Nicomedia

The imminent US election has the world media transfixed. It’s hard to imagine the marathon campaign will be over in a day or so.

In 2000 George W. Bush won office in a controversial election result – one that some, like doco Outfoxed,  have suggested may have been helped along by the major news services in the US. I can’t see that happening this time around, particularly with the change in media habits in the last eight years.

Microblog site Twitter is providing some great election forums: Election 2008 and Twitter Vote Report. Both these sites publish unmediated (or less mediated) information about the election, offering a fascinating on-the-ground insight into how people are thinking and voting.

Current TV will broadcast tweets marked #votereport in their election coverage, which again will possibly subvert any malevolent corporate over-riding agendas that may influence the election’s outcome. If any such thing exists.

The internet is ripe for hoaxing. A great example of a reputable news source being caught out recently is the Kyle Doyle fiasco. I first heard of it on the front page of The Age website – the big cheesey photo that lives on left screen was of Kyle Doyle’s face. Apparently he’d been busted by his boss chucking a sickie via his Facebook status. The next day however it was claimed – by Doyle’s employer AAPT plus Doyle and his boss – to be fake.

Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to have deterred The Age from filling its site with crap tabloid content.