Though 20 million may sound like an impressive goal, it's merely the same raw number of voters 18 to 30 who made it to the polls in 1992, the last year a candidate gave real attention to wooing the youth vote, with the help of MTV. Bill Clinton, the hip, energetic "Boy from Hope," gave the first nationally televised interview of his campaign to MTV's 24-year-old Tabitha Soren. People hooted when Clinton blew his sax and answered the "boxers or briefs?" question, but these antics were part of a serious appeal to youth on issues of higher education, national service, gay rights, health insurance, and change for America. Over a million new young voters registered in that election season -- 350,000 by Rock the Vote alone. And turnout among those 18 to 24 surged 20 percent, with the overwhelming margin going for Clinton. In a post-election poll of 18- to 29-year-olds, 12 percent said that MTV's coverage directly influenced their vote. Today, Rock the Vote's Web site still counts 1992 as its most successful year.

So with a combined budget of several million dollars, and with interest in the 2004 election unusually high, why haven't the groups in 20 Million Loud set their voter turnout goals higher than the peak of 12 years ago? Maybe Gen Y is too inured to celebrity and marketing for the glitz-and-glamour approach. "There's a little bit of a mythology surrounding media and celebrity-driven campaigns," says Michael Delli Carpini, dean of the Annenberg School of Communications at the University of Pennsylvania, who has published research with CIRCLE, the nonpartisan think tank. "Rock the Vote, for example, has increasingly moved in this direction. But there's no systematic evidence that this kind of mass-mediated message aimed at young people works." A comment posted on MTV's own Choose or Lose Web site points out that young people are far from easily swayed by star power. "I think that celebs need to shut their mouths," wrote Adam, 22, from Orlando, Fla. "Just because they are famous does not give them the right to tell America what to think."

It turns out Hoobastank and Maroon 5, Rock the Vote's poster bands this year, have less credibility with young people than volunteers like Megan Brown. "The one place where there is good evidence for effects on participation rates is this kind of traditional grass-roots, door-to-door, face-to-face contact," says Delli Carpini.

Donald Green, a political science professor at Yale, has published research with CIRCLE and is the author of an April book from the Brookings Institution Press called "Get Out the Vote!" "The more personal the interaction between campaign and potential voter," says Green in his book, which cites studies held across 18 states and five election years, "the more it raises a person's chances of voting." Green's studies had well trained and enthusiastic young people calling other young people or going door to door: "Hi, my name is ____, and I'm a student at Fresno State," reads one sample script. "I want to talk to you about the upcoming elections on November 5. Voting gives young people a voice. Can I count on you to come out and vote?" For younger voters, a direct request from a peer helps overcome their unfamiliarity with the political process.

In an experiment Green conducted with the Youth Vote Coalition, young people called other people ages 18 to 30 in four university towns in the days before the 2000 election, using an informal, chatty script to ask them to come out to the polls. Youth voter turnout in those towns went up 8 to 12 percent.

By contrast, online peer-to-peer "viral" methods like chatting or mass e-mails -- the main way that Rock the Vote contacts people -- and "robo-calls" by celebrities had little to no effect on turnout in other campaigns Green and his colleagues studied. "I'm not unwilling to believe that celebrities can make a difference," Green says. "I'd just like to see the evidence.

"We have reason to be skeptical," he continues. What distinguishes this generation from previous ones, he says, is that "almost all their contact with the political sphere is through impersonal means, like direct mail, mass media, radio and TV." In other words, our media-obsessed culture is more likely part of the problem of youth apathy, not part of the solution. After all, for all the talk of action and self-expression, MTV is a broadcaster, and Rock the Vote's and Smackdown your Vote!'s spokespeople are entertainers. Their goal is to "capture the youth audience," which means keeping young people at home, watching television, not out in their communities.

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