MatthewHindman.com: Political science, political communication, and Internet politics http://www.matthewhindman.com 2010-09-07T21:02:52+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/images/M_images/joomla_rss.png text/html 2009-10-09T23:30:51+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2009100950/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/Sold-Out-On-Amazon.html Score one for old media. In the wake of the book being featured on last week's On The Media (http://www.onthemedia.org/transcripts/2009/10/02/05), it is sold out on Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/Myth-Digital-Democracy-Matthew-Hindman/dp/0691138680/), at least for the next week or two. Those eager to read it should know that there are still plenty of copies available: click here (http://press.princeton.edu/titles/8781.html) to order the book directly from Pirnceton University Press. text/html 2009-09-28T20:00:00+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2009092843/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy-Featured-on-NPR-s-On-The-Media.html About a year ago, driving home from Tucson, I heard one of my grad school professors on NPR talking about his latest book. Boy, I thought, wouldn't it be great if I could go on NPR to talk about my book once it comes out?Be careful what you wish for. A couple weeks ago I got a call from James Hawver, a producer for On the Media (http://www.onthemedia.org/), NPR’s weekend media affairs program. He had read Ben Carlson's piece (http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200909u/professional-bloggers) in the Atlantic, and so he ordered a copy of the book. Long story short, this Monday I went down to KJZZ for a half-hour interview with Brooke Gladstone. In part, the interview was a lesson in humility. Brooke is very good at what she does. Naturally enough, the hosts of OTM often adopt a skeptical tone and press their guests hard on points of disagreement. And I have very little experience in front of a microphone or a video camera.This made for a couple of awkward moments. Early on in the interview, after I talked about online news readership being more concentrated than print readership, Brooke said that she doubted that this was the appropriate comparison.... text/html 2009-09-20T20:00:00+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2009092044/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/Social-Media-So-What.html That was the entertaining title of my panel at the Oxford Social Media Conference (http://people.oii.ox.ac.uk/research/2009/07/29/the-oxford-social-media-convention-2009-assessing-the-evolution-impact-and-potential-of-social-media/). In my opening remarks I strenuously disagreed with other presenters’ claims that the Internet provides for “low barriers to entry.” Different barriers to entry? Sure. Low barriers in 1995? Of course. But low barriers today? Not in any of the mature part of the Web, and certainly not in the niches that I study. Most online news remains the product of print or TV or radio outlets, and new outlets like the become highly professionalized (http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200909u/professional-bloggers), with few new bloggers rising to prominence over the 2008 election cycle. Moreover, just gaining “entry” doesn’t mean very much, if a broader class of entrants don’t really expand the pool of winners. Any golfer able to win a regional qualifying tournament can gain entry into the U.S. Open (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Open_%28golf%29), while other events (such as the Masters (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golf_masters)) are strictly invitational. But cheesy Kevin Costner movies (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117918/) aside, the folks who win the U.S. Open are full-time pros, not guys who play a few rounds on the weekends.Still, an edifying conference filled with smart people doing interesting things. Thanks to the... text/html 2009-09-10T20:00:00+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2009091045/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/Me-in-The-Atlantic.html For those of you interested in political blogging -- and who among my readers isn't? -- it's worth checking out Ben Carlson's new article (http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200909u/professional-bloggers) on the professionalization of online political commentary. I had a long talk with Ben about the piece, and he was kind enough to quote me in it. Any day where I’m quoted alongside Nick Carr (http://www.roughtype.com/), Ezra Klein (http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/), and Matthew Yglesias (http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/) (who might be my favorite political blogger) is a good day.My lines: The era when political comment on the Web is dominated by solo bloggers writing for free is gone, and “There is a difference between speaking and being heard.” The first quote comes from the article I presented at Penn’s Democracy Citizenship and Constitutionalism seminar this spring, titled “The Closing of the Frontier: Political Blogs, the 2008 Election, and the Online Public Sphere (images/docs/hindman_closing_of_the_frontier.pdf).” Click on the title to read the full piece. The second quote comes from my book (http://www.amazon.com/Myth-Digital-Democracy-Matthew-Hindman/dp/0691138680/), which of course you should all buy and read if you haven’t already. text/html 2009-08-19T20:00:00+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2009081947/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/Review-in-Political-Communication.html Diana Owen (http://explore.georgetown.edu/people/owend/) has a very, very kind review (http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a913649540) of the book in the latest issue of Political Communication (http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t713774515~link=cover). The review even goes so far as to call the book a “landmark work in political communication.” That is hard praise to live up to. text/html 2009-08-16T20:00:00+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2009081646/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/Netroots-Nation-Who-s-Left-Out.html I was lucky enough to attend the Netroots Nation (http://www.netrootsnation.org/) conference at the invitation of Campus Progress (http://www.campusprogress.org/). The panel title was “Who’s Left Out? Taking a Critical