White house race draws voters to Web

Fifty-nine per cent of the 2,599 registered voters polled by the Pew Research Centre for the People & the Press said they have sought out election content online or had some type of online communication about the campaign.

Six in 10 of the voters who identified themselves as liberal Democrats said they have watched some form of campaign video on the Web compared with just 33 per cent of conservative Republicans.

Forty-three per cent of liberal Democrats said they read blogs about politics and the campaign while only 22 per cent of conservative Republicans said they do so.

The Washington-based Pew Centre said increasing numbers of voters have been using the Web for campaign information and activity with the approach of the November 4 showdown between Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain.

In December last year, just 18 per cent of voters said they had exchanged e-mails about the campaign with friends or family; now 37 per cent have done so.

Twenty-six per cent of voters now say they have received an e-mail from one of the political campaigns or from a political group or organisation, up from 17 per cent in December.

Overall, 39 per cent of voters said they have watched some type of campaign-related video online, up from 24 per cent in December, while 23 per cent said they have visited a candidate's website, up from 16 per cent.

Pew said use of social networking sites, such as MySpace or Facebook for campaign information did not appear to have grown much.

Just 8 per cent of voters said they have visited a social-network site for campaign information, up only two points since last year. Four per cent said they have signed up as a "friend" of a candidate.