1) explain the importance of high-quality information for political micro targeting
2) is it ever possible to have all of the information required to make a 100% accurate statement
3) do you believe microtargeting signals the dehumanization of politics?
a word rarely expressed. s been crucial to es spoken int s augunation speech because capturing and analyzing data hasd Obama's rise to obama st surprising Did for Obama Piesident Barack is not surprising that the word Chpter Sin Case: Political Microtargeting: What Data CAl secioehworking and tund rasing, but also to identiy potential swing voters. Obama's montoed contesedt sates and congressional dastricts, because 1,000 to 2,000 voters curetay voters could prowe political parties detaire Obama's historic campaign he used the Internet not hied technology wicards to help sith through the mountains of consumer and de recognice these important voters the focus was on only a tiny fraction of the voting public. Both detailk famly sires, and spending patems to categorize every American of woting age-175 million of us-into 10 vualues tribes"Individualtribe members do not necessarily share the same race, or income bracket, but they have common Ten "Tribes ssues: God, community, respon- morally guided (but not necessarily religious) tribe of some 4 milion voters that it dubbed Barm Raisers Barn Raisers comprise many races, religions and ethnic groups and around 40 percent of Barn Raisers favor Democrats and 27 percent favor particular Republicans. Bam Raisers are slightly less ikely to have a college education than Spotlight's other swing groups. They are active in community organizations, are ambivalent about government, and care deeply about playing by the rules' and "keeping promises, to use Spotlight's definitions. Spot- ght believed that the Barn Raisers held the key to the race between Obama and his Republican chal- enger Arizona Senator John McCain. typically seen outside of such corporate American icons as Google, Amazon, and eBay. political microtargeting which depends on data, databases, and data analysis techniques, is turning political parties into sophisticated,inteligent, methodical machines. In nanoseconds, computers sort 175 million voters into segments and quickly cakculate the potential that each individual voter has to swing from red or purple to blue or vice versa For some, poltical microtargeting signa's the dehumanization of politics For others, this type of sophistikated analysis is a highly efficient way of pinpointing potential voters, For example, analyzing voter in Richmond,Virginis,tadtionaly simply isent les the number of school-age children, type of car, zip code, magazine subscriptions, and mortgage balance. But data if the voter has dogs or cats. (Cat owners lean slightly for Democrats, dog owners trend After the analysis, the voter is placed into a political tribe, and analyzers can dr the issues that matter to this particular voter. ls that so horrible? crunching could even indicate Behavioral Grouping about For generations, governments lacked the means to study individual behaviors citizens into enormous groupings such as Hispanics, etc. With the use of sophisticated databases and data analysis techniques, ght can group individuals based more on specific behavior and choices and less and simply placed all Jews, union members, hunters, soccer moms. ors colors, and clans that mark us from birth. old-fashioned way. At first, the Barn Raisers did not seem significant and the tribe Barn Raisers stood at the epicenter of America's political swing. In 2004, 90 per When Spotlight first embarked on its research, the company interviewed th such as Spot- thousands of voters the 9 percent of the electorate. However, when Spotlight's analysts dug deeper, they disented about for President Bush, but then the group's political leanings shifted, with 64 percent percent of of them
