Akademik

n.

A person who donates a small amount of money to a political campaign or other cause. Also: microdonor.

—micro-donation n.

Meanwhile in Chicago, Obama's elite high-end fund-raisers, his National Finance Committee, met Thursday for strategy sessions.

Obama has developed an army of micro-donors during his campaign.

—Lynn Sweet, " Obama passes on public money: http://www.suntimes.com/news/sweet/1015950,CST-NWS-sweet20.article," Chicago Sun Times, June 20, 2008

Rather than relying primarily on a network of wealthy and well-connected bundlers — as candidates have since President Bush pioneered that technique in 2000 — Obama also tapped a list of 3 million ordinary donors, many of whom who gave in increments of $25 and $50.

Obama's success with these kitchen-table contributors has set up one of the most lopsided financial advantages in modern presidential campaigning. During the first two weeks of October, Obama spent four times more than McCain, including for an unprecedented $82 million saturation-advertising campaign that blanketed the airwaves in key battleground states.

Campaign finance experts have already classified this contest as one of the transformational elections that will dramatically change the way politicians pay for campaigns in coming cycles.

"It's the model of the future," said Rick Hasen, an election law specialist at Loyola Law School. "Gone will be the $2,300-a-plate dinner. That will be replaced by the $30,000-a-plate dinner, the kind of select event Obama had hosted by folks like Warren Buffett. And the rest will be the micro-donors — entirely Internet-based."

—Matthew Mosk, " Campaign Finance Gets New Scrutiny: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/25/AR2008102502302.html," The Washington Post, October 26, 2008

Perhaps there could be a south-south cooperation to work out how to best inspire assistance from microdonors in the North.

I, for one, would be interested in seeing a microcredit project that I could monitor online and could put my $100 dollars into.

—Thomas Crampton, " Will Digital Communication Undermine NGOs?: http://joi.ito.com/weblog/2005/12/01/will-digital-co.html" (comment), Joi Ito's Web, December 2, 2005