Flickring here, twittering there

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: campaign at once signs up to yours.

This, says Rasiej, proves that Obama ‘understands the DNA of the internet’. McCain frankly admits he doesn’t. But this may not matter, says Patrick Ruffini, who worked on George Bush’s 2004 run and is co-founder of The Next Right, an online hub for centre-right activism. What matters a lot are the tactics he employs. The Republicans are beginning to raise their game to compete with Obama’s skill.

Peter Daou, Hillary Clinton’s internet director, says that YouTube, even more than Facebook or MySpace, has had a huge impact on the campaign. Will.i.am’s ode to Obama, ‘Yes we can’, has had nearly 9 million views since it was uploaded six months ago; some 1.9 million have watched the McCain Girls’ ‘Raining McCain’ over the past four months. Thousands of clips created by ordinary people have been uploaded, to be shared in blogs and often covered by traditional media too.

Both nominees have their own YouTube channels. Obama’s videos have had 52 million views, McCain’s 9.5 million. Obama’s entire 37-minute speech on race in America has been viewed 4.7 million times on YouTube. But the inflamatory sermons of his former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, have also been seen by millions.

YouTube is moderating a joint Democrat and Republican contest. Each party is asking YouTube users to submit two-minute clips explaining why they will support either McCain or Obama. The winner of each will receive a trip to their party’s convention. The conventions themselves are more ‘techie’ than ever before. Twitter feeds, Facebook pages, MySpace profiles and Flickr, an online photo album, will be on offer as well as YouTube.

Texting from mobile phones is also playing a role. Some 255 million people have mobile phones in America, and about two-thirds of these, in almost every age group, use texts. On August 12, Obama sent out an email inviting supporters to sign up to receive an email or a text to be the first (or in the first few million) to know who he picks as his running mate.