The Dean Dream

Though former Democratic contender Howard Dean may not go down in history as the 44th U.S. president, his campaign may go down in history because it changed the way political hopefuls rally support. The campaign's unique use of Internet technology, such as meetup.com, could be a useful lesson to others wishing to gain office -- especially lesser-known candidates for state and local offices.

Much was made of Dean's ability to raise funds via the Internet, and initially Dean's e-campaign received high marks for generating a groundswell of Dean backers. There was plenty of talk that his campaign would revolutionize campaigning specifically, and politics generally.

There's no doubt Dean succeeded at creating a strong Web presence overall, but that didn't translate to instant political success -- as some perhaps overly enthusiastic observers speculated in the beginning of the race.


The Right Steps
"They were just masters at getting information to supporters and getting local e-mail lists going," said Richard Davis, a political science professor at Brigham Young University (BYU).

Though Dean's bid flamed out rather quickly during the Iowa and New Hampshire democratic primaries, his legacy continues to impact this year's election campaigns. But the impact Dean's campaign had may not be what many expect, according to Tom Spooner, a research specialist at the Pew Internet & American Life Project.

"People are going to look at this Howard Dean [phenomenon] and say this is a new paradigm about politics online, and that people have become more engaged online with politics, money and all that other stuff," he said. "But the number of people who have been going to political Web sites has been the same since fall of 2000."

According to the project's research, the same percentage of Internet users visiting Al Gore's Web site and George W. Bush's Web site in 2000 is visiting presidential contenders' Web sites now.

"You can talk about the Howard Dean phenomenon in terms of the money, for instance, how much he was able to raise online," Spooner said. "But if I recall correctly, even Al Gore was doing that four years ago."

The difference this electoral season, argues Spooner, was the role of an online technology that translated into real-world support: meetup.com.

"This sort of online Dean community was created, and then it became an actual community when you went to these meetups," Spooner said. "It wasn't just based on going to certain Web pages; people took that opportunity to physically meet each other to become an actual community, and whatever forces come out of that."


Meetup to the Challenge
Through proprietary technology and a global network of local venues, meetup.com helps people self-organize local group gatherings in as many as 612 cities in 51 countries.

Meetup.com helps create meeting agendas, send reminder and feedback e-mails, and offers a partnership account manager to expand the number and size of meetups. A campaign's IT person can control the campaign's meetup site through customized administrator tools.

Initially, as grassroots movements go, it wasn't Dean's campaign that hitched on meetup.com, said Myles Weissleder, meetup.com's vice president of communications.

"The supporters tapped into it first," Weissleder said. "They wanted to meet up to talk about this guy Howard Dean, and then the campaign realized what was going on, and soon after, partnered with us to help fuel these meetups even better."

Former campaign manager Joe Trippi read on a Weblog that many Dean supporters around the country were getting together using meetup.com. Trippi visited the Web site, and within a couple of weeks, decided the campaign would encourage supporters to use meetup.com, ultimately affixing the icon and link in a prominent spot on the Dean for America home