John McCain Themed Mobile Content

Political prognosticators searching for a bellwether of the 2008 U.S. presidential election outcome needn't have looked much further than the mobile platform, where eventual winner Barack Obama beat opponent John McCain like a rented mule. In the weeks leading up to Election Day, mobile content tied directly to Democrat nominee Obama outsold Republican nominee McCain-themed content by a nine to one margin [1], according to mobile entertainment destination Thumbplay. Among the Obama content downloads available via Thumbplay, the best-selling realtone was "Tell Yo Mama, Vote Obama," the best-selling video was the "Candidates--Obama" clip and the best-selling wallpaper was "Obama, My Homeboy." The best-selling McCain realtone was the "McCain Love Ballad," the best-selling video was the "Palin Moose Call" clip and the best-selling wallpaper was "McCain Republican Elephant Blue."

Obama was the favorite of mobile subscribers throughout the election season. In early June, he won a SMS-based mobile survey conducted by Virgin Mobile USA [2], garnering the favor of 40 percent of the 20,000 subscribers queried--then-Democratic rival Hillary Rodham Clinton earned 18 percent of votes and McCain trailed with just 5 percent. Days later, "Barack Obama" was reported as the most searched term [3] on wireless according to mobile solutions and services provider Crisp Wireless' first Crisp Wireless Index, a quarterly barometer tracking consumer activity across select publisher sites. And just days prior to the election, a survey conducted by mobile advertising solutions provider JumpTap and polling firm Zogby International reported that U.S. voters who surf the mobile web overwhelmingly preferred Obama--among the 3,462 likely voters surveyed, 71 percent supported Obama, 25 percent favored McCain and the remaining 4 percent were either undecided or backed another candidate.

To be fair, it wasn't always smooth sailing for Obama. After securing the Democrat nomination, Obama promised supporters he would announce his running mate via text message [4] before releasing the name to the mass media--the historic moment nevertheless fell flat when the national networks started naming Sen. Joseph Biden as the pick hours before the campaign's text alert went national. Although some Obama supporters received the Biden text right away, many didn't receive it until 3:00 a.m. the following morning. Consumer research firm Nielsen Mobile later reported that 2.9 million U.S. mobile subscribers received the text message from the Obama campaign [5], a total derived by monitoring shortcode marketing. Impressive numbers, but the next time Obama has something to share with America--say, the threat of imminent global annihilation or something--let's hope he turns to television, not text. (And not mobile TV, either. No one watches that.)