e.politics: online advocacy tools & tactics

Digital Editing and Campaign Trickery

July 25th, 2006

A Micropersuasion post about digital editing made me wonder — will political campaigns try to use anonymous online videos as a dirty trick? I.e., using easily-available editing software to put their opponent in a compromising or unflattering position, posting the video on YouTube or some other video hosting site, and then spreading the word behind-the-scenes.

Campaigns have already been accused of digitally manipulating photos, for instance to make a crowd at a friendly event seem larger than it actually was, and over the years political operatives have tried just about every dirty trick imaginable, from push-polling to outright voter intimidation. So why not a video-driven whisper campaign? It’s unethical, of course, but the bigger dissuader may be the consequences of getting caught and exposed in the press.

– cpd