UNITED STATES: The Internet and the 2008 Election

A record-breaking 46% of Americans have already used internet for politics this election season and Obama backers have an edge.

Fully 46% of all Americans have used the internet, email or cell phone text messaging to get news about the campaign, share their views and mobilize others.

Further, the proportion of Americans going online on a typical day at the tail end of the primary season to get political news or information has more than doubled since a comparable point in the 2004 race—from 8% of all adults in spring 2004 to 17% of all adults in spring 2008.

These are among the highlights of a new national survey of 2,251 American adults by the Pew Internet & American Life Project between April 8 and May 11. The poll found, among other things, that younger voters are among the most active and intense internet users. These online voters are more likely to support Democrat Barack Obama and that means his partisans were significantly ahead of Hillary Clinton''''''''s supporters online in the endgame of the Democratic race. In addition, Obama backers have a higher profile in some online areas than supporters of Republican John McCain.

The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.

The 46% figure was calculated by adding up the number of people who said had done at least one of the following activities:

• 40% of all Americans (internet users and non-users alike) have gotten news and information about this year"s campaign via the internet.
• 19% of Americans go online once a week or more to do something related to the campaign, and 6% go online to engage politically on a daily basis.
• 23% of Americans say they receive emails urging them to support a candidate or discuss the campaign once a week or more.
• 10% of Americans use email to contribute to the political debate with a similar frequency.
• 4% of Americans have exchanged political views via text messaging.

The figures above add up to more than 46% because many citizens said they were doing several of the activities.

Three online activities have become especially prominent as the presidential primary campaigns have progressed: First, 35% of Americans say they have watched online political videos - a figure that nearly triples the reading the Pew Internet Project got in the 2004 race.

Second, 10% say they have used social networking sites such as Facebook or MySpace to gather information or become involved. This is particularly popular with younger voters: Two-thirds of internet users under the age of 30 have a social networking profile, and half of these use social networking sites to get or share information about politics or the campaigns.

Third, 6% of Americans have made political contributions online, compared with 2% who did that during the entire 2004 campaign.

A significant number of voters are also using the internet to gain access to campaign events and primary documents. Some 39% of online Americans have used the internet to access "unfiltered" campaign materials, which includes video of candidate debates, speeches and announcements, as well as position papers and speech tra