Got campaign?

Santa Clara-based online media giant Yahoo! Inc. announced this week a chance for presidential candidates to personally address Yahoo!'s global audience with their positions on the issues and goals for the office of President of the United States of America.

Don't fret; every freak with an Internet connection won't soon be spouting political rhetoric at you. Yahoo! says only individuals who have officially registered their candidacies will be allowed to participate (so it'll be just as many freaks as you're normally used to).

Co-founder and Chief Yahoo Jerry Yang invited "qualified" presidential candidates to participate in Yahoo! News' "Hear from the Candidates" forum late yesterday, which Yang says will give them a chance to reach out to Yahoo!'s 156 million estimated monthly visitors.

"With the `Hear from the Candidates' forum, Yahoo! News is providing an opportunity for candidates and the American public to connect in a way that has never been possible in a presidential election," says Ed Henry, co-editor of Roll Call, a twice-weekly publication covering Capitol Hill. "Yahoo! News is helping to bring America's political dialogue online."

Under the program, candidates will be able to submit two-to-five minute video segments to Yahoo! on a weekly basis, starting September 1. From that point until November 3, the number of weekly submissions and/or topics addressed will be left entirely to each candidates' discretion.

(OH GOD!)

Both the video segments and text transcripts will be hosted on Yahoo! News' political section, Yahoo! Politics.

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"In this election year, Yahoo! wants to make it easy for individuals to have access to information about candidates. We hope this forum encourages voter participation and results in more informed decisions at the polls in November," says Brad Rubin, a producer at Yahoo! News. "Through Yahoo!'s rich media capabilities, and as part of our comprehensive coverage of Election 2000, this forum enables people to stay connected to the candidates and ultimately the election process."

ePolitics is nothing new to the Internet, at least not to the extremes, but the last few years have also shown explosive growth in more mainstream attempts to use the medium as a political force.

San Bruno-based Grassroots.com, Speakout.com, and Dick Morris' Vote.com all believe in the power of politics online, offering a plethora of polls, surveys, in-depth commentary, and general discussion of politics in America and beyond.

But do they really do any good?

"It's a great platform to distribute information, but they have to get the consumer used to going online to get that type of information," says Emily Meehan, an analyst with the Yankee Group, when asked about politics online. "And it can't just be the same people who are already involved in some way offline, i.e. the white, middle class male."

Nonetheless, the chance to tap into 156 million desktops for free in an age where the average presidential campaign costs more than a small city isn't likely to be passed up, even by the most skeptical of candidates.

Jayson Matthews will be running for office under the Paparazzi ticket. Vote for him or he will come to your house and take pictures of you in the bathtub.