It's no secret that Barack Obama is the most unique candidate for the democratic nomination in recent memory. What's less clear is the amount of support behind Obama's campaign.

With baracktheyouthvote.com, students like UW senior Charley Johnson hope to change that uncertainty.

As blog team director for the grassroots Web site, Johnson, along with project founder Joe Vogel (a graduate student at Brigham Young University), intends to get the ball rolling early for Obama's 2008 run by focusing on informing young voters.

"[The Web site] is a platform for people to learn more about the Obama campaign, to get involved and to make sure their voices are heard," said Johnson, who is a double major in international studies and economics. "[Vogel] created this group to add substance to the Obama movement, which has been purported by the press as all style, no substance."

Along with other youth movements, baracktheyouthvote.com stands as the next online forefront for recruiting youth support, Vogel said.

"To be able to do that in a few weeks, we feel very happy," Vogel said.

The Web site's blog "gets to the heart" of baracktheyouthvote.com's goal to dispel negative perceptions of Obama's campaign, Johnson said.

"We want to paint him as a candidate who does have the necessary qualifications and does represent things that we want to see in a president," Johnson said.

Kristine Deku, director of communications for the Web site, agrees that in particular, the youth movement supporting Obama has been colored in a superficial light.

"In the coverage of Obama and of his support, especially the youth support, it's very much that he's just a rock star and we're screaming over him and fainting," Deku said. "That's just not how it is."

Vogel, 25, credits online networking sites like facebook.com and barackobama.com for his ability to get supporters from across the country behind baracktheyouthvote.com. But the dispersed location of Web site participants is also seen as a future obstacle.

"That's probably the biggest challenge — communicating and getting coordinated with people from Texas to Illinois," Vogel said.

Deku also sees the wide demographic of "youth" as problematic; the site describes its target group as between the ages of 16 and 35.

"There's a lot of different interests and lifestyles that go into that age group," Deku said.

Vogel's interest in Obama was sparked shortly before the 2004 elections when, as vice president of his school, Vogel invited liberal mouthpiece Michael Moore to speak at his school. The response to Moore's appearance was less than enthusiastic.

"It was this terrible, vitriolic reaction," said Vogel, who experienced death threats and pulled funding. "To me, it symbolized what was taking place on a national scale — polarized rhetoric and no one communicating with each other."

That same year at the Democratic National Convention, Vogel saw Obama's speech and was highly impressed with his intelligence and balanced political perspective.

What seems universal among Obama's serious supporters is the way he inspires "hope for a different kind of politics," Johnson said.

Deku concurred, saying, "I never really felt there was someone out there running for president who believed that something could change in this country. [Obama] finds a way to bridge divides between people."

Although the site has been online for less than a month, Vogel and his team are thinking big.

Already in the works is a book of essays written by youth supporters compiled from around the country; Vogel said he's aiming for a summer publishing date, but the book is still shopping around for a publisher.

As for Obama's chances in 2008? The staff of baracktheyouthvote.com says that Obama is slowly and surely gaining support in comparison to front-runner Hillary Clinton.

"I know that Hillary has started off with a big advantage, but I think a big part of that is name recognition," Deku said. "I think [Obama] has just a good a chance if not more."

Johnson sees 2008 as "a million years" away but thinks Obama's future is bright.

"I've been making the argument to my friends for a couple of years that he will be our next president, and I think his chances are great," Johnson said.

He's got almost a year to show America who he is, Vogel added.

Reach reporter Tiffany Wan at news@thedaily.washington.edu.