As political producer for the Election team at Yahoo!, my job is to help political campaigns and organizations of all sizes and parties understand (and hopefully use) the social media platforms on Yahoo!.

This morning, Mitt Romney's campaign launched a contest on Jumpcut in which users can create their own Romney campaign commercials. The winning entry will be used as a TV spot by the Romney campaign.

This highly unusual contest shows how much the American political process has been changed by the social networking capabilities of the Web.

Mitt Romney is not the only presidential candidate tapping into the Yahoo! network. In fact, all the major candidates are using Yahoo!'s social platforms to strengthen their relationships with citizens and to find new supporters. Candidates and their teams are actively posting to Flickr, uploading videos, and participating in Answers.

Perhaps more important are the grassroots activities that are thriving across the network. Citizens across the country are participating in the political process by joining Yahoo! Groups (there are thousands of active political groups), uploading photos of candidates to Flickr, or simply stating their political preference with an election-themed Avatar.

In previous elections, Yahoo! has helped millions of people with straightforward tasks such as registering to vote or finding their local polling places. We hope to help even more people during the 2008 election cycle.

With the Jumpcut contest, we're offering users a new level of participation — taking the promise of the democratic process up a notch. It's an amazing change from the old-boy networks and smoke-filled rooms of politics past.

Kathie Legg
Political Producer, Yahoo! Elections