Politicians Clicking Catch Up In A Digital World
As Stand Up Be Counted prepares to quiz the party leaders on Facebook, Sky News looks at the challenges of politics on the web.
The first commercial dial-up internet connection was available in the UK in 1993 - and political parties have been playing catch up ever since. Why are they always a step behind when it comes to digital tools to reach voters?
In the 1997 General Election, the main technological tool was the telephone - landline, of course.
But by the end of the millennium, all the main political parties at least had websites, even if they were fairly ropey.
In 1998, an outsider American candidate showed how it could be done.
Jesse Ventura, a former Navy Seal, actor and professional wrestler, ran for the governorship of Minnesota. His campaign made heavy use of the internet and email to raise support.
Mr Ventura set up the 'Jesse Net', an extensive email list, and a website to win donations and grass-roots campaigners, which scored two million hits during the campaign - huge for the time - and $50,000 from internet users alone.
His campaign manager said: "The internet did not put Ventura over the top, but without it Ventura could not have won."
Politicians here looked on with admiration or, perhaps, confusion.
The stage was set for the 2001 General Election - much hyped as the first internet election - back when you spelt "internet" with a capital I - or "e-election".
As in the US, email was the crucial tool. Mark Pack managed the Liberal Democrats' online campaign and attributes winning the marginal Cheadle constituency to a concerted email effort.
But the most popular digital activities of the 2001 election didn't come from the parties. Voters took to the web with glee, reading spoof accounts and playing online games. You could punch whichever politician you desired, splat them with an egg or make them dance.
No wonder that a study afterwards from the Electoral Commission said that: "Given the choice, voters said that they did not want to access the political parties directly online."
Some things never change.
And as a post-mortem Hansard Society report put a few months later: "Parliamentary seats are not decided by clever technology, good graphics and fast downloads."
But in 2001, only a third of UK households were online. By 2005, more than a half were, and websites and email campaigns were now standard weapons in the political parties' weaponries.
The 2005 election coincided with the birth of the next stage of the internet: social networking. Facebook was founded in 2004, YouTube the next year, Twitter came along in 2006, and in 2007, the iPhone was born.
Another US challenger once again showed how to use the tools: Barack Obama's 2008 campaign became the blueprint for how to run a digital election.
E-democracy became i-democracy, and 2010 would be the UK's first social media election. And it was the Tories who went all out. They won 100,000 fans on Facebook, compared with Labour's 50,000.
Across the spectrum, 600 political candidates used Twitter during the campaign.
So where are we now? We're unlikely to see the newest social platforms - Instagram, Whatsapp and Snapchat, play much of a part.
As Carl Miller, director of the Centre for Analysis of Social Media at Demos, a thinktank, puts it: "Politicians are always a platform behind."
This time, the parties are focusing on where the largest audience is - and that means Facebook
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