May 7, 2007

How Come Obama MySpace Page Creator Doesn’t Have a Lawyer?

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As Josh writes here, there has been quite the flurry over the changing of hands (from young paralegal and diehard supporter to Obama’s official campaign staff) of the unofficial, yet official-looking, 160,000 friend-boasting Barack Obama MySpace page. When the scandal blew up, there was talk that the 160,000 MySpace friends Joe Anthony, said diehard supporter, rallied together were theoretically worth a bundle of cash, and therefore all moral questions aside, the Obama campaign should pay up. Micah Sifry, founder of techPresident, (a site that monitors campaigns’ web strategies) noted on the site:

Care2, the massive progressive email list vendor, charges about $1 per email address that they generate for a campaign.

But like Sifry points out, Anthony could not have generated this large number of members if it weren’t for Obama’s success and charisma, so it’s not like he could expect to make $160,000 plus, but I’m betting, if he’d played his cards right, he could’ve raked in some dough. I mean, these campaigns pay media consultants big money to gather supporters the way Anthony did. Apparently, though, contrary to what Obama’s campaign staff were claiming — that he was just looking for a “big payday” — Anthony doesn’t seem to be after money at all. Sifry writes on Friday:

Anthony is pondering donating the url over to a non-profit group, or trying to continue working with the community gathered around the site to make it into a kind of clearinghouse or forum on the presidential candidates in general.

He is also still planning to vote for Obama!? Alright, so, I know I should feel warm and fuzzy about this, but instead, I’m scratching my head. This guy could have made some money — at the very least, he could have more adamantly demanded some compensation for his 2.5 year-long (Anthony maintained the page for 2.5 years) labor of love. Why didn’t he? Are we really seeing loyalty to the Democratic movement trump selfish desires, did he just give up or did he not have the right counsel? He’s a paralegal, right? Where were all his lawyer friends?

WE CAME UP SHORT.

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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