 We're here at the Internet and Politics Conference at Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet Society, and I'm here speaking to Matt Heinemann from Arizona State University Thanks for stopping by. My pleasure. Thank you So I'm there's a lot of hype going around about the the role of the internet in the election this year and that it was Amazing and you know, nothing has ever been seen before quite like it And I want to know if there's another side to that if that's actually true or maybe it's maybe it is true Well, there's certainly aspects in which the internet played a key role in this election I think it's pretty clear that Barack Obama would not have been the Democratic nominee But for the internet the Democratic race was already quite close And it's pretty clear that online resources in terms of money in terms of volunteers Really put Obama over the top and what was already a very tight race I think most political scientists would say that we would we would have expected Obama to win No matter how much money he'd raised online or no matter what his online effort had looked like in in 2008 but it's also clear that The internet clearly added to Obama's margin and it clearly shaped his Campaign in profound ways if he hadn't had access to the internet if he'd run a the same kind of internet strategy that we saw in 2004 Obama would likely have won, but the campaign would have looked radically different We might not have had the same margin of victory. Is that what you're saying? I think I don't think certainly this certainly the margin of victory would likely have been smaller though It's though. It's hard to it's hard to know and these kinds of counterfactuals But I think even the substance of the campaign would have looked different. I think the camp. I think the I think that Obama really adapted well to to the medium What so so is more than just the candidate was the issues Dictated by the internet. Yeah, I think that and I think that you can see this The role of the internet in shaping the discourse on a few key issues take for example the health care plans of the candidates I think that I think that but for the influence of new online opinion outlets Hillary Clinton would have offered a more a more conservative health plan I think that certainly what Obama expected her to do at least initially and I think that I think that ultimately You know that you know that certainly shaped how Obama responded and I have a Kind of question about that was raised earlier today about whether this this kind of like web democracy is That's a phrase Is it really representative? Are we really you know these these folks who are out there and trying to get these issues on the? the agenda Are they truly representative is? Are we is the internet playing an effective role or is it just a group of people who have some tools? Well? Oftentimes we hear talk about the internet and democratization and talk about how the internet is democratizing politics and really To really answer those kinds of questions We need to think hard about which democratic values are most important to us if what we really want is You know Joe six-pack to be an important voice in politics the internet is probably not helping actually But if what we want is accountability of elites if we want really hard vetting of policy positions the blogosphere is better than certainly better than the Than the existing traditional media certainly on their own and perhaps even in its own right What if we just want to make sure that everybody's voice is heard in that idealistic kind of way? If what we're trying to ensure is that people's voices are considered equally The good news is that Campaign finance for long for for a very long time the most unequal form of Participation at least in this election at least for the Obama campaign and to a lesser extent to the mate with the McCain campaign Looks more equal than it ever has so that is good news in terms of considering citizens voices equally But in terms of ordinary citizens having access to the online public sphere, I'm quite skeptical about that I think that the people who matter most the online public sphere are mostly pointy-haired, you know academics with Ivy League caliber degrees such as the the ones here at Harvard University Just one last question. I mean will that will that change should it change should the internet become a Utility for everybody to be able to participate in society. I don't think so It's been a long time. I mean The portion of the population that's online has been relatively stable for four or five six years depending on how you count This is not the first cycle that we've seen the internet play such a major role Well, and if we look at the online public sphere and actually look at the audience that these sites receive We see quite stable patterns and we see that in fact the online public sphere is actually quite concentrated on a few top sites And I certainly don't expect that to change if anything in the lead up to the election We saw the online political sphere get more Concentrated on top outlets not less And should that change? I Think it I think we again we need to think hard about what kind of trade-offs we're willing to make If you know, there certainly would be an advantage in having a more substantively representative blogosphere Having a public sphere that does a better job of representing not just one gender but both genders right that rep you know That's less overwhelming the white But at the same time there are certainly our advantages to having a blogosphere that is so focused on The thoughts ideas of elites. It's a very mixed blessing a very scientific answer to a to a general Question and I appreciate it. Thank you so much