From the Pew Internet and American Life Project: [As of June 15, 2008,] "At this point in the campaign, 8% of internet users (representing 6% of all adults) have donated money to a candidate online. This is a notable increase from the 3% of internet users (representing 2% of all adults) who had donated money online the first time we asked this question in our fall 2006 survey."
Update: The Obama campaign's success came on all fronts, not just from small donors, per this debunking report from Michael Malbin of the Campaign Finance Institute.
"Although an unusually high percentage (49%) of Obama's funds came in discrete contributions of $200 or less , only 26% of his money through August 31 (and 24% of his funds through October 15, according to the most recent FEC reports) came from donors whose total contributions aggregated to $200 or less. Obama's 26% compares to 25% for George W. Bush in 2004, 20% for John Kerry in 2004, 21% for John McCain in 2008, 13% for Hillary Clinton in 2008, and 38% for Howard Dean in 2004.... The fact is that Obama's financial juggernaut broke records at all contribution levels. The reality does not match the myth, but the reality itself was impressive."
Not to be left out of the discussion is Bob Bauer, counsel to the Obama campaign and the leading election law attorney for the Democratic Party. He argues that CFI's parsing of small donor categories is skewed to favor its vision for reform. "Even if one curiously believes that every donation above $200 is a large donation, or that someone giving repeatedly in small amounts totaling more than $200 in the aggregate is a large donor, the fact remains that Obama could not have raised the funds he did without this unprecedented pool of voters donating in the aggregate less than $1,000 (the maximum allowable donation per election is $2300). And in the category of contributions of $1,000 or more—the category of donors that CFI describes as "large"—Obama’s total by CFI’s calculation was merely 33% of the whole, to be compared to McCain’s 53% or Kerry’s 44% or Bush’s 57%."
-- Bill Corbett
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