The Wall Street Journal reports that the Obama campaign is set to roll out its major digital initiative, called Dashboard, on Wednesday — hoping to combine the broad base of social media with the tools of a virtual campaign office.

"The immediacy of Dashboard really sets it apart from 2008," said Obama campaign spokeswoman Katie Hogan. "It provides a good volunteer experience online that is directly tied to our field-operation goals."

As previously reported by the Guardian last week, the goal for Dashboard is to allow volunteers and staffers across different states to immediately work with real-time data — for example, by allowing canvassers in one state to collect data, which is immediately synced to phone-banks in another state.

The Journal reports:

The Dashboard's appearance borrows a bit from Facebook's white-and-blue layout. On the left, volunteers see recent local activities, including people who updated their profiles or joined a volunteer team such as "Women for Obama." From the home page, users can get phone numbers of would-be voters. Staffers can use the program to organize and track volunteers' progress.