One hundred days is scarcely enough time to draw any firm conclusions about a new president’s capabilities. Even so, Barack Obama has garnered considerable respect for his media skills. Pundits have dubbed him the “new media president;” while some of the most cynical among them believe his underlying strategy is to end run traditional Washington gatekeepers by communicating more directly with constituents sympathetic to his agenda. But his fans and critics alike may be missing the bigger picture.

It’s true Mr. Obama has readily embraced most things digital. Throughout much of his campaign, his unique online audience bested those of his opponents – Hillary Clinton during the primaries, and John McCain in the general election – sometimes two-to-one. His historic 26-word text message announcing Joe Biden as his running mate reached nearly three million U.S. mobile subscribers, and is considered the nation’s single largest mobile marketing event ever. And since taking the oath of office, he has continued to use the web to blog on vital issues and field questions from the public. 

It should come as no surprise, however, that the president is taking full advantage of new technologies. Given the current state of the media, it would be more astonishing if he didn’t.

American consumers, like their counterparts around the world, have a seemingly insatiable appetite for information, from just about everywhere. Time spent with blogs and social networks, for example, is increasing globally at more than three times the rate of overall Internet growth, particularly among audiences 50 and older. Little wonder then that Mr. Obama is active on Facebook, MySpace, Flickr and Twitter.

Much has also been made about the president’s penchant for his Blackberry. Yet with the typical U.S. mobile subscriber now sending and receiving more text-based data than voice calls, the ability to “thumb” a message is critical to reaching certain sectors of the population.

Still, it is with video, the emerging lingua franca of the 21st century, that Mr. Obama has probably been most prolific. Americans today watch more video than ever before, primarily on three screens – television, the Internet and cell phones. But despite the growth of online and mobile media, more than 99 percent of screen time is still in front of the TV set in the home. Acknowledging this fact, the president has made ample use of the medium. [see: Video Viewing Up At WhiteHouse.gov]

Tonight, he will hold his third televised press conference, raising his monthly average above any other president since John F. Kennedy. Last month he appeared on both The Tonight Show and 60 Minutes, helping to drive up their ratings to the highest levels in four and 10 years respectively.

Consequently, President Obama has underscored two important facets of an ever-changing media landscape. First, as audiences continually fragment into smaller, self-defined groups, communicating with them will mean working across multiple platforms.  Second, the process is not a zero sum game. At any given time, consumers tend to favor the best available screen, basing their decisions on factors such as convenience, availability of content and the quality of the viewing experience. Thus, new media alone will not be enough to successfully reach all constituencies.

Regardless, Barack Obama will increasingly turn to new and emerging media technologies, as will the rest of the nation. Yet he is hardly the only president to do so. Some 67 years ago, Franklin Roosevelt became the “radio president,” as people began listening to radio to help carry them through the Great Depression. For his part, JFK initiated live, televised news conferences.

Back then as now, neither was the first to use their respective medium, though each was the first to truly master it. Like President Obama today, each was also able, to some degree, to bypass mainstream filters and talk more directly to the public. Since the invention of movable type, that has historically been one of the key advantages of any new medium. What is more, it is not likely to change.

The Internet played an important role in the 2008 election campaign, so it’s no surprise that on Election Day, people used multiple news sources to follow results.  By combining television and Internet samples through a process known as fusion, Nielsen provides new data showing how the two media worked together to meet the demand for election news updates.

A total of 163.6 million adults sought election coverage from either television or the Internet — or both. This shows the unduplicated or cumulative audience that used one or the other medium for at least one minute.

158.3 million watched Election Day coverage on television. Of those, 134.8 million only watched TV coverage.

28.8 million used the Internet to get Election Day coverage from major news websites. Of those, 5.2 million only used the Internet for election coverage.

23.6 million got Election Day coverage from both TV and the Internet. Of these, 48% of these accessed online Election Day coverage only while at work; 42% got their online coverage only at home; and 10% checked online coverage both at home and at work.

Demographic Breakdown
From an overall reach perspective, adults aged 50+ were more likely than younger adults to seek Election Day news from TV or Internet — 80% of these adults were reached by one or the other medium, compared to 60% for 18-34s and 76% for 35-49s.