Look at Online Organizing (http://netrootsnation.org/node/1136) .” To be honest, I wasn’t quite sure how my book would be received. I had a testy email exchange with one prominent blogger about the book, and I have often had audiences get upset when I suggest that there are limits to the online meritocracy. But it ended up being one of the most interesting and enjoyable panels I’ve been on. Click here (http://www.netrootsnation.org/node/1328) to view video of the panel. Much of the credit for the way the panel went goes to Erica Williams (http://www.campusprogress.org/events/1702/speakers-erica-williams) (also from Campus Progress), who did a great job in directing the discussion. But I was also blessed with excellent co-panelists: Eszter Hargittai (http://www.webuse.org/) (whose work many of you know), Biko Baker (http://tba2007.confabb.com/users/profile/bbaker) , Xavier Lopez-Ayala (http://allianceminnesota.org/page/community/blog/xavier) , and Jenifer Fernandez Ancona (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jenifer-fernandez-ancona) . Thanks also to Katie Andriulli (http://www.americanprogress.org/aboutus/staff/AndriulliKatie.html) for organizing the session. text/html 2009-03-29T20:00:00+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2009032948/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/Oxford-Keynote.html I was privileged to attend the joint conference at Oxford put together by Harvard’s Berkman Center (http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/) and the Oxford Internet Institute (http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/) . I was even invited to give the keynote address kicking off the event. You can find video of that presentation here:p9kV8QLpYC8I’ve rarely felt more jetlagged than I did the day I presented, but I remain excited about the dynamic models of Web traffic I present here, which come out of my work with Bruce Rogers (http://mathpost.asu.edu/~rogers/). text/html 2009-03-25T20:00:00+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2009032549/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/Nature-Reviews-The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy.html A very positive review (http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v458/n7237/full/458409a.html) of the book in the latest Nature (http://www.nature.com/nature/index.html), by Richard Allan (http://www.richardallan.org.uk/), a former British Member of Parliament and all around interesting guy. The review is quite well written (particularly for such a short article), and does a good job of both describing the book and offering Allan’s own insights. Worth a read no matter what you think of my own work. text/html 2008-11-20T22:21:43+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2008112042/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/Obama-s-Final-Web-Fundraising-Numbers.html Half a billion dollars (http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/11/20/obama_raised_half_a_billion_on.html) in online donations over 21 months. $100 million of that in September alone.For years I was told that I was overestimating the potential of the Web to change the way that campaigns are funded. I don't think I'll hear those complaints again. text/html 2008-11-17T02:19:36+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2008111741/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/The-Book-Now-Released-into-the-Wild.html I am pleased to announce that The Myth of Digital Democracy is published (http://www.amazon.com/Myth-Digital-Democracy-Matthew-Hindman/dp/0691138680/). If you order the book through Amazon right now, it will be in your hands by the end of the week. (Feel free to test of Amazon's logistical prowess by ordering multiple copies.)This website has lain dormant for the past few months, as I’ve been preoccupied with final editing on the book and a host of post-book projects. But that's about to change. I’ll be updating this site at least once a week during the coming year. Partly, I want to clarify and expand on the arguments I make in the book. Academic publishing has a long lead time. When writing about a fast moving topic like Internet politics, years-long delays can be downright annoying. I’ll also be responding to inevitable criticisms, and talking about the continuing evolution of media politics in the 21st century.So stay tuned.PS: After some early hiccups, the RSS and Atom feeds of this website seem to be behaving themselves. You can make sure that you don’t miss any updates by subscribing using the links on the bottom left of this page. text/html 2008-07-30T16:58:14+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2008073040/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/Competing-Against-Google-is-Hard.html Just ask the folks at Cuil.com (http://www.cuil.com), a new search engine which launched last week. Reviews of the new search engine have not been good (http://www.crn.com/software/209800399). Google has thousands of employees doing research and development; Cuil.com has 18. text/html 2008-07-17T15:58:39+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2008071739/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/Gastronomical-Googlearchy.html Here is a real-world example of how winners-take-all algorithms (such as Google's PageRank) are shaping offline behavior. The new iPhone has an application called Urbanspoon whereby, by shaking the phone, the hip and hungry urbanite is directed to a nearby restaurant.Problem is, the New York Times reports (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/16/dining/16note.html), the phone only picks restaurants that already have a wealth of positive reviews: If Urbanspoon users haven’t visited and taken a shine to a place, you’ll be shaking your way to carpal tunnel syndrome before it pops up. Googlearchy: it's not just for Web sites any more. text/html 2008-07-09T16:43:30+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2008070938/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/Debating-the-Power-of-Political-Email.html The Politico's Ben Smith (http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/) has a story on Hillary Clinton's e-mail list (http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0708/11532.html), and its ostensible power. For political scientists, data on the effectiveness of political e-mail has been mixed at best. Recent field experiments by campaign scholars have found that, compared to control groups, supporters