I was on the phone with Alan Grayson a few days ago and he told me that he feels the campaign he so painstakingly put together has degenerated into a quest for money to run ads on television, instead of an opportunity to talk with the people of Orlando about how government can help to improve their lives. There are many ways to approach running a campaign, but almost every candidate and staffer I talk to says, no matter how idealistic it starts, it always ends with TV ads. Alan's ground game probably won him the primary-- but his startling TV ads sure didn't hurt.
Today Blue America, with our partners at SaysMe.TV, is launching a new application that can make everyone a political media consultant-- or, better yet, a replacement for a political media consultant.
Click here to see the program.
Start by picking a media market:
Cincinnati- Vic Wulsin
Miami- Annette Taddeo
Washington, DC- Judy Feder
Detroit- Gary Peters
New York- Dennis Shulman
Seattle- Darcy Burner
Philadelphia- Sam Bennett
Charlotte- Larry Kissell (should be up Monday)
Los Angeles- Debbie Cook or Russ Warner (should be up Tuesday)
Then pick which ad you want to run. Right now we have one ad available per candidate but we're hoping to add some more in the next week.
Type your name in at the top, because at the end of the ad it will credit you with paying for it.
Then pick the network and the daypart (time).
An individual ad can cost as little as $10, but the minimum purchase per candidate is $100.
Review the ad purchase, then check off all the boxes that attest that you're a U.S. citizen and that you're not a member of the Bush cabinet, etc.
And then pay for it with your credit card. SaysMe.TV will notify you before your ads run. This is the beginning of a new world in media buying. I have a feeling it's going to get better and better over the next year or so. Meanwhile, as usual, we're the pioneers. Play around with it.
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Wow, Howie, thanks for helping us all change America!
Present at the creation of a new media paradigm, etc.
Howie! This is great stuff.
Has anyone tried it yet?
Thanks Howie!
Change will come about ,but it will be slow,one congressional district, one senate seat at a time.
Keep up the good work Howie, we could use more like you!!
The Blue America PAC put $20,000 into this program this week but if people here at FDL this morning want to go through this step by step, I’ll stick another $100 or so into a little campaign we pick together. Any suggestions?
Digg this post
Dugg!!
I like anything that allows me greater involvement in the political process!!
Hey Pups Digg this Post and if you can help support these fine candidates!!
Howie, this is an excellent idea for people who have $100 or more to spend. I don’t, at this time. I wonder if there is a way to modify the program so that it would aggregate contributions of less than $100 for each ad, and when the total of small contributions reaches $100, the program would “buy” one showing of that ad. That way smaller contributors could still choose to help air a particular ad for a particular candidate.
I realize that might be too complicated. Just a thought.
I’m one of those dudes with a maxed out card, gave all my money to Obama…seriously!!
Going through the steps now; after choosing Cincinnati, it asks me for the ZIP code, so I’m going to enter 45230 since that’s where Vic Wulsin’s office is located.
Now it’s asking me to choose an ad, but the only ad featured in the Courage Campaign’s against David Dreier: “Bush Rubber Stamp” That’s a great ad, but I don’t want that to run in Cincinnati, so I’m stumped. Gonna try another market now.
When I enter 18105 — the ZIP for Sam Bennett’s office — I get a message that says “We are serving this market soon!”
Oops, nahant and I both submitted this article to Digg. Nahant got there first. Please ignore my link at 6, and use nahant’s link or the Digg button at the top of the page.
Looks like Nahant’s Digg went over the top of yours and is the one linked above so you might want to re-do the Digg
Daym Neuro we did it again(:>(( Double Digging…
Hey Lurk can you fix it so who ever was first gets the diggs…
Mod?
Me too but it sure good idea if you can afford it. That way you know right where your money is going.
I spoke with SaysMe about that and they’re working on it but it won’t be ready this year. I think I figured out a way to kinda/sorta do it through ActBlue and I’ll try to have it up this week. Neurophius, it was the first problem I had with it.
sorry to interrupt the discussion with the Digg chatter.
now, back to Blue America…
And nahant:
I don’t think it’s something the Lurking Mod can fix. It’s part of how Digg does things on their end. If two people are submitting at the same time, one gets tromped by another. I know it’s happened to me a few times. Always seems to be when I’ve done an especially good job at getting a good precis into the description, too.
Teddy, both of those markets are working ok for me. Amos, our contact at SaysMe.tv is in his car on the way to his office and he’ll be online with us in 10 minutes or so answer questions.
