Actually, it’s David Axelrod who is the real brains–Obama’s Karl Rove, as a friend of mine likes to say. Nevertheless, I’ll give Obama credit for hiring the genius. They’ve taken the campaign into full fledged PR mode now and they are definitely breaking new ground. Instead of announcing a Vice Presidential pick in the standard press release/conference, they’re going to announce it via text message. And anyone can sign up to be “the first to know.” Seriously, this is brilliant.

But it may be too brilliant. Politics and marketing are still different in some very important ways. Having a massive email or text list doesn’t necessarily convert into more votes. For instance, I’m going to sign up for his text list, but probably won’t vote for the guy. So what good was it?

But it doesn’t hurt, right? If he can get just one more person on the bandwagon, it was probably worth it because the marginal cost of maintaining a text list (verses a phone bank, for instance) is relatively low.

If there’s a drawback, it’s only the risk of the campaign getting lulled into a false security and over-reliance on “new” techniques. Campaigns are still about people and getting them out to vote. That has more to do with door knockers and messages and organization, than it does technology. If the fundamentals take a backseat to the “new” techniques, the result could be abject failure.