Under the Dome is growing on Facebook.

Many of you are already friends with your chief political blogger on the popular social networking site. 

For the past few months, you've also joined a Dome group.

During the elections, we used the site to contact readers about robocalling, campaign ads and plans for the inauguration.

(Media experts call this "crowdsourcing." We don't care what you call it, it's been a tremendous boon to our reporting.)

This past week, Dome added its 500th member to the Facebook group.

So if you haven't joined already, now's a good time.

A Raleigh high school junior is organizing an online revolt against the state's new high school graduation requirement — the graduation project.

Alex Paschall's anti-graduation project Facebook page has attracted more than 120 comments. Someone attached to the page an online petition that nearly 600 people, most of whom appear to be students or parents, have "signed," Lynn Bonner reports.

Paschall writes on his page about organzing protests at State Board of Education meetings, but they have not materialized.

Paschall said in an interview that he'd like to fill the entire meeting room with students, but that's not possible because the board meets during school hours.

Instead, Paschall said, he plans to write board members about his objections. He’ll post those letters on his Facebook page and encourage others to write their own letters.

"My issue is not with the project itself," he said. "It's with the state school board mandating the project.”

He hasn't decided what to do with the online petition.

Paschall, who attends Leesville Road High School, is doing his graduation project on the USA PATRIOT Act, examining the sections he argues are unconstitiutional.

Students are required to find mentors to guide them. Rep. Marilyn Avila, a Raleigh Republican who met Paschall while they were working the polls during the election, is his mentor.

Kay Hagan had her picture taken with Barack Obama.

In a sign of the Democratic presidential candidate's perceived strength in North Carolina, the Senate candidate got a snapshot with him at a Charlotte rally on Sept. 21.

The photo is available for download on Hagan's Flickr site and her campaign Web site and has shown up on Hagan supporters' Facebook profiles, among other places.

She also had two casual photos taken of the two talking with a voter.

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Beverly Perdue had a snapshot taken with Obama for use on a mailer sent to black voters in the primary.

Although U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole was closely tied to George W. Bush in 2002, it's unusual for a North Carolina Democratic Senate candidate to be so closely — and visibly — tied to the party's presidential nominee.

Under the Dome is on Facebook.

Many of you already are friends with your chief political blogger on the popular social networking site.

(And at least one of you angrily de-friended us over a post!)

But you may not know that Under the Dome is also a Facebook group.

In recent weeks, we have begun ramping up our efforts in the social networking site. We hope to use it to broaden our perspective when reporting on statewide issues.

As an example, we recently e-mailed the members of the Dome group to ask their thoughts on the nicknames used in recent political ads. One of the people who e-mailed back was quoted in the next day's newspaper story.

If you want to join, search for "Under the Dome" on Facebook and click "Request to Join."

The state House and Senate need to work out their differences on a proposed law that would make it a low-grade felony for registered sex offenders to use social networking web sites.

Sen. Walter Dalton, a Rutherfordton Democrat who is running for lieutenant governor, said the House deleted provisions that should have been included, such as making it a felony to lie to an SBI agent and making  in-person solicitation of minors and online solicitation separate offenses.

Noelle Talley, a spokeswoman for the state Attorney General's office said they want those provisions added back to the bill, Lynn Bonner reports.

State Attorney General Roy Cooper started pushing for the law last year. Back then, the proposal included a requirement to have social networking sites obtain parental consent before they allowed children to join.

Since then, MySpace and Facebook came to agreements with state attorneys general to add safeguards to protect minors from sexual predators.

Many sections of the original bill, including the provision that would have required parental consent for a child to join a social networking site,  have been removed.

Kay Hagan has started a Virtual Phone Bank.

The Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate has started an online effort to allow volunteers from anywhere in the United States to call North Carolinians about volunteering for the campaign.

The technique was key to the success of Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama, as described by a recent Time magazine article:

In state after state, the campaign turned over its voter lists — normally a closely guarded crown jewel — to volunteers, who used their own laptops and the unlimited night and weekend minutes of their cell-phone plans to contact every name and populate a political organization from the ground up.

Hagan's college-aged daughter, Carrie, is spearheading the effort through the Carolina for Kay group on Facebook, which so far has 104 members, mostly students at UNC-Chapel Hill.

"It is very important for us to contact as many people as possible and we need people like you to help us do that!" she wrote in a message to the group today.

Update: Hagan spokeswoman Colleen Flanagan says the campaign's County Captains are recruiting virtual phone bankers as well and have already made calls. 

Barack Obama is attacking Hillary Clinton's gas-tax proposal online.

In ads on Facebook and other Web sites, the Democratic presidential candidate warns voters to "beware of Hillary's gas tax gimmick."

"The Clinton Gas Tax 'Holiday' Gimmick will * do nothing to reduce the long-term price of gas * do nothing to reduce carbon emissions * do nothing to reduce our dependence on foreign oil."

Instead, it says Obama will increase mileage standards, invest in alternative fuels, move toward energy independence, reduce carbon emissions 80 percent by 2050 and "restore U.S. leadership" on climate change.

The Obama campaign has used Facebook and online advertising much more heavily in North Carolina and elsewhere, in part because it is targeting college-aged voters who use those sites.

Still, it is the first negative ad Dome has seen online from either side.

Pat McCrory sent out some bad advice via Facebook.

The Republican gubernatorial candidate sent 649 members of the "Pat McCrory for Governor" group an e-mail at 1 a.m. today urging them to vote for him during North Carolina's one-stop voting.

Remember, if you're an unaffiliated voter, you must pick the Republican ballot to vote for me whether you vote early or on May 6th If you're a Democrat, you can switch to unaffiliated or Republican at your onestop voting site so you can vote for me!

The first part is true. Unaffiliated voters can request the Republican ballot to vote for McCrory.

But Democratic voters will not be able to vote for McCrory no matter what they do.

Though North Carolina allows existing voters to update their address or other vital information at one-stop sites, they cannot change their party affiliation.

Barack Obama is pushing one-stop voting online.

The Democratic presidential candidate is running a small ad promoting North Carolina's one-stop registration and voting through Google Ads.

The ad has shown up in Dome's Facebook account and on various political blogs. If it's like other online ads, it's likely tied to whether your IP address is registered in North Carolina.

"One-Stop Early Voting April 17 - May 3," it reads. The ad links to a page on Obama's Web site that will send you your polling place.

Pat Smathers raised $63,035 by the end of 2007.

The Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor raised $61,079 from major donors, including Greensboro Business Journal publisher Douglas Copeland, state Sen. Joe Sam Queen and Haywood County Commissioner Larry Ammons.

He also raised $1,956 from donors who gave less than $50. He did not receive any money from poitical action committees, but he loaned his campaign $23,667, according to a campaign finance report filed with the State Board of Elections last week.

At the same time, he spent $82,378 on a bluegrass fundraiser, radio advertising, Beach Boys tickets, Google and Facebook ads, and mailers.

That left him with cash on hand of $5,178.

Update: Smathers' donations include $6,513 worth of in-kind contributions he gave his campaign.