar to discuss their coverage of a recent campaign. They wring their hands and pine over what they should have done or could have done. What started as an educational forum becomes a confessional: “We didn’t cover the issues as well as we should have.” “We failed to get people interested in the campaign.” “We never got beyond the horse race.” “We spent too much time reporting stories spoon-fed to us by the campaigns.” Granted, there are challenges. There is only so much time in a newscast, an election isn’t the only story you’re covering, and in an era of relative peace and prosperity a lot of people just aren’t interested in politics. In an attempt to provide more thorough coverage of elections, many stations are turning to their web sites. There they can give their viewers loads of information, free from the time constraints of a broadcast. They can re-purpose stories already aired, and use information reporters gather that never makes it into the newscast. They can stream video from debates and citizen forums, live or for people to view later. They can get the users involved by doing polls, live chats with candidates, and more. If you want to do serious election coverage with your web site, you’ll have to do more than post the day’s news and slap down a few links. Here is a look at what some people are thinking and doing. Moving Beyond the Broadcast During the recent mayor’s race in San Francisco, SFGate.com ran active discussion groups and streamed video of candidate debates, in addition to providing daily news coverage, candidate profiles and links to other sites. SFGat includes reporting from KRON-TV, the San Francisco Chronicle and the San Francisco Examiner, as well as the site’s own staff. Site news director Vlae Kershner says SFGate has had an impact on the race, adding that, ”things that started with people posting them on our site have ended up as issues in the campaign.” In 1998, Alabama voters had six statewide races to follow, including a hotly contested governor’s race. That prompted Alabama Public Television to create an expansive campaign section on its site. Among the features it developed were video-streamed responses from candidates to questions about campaign issues, an archive of the network’s nightly news program, and an ad watch section where users could view candidate ads in their entirety and watch analysis from commentators. News director Johanna Cleary says the effort attracted more than 300,000 hits in the six weeks leading up to the election, with an average viewing time of more than eight minutes. About half of the hits came on election day and the day after, as people flocked to the site for live vote total updates and webcast news updates, which were posted every 30 minutes though not put on air. “In 1998, we were the only news organization in Alabama updating live on the web,” says Cleary. Another news outlet followed suit in 1999, and Cleary anticipates more will do so during the 2000 elections. But How Much Influence Does the Web Really Have? Conventional wisdom holds that in 1998 Jesse Ventura rode the wave of the Internet into the Minnesota state house, supported by legions of Netizens who emerged from the virtual woodwork to elect him. But not everyone buys into the notion that the web can create momentum for a candidate. Bill Hanley is one such skeptic. “People talk about how the web is revolutionizing the way people get information about candidates,” says the executive vice president for content at KTCA-TV in Minneapolis/St. Paul. “I think that’s true for [some]....but for a typical voter — who approaches these things not feeling strongly passionate about one candidate or the other — I’m not sure we’ve yet found the right way of getting those people into the process.” As for Ventura, Hanley says that while information about the ex-wrestler was popular on the web and on KTCA’s own site, what really benefited “The Body” were the televised debates. “Good, old-fashioned, old-media, television debates. Because let’s face it, that’s the high-bandwidth way of doing this,” he says. “You get to see the candidates. You get to see the way they behave. This is the way human beings make their judgments about people.” Getting More People Involved One of the web’s best traits is its flexibility. Anyone looking to get more people interested in elections has a world of opportunity at their fingertips. You can host a debate or a town hall meeting, and no one will have to fight for parking. “The web offers us an opportunity to do more and to answer some of the criticism that the candidates never get a chance to speak directly to the voters,” says Candy Altman, news director at WCVB-TV in Boston. Kershner believes that’s the role that should be emphasized. “What we bring to the party is the ability to let citizens communicate with candidates without the filter of the media in between,” he says. One idea Hanley is considering for 2000: Developing a voter profile section on KTCA’s site where users can find out what people like themselves think about the pending elections. The feature would profile 20 to 25 individual voters and their thoughts about candidates and campaign issues. For example, a 25-year-old single female professional could log on to see what a peer has to say about the elections. A 50-year-old male who’s married and has two kids could do the same. Hanley thinks the concept might help generate interest in campaigns, particularly in lower-profile races. At KMEX-TV, the Univision station in Los Angeles, news director Jairo Marin has made an effort to help Latinos, particularly recent immigrants, become more active in elections. KMEX and KCET-TV, the PBS station in Los Angeles, will develop a bilingual web site for the 2000 campaign that will explain everything from how to register to vote and who the candidates are, to how democracy works in the United States. The project is supported by a grant from Best Practices 2000, a project led by Wisconsin Public Television that aims to encourage innovative campaign coverage. “For many Americans it may look peculiar that we are telling people how [they can] vote, but for this