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Throw the old book out the window.

Replace it with a BlackBerry, iPhone or Wi-Fi connection, because politics-as-usual is bypassing many of the old standbys once used to spread the message.

Technology in the 2008 election is eroding the power of campaigning through traditional media — television, radio and print.

Some of the innovations are nothing new, but how they’re being used is. Blogs, e-mail and social networking sites on the Internet offer new ways for people to get politically involved, from planning a debate party to torpedoing candidates with attack ads that exist mostly online.

“I look back to what we were doing four years ago, and I think, 'Oh my gosh, how did we get anything done with the tools that we had then?’ ” said Melissa Westmoreland , 24, a UNCG graduate, political blogger and Facebook junkie.

As soon as Westmoreland posts on a blog — she’s focused on electing Republican gubernatorial candidate Pat McCrory — she links it to her Facebook account. And she researches opposing attack ads online.

“I can say that I know what the Democratic argument is, and I have access to all the newspapers in the state, and I’m able to read three newspapers a day through e-mail.”

The business of news is changing, too.

“You saw a lot of candidates this year that would forgo the traditional press conferences,” said Steve Myers, news editor for Poynter Online, the Web site for The Poynter Institute, a journalism think tank. “It may be in four years that you may not even watch a debate on CNN.”

Those traditional televised debates already are streamed online. But in the 2012 presidential election, those could be paired with streaming video accompanied by Twittering (think text messaging, but online) and sidebars of ratings from viewers and pundits watching anywhere there’s an Internet connection.

Out the window

A Wake Forest University class this semester focuses on how politics are playing out in the digital world. And it’s changed mid stream, according to Allan Louden , the professor teaching Digital Politics .

As the election season morphed into a battle of campaigns working online and in the real world, often sidestepping traditional media, Louden’s class went from a teacher-teaching-student format to students and teachers teaching each other.

“I pretty much threw the syllabus out the window,” he said.

“There’s so much going on out there and so much access,” he said, comparing it to Wikipedia, the open-source online encyclopedia. “It’s a bit of a Wiki-class.”

These days anyone can be an expert or change the stream of information.

Groups that previously wouldn’t have had constant access to the public through television ads or newspaper ink can air a commercial once and post it online for all to see.

“That’s a huge difference, and it brings out a lot of fringe groups,” said Amanda Schwartz, 21, a political science and communication major in Louden’s class.

Her example: a video from Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund on Sarah Palin and hunting wolves by plane in Alaska. The state issues permits for hunting by plane to keep wolves from overkilling caribou, moose and deer — animals many Alaskans use for food.

The graphic commercial shows scenes of wolves shot and bleeding with audio commentary on Palin. The commercial aired on network television in swing states and made reports on news programs, but a TV spot lasts only as long as the clip. Online, the video lives on, and has been viewed more than 530,000 times with links to it from political sites such as Daily Kos, Politico and The Huffington Post.

“They buy on one network and post it on a Web site, and it’s being seen by hundreds of thousands of people,” Schwartz said of how a relatively small group can spread the message without a ton of money.

“That’s a huge difference,” she said.

Some things never change

The same holds true with how campaigns market a candidate.

If someone’s Facebook account shows interests consistent with a political party , there’s a good chance that profile’s owner will see ads for one candidate or another.

“On any Google Web sites you get, it reads your interests,” said Rebecca Bowers, 19, also a student in Louden’s class. “And I have a tendency to want to click.”

That kind of ad puts a message in people’s laps in a way that TV or newspapers may not.

Now the message is in a laptop. Or iPhone. Or BlackBerry.

“You have seen Obama with text messages. It’s that kind of new media,” Myers said.

“I think that you see a mingling of physical communities and virtual communities.”

It’s happening already, like when Westmoreland sent a Facebook invite to drum up people for a presidential debate party. She didn’t even know the first three people who came, who, like her, were Republican.

She had hoped for a mixed group, though.

“The Democrats that I sent it to, they said, 'Yeah, sure, we’re going to go to your debate watch party,’ ” she said.

So although the Internet is changing how the politically minded operate, it’s unlikely to change politics.

Contact Gerald Witt at 373-7008 or gerald.witt@news-record.com