Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s campaign team has released an application specifically for iPhone users to help supporters of the candidate connect with others and get involved, stay up to date on breaking issues and more.
It also provides you with information about the campaign via text messages and e-mail, offers coverage of national and local campaign news, helps you find local events, share the information by e-mail, and get maps and directions. You can also use the application to browse videos and photos from the campaign.
Presidential election season is always contentious, but increasingly tech-savvy pundits, campaigners and others have turned to new ways to get the news out. Blogs have played a role for years, but now with the advent of the App Store, more developers have turned to the iPhone as a way of energizing the voter base.
The Obama campaign is wading into water not yet swum by the McCain campaign, it seems—there isn’t, as this story was posted, a McCain-centric app available for the iPhone yet. But there are plenty of politically-oriented applications for the iPhone and iPod touch available for download from the App Store.
Campaign, for example, provides a customized newsfeed from various sources specifically related to Democratic and Republican news coverage. Congress+ provides users with a detailed list of U.S. congressmen, including contact information, biographical, campaign and opponent information and more. Elections lets you browse and assess not only candidates for the U.S. Presidential race, but also for congress, state legislature and gubernatorial seats. ElectionMap lets you view current trends and predictions for the polls, while Days to Election Day lets you know how soon before you can cast your ballot. And Poll Tracker uses data from Pollster.com to track McCain and Obama’s polling numbers.