community it’s very important because our experience has been completely different in Latin America,” he says. The Tangled Web Candidates Weave Another idea for 2000 that’s catching on: expanding the ad watch franchise — as much a part of campaign coverage as the election itself — to cover web sites. Candidates for political office have become far more sophisticated in their use of the web, where they can communicate with voters directly and provide a larger quantity of information than can be relayed in a paid ad. In Boston, WCVB-TV and WGBH-TV are using a Best Practices 2000 grant to hire a shared researcher for ad watch and web watch reporting. “It’s our feeling that there’s a whole segment of the voting population or the potential voting population that is going to be reached on the web now. And candidates — particularly those with a lot of money — are very savvy to that already and are going to try the most direct route possible to reach voters,” says WCVB’s Altman. WFLA-TV in Tampa also plans to assign watchful eyes to the web, not just to scrutinize accuracy, but to monitor the consistency of a candidate’s message. “We’re specifically going to look at the way that candidates may target voters differently on the web versus traditional direct mail, television advertising, etc. and see if their messages change from medium to medium,” says WFLA assistant news director Deborah Halpern. An effective web watch effort may well be more work than its old media progenitor. Most candidate web sites are richer in information than a 30-second TV spot. And there’s more to look at than just candidates’ web sites: independent sites get involved in all sorts of ways, doing anything from advocacy to reporting to ridicule (see sidebar). Even someone with mediocre skills can create a site that looks official at first glance, but could have any number of intentions to the contrary. If You Build It, Will They .com? It isn’t easy to make a site stand out on the web, where the competition stretches beyond those in your market area. Many sites try to attract political junkies with the same features found on news organizations’ sites. Want video-streamed statements about various campaign issues from presidential and congressional candidates? Go to www.freedomchannel.com. Interested in debating issues online? Head to www.debateamerica.org. All the possibilities breed many uncertainties, and there’s no magic formula for success. One risk with beefing up your election coverage, in particular, is that few users will notice. “The other night we put up a video clip of George W. Bush in the Republican debate and it really got only a handful of views compared to other stories on topics which are not political at all,” says Walt Zwirko, managing news editor of WFAA.com. Still, parent company Belo is considering developing a comprehensive George W. Bush archive on the web. Drawing on stories from the Dallas Morning News and the four TV stations Belo owns in Texas, the feature would contain detailed information on Bush’s background and his work as governor. Given Bush’s standing as a leading candidate, “There’s some thought of historical significance going into this,” says Zwirko. Hanley thinks the revolution will only come once today’s bandwidth constraints are resolved. “Eventually this form of interactive information site — that includes rich video, so you can actually see a candidate and actually participate — is absolutely going to revolutionize things,” he says. “But not yet.” Another possibility he offers: Stations could split digital signals to offer an in-depth election channel whose content might look quite similar to a high-bandwidth Net. Change happens awfully fast on the web. What worked last year or what proves successful this year could well be “like, so late-’90s” come the next election cycle. Regardless of what direction the web ultimately takes, Hanley reminds that no one should feel too comfortable with what they are doing. “Anybody who says they have [the web] figured out is a liar.” Judging Credibility on the Net Wondering how credible a site really is? Here are some tips from Mike Wendland, a veteran reporter and online specialist who’s currently a fellow at The Poynter Institute. Know who owns the site. To find out who is behind what you’re viewing, go to the WhoIs page at www.internic.net. Type in the domain name you’re interested in, but don’t type in “www.” (For example, to find out who owns www.rtnda.org, you would simply type “rtnda.org.”). There are several accredited registrars of domain names, and this will tell you which one was used to register that particular name. Go to the registrar’s web page, do another “WhoIs” search, and you’ll learn the identity of the owner, usually listed as the administrative contact. (Technical contacts are often web hosting companies or ISPs.) Keep in mind that this is like looking someone up in the phone book; a WhoIs search will not tell you where the person’s interests lie. Can you reach those people? If they hide, chances are they’re not legit. How current is the information? If the site isn’t updated daily or almost daily, the creators probably aren’t that serious. Cheque they’re spelling! Amateurish style likely means amateurish standards. Watch for spelling mistakes, poor grammar, heavy use of exclamation marks, etc. Trust your gut. Does what you’re reading sound right? Is the information attributed? Are there links to source material? If not, be wary. Ideas For Your Web Site During the 2000 Campaign Candidate bios Event and appearance schedules List of candidates’ major contributors Discussion boards and forums Online candidate debates Continuously updated election night results Audio and video streaming Ad/web watch Basic civics information in English and Spanish News archive Candidate statements (text or video) Links to candidates’ official sites and other sites of interest Links to candidate voting records An issues quiz that asks users what they believe are the most important, and suggests which candidate most closely shares their views. Tim Graham is managing editor of Communicator. top • back to Publications