Now I see that I should click on the bar that says, “2. Choose Your Ad” on the left side rather than clicking on “Choose An Ad” with the little arrow on the right side.
Can’t go back and change cities; have to reload the page and start from the top. It holds my “Cincinnati” selection regardless of what ZIP code I enter. I would hate to place an ad for the wrong person in the wrong place!
I wish I had $100 to spare ,I wanna play too!!!!
If you are maxxed out to Obama or any of these individual campaigns, you can give unlimited amounts here. They are filed as independent expenditures, so you can spend unlimited amounts. These ads are not affiliated with any campaigns. Go crazy!!
There’s a drop down bar that lets you pick your city without that map process
Teddy, ads won’t be placed in the wrong place. Dreier is only approved for LA. I have checked Cincinatti and Mean Jean Schmidt is all that appears for me. If you close out, and go back to the site, does it still show Dreier?
I just made a dry run of the Blue America Saysme site up to the point where it asks you to enter the Zip Code. It does not offer a menu of Zip Codes for the district you are interested in. What is a contributor to do if they don’t know the Zip Code of the candidate to whom they want to contribute–go look it up on the Internet?
(maybe I just misread the instructions)
fabulous, howie! i saw this this morning over at your place and flipped out. will place some ads later today.
question: in the video intro it tells you to fill in the name you want to appear at the end of the ad. Are there legal restrictions as to what name you can put in? i.e. are you required to put in your legal name? seems weird that you’re given a choice of what info to put in, from a campaign finance standpoint.
You can double click within the map of the District as to where you want the ad to run.
You have to put your legal name. FEC regulations require it.
Super political tool. Congratulations to all involved.
unfortunately your order has to be a total of $100, even though you can buy an individual ad for $10. As more people use SaysMe, the better chance we have of lowering that amount.
Just double click within the orange map as to where you want the ad to run. The cable zones on the map overlap with the specific congressional districts. If you want to look up the zips you cn, but double clicking on the map is easiest.
The FDL folks did a great job of getting this thing up and running on such short notice. Great job!!!
Howie, way to go with this. You are democratizing TV advertising by letting the people choose what goes on TV. No longer is TV dominated by big corporations and politicians. The little man now has a soap box to talk to the masses!
thx! great tool. can’t wait to try it out.
A blogger we all know and LOVE entered a program of ads in OH-02 and she used the name “Rahm Emanuel” but I’m not certain if she pulled the trigger or not. Elmanuel, are you Amos from SaysMe.tv?
yes, its Amos. The name has to match the name on your credit card. Its also the name we file with the FEC as an independent expenditure.
Amos, would it be possible to establish a Blue America page that is dedicated to this project that would allow $10 and $20 dollar donors to contribute and them just put the ads up under the name “Blue America” instead of an individual’s name? I can’t see why that would cause a problem for the FEC.
We can discuss offline. Check out www.saysme.tv/wamp.
Why does the anti-Schmidt ad say “Vote for Dr Victoria Wulsin” at the end, and the anti-Frank Wolf ad says “Vote for Jedy Feder” but the anti-Robin Hayes ad doesn’t mention Larry Kissell?
Kosacks, I just posted about this at Daily Kos. Recs would be much appreciated.
Recommended!
Teddy, Charlotte is a TimeWarner market and I suspect they haven’t approved the ad yet (hopefully Monday) and that the finished copy with the candidate’s name will go up when the ad is approved and ready for action. Is that right, Amos?
Should be. The Hayes ads haven’t been approved yet. We are still waiting on Charlotte and LA.
There are also 2 Hayes ads coming. Coming soon……
Howie - this is the coolest project ever - wow!
I will be back in 25 if any questions come up, I will reply to them then. Enjoy!
Recommended at Daily Kos, Howie
Thanks– and thanks Teddy too.
Dennis Schulman is running in Congressional District NJ-05 (not NY). The incumbent is Scott Garrett he is a horror of a far-right Republican (he voted against help for Katrina victims).
Schulman for Congress!
The marker refers to the media market. NJ-05, alas, is in the most expensive media market in America, New York City. Dennis is one of the best candidates running for Congress anywhere and the idea of replacing a corrupt and bigoted reactionary like Garrett with such an enlightened and accomplished man like Dennis makes the extra few dollars to advertise there well worth it.
SaysMe really is a great resource, the WAMP - Women Against McCain Palin movement got started after we read this article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08.....=permalink
Have fun playing “political ad agency”..