MySpace Takes on Voter Apathy

Posted on September 29, 2006

MySpace.com has teamed up with Declare Yourself in an effort to get MySpace users to vote. The MySpace Declare Yourself website can be seen here. It includes a registration form provided by Election Impact. The Associated Press reports that MySpace users can get a badge that says, "I Registered To Vote On MySpace," for use on their profile.

Berman said the company was hoping its users would use such tools to encourage friends to register. He acknowledged MySpace was late in launching a voter-registration drive, but said he still hoped "thousands upon thousands of MySpacers will register to vote and spread the word."
Election Day is Nov. 7, and many states close voter registration up to a month before that.
To register, members simply go to http://www.myspace.com/declareyourself and enter a state or ZIP code. After entering the requested information, the site generates a PDF file that can be printed and mailed to state election officials. A Spanish version also is available.
Although MySpace has a heavy youth population, about 80 percent of its 114 million registered members are old enough to vote, according to the Los Angeles-based company.

The MySpace Declare Yourself page has 823 friends. The site also includes a video about voter apathy starring Amber Tamblyn. The video is from the Declare Yourself website.