The American Prospect just published a nice little exit interview with Matthew Gross, who started and ran Howard Dean’s blog until he recently had to leave the campaign to deal with some family medical issues.

While most of the interview is pretty pro-forma, there are a couple of solid nuggets in there from a guy who’s probably learned more about Internet organzing in the past year than the rest of us have learned in a lifetime.

[C]ampaigns are going to have to become their own media channels, and find ways to reach out to an increasingly segmented American audience. Campaigns will have to decentralize as the electorate becomes more decentralized.

The Internet has the ability to nationalize any race — look at the Chandler race in Kentucky right now. But the Internet’s not a trick. You still need a good candidate with a good message. And the media still exerts an enormous influence. That influence can be countered by the Internet, but the Net doesn’t eliminate it.