I have a short article in the Media supplement of today’s Guardian.
The full article, before it was edited down, can be read below the fold:

Politics down the YouTube

The Evening Standard may have helped Boris Johnson enormously in his election campaign, but its impact in influencing the Mayoral race four years from now may be dwarfed by a bigger competitor: YouTube.

The mayoral election was in many ways a turning point for the convergence of new media and politics. For the first time bloggers like myself were inundated with videos uploaded to the internet, attacking the Tory candidate.

These weren’t just clips of London’s new mayor being asked by Jeremy Paxman 13 times on the cost of his new buses, or Arnold Schwarzenegger whispering to his aide that he was “fumbling all over the place” during a speech, or embarrassing segments from Have I Got News For You.

In fact many were newly made attack ads that brought together a whole litany of incidents Boris would rather forget, while others poked fun of the floppy haired one in the form of songs. My favourite one was a remix of Kate Nash’s Why You Being a Dickhead For, but for sheer hilarity nothing beat the posh bloke singing I think I Fancy Boris in front of Westminster.

But there is a serious side to all this fun. While broadcasting rules prohibit political parties from the number of broadcasts they can air to make their case to the public – on the internet anything goes.

In the last week of campaigning the Libdem candidate Brian Paddick released two videos through YouTube, satirising both Ken Livingstone and Boris Johnson. They weren’t funny enough to catch fire among the Bebo/Facebook crowd, but these are the birth pangs of a political shift using new media.

In the United States online video has already played a huge role in the Presidential election. From Obama Girl, a spoof female superhero who has regular updates on her battle to win him the nomination to the now infamous slicing and dicing of speeches by Obama’s pastor Rev Jeremiah Wright, they have frequently ended up making news.

In some cases candidates have even released campaign videos directly online instead of paying for television ads, and watched them make the headlines or be distributed across thousands of blogs. CNN and YouTube even hosted a debate for the candidates with questions being sent in by video.

But while there is little restriction on political advertising in the States – the candidates have already spent over $232 million on their presidential bid – British political parties are limited by the number of candidates they put forward.

Slowly but surely they are experimenting with new media to reach potential voters, as Barack Obama has done there with extensive social networking tools on his website. Starting Facebook groups, taking part in web-chats, messaging on Twitter and using the websites to sign up volunteers are only a small part of what is about to come.

Political videos – whether made by passionate supporters, passionate haters or directly by the campaigns themselves – is where the real difference can be made.

The most dramatic example was of Boris Johnson being ambushed by a Labour supporter on the cost of his buses, and having the exchange caught on mobile video. Labour’s press office immediately uploaded it to YouTube and sent links to all the journalist. They were rewarded by coverage on BBC London News.

The Mayoral race, because of its closeness and larger-than-life personalities, subtly shifted the rules of the game. That trickle could soon turn into a flood as bloggers, and musicians, use the web to hold politicians to scrutiny and make their life as difficult as possible. The revolution may yet end up being televised.

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