Support the fact-based journalism you rely on with a donation to Marketplace today. Give Now!
Codebreaker

Obama’s data management could keep him in the White House

Marc Sanchez Oct 11, 2011

CNN ran a story by Micah Sifry, co-founder of the Personal Democracy Forum, about the Obama campaign’s data crunching strategy. Sifry says Obama’s team is way ahead of Republicans on this because Republicans are still looking at the Internet as a broadcast tool, whereas the Obama team sees the web as much more: “Inside the Obama operation, his staff members are using a powerful social networking tool called NationalField, which enables everyone to share what they are working on. Modeled on Facebook, the tool connects all levels of staff to the information they are gathering as they work on tasks like signing up volunteers, knocking on doors, identifying likely voters and dealing with problems. Managers can set goals for field organizers — number of calls made, number of doors knocked — and see, in real time, how people are doing against all kinds of metrics.”

There’s a lot happening in the world.  Through it all, Marketplace is here for you. 

You rely on Marketplace to break down the world’s events and tell you how it affects you in a fact-based, approachable way. We rely on your financial support to keep making that possible. 

Your donation today powers the independent journalism that you rely on. For just $5/month, you can help sustain Marketplace so we can keep reporting on the things that matter to you.