NEWS ANALYSIS: Web pages enhance campaigns

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by Christof Spieler

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Last year will be remembered as the year where Owlnet became an integral part of Rice life. This year's general elections, in turn, will go down in history as the first in which campus politics found its way onto the World Wide Web.

Some of the campaign pages were simple; others were elaborate and played a central role in campaigns. In the end, though, their impact may have been minimal.

"I don't think the campus is quite ready for this," Thresher co-editor in chief-elect Marty Beard said.

Consider, for example, the Rice Program Council race. Of the three candidates, two, Kari Hoffman and Travis Hopp, had pages. Both lost to Angie Chen and Erika Windham, who didn't. Christine Pan, the only other RPC candidate to have a campaign page, also lost.

Advantages

Hoffman and other candidates said that the main reason they used the Web was the amount of information it allowed them to convey.

Hoffman now doubts the impact her page had. All the same, she said that she doesn't regret emphasizing it in her fliers. "I was glad I did it -- I ran my campaign like I wanted; I didn't have to compromise my principles," she said.

Fliers and blurbs alike allow little space to express ideas or list qualifications. A homepage, by contrast, allows an almost arbitrary amount of information, and readers can choose what they want to read. Student Association President Maryana Iskander, for example, included sub-pages on a variety of different issues including athletics, environmental policy and technology.

"I wanted to bring actual ideas I had to show my qualifications," Hoffman said. "I wanted to go past cheesy slogans to show some substance."

Hoffman also said that she prefered Web campaigning because it wasted less paper.

Candidates' Web pages varied greatly. Thresher editor in chief candidate Packy Saunders used an elaborate and detailed photo illustration on his opening page along with a series of pages explaining his plans for the newspaper; his opponents, Marty Beard and Vivek Rao, simply scanned in a campaign flier.

Pages also varied in how seriously candidates treated them. Travis Hopp, for example, featured a photo of a kangaroo. Jeff Halladay, one of the first candidates to put up a page, said that his page got less serious as time went on. He ended up featuring a series of pork conspiracies and a movie.

"I did it for fun. I was hoping that people would take a look and get a laugh out of it," he said.

Does it work?

The candidates generally agreed that pages had little effect on this election.

"My page was effective for the people who saw it. I got 400 visits but that's only a quarter of the voters," Hoffman said. Iskander cited a similar number of visits.

"The page was ineffective as far as campaigning goes. My counter didn't change significantly from day to day -- people weren't accessing. A lot of people don't use the Web at all," Halladay said.

"I think most of the people who were informed enough to look at Web pages already had made their decision -- they only reinforced people's opinions and had only a marginal impact," Saunders said.

He added, though, that they will probaly have a greater impact next year, especially if elections are conducted electronically, as the SA has been considering. "By next year, all the people will be using it," he said.

Saunders also noted that Web pages bring new issues for the SA to deal with, probably in the next year: What constitutes campaigning, for example, has yet to be dealt with. For example, would a page placed on Owlnet but not linked to any other page be considered campaigning? And is it legitimate to place campaigning pages on work-related accounts like ruf and chico?

"It's a sort of trial year for campaign Web pages. I think they'll become more of a part of campaigns. I really hope they will," Hoffman said.

Jeff Halladay disagreed. "I don't think this will ever be a big deal as far as campaigning goes. A lot of people don't use the Web at all. Some people said to me, `it's a big evil wasting suck of time.'"

Some voters, though, say that the Web pages are already making a difference. Vikki Otero, for example, said that she voted against one person she knew simply because they didn't have a Web page. "I think the Web is an important part of communication and anyone who's going to hold an office should be familiar with its uses."

For now, the Web remains a peripheral, not central, part of Rice campaigns. "The best way to do it is still probably mass fliers -- you get people to see your name every moment of the day, so when they see it on the ballot, they'll notice."

The Web, though, allows candidates more flexibility and could bring more substance and less flash to the election, a change most students would probably find welcome. Only time will tell what its role will be next year as technology and Rice life continue to evolve.

This item appeared in the News section of the March 1, 1996 issue.

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