Campaigns

Is campaign cold outreach slowly dying?
FWIW
"The Biden campaign itself launched several relational organizing pilot programs in Wisconsin and Arizona last fall. Those efforts targeted volunteers in several specific constituencies and attempted to get them to log their own networks of Biden supporters. The result: they were to reach a large percentage of potential voters who weren’t contacted in 2022."

Meet VIC, Wyoming’s First AI Candidate Running For Cheyenne Mayor
Cowboy State Daily
"Miller stresses that only VIC, not he, would be making decisions for the city if elected mayor. His duty as its human assistant, or “meat avatar” as Miller colorfully puts it, will be to feed all relevant data on an issue into VIC, who will then render a decision or opinion about it. When a member of the media sends VIC a question, Miller copies and pastes VIC’s answer and sends it back to the reporter."

An AI Bot Is (Sort of) Running for Mayor in Wyoming
Wired
"OpenAI spokesperson Liz Bourgeois told WIRED in a statement that the company had 'taken action against this GPT due to a violation of our policies against political campaigning.'"

International

WhatsApp Channels, used by millions, has no clear election rules
Politico
"More than 2 billion people in 180 countries use WhatsApp messaging, with the most users in Brazil and India. It has been a vector for the spread of misinformation in previous elections, particularly among non-English speakers."

Social Media

How Americans Get News on TikTok, X, Facebook and Instagram
Pew Research
"A 2023 Pew Research Center survey found that Facebook outpaces all other social media sites as a news source for Americans, with 30% of U.S. adults saying they regularly get news there. Smaller shares regularly get news on Instagram (16%), TikTok (14%) or X (12%)."

It’s 2024. Elon Musk Rules X. And the Political World Is Still Addicted.
NOTUS
"Last year, Democratic candidates spent more than a million bucks on Twitter ads, The Washington Post reported."

TikTok Basics For Political Campaigners
Best Practice Digital
"While the platform now allows videos up to 10 minutes long, TikTok itself recommends keeping videos between 21-34 seconds for optimal engagement."

Technology

The AI election is here. Regulators can’t decide whose problem it is.
Washington Post
"Adav Noti, executive director of the Campaign Legal Center and a former FEC associate general counsel, said that given the bureaucratic quagmire, the likelihood of having federal restrictions on AI use in place for campaigning ahead of the November presidential election is 'extremely low.'"

Non-profit Tech Vendor Looks To Expand Down-Ballot Tools With New Collaboration
Campaigns & Elections
"Action Network is also hoping that the new collaboration, with a well-funded campaign committee engaging in races nationally, will help it prove the non-profit model can compete with increasingly well-funded for-profit technology vendors."