who received candidate e-mail were not more likely to support the candidate, or to turn out on election day. But despite my initial skepticism, traffic data suggests that e-mail has indeed become a powerful force in the 2008 presidential election. Consider the chart below. text/html 2008-07-07T20:48:11+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2008070737/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/-I-Hate-the-Bloggers.html John McCain on our (supposedly) fragmenting media environment: wset9i4b0b4 Two comments: text/html 2008-07-07T18:01:06+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2008070736/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/-The-Only-Criterion-for-Membership-Is-a-Modem.html Several aspects of online political discourse never cease to surprise me. Foremost among these is the inability of extremely bright people to understand that they themselves are not ordinary citizens. Andrew Sullivan had a minor classic of the bloggers-are-just-ordinary-folks genre recently. Referring to David Brooks' New York Times op-ed piece (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/27/opinion/27brooks.html) about a group of young right-leaning writers, Sullivan commented (http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/06/the-next-conser.html) that Like the blogosphere itself, it's an open group. And the only criterion for membership is a modem. Um, no. Take a closer look at exactly who is on this list: text/html 2008-07-01T21:03:32+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2008070131/The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy/Announcing-The-Myth-of-Digital-Democracy.html I'm very pleased to announce that my book will be published this winter by Princeton University press. The title: The Myth of Digital Democracy. Over the coming months, I'll be using this space to discuss the book's themes and central findings. Here is the blurb from the Princeton catalog: text/html 2008-05-22T20:00:00+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2008052235/Research/The-Hyperlinked-Society-and-the-Online-Public-Sphere.html Another edited volume to which I've contributed has made it to press. The Hyperlinked Society: Questioning Connections in the Digital Age, edited by Joe Turow (http://www.asc.upenn.edu/usr/jturow/) and Lokman Tsui (http://www.lokman.org/) , has come out from DigitalCultureBooks, a new imprint of the University of Michigan Press. My contribution is entitled What is the Online Public Sphere Good For ? My very short answer: scandals and fact-checking, but NOT giving ordinary citizens greater voice in politics. I am particularly critical of what I term trickle up theories of online discourse. Scholars like Yochai Benkler (http://www.benkler.org/) , Daniel Drezner (http://www.danieldrezner.com/) , and Henry Farrell (http://www.henryfarrell.net/) are right about many things, but I argue that their vision of an accessible, bottom-up political discourse doesn't fit with the available evidence. You can see a preprint of the chapter here (images/docs/hindman_online_public_sphere_pre.pdf) . If you like what you read, the book can be purchased from Amazon here (http://www.amazon.com/Hyperlinked-Society-Questioning-Connections-Digital/dp/0472050435/) . text/html 2007-09-29T20:00:00+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2008070434/Research/Infomation-Government-and-Open-Source-Politics.html Governance and Information Technology: From Electronic Government to Information Government, the collected volume edited by David Lazer (http://www.hks.harvard.edu/about/faculty-staff-directory/david-lazer) and Viktor Mayer-Schö (http://www.hks.harvard.edu/about/faculty-staff-directory/viktor-mayer-schoenberger)enberger (http://www.hks.harvard.edu/about/faculty-staff-directory/viktor-mayer-schoenberger) , is now out from MIT Press. The volume includes my chapter 'Open Source Politics' Reconsidered: Emerging Patterns in Online Political Participation. My previous discussion of the chapter can be found here (index.php/2007050121/Research/Reconsidering-Open-Source-Politics.html) , and while you can find a preprint version of my chapter here (images/docs/hindman--reconsidering%20open%20source%20politics.pdf) .Better yet, click here (http://www.amazon.com/Governance-Information-Technology-Electronic-Government/dp/0262633493) to buy the book from Amazon. text/html 2007-04-16T00:00:00+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2007041619/Research/Amos-Andy-n-the-APSA-Political-Scientists-the-Public-and-the-Origin-of-Commercial-Broadcasting.html In recent years, many have called for political science to engage more strongly with the public. In his 2004 APSA presidential address, Robert Putnam declared that attending to the concerns of our fellow citizens is... an obligation as fundamental as our pursuit of scientific truth. Other scholars (and other APSA presidents) have echoed this theme. APSA committees on inequality, and on civic education and engagement, have recently striven to make their work more accessible and more relevant. There is a strange omission in these debates. In calling for political science to have a stronger public presence (in Putnam's words), scholars have ignored the historical period when the public presence of political science was at its zenith. text/html 2007-03-23T00:00:00+01:00 http://www.matthewhindman.com http://www.matthewhindman.com/index.php/2007032317/Research/We-Don-t-Need-No-Stinkin-Parties.html Legislative scholars have long argued about the role that political parties play in shaping how legislators vote. Some claim that parties just reflect members' preexisting preferences. Others suggest that the highly-structured voting patterns seen in the U.S. congress are due to the bonding effects parties provide.This conference paper (coauthored with Rodolfo Espino (http://www.asu.edu/clas/polisci/personnel/espino.html)) looks at the parties v. preferences debate using an unusual data source: roll call voting data from the Arizona Territorial Legislature. Party organizations were slow to arrive in Arizona; when they finally did emerge, they were weaker and more divided than in nearly any other area of the U.S. The five decades of territorial voting data help disentangle the influence of partisanship, and suggest that neither side in the parties v. preferences debate has it quite right. Click here (images/docs/espinohindmanwpsa2007.pdf) for a .pdf file of the paper. Full citation and abstract below the fold.