Obama texts his supporters his choice of VP, is Obama the first "cybergenic" candidate?, What will McCain do for VP?, Obama hits back at two McCain ads, the blogs respond to Edwards' extramarital affair, Bush enjoys women's beach volleyball, and Barack gets "Rick Rolled"

Mark Glaser interviews Patrick Ruffini; Rolling Stone glowingly investigates Obama's grassroots game; Mike Connery at TPMCafe; who's winning the Wikipedia primary?; Flickr for Good launches; and the candidates do some, er, interesting things with splash pages.

More on young voters in 2008; lost votes in California?; Ben Smith shares the labor and the smarts; Real Clear Politics earns some kudos; Matt Stoller reinvents campaign finance reform; Patrick Leahy wants the Founding Fathers online; what went wrong for Mitt Romney; McCain aide shares some secrets; GOP "money-bomb" bombs; Josh reports from Italy; our favorite videos; and some reality checks to end the week.

Voting on 10Questions closed yesterday with a huge surge in participation...and a number of last-minute submissions, including one that appears to have climbed into the top ten. And that raises an important question, was the process fair?

Next Wednesday the founders of TechRepublican.com, led by David All will be leading the first-ever Modern Media Strategies workshop. The event is designed to teach conservative activists and Hill staffers about new media (or, as All calls it, “modern media”) and how to use the web the way the liberals do. It's the latest in a string of projects unleashed by a small group of online activists that has struck a chord with mainstream conservatives.

The open-sourcing of debate planning; the debate on the online Right; the demographics of the online Left; the ongoing decline of newspapers; another exploitative video; and whose website is winning the most attention...

The Web on the Candidates

Kate Phillips of The New York Times' The Caucus rounds up the netroots' reaction to John Edwards' decision not to participate in a Fox News-sponsored debate in Nevada next August. Some at TPMCafe see the decision as a sign that Edwards "is making a serious bid to be the 'netroots' candidate." With praise for the decision coming from Atrios, Matt Stoller, and others, Edwards is certainly scoring some netroots points.

Giuliani advisor Patrick Ruffini lists his favorite '08 blogs that, he says, "will be in the thousands of visits by the time Iowa and New Hampshire roll around." The list includes Race42008, Eyeon08, GOP Progress, and the Brody File.

A Rightwingnews.com poll suggests that Duncan Hunter has gained significant new support among the conservative netroots. Newt Gingrich was the most popular potential candidate, followed by Hunter and Mitt Romney. Chuck Hagel, George Pataki, and John McCain were very unpopular among the 230 participants in the poll.

The Politico and MSNBC are sponsoring the first GOP debate at the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, CA on May 3. It will be broadcast online on the Politico's web site, where viewers can submit questions to the candidates.