As a social media consultant/geek, this has been an exciting week in politics! It started the morning of SoCon07, during which time Barack Obama announced to the world that he was running for President of the United states. I think his message is exactly what's needed today. People do need to get involved. What goes on in Washington shouldn't be driven by petty politics. etc, and so on. He is exactly the kind of candidate we need in order to get past this challenging time period. Now, I'm not sure if he's the right person for the job, but I think his candidacy is most definitely needed in order to refocus the current political discourse.
What's so interesting about him from a social media perspective? Well, when he announced his candidacy, he also unveiled a social networking site to go along with it. Within days, thousands of people signed up. All around the US people have been holding meetups all week to talk about Barack Obama and change. Locally, over nearly people signed up for a meeting that was capped at around 50 or so people. This is a campaign that has started