Add AOL to the new list of major political players

The stars -- the dot-coms -- were so aligned this year that the Internet was bound to play a significant role in the presidential campaign, with or without Howard Dean (or Matt Drudge). There seems little doubt, though, that Dean kick-started the process. He used MoveOn.org and other websites to raise early money and rally early support, and then he watched in horror as his post-caucus speech in Iowa wound up all over the Web, magnified and distorted beyond recognition, essentially dooming what was left of his campaign.

But even before Iowa, a Pew Research Center study showed that a third of American adults “regularly or sometimes learn something about the candidates from the Internet.” A subsequent Pew study, released early this month, said the Internet has become “the primary source of election news for a growing number of Americans.”

Thus, there seem to be more political websites in this election than there were hanging chads in the last one. The New York Times now has a daily, online campaign roundup (nytimes.com/onthetrail) with links to many other sites. Other mainstream news organizations -- The Los Angeles Times among them -- also have campaign links on their websites. Even the Kaiser Family Foundation has created a campaign website -- kaisernetwork.org/spotlight/election2004 -- to provide “easy access to the candidates’ position on critical health policy issues.”

So perhaps it’s not surprising that America Online, the largest Internet service provider and most-visited online news destination, has started its own all-election, all-the-time site: electionguide04.com.

The site, an expanded and improved version of AOL’s election site in 2000, offers frequent updates on breaking campaign news, commentary by political strategists, frequent polls, humor and satire, audio and video features, information on the candidates’ daily schedules and links to various blogs and to other news sites (including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and ABC).

The site also provides several forums for user participation. Recently, one of those forums -- in the “Political Insider” section of the site -- encouraged discussion of a question on the Republican ticket -- “Should Bush Drop Cheney?”

“We want to be more than a site that distributes content,” says Lewis D’Vorkin, vice president and editor in charge of news and sports for AOL. “We want to create an online news environment where the community participates.”

I’m not a big fan of online chat rooms and bulletin boards. I prefer my conversations face to face -- with people I know, not strangers. But other interactive elements of the Internet do interest me.

My favorite feature on the AOL election site, for example, is “President Match,” a quiz of sorts for users who (like me) are uncertain who’s the best candidate in this year’s presidential race. There are about 25 questions on foreign and domestic policy (abortion, gay rights, gun control, the war in Iraq, international trade agreements) and candidate qualifications (the importance of military service and prior elective experience). AOL will then, within a matter of seconds, match your answers with the candidates’ positions and background to determine which candidate best meets your criteria. The candidate matches are listed in order, by percentage for each candidate. More than half a million users took the “President Match” quiz in February.

Since I’m always in the market for a good laugh in politics, I’m especially appreciative of AOL’s links to Bill Maher, “The Daily Show” and to the Onion’s political glossary (“Concession statement: An act of willpower in which the loser lies about the election being well-fought and disingenuously congratulates the victor”).

Media synergy

On a more serious note, the AOL site has a “Voter Services” component that provides state-by-state information on voter registration, primary and caucus dates, polling place opening and closing times and a simple explanation of how each state’s caucus or primary system functions.

The Project for Excellence in Journalism, funded by the Pew Trusts, is critical of the AOL site -- and most other campaign sites run by major news organizations for that matter.

AOL’s electionguide04.com doesn’t carry the “rich content from other parts of the Time Warner empire” that one would expect to find on the site of a Time Warner subsidiary, the journalism watchdog group said after studying the site (and nine others) on five dates after the Iowa caucuses and two days

after the New Hampshire primary.

D’Vorkin insists his site has “the best, most varied content on the Web” and says AOL makes use of its Time Warner partners when events warrant.

“We’ve used whole Time magazine cover packages on politics,” he says, but the content in many other Time Warner magazines -- People, Entertainment Weekly, Sports Illustrated, In Style -- “don’t very often translate into politics.”

But why doesn’t the AOL site make more use of CNN, another Time Warner partner?

CNN, D’Vorkin says, appeals to a “more highly engaged, narrower user base in terms of interest” than AOL’s “mass market, mass appeal audience.”

Really? In this situation, that seems a dubious proposition to me. I’d agree that a typical CNN watcher is likely to be more of a news junkie/political junkie than a typical AOL user, but I’d think that anyone interested enough in politics to visit the AOL election site would certainly be interested in CNN’s political coverage as well.

Although some elements of the AOL site are reserved for AOL subscribers, most features are available to anyone with a computer. These include a weekly poll that has so far provided an accurate guide to Sen. John Kerry’s growing strength.

Before the Iowa caucuses, Kerry wasn’t seen as much of a factor, and AOL didn’t even ask its members who they thought would win a Bush vs. Kerry race. After Kerry won Iowa, AOL asked, and the vote was 62% Bush, 38% Kerry. After another Kerry victory, in New Hampshire, the margin dropped to 58% to 42%. After the next round of primaries, it was 55% to 45%.

Oddly, AOL didn’t include the Bush vs. Kerry question in its survey after the two most recent rounds of primary voting, saying it preferred to vary the questions to keep them “fresh” and to “engage [users] ... with forward-thinking questions.”

It’s hard to think of a more “forward-thinking” poll question than who would win a Bush-Kerry matchup in November. But with more than eight months to go, I’ll bet that question will come up again on AOL.

David Shaw can be reached at david.shaw@latimes.com. To read his previous “Media Matters” columns, please go to latimes.com/shaw-media.