Thanks to our friend Mathew Ingram for pointing this out. Posted on GigaPan – it is a panaromic shot made up of more than 200 separate images.
You can zoom right in and see individuals in the crowd (use the controls in the upper left of the screen –access via the link above). The artist explains how he did it on his blog.
With the world caught up in Obama mania today, I thought it only appropriate to do an inauguration-related post. You might say, I too had a “Barack attack.” ; )
The proclamations of “history in the making” and invocations of former Presidents got me thinking about a neat way to visually compare Obama’s inauguration address to those past. Some people may remember my visual analysis of the eight years of Bush; this is a bit different. Using IBM’s ManyEyes social media visualization tool, I’ve compiled a Wordle (stylized tag cloud) comparison of Obama’s address to those of Presidents to whom he is often compared. Note particular similarities to JFK and FDR (more visualizations after the jump).
As Mike pointed out yesterday, the world was watching last night’s election with eager anticipation. So what was the reaction today? My son Alex, who has been tracking the election results last night and this morning, linked me up with a great resource called Newseum. The concept is simple: a museum for news and journalism. What struck me was the archive of newspaper front pages from both American and international sources. Forget about going to the library and digging through microfiche! Here are some of today’s global front pages for the historic Obama win (by the way, I love being right):
OK, first off, I need to stop betting on Presidential elections. Not only am I 0 and 2, I’m 0 and 2 against self-made wealthy men named Don. And, on Saturday I am going to make good on my Dukakis bet; hopefully, I’m not charged interest and penalties that may have been accruing for 20 years.
Our friend Neil Howe has written extensively about generations. He was the first person that I know to recognize the Silent Generation (birth years 1925-1942) is the only generation in American history never to have one of its members elected President. John McCain was almost certainly the last chance. Joe Biden is actually born in the last year of the cohort, but he would likely be 73 before he would have a chance to run. In fact, this generation across the board has been under-represented with respect to public service.
On the other hand, President Obama is the first President from Generation X. Sorry Dad, that’s one for me, none for you.
Grammar corrected.
Can anyone see any blue in this map? See here for a mashup showing how the world stacks up for Obama and McCain. McCain has a slight edge in Albania (which, from what I understand, borders on the Adriatic. If you recognize that cultural reference, press “one” now). He also has a dominant lead (cough, sample size of one) in Niue.
October 23rd, 2008
This is cool and a little bit scary. Thanks to our friend Anastasia Goodstein for the heads up.
Denis’ Response: in fairness, I was going to base my decision on the outcome of this videotaped battle between the two candidates, but I think we can all agree it was a tie.
Praised for their use of social networking throughout the presidential campaign the Obama team has added yet another social media weapon to its arsenal. The following blog post caught my attention while I was sifting through information related to the use of technology in the American election.
“The Obama campaign has released an application for the iPhone that cleverly sorts your address book, prioritizing which friends you should call to convince them to vote Obama. (”Call Friends” sorts your friends by how close the race is in that state. So you can call your Ohio friends or Missouri friends and not bother with your California or NY friends.) It’s a smart marrying of the fact that friends are much more likely to convince friends politically, coupled with the technology that helps you to easily see where your social networks may make the most political difference given battleground states and the electoral map. The ‘Get Involved’ Button uses GPS to help you find the closest Obama campaign headquarters.
Another interesting part of the application is that it shows how many calls you have made using this application and how many have been made nation-wide, enabling one to feel a growing sense of momentum and part of a larger national cause. (The software doesn’t transmit who you called, but records the number of calls made with the application so they can centrally keep track.)”
Apart from being a brilliant campaign tactic I can see this application being used outside of the political arena. I agree with the blog posting in that your friends are some of the most influential people in your social network. It is a relationship founded on the basis of trust and as such their opinions, recommendations or warnings carry a lot of weight. Would you eat at a restaurant where a friend said the food was terrible? Probably not, but you might be willing to try a product or rent a movie that came with a positive recommendation from the same individual. Marketers are constantly searching for new ways to convince people to test their products or switch from a competing brand and I think teamed with the right business this iPhone application could make a powerful impact. For instance, if this application could sync with my iTunes it would know who my favorite bands or musicians are based on the music I’ve purchased. Using this information it could notify me when a certain band or artist is performing in my area. That way if Coldplay was coming to town the application would inform me of the concert date and where I could purchase tickets. It could also prioritize my friends using the band’s concert schedule so I could call my friend Lauren in Boston and my cousin Murray in Seattle to let them know Coldplay would be performing in their town and encourage them to purchase tickets. It isn’t difficult to see why bands would want to support this application and have fans contacting fans from coast to coast sharing information and encouraging faster ticket sales. Prioritizing your contact list using geographic locations could also be an application that travel websites could use to entice users with discounted airfare. If this application was sponsored by Expedia or Travelocity it could tell me when there is a cheap flight to visit Kyle who goes to school in Madrid or Iris who lives in Paris. This Smartphone application has created the ultimate ripple effect in the sense that you aren’t just telling me about a concert, you are also using my relationships to notify my circle of friends. I’ve merely scratched the surface of how this application could provide some great word-of-mouth advertising or promote information-sharing across the globe but I’d love to hear some suggestions or ideas on where you think the iPhone could take this application.
I blogged last Fall about an initiative here in Canada called Student Vote that runs in parallel to the general election. The program educates over 400,000 young people about political issues and allows them to cast mock ballots that are tallied according to riding, as would real ballots.
As the voting public digests the results of yesterday’s Federal election, I thought I’d bring it up once again. Viewing the disparate results between young students and those eligible to vote, I have to believe that as this next generation matures, they will elect a fairly different (and greener) Parliament than we did this time around.
We’ve written before about how Obama has deployed technology and engaged the Net Generation to enhance his bid for the Oval Office. See here, here, here, here, and here.
Here is another interesting story in today’s Wall St. Journal.
After two campaign signs disappeared from his lawn, Preston Fosback decided to monitor it via an Internet camera. From the article:
Dozens of viewers now take shifts, based on their time zones, so as not to leave the sign unwatched at any time. Viewers in Europe take over for those turning in on the West Coast, who are in turn relieved by a dedicated crew of Australians. It’s attracted more than 40,000 viewers and ranks among the top 10 most-watched videos on Ustream.tv, the Web site that hosts the video, among videos of the two presidential candidates and comedian Dane Cook.
The video (and ongoing commentary) can be found here.
VP Candidate Sarah Palin (here is the SNL skit if for some reason you haven’t seen it) has allegedly had her yahoo account (really) hacked. Not confirmed, but the rumour is that the hacker contacted Yahoo claiming to be the Alaska governor and said he lost the password. Oddly enough, he was able to answer the security question about where she met the “First Dude”…Wasilla high school.
Anyway, judge for yourself…here is a screenshot from Wikileaks, who I blogged about several months ago.
Oh, and remember the Swift Boaters? Here is a video from the Hockey Moms for truth.
