This year for the annual State of the Union address, the President has again engaged the use of technology by offering advanced information to those who use digital technology. For instance, you could have gone to YouTube and uploaded a question that he could answer on Thursday or you can visit the White House website during the speech to see annotated statistics and graphs illustrating how the White house came to the conclusions drawn in the speech. Or you can do what I’m doing and participate in a nationwide poll that could gauge the reactions of hundreds of thousands of citizens, right from the comfort of your smartphone.
If you ever watched The West Wing, you may have seen this clip where, during a State of the Union the White House is collecting polling numbers based on live-reactions to the speech. If you don’t salivate over polling data like I do, then give this clip a watch for a quick understanding of what I am talking about.

While this app is being sponsored by partisan or ideological groups, we find this use of technology innovative and interesting because it will provide a unique snapshot of our nation’s reactions to President Obama’s State of the Union address regardless of which groups help fund the project.