The YouTube-ification of politics

A very interesting article on how YouTube is empowering the average person to influence the political process like never before:

youtube.effect@CNN

"I think it really breaks down some of the traditional barriers we have seen in American politics," Steve Grove, head of news and politics at YouTube, told CNN's John King Monday. "Time was, if you wanted to engage in a primary debate process, you had to be in New Hampshire or in Iowa."

"Candidates do genuinely hate audience participation, because they like to control the environment," said longtime television news anchor Dan Rather, now the global correspondent for HDNet. Tell candidates people will ask them questions via a YouTube video, he says, and "they get the shivers."

It's those unscripted moments that have taken on a new life on the video-sharing Web site.

There is a flip side to the YouTube phenomenon. It can also help campaigns looking for new ways to harness the power of the popular Web site... Sometimes the campaigns are getting help without asking.

Truely, the Internet has turned the world into a global village; so, its leaders need to become as accountable as panchayat chiefs. Ha, now I begin to understand why Microsoft had aptly termed the most superior age in the 'Rise of Nations' as the Information Age!

where does this lead? check out Micah's view: Event Horizon and Singularity -by Micah Glasser
;)