The demographic difference between the TV audience and the online audience wasn’t “younger” versus “older” — but rather, “middle-aged” versus “older.”

Younger adults between the ages of 18-34 made up about a quarter of the audience for both television and the Internet, but from there online coverage skewed younger than television:

-Adults 18-34 were 24.8% of the TV audience and 24.4% of the online audience.

-Adults 35-49 made up 40.7% of the online audience, but only 29.5% of the TV audience.

-Adults over the age of 50 made up 46% of the TV audience and accounted for 35% of the Internet users.

In addition, there are decided differences in demographic composition, based on whether people accessed election coverage online only, on TV only, or both on TV and online:

-Internet Only Users were the youngest: 34.5% were aged 18-34, compared to 34.0% for 35-49 and 31.5% for 50+.

-TV Only Users were the oldest: 25.3% were aged 18-34, 27.3% were aged 35-49, 47.4% were 50+.

-People who accessed Election coverage on both TV and online skewed 35-49: 22.2% were aged 18-34, 42.2% were 35-49, 35.6% were 50+.

Convergence Panel Results
A new Nielsen sample tracks both Internet and television usage with a single sample, making it possible to see how people used the two media simultaneously to check Election Day results.  This “convergence panel” shows that while simultaneous use of TV and Internet for Election Day coverage was limited, TV and online news outlets drew larger than average audiences:

-Only 1% of TV viewers on Election Night were simultaneously searching news websites — three times greater than the prior Tuesday night.

-On the other hand, 25.5% of news website visitors on Election Night were also watching TV election coverage — 2.5 times greater than the normal simultaneous traffic.

Obama’s simulcast would be the first to be aired by a presidential candidate since Ross Perot ran a series of 15 political telecasts during the 1992 presidential election.

Perot’s 1992 telecasts drew an average audience of 11.6 million viewers — 4.6% of all viewers nationwide.  His one simulcast, carried on ABC and CBS on November 2, 1992 between 8pm and 8:30pm, attracted 26 million viewers.

Obama’s October 29 simulcast would also air between 8pm and 8:30pm.  During the last four weeks, that daypart has drawn an average of 6.3 million viewers on CBS and 9.3 million viewers on NBC.

Political TV broadcasts have drawn unusually large audiences this year.  The October 7 debate between Senators McCain and Obama drew 63.2 million viewers less than a week after Sen. Joe Biden and Gov. Sarah Palin set a new V.P. debate TV audience record: 69.9 million viewers. 

In August and September, nearly two-thirds of all U.S. households (64.5%) — 120.1 million people age two or older — watched at least one of the political conventions.

The Vice Presidential message (sent in the late hours of Friday night) is, by many accounts, the single largest mobile marketing event ever in the U.S.

“From a mobile perspective, it makes sense that the campaign chose to use text-messages,” Nic Covey, Director of Insights, Nielsen Mobile, noted. “Today, 116 million U.S. mobile subscribers (52 percent of subscribers) actively use text messaging, making it a new mass medium for marketing efforts.”

Obama’s VP text-message is already being seen as one of the most important text messages ever sent, and one of the most successful brand engagements using mobile media. “The value of the message goes far beyond the 26 words and 2.9 million recipients,” Covey said. “Here, Obama branded himself as cutting edge, inflated the already enormous press attention paid to his VP pick and further established a list of supporters’ most coveted form of contact: their cell phone numbers.”

Read coverage of Nielsen’s findings in Newsday and the Los Angeles Times.

That strategy seems to be paying off, the L.A. Times noted.  According to Nielsen, Fox News has averaged 1.66 million weekday primetime viewers this year — up 14% from 2007.  Meanwhile CNN’s audience has grown by 40% to 1.06 million in 2008, and MSNBC’s viewership has increased 41% to 713,000.

The current cable news ratings increases extend a trend that began in 2004, when Fox News earned higher ratings for its coverage of the Republican convention than network broadcasters.

The story noted that one McCain ad attacking Obama aired last Friday during the Olympics opening ceremony’s “parade of nations” — a procession of smiling athletes. 

According to Nielsen, that ad accounted for 30 seconds of the total 35 minutes of commercials that aired on NBC’s U.S. broadcast of the opening ceremony.

View Nielsen’s advertising data round-up for the 2008 Beijing Olympics opening ceremony.