.mobi: Changing the Course of Politics

The title of this post is (playfully) overblown but it is interesting to see the recent Australian election results in which incumbent John Howard lost to Kevin Rudd. Among the many differences between the two candidates, the one that interests me is that one had a .mobi site and one didn't. Which one? The winner: Kevin Rudd with kevin07.mobi.

Over the past thirty-five years, it's been interesting to note that shifts in content delivery have often been heralded by two "verticals": politics and pornography. Aside from any obvious jokes, the one thing both have in common is the sprit of trying all means available to get their messages out there.

Some of the first .mobi sites I saw last year after the .mobi domain was generally available were ones for the 2006 U.S. gubernatorial elections; I think these came too late in the election cycle to be noticed, much less move any needles. So it was exciting to see a .mobi site used as a part of an overall communications strategy for a winning candidate in 2007 ... and I suspect you'll be seeing candidates using .mobi in that same way as the 2008 US presidential election heats up.