The founder of a job-listing site is urging netizens to fight the impeachment of Bill Clinton by filling the Web with his pro-president banner ad.
Internet Job Source founder Joseph Shieh posted a banner atop his site at the same time the US House of Representatives debated on whether to impeach the president. Shieh's ad read, "We Support President Clinton."
"The purpose of this banner is to get Internet sites to unite and show support for the President," said Shieh, who is a registered Republican from the state of New York. "I -- and I'm sure many other Americans -- feel powerless with the current situation in Washington."
With polls showing most Americans continuing to oppose impeachment, Shieh sees the Internet as a natural platform for the public's voice. He urges like-minded Web-site hosts to copy the banner from his site and publish it on their own home pages.
The best-known and most successful issue-oriented Web campaign -- and one dealing with the Internet itself -- was the Blue Ribbon campaign led by the Electronic Frontier Foundation in 1994 to protest the Communications Decency Act.
Alex Fowler, director of public affairs for the EFF, said success of issue-oriented campaigns today must face the reality of an entirely different -- and heavily commercialized -- Web. In contrast to the explosion of personal homepages and home-brewed Web sites that marked the birth of the Net, Fowler said issue activists like Shieh must aim their banners elsewhere.
"Nowadays most people view the Internet through commercial sites," Fowler said. "Unless you see this on those types of sites, this campaign may be slow moving."
Where personal homepages provided an excellent platform for issue campaigns four years ago, they simply aren't as prevalent on today's Web, he said. News sites and portals have taken over.
"[Shieh] really has to go beyond encouraging people to put up the banner," Fowler said. "He has to go about building coalitions with those organizations and companies.... In a campaign, especially one dealing with a political issue, it comes down to where these are placed and who sees them."
Still, if Shieh gets his banner on high-profile sites, Fowler thinks the banner ad still has plenty of power as an inexpensive way to draw attention to an issue.
Shieh said he hopes to get major sites like Yahoo, Excite, Netscape, America Online, and Microsoft to run the banner, though he isn't optimistic he'll be able to do so.
"It would be an impressive display of unity for the Internet and Americans," he said.
