Tom Mantos, of Nancy Pelosi's office, for one - gets it. It is about beginning the conversation, and finding out what the people who support the party feel, and think, and know. It is about getting high value, rather than low value support.
It's also about putting ideas in the right form - blog, don't press release at people. Just as there are certain ways of putting things that work on television, and on the radio - the internet too, has its rules and ways of doing business.
Any organization - political or otherwise - that wants to work through the internet, needs to learn these rules, as much as they need to learn television.