We will be liveblogging this afternoon from a conference we are cosponsoring at the George Washington University, called “The Future of Political Communications — Connecting with Young Voter.”

The half-day event is focused on the Internet’s role in youth voter strategy and features adviser from the top presidential campaigns.

Here’s the description:

Young voters are spending more and more time on social networking platforms, such as Facebook and YouTube, and are getting their news from many sources including web video, blogs, podcasts, websites, television, radio, and print.

The George Washington University, Opportunity 08, a project of the Brookings Institution in partnership with ABC News, PR Newswire, I’m 18 in 08, and Business Development Institute have partnered to produce a half-day event that will bring together the best and brightest minds to showcase and explore successes and failures and discuss how political and policy communicators can make sense of an increasingly fragmented media landscape and connect with young voters.

We will also present the world premiere of David Burstein’s, “I’m 18 in 08″, a documentary film whose goal is promote and encourage more youth to vote and get involved in the political process.

Speakers include:
> Jeff Berman, SVP Public Affairs, MySpace
> Peter Daou, Internet Director, Hillary Clinton for President
> Mindy Finn, director of eStrategy, Romney for President
> Steve Grove, heads of News and Politics, YouTube
> Chris Henick, senior adviser, Rudy Giuliani Presidential Committee
> Chris Kelly, chief privacy officer, Facebook
> Josh Orton, deputy new media director, Obama for America
> Mark SooHoo, deputy eCampaign director, John McCain for President
> Joe Trippi, senior adviser, John Edwards ‘08

The event is organized by the Business Development Institute, GW’s Graduate School of Political Management, “I’m 18 in ‘08″, Opportunity ‘08, and the PR Newswire.

Stay tuned, it should be an interesting and enlightening discussion. We’ll bring you the highlights, the insights, and the quotables.

Ok Dallas, we know you’re not the only city on YouTube. Cody Ryan York points out that  six mayoral candidates in Nashville, Tennessee have been using web video.

David Briley’s campaign has his speaking appearances covered in a series of 33 YouTube videos, like this one on Green Leadership. On YouTube, BrileyForMayor had six subscribers and 146 channel views.

Bob Clement has an “idea factory” generating 30 ideas in 30 days to improve Nashville and documenting those ideas in web video. In idea 30, Clement asks the public to submit their ideas on his website. On YouTube, Clement for Mayor had eight subscribers and 526 channel views when we checked it out this morning.

Karl Dean was followed by a videographer while filing his petition to get on the ballot. The campaign’s seven YouTube videos range from issue-themed pieces to speaking appearances. We couldn’t find a YouTube channel just for Dean, but Hester2007’s collection of Dean videos had 4 subscribers and 54 channel views.

Buck Dozier’s online multimedia program includes a nine minute biographical piece about Dozier and four issue-themed pieces on public safety, small business, seniors, and learning. The DozierForMayor channel on YouTube had six subscribers and 79 views.

Howard Gentry’s multimedia kit includes a six minute look at education, as well as a series of events and speaking appearances. The HowardGentry YouTube channel had five subscribers and 112 views.

Kenneth Eaton’s website doesn’t have a multimedia section, but the Kennetheaton YouTube Channel included five videos, mostly of speaking appearances, like this one of an Antioch Forum. The channel had four subscribers and 20 channel views.

Got any tips on local races? Send them to ipdi@ipdi.org.

The Library of Congress might well be one of the first parts of the federal government to start incorporating interactivity and social media into its web presence.

Yesterday Kevin Novak, director of web services for the Library of Congress, spoke at a Web Managers Roundtable event in Northern Virginia about social media. Novak is trying to use the Internet to encourage participatory volunteerism and reach people in a way that maintains LOC’s relevance in an era of digital media.

LOC’s current and upcoming online efforts include:

• Using Flickr to post pictures of the LOC content and ask the general public to help collect information on different items of historical interest.
• Developing a pilot program in Second Life.
• Launching a blog – the first in the federal space, according to Novak – authored by LOC’s director of communications, Matt Raymond. To date, the blog entry that generated the “busiest” response asked readers to name their favorite books.
• Online collections that include webcasts.

Novak considers LOC’s web presence to be an experiment for interactivity on the federal websites. The unknown, the gray areas, the questions that we don’t even know exist yet – those are the sticking points, according to Novak. He mentioned a few of them at the roundtable:

What process determines who gets to write the official blog for a federal organization?

Is the LOC’s web presence a part of the public record?

Do constraints to online interactivity exist that the LOC hasn’t explored yet?

How does a federal organization achieve success online?

Ahh, the unanswered questions. 

Check out the websites of Dallas mayoral candidates Tom Leppert and Ed Oakley and their two approaches to web video.

Tom Leppert – Video, video, and more video. Check out the issues section of the website for a series of video clips of Leppert discussing each issue with a living room set full of constituents. Leppert’s YouTube channel attracted 1 subscriber and 38 viewers when we checked it out a few minutes ago.

Ed Oakley – One video (Oakley’s TV spot) on YouTube with 974 views. Oakley’s YouTube channel had zero subscribers and 22 views when we checked it out, but the video itself had about 974 views.

The election is June 16^th.

Seen something on local races in your area? We like local. Email tips to ipdi@ipdi.org.

Update: We just saw this attack site, The Truth About Tom, paid for by the Ed Oakley for Mayor campaign.