To this point, Unity08 has adopted a media-centric strategy for meeting its stated goal of registering 10 million delegates by July 1, 2008 to participate in the world’s supposed first-ever online secure national presidential nomination. That’s just 407 days from now. Over time, Unity08′s recruitment has risen when its leadership appears on TV, and plummeted right back to low levels after its leadership steps off stage.
But beginning this week, Unity08 seems to actually be trying to adopt the grassroots strategy that is has to date used as just a pose. The Trailblazer strategy, announced in an e-mail to people signed up to Unity08, asks every current member to sign up ten more members, and to find two more people who agree to each sign up ten more. If that is actually done, then the number of delegates will expand by a factor of 30. It’s a rank-and-file-based approach that might work and might not work… but that’s no longer up to the Unity08 corporate leadership — it’s up to the everyone who chooses to lend a hand. From this point the success of Unity08 will be not only a mark of Unity08′s leadership connections to mass media outlets, but also a mark of the passion and dedication of its followers.
I’ve been following the recruitment rate of Unity08 since March 20 of this year, and I’ll keep following it as time goes on. As of today, the maximum Unity08 delegate count (assuming generously and incorrectly that a) all member numbers to the point of this maximum count are filled, and b) all new members are also delegates) is 38,831. What does that indicate for the recruitment rate? Here’s a chart showing the volatile experience of Unity08 recruitment over the past two months:
In words, since I’ve begun measuring Unity08 recruitment, this past week has been the most successful one yet. Is it an accident that this is also the week during which Unity08 has finally rolled out a grassroots recruitment program? And can this level of recruitment be sustained? Let’s wait another week and find out.
from tomorrow’s Zogby column:
As if the Diebold phenomenon wasn’t reason enough to be cautious about U08, here is another danger of online voting. The Estonian government says that at least a million computers worldwide were taken over by Russian hackers in order to launch three waves of cyber-attacks that paralyzed Estonian websites: