Obama's VP selection to be revealed in text message

ATLANTA — In the days and hours before the Democratic National Convention opens on Aug. 25, Jennifer Kitt will check her e-mail for a note from Barack Obama.

That's how the presumed presidential nominee is going to tell the Smyrna resident, and anyone else who signs up to hear, whom he's picked as his running mate. Rather than hold an old-fashioned news conference, the Obama campaign has promised that its supporters will be "the first to know" the news via e-mail or text message.

The buzzed-about strategy is seen as a way to simultaneously boost the candidate's database of supporters and build loyalty among them. But is it more stunt or innovation?

Neither, says Kitt, 23, president of Cobb County Young Democrats. E-mail and text messages are 24/7 realities for people like her; Obama's campaign is simply catching up.

"I see this as being current," says Kitt, a regular e-mailer, texter and Facebooker. "It's what you use every day."

Not that she isn't excited about seeing the VP message, she says. If leaks and spoilers are kept to a minimum, it should send a ripple of insider excitement through his supporters — with standard text-messaging rates, and maybe more messages to follow.

"People enjoy being the first to know, even if they're not," she says. "People want that feeling. I truly feel like part of the process."

Obama's campaign isn't the first to take advantage of technology and online social networking. Remember Democrat Howard Dean's grass-roots online fund-raising, or President Bush's tech-driven army of volunteers? Readers of Republican nominee John McCain's current Web site might remember its precursor, www.mccain2000.com.

No, Obama isn't the first, says Michael Cornfield, adjunct professor of political management at George Washington University. But he's doing it broader and better, using digital tools like Twitter and offering customizable features, such as "my.BarackObama" on his Web site. It's worked for him so far: techpresident.com shows Obama handily wins the popular vote on Facebook, MySpace and YouTube.

The text/e-mail-first option isn't likely to alienate many voters, Cornfield says, and it could be effective because Obama already established himself as youthful and tech-friendly.

"The trick for a political campaign is to be innovative, but in step," Cornfield says. "You want to be riding the wave not of the early adopters, but the middle. Then it's not a strained step, it's just a translation."

The translation so far: record numbers of young voters during the primaries, plenty of media attention and a sense for many that the candidate is your buddy, Barack.

Connecting with supporters in this way is "really about the relationship more than the technology," says Walter Carl, an assistant professor of communications at Northeastern University in Boston.

The kind of relationship, that is, that the Internet makes possible. You might not want to hear important news from a close friend by e-mail or text message, but getting exclusive-feeling news from a major player who seems like a friend — that's special.

Kitt says she knows she'll never get a call from Obama to chat about wife Michelle and the kids. But she'll be watching for his VP announcement e-mail. It will help steer some of the work she and other Young Democrats do this fall, especially when they come together at meetings and events — the ones they organize on Facebook.

Jamie Gumbrecht writes for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. E-mail: jgumbrecht AT ajc.com