This week the Obama campaign launched a new front in the heightened information wars that come with presidential campaigns, with a starkly designed and somewhat controversial new website called Attack Watch. The site enables user-generated submissions of what Obama supporters deem to be unfair or untruthful media attacks on President Obama, his political campaign and his administration’s policy. Almost immediately after launching, right-of-center Internet outlets derided the effort, and a Washington Post article called it a “laughing stock.”

What does History look like? In the weeks leading up to the historic 2008 election, filmmaker Jeff Deutchman wondered just that, and decided to capture it. Armed with his own cameras, he set out to chronicle that day as he experienced it — and sent out an open invitation for others from around the world [...]

In October 2008, I sent e-mails and Facebook messages to everyone I knew and asked my friends, family, acquaintances and perfect strangers all over the world to film their experiences of 11/4/08. In the months following 11/4/08, I received footage from over a dozen cities around the world – from Homer, Alaska to Austin, Texas to Chicago, Illinois to Berlin to Dubai. As I edited together a feature documentary from this footage, I watched these images over and over again, living in a Groundhog Day of my own creation as the world was moving on and becoming cynical.

At a Scott Brown rally in Worcester yesterday, a supporter of Brown’s yelled a suggestion that they “shove a curling iron up (Martha Coakley’s) butt.” The clip is gaining traction, though, because of Brown’s reaction to the outburst. Initial reports had Brown smiling at the comment, but the video shows he may have responded by saying “We can do this.” Or not.

Given that media critics often describe FDR as the first “radio president” and JFK as the first “TV president,” logic dictates that 2009 brought forth the first entry in a new era: the Wifi President. With his Blackberry forever in tow, a sophisticated election campaign grounded in new social networking media, and the most YouTube [...]