Will It Spread? She Voted for the War

We did this last week — why not do it again? But, for a change, let’s tackle the subject of politics…

Will It Spread? She Voted for the War

What’s It About: Using fair-use and public domain archive materials, this viral campaign seeks to remind Pennsylvanians about one important vote of Hillary Clinton’s political career.

Premiered: Sunday, April 13, 2008.

Viral Qualities: Strong catch-phrase. Politically themed. By design, short and punchy. And targeted towards a specific event (the Pennsylvania primary).

Star Power: Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton (archival footage).

Drawbacks: The use of found footage and mashups is interesting as a series concept, but a bit one-note. Also very execution-dependent. The Lichtenstein homage is nicely done, but the most recent video’s use of The Lady’s a Tramp and kissy-face graphics lacks sophistication.

Mashup Potential: Strong. By encouraging people to create their own shorts and submit them to the project’s official YouTube channel, this could morph into a full-on meme…if it catches on.

Current Viral Status: As of April 14th, user sheVOTEDforWAR is the #12 Most Viewed Director on YouTube, and in the last 18 hours the first two videos in the series have racked up almost 80,000 hits.

Spread-factor (scale of 1-10, 10 being Lazy Sunday): 4. Some interesting potential, but will need to pick up momentum quickly. The UGC element of the concept has yet to take off — at 1:30 PM PST, any videos beyond the first three had yet to premiere. Plus, YouTube stats show no sign of major linkage — and without the support of political blogs, there’s little chance for success.