Back in the 80's and 90's, I collected a vast amount of "bootleg" concert tapes. Toward the end of the second decade two things happened: I bought two new tape decks and then a year later I quit adding to my collection - - not because I didn't crave new music but because I could finally see the day when it would all be on CD. To wit, etree and furthurnet are proof that the digital age has come and access to the newest live recordings is only an hour's download away. I bring this up because there are some changes which no matter how evident, are hard to envision before they happen.
As bloggers, most of us know that someday this variety of candid analyses called the internet is going to give way to the day when traditional media will have to report their stories in ways that meshes with what's reported in the new media. I'm talking more about omission than spin. What is now veiled in secrecy will one day be laughably absent. Sure, we can predict this day will come as sure as the fabled home CD burner, but at the moment it's tough to picture the day when the now stumbling traditional media will be brought to its knees.
The rise of Barack Obama is an irreversible groundswell which brings with it the power to coup the traditional media.
If 2006 was the year that it was decided that the blogosphere could be mighty, 2008 will be the year that this generation takes it to the streets. Soon the establishment won't treat people powered politics like a worm but as the monarch which we will someday be.
Today we are frustrated, because they control the message. They elevate gotcha politics over substance. They ignore our historical events and give the Republican candidate a pass for sidestepping a law that bear his own name.
But that's o.k. Every time this happens it makes me giddy. This fabled era of the internet replacing traditional media isn't just inevitable, it's imminent. There's nothing they can do to keep Obama from becoming the Democratic nominee. And his campaign will change America. There will be no stopping it.
I'm not saying that it's a cinch for Obama to baet McCain. It will be an uphill battle all the way. But it will be fought in a different way than any other campaign I've seen in my life. All of you who have done voter registrations in the past know what it's like dealing with apathy and the disinterested. Constituents who are not voters don't believe that politicians don't differ enough to choose one. Obama's campaign strength has always been its grassroots base. They have been way out front building the networks that get people involved. Involved people who will talk to other people on a scale that's unprecedented, in social ways that will be very fine in its granularity.
A new generation of involved, networked and informed supporters. Big media sees that and it scares them shitless. A year ago the disinformation age was in its full glory, now its name is Maxell.
If Obama pulls this thing off it will be against the concerted protests of traditional media, and if he does, it will be for running his campaign in such a way that he wins regardless of what they do. One day we'll look back and try to peg the time when broadcast news died. I think this could be the year.