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New Media News Every Morning

Impremedia, MySpace present live streaming of presidential debates for Hispanic audiences

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ImpreMedia, the Hispanic news and information company in the US, and MySpace is teaming up to offer Spanish-language coverage of the Presidential and Vice Presidential Debates. ImpreMedia’s online portal, impre.com, will host live feeds of the Debates and provide simultaneous translation of the debates into Spanish, making the Debates accessible for the first time in Spanish to Spanish-preferred Hispanic voters.

The Spanish-language live coverage is also accessible on MyDebates.org, a new website that hosts interactive tools for viewers to virally engage in the political process, including a personalized issue scorecard, polling, reportable national statistics, and live web streaming.

ImpreMedia’s online portal, impre.com, will host live feeds of the Debates and provide simultaneous translation into Spanish, making the Debates accessible to Spanish-preferred Hispanic voters.

Registration of Hispanic voters has grown 50% over the past ten years, according to the 2008 Pew Hispanic Survey, with some 18.2 million Hispanic voters now comprising 9% of the overall US electorate.

MySpace, Commission on Presidential Debates launch interactive toolset for MyDebates.org

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MySpace and the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) announced the launch of its toolset for MyDebates.org, a new website that will house interactive tools for viewers to virally engage in the political process, including a personalized issue scorecard, polling, reportable national statistics, live web streaming and much more.

MyDebates.org is part of a landmark partnership between MySpace and the CPD for the upcoming presidential and vice presidential debate series. The partnership marks the first time that the CPD has paired with an Internet property to include online functionality into the event series and traditional debate format.
 
When visiting MyDebates.org, users will be prompted to take an “Issues Quiz” that will assess their stance on 14 issues, including the economy, national security, the environment, same-sex marriage, education and healthcare. Once they’ve taken the quiz, users can see how their values line up with the candidates and view a state-by-state breakdown of how other Americans feel on the issues. Users will also have the option of downloading a personalized application which can be embedded anywhere on the web, for example on a blog, social networking site like MySpace, or another website. The application will provide a summary of the user’s stance on the issues, on-demand playback functionality and issue-based tracking, allowing users to track a candidate’s stance on issues they care about throughout the debate series.
 
The general election debates, a series that includes three separate presidential debates and one debate featuring the candidates running for vice president, will kick off on September 26 with a broadcast on all the major national television networks. Each historic television event captures more than 60 million worldwide viewers and will now include an entirely new audience online able to watch each debate via live web stream.

About.com launches editorial special for 2008 Election

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About.com has launched Election ’08: Behind the Headlines, an editorial special devoted to informing readers about the upcoming 2008 election.

Election ’08: Behind the Headlines features detailed information on each of the presidential candidates, what people can do to participate in the upcoming election and expert opinions on the concerns many voters have raised about Senator Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential nominee, and Senator John McCain, the Republican presidential nominee, among other election topics.

Along with the opinions and perspectives from About.com’s expert political Guides, the site also features Voices on Change, a blog authored by several diverse Guides, including Lahle Wolfe, About.com’s Guide to Women in Business, and LaToya Irby, About.com’s Guide to Credit, who represent the voices of ordinary citizens and what they are seeking from the next president of the United States.

With the election campaign on its last stage, coupled with an economy that is going south uncontrollably, we need all the guide to make an intelligent decision come November.

Majority of people with disabilities say they don’t have political voice

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Majority of people (91 percent) of people with disabilities believe they receive less attention than other minority groups from the presidential candidates, according to a recent poll conducted by Disaboom, the online community for people with disabilities.

In a follow-up poll to gain an understanding of the key political issues of importance to people with disabilities, respondents identified healthcare, unemployment and community support as the key issues they’d like to see addressed by the candidates in the 2008 election.

Disaboom’s most recent poll asked respondents to identify, from a list of nine political issues, their choice of the top issue facing people with disabilities in this election.

(1) 44 percent of respondents identified healthcare as the top issue facing people with disabilities in this election.

(2) 18 percent identified unemployment rate as the top issue.

(3) 10 percent identified community support as the top issue.

Other issues of importance to people with disabilities identified by poll respondents include housing, accessible transportation, gas prices, the wars in Iraq and Afganistan, education and veterans’ issues.

This announcement follows Disaboom’s recent findings that 57 percent of people with disabilities support Barack Obama and 37 percent of people with disabilities support John McCain in the 2008 presidential election.

For more information about the political issues of interest to people with disabilities, visit Disaboom’s 2008 Election coverage.

C-Span RNC and DNC Sites Look Snazzy

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Long the butt of insomnia jokes, C-Span, the cable television non-profit, has launched a new Web site that is actually – well – not boring.

Featuring the typical red, white and blue political look, the Web site manages to integrate YouTube and Qik videos and offer a roundup of relevant Twitter tweets.

There are actually two sites.  One for the DNC and one for the RNC.

Access to major political blogs such as Politico, The National Review, Gawker, etc is available.  You can also search for political blogs based on state.

Live streams (in case you’re having trouble sleeping) are only a click away.

When companies like C-Span and AARP can roll out pretty nice looking Web sites, you start to realize that the Web has been embraced by just about everyone.  Evolve or die.  It’s nice to see there are still a few dinosaurs out there.