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e-Elections.com Offers Free Web Addresses to Nation's Campaigns

OAKLAND, Calif. (Oct. 9, 1999) -- A new Internet company was launched today that for the first time "rents" addresses on the World Wide Web.

The company is being launched at a time when more political campaigns are turning to the Internet to inform and influence voters. e-Elections.com, Inc. will offer a variety of services to issue-oriented political campaigns — including renting space on the Internet that will allow more than one campaign to use the same address — that carry a letter or number.

This is how it works: e-Elections, a Web hosting company, will "rent" to campaigns space at standard Internet addresses so that voters in several states or towns can access information about their local issue-oriented elections by using easy-to-remember URLs, such as www.YesOnA.com. Any campaign designated by a letter — a Measure M or Initiative M, for instance — can rent space at www.YesOnM.com or www.NoOnM.com. When a voter types in that address, he or she will be presented with a list of communities. Clicking on the community will take the voter to the appropriate Web site.

URL, which stands for Uniform Resource Locator, is the address for a Web page and is the string that starts with "http://……" By registering standard addresses, e-Elections.com has assured campaigns across the country access to the same address.

"There are hundreds of campaigns out there that want simple, easy-to-use Internet addresses to get out their message," said Chris Lavin, executive director of e-Elections. "But with thousands of Internet addresses being registered every day, their choices are becoming more and more limited."

Rental fees for URLs range from $125 to $1,250 per month, depending on the size of the campaign. e-Elections also offers other services to campaign consultants — such as volunteer management and on-line fund-raising.

"We found that small, local campaigns were registering addresses that gave them exclusive rights," Lavin said. "Not only that, but they could register their opposition's URL, as well, to prevent its use or to put up a sham site. We thought that went against the spirit of what the Internet is all about — free and open access to information."

e-Elections.com, Inc. is located in Oakland, Calif. It is a nonpartisan, for-profit service. For more information about e-Elections, visit their Web site at www.e-elections.com.