During elections individuals are under constant bombardment of political ads that lash out at the opposing side. How does one decide which ads are speaking truth and which are spreading slander? A new app called the Super PAC App was developed just for that job for the 2012 election year.
The app, in a way, works much like the apps Shazam and SoundHound. An audio recognizer identifies the audio from the ad and brings up information regarding the ad like who the ad supports, money raised/spent, and primarily the claims made in the ad. After reading up on the claims the app allows you to decide if the ad is a Love, Fair, Fishy or Fail. The app also lets users check out other political ads and the claims made in those, which is handy in case one misses an ad.
But what is a Super PAC?
“Super PACs are political action committees (see the acronym?) that can raise and spend unlimited funds on political races. Legally, they can’t coordinate with a candidate. Super PACs are new to the presidential race as the result of two federal court rulings in 2010; the Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission and the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit decision in SpeechNow.org v. Federal Election Commission.
The term Super PAC has also emerged as a short hand for political organizations with lots of money behind them.”
-From the Super PAC App FAQ
The ad takes around 10 seconds to recognize the ad, which can prove to be a challenge give the amount of time it takes to realize an ad is running, grab your phone, open the app and let it recognize the ad. However, if you do miss the ad on TV the app also works on YouTube.
More information on the SuperPAC App can be found here.
