Howard Dean and the Internet were not always so inextricably linked

Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve seen about as many stories that mention Howard Dean’s incredible online success as any other political story in America. Probably more.

The Washington Post, for example, said Dean has “clearly tapped into something” by “running an ever-expanding grass-roots campaign online.” Mother Jones said that Dean “has tapped [the Internet’s] power in a way that no other candidate ever has.”

To be sure, Dean is generating enormous support via the Internet. Online organizing has quickly created a base for Dean’s overall support — both in terms of grassroots activism and fundraising. It’s fair to say Dean would not be a top-tier candidate were it not for his online presence.

This is particularly true when it comes to finances. Bush, the Michael Jordan of presidential fundraising, raised $700,000 out of his Q2 $34 million online. Dean, meanwhile, raised $4 million online, including $800,000 in one 24-hour stretch late last week. Not bad.

At this point, the other Dem candidates seem to look at online activists as just another constituency, one which Dean has already won over, as evidenced by his overwhelming victory in the MoveOn primary. None of them see this as a catastrophe. After all, there are lots of constituent groups and each candidate is working to make an impact with a specific faction. Kerry is tight with veterans’ groups, Edwards is big with trial lawyers, Gephardt is in with the unions, and so on.

What hasn’t been explored, as far as I can tell, is how Dean came to be the darling of the online world. One thing I’m sure of, it wasn’t Dean’s idea.

The Dean for America website went live in August 2002, as Dean was wrapping up the final months of his stint as governor of Vermont. The website, which really only consisted of about 3 individual pages, gave no indications that the good doctor was going to base his campaign on ‘net-based activism.

Indeed, the original home page essentially featured two links — one for information on Dean’s positions on the issues and another with a collection of links to articles about Dean in the mainstream media. If Dean’s staff was planning to take online campaigning to new heights, they hid it well.

To say that the site was unimpressive is to be very generous. The page with media articles misspelled Des Moines, for goodness sakes. (It’s only the capital of the state with the first caucus; don’t bother checking to see if you spelled it right.)

A few weeks after the site went up, the staff added a “contribute” button so supporters could help Dean build up some financial support. The only problem was the link didn’t take you anywhere. Anyone who wanted to give the Dean campaign an online donation couldn’t. The link went unfixed for months and wasn’t able to start accepting donations until mid-December. The campaign simply treated the website as an afterthought.

The site lacked what most would tell you are standard features that any candidate for any office should have. There was no calendar of upcoming events, no references to “Meet Up” or local organizing, and no way to request bumperstickers, yard signs, or other materials.

It was, to put it simply, the worst campaign website I’ve ever seen.

Three months after starting Dean for America.com, the site got a minor overhaul. There was a new link added, for example, to join an email list serv. The site was still remarkably amateurish — people who signed up to receive announcements via email started getting updates up to a month later, if ever.

The website, believe it or not, didn’t even include a photo of Dean until November 2002, almost four months after the site went live.

Demonstrating just how seriously the site took the Internet, Dean for America.com went down for four days in mid-January for maintenance — not a redesign, mind you, just technical work. The campaign made no effort to keep the site live or redirected to a temporary server. Again, as far as the staff was concerned, having a dead site for a few days was of no consequence.

At the time, Internet activists started gravitating towards Dean, not because the campaign was engaging in some creative online outreach, but because these activists happened to like Dean and his message. Democrats.com, for example, hosted weekly straw polls of favored candidates. In January, Dean trailed only Al Gore, who had not yet withdrawn from the race, despite no meaningful online operation.

A group of Dean supporters started an unofficial Dean blog a year ago to tout Dean’s candidacy. Even they realized, however, that the campaign seemed disinterested in the online community.

On Dec. 20, 2002, for example, the unofficial Dean blog noted that “despite the strong support of the Internet political community, the Dean campaign has been strangely slow to get organized on the web.” The site added, “One has to wonder if the campaign is even aware of the netroot support?”

The same Dean blog noted a month later that pro-Dean online activists “are self-organizing.” Not campaign-driven organizing, but self-organizing. The blog also said that MeetUp.com could be useful for the Dean campaign, if only the campaign would pay attention.

“It’s really up to the campaign whether it wants to give an official blessing to these kinds of netroot efforts or not — but they will likely happen regardless,” the blog said.

The Dean campaign eventually came around when Joe Trippi and others began to appreciate the potential of tapping these supporters who liked Dean despite the campaign’s disinterest in online campaigning.

Now, of course, it’s a model for how a presidential candidate can utilize the Internet, complete with an official blog, “Dean TV” broadcasts, and “Dean Wireless” so you can read updates on your PDA and cell phone. These advances are tremendous and the campaign should be applauded for taking full advantage of the medium.

My point, however, is that the Dean campaign didn’t reach out to online Dem activists, online Dem activists reached out to Dean.

The campaign, it seems, would have you believe that they are led by visionaries who appreciated the value of the Internet before anyone else. The truth is, however, the campaign woke up one morning and realized there were thousands of people excited about Dean’s candidacy that they had been effectively ignoring for months. Luckily for Dean, the campaign woke up before it was too late.