The Spartan Internet Political Performance (SIPP) Index employs 650 quantitative factors focused on finding out the level of interest a candidate is generating online. Each factor comes from numeric values on the Internet such as social network outreach, Web site traffic, blog presence and search engine utilization. The score for each candidate indicates their overall ability to reach people online and connect on issues.

"This can be compared to counting the number of digital yard signs and bumper stickers posted for each candidate on the Web," said Ryan Vartoogian, President of Spartan Internet Consulting.

The index was created because of the growing influence of the Internet in the political process. According to a July study from iCrossing.com, 42 percent of voters will turn to the Internet for information on the 2008 presidential candidates.

"In the 2008 presidential election and beyond, the Internet will play a dramatic role in shaping the decision support mechanism for voters," said Vartoogian

Weekly updates of the index will be published every Thursday online, with charts comparing the position of each candidate.

More than 56 percent of respondents said that they trust traditional media more than any other source when seeking political knowledge.

"There’s been tremendous publicity surrounding how many ‘friends’ candidates have on MySpace, the ‘Obama Girl’ video on YouTube and Bill and Hillary’s Soprano’s spoof," said Rebecca Wettemann, vice president of research for Nucleus Research.

"While these stories are entertaining, the fact of the matter is that people trust and rely upon what they learn from mainstream media more than five times as much as the information they access on the Internet."

The survey also revealed that 18 percent of respondents receive their information from alternative news programs, such as the Daily Show with Jon Stewart.

"Candidates have rushed to create an ‘Internet persona’ to keep pace with our tech-savvy society, but at a significant cost," said Jeff Ramminger, executive vice president, KnowledgeStorm.

"When it comes to believability, Nucleus’ research has found that mainstream media still holds the most weight. The results of the Nucleus survey prove that what is perceived as most edited and vetted remains the most trusted."

The survey also found that just 51 percent of people feel as if they have a clear understanding of what the candidates stand for. Voters are interested in learning more about candidates, but do not have the time to research on sponsored Web sites, or less traditional media outlets such as blogs.

"The bottom-line question is: are Barack Obama’s 97,954 Facebook ‘friends’ going to help him secure the swing vote and defeat Hillary Clinton? We believe absolutely not," added Cheryl Gutowski, analyst at Nucleus Research.

"An effective online campaign strategy encompasses much more than just putting up a nice Web site," said Jeffrey Herzog, CEO, iCrossing. "Our research shows that people are looking for election-related information online, but most presidential hopefuls are missing out on the opportunity."

Forty-seven percent of those who go online for political information use search engines to do their research. Eighty-eight percent of those who use the Internet for political information visit online news sites and 42 percent go to social media sites. Just 30 percent go to a candidate’s Web site.

Out of potential voters who are looking for election information online, 61 percent of 18 to 24 year olds and 55 percent of 25 to 34 year olds search for information on user-driven content sites such as blogs, YouTube and Wikipedia.

The iCrossing study says that candidates need to build out content around highly-searched issue based terms and focus their online marketing campaigns on building visibility for them in both paid and organic search.

Stanford Law’s Lawrence Lessig initiated the movement on his weblog, publishing open letters to both the DNC and RNC with 75 signatories, including Wikpedia founder Jimmy Wales, Craig Newmark of Craigslist, MoveOn.org and Arianna Huffington on the left, and blogger Michelle Malkin and RedState.com founder Mike Krempasky on the right.

Currently, the major television networks hold full rights to debate content, limiting the reach of the content as well as controlling what is done with it. Lessig and company feel the Presidential debates are too important face the barriers of copyright in an age of Internet video sharing on sites like YouTube and Blinkx.

The signers are pressuring the committees, especially the DNC, which recently announced it would sanction six official Presidential debates, so the committees can pressure the TV networks. Networks are notoriously heavy-handed regarding use (even fair use) of their content.

“The big TV networks should not be the only ones determining which sound bites are newsworthy after a debate," said Adam Green, MoveOn’s Civic Action Communications Director. "Everyday people should be able to put candidates’ positions on YouTube and share them with others without fear of breaking the law.”

“Technology has exploded the opportunity for people to comment upon and spread political speech,” said Lessig.  “I am very hopeful that both the Republicans and the Democrats will help encourage the extraordinary public discussion around the election that the Internet has enabled, by removing any uncertainty about the right of the people to comment upon the speech of presidential candidates.”

Lessig admits that many "rightly and fairly struggle over" copyright issues, the place of copyright in political debate is one more difficult to justify. In order to ensure a more genuinely participatory democracy, any network broadcasting the debates would be required to license them freely after the initial broadcast by putting them in the public domain.

"I am confident that I won’t like much of what this freedom will engender," Lessig writes on his blog. "But if that were a legitimate reason to regulate political speech, this would be a very different world."

Already dubbed "the YouTube Presidency," the 2008 election coverage has fully crossed all media. The Internet is living up to its potential as candidates and politicians post messages at video-sharing sites, and social networks like MySpace announce their own Presidential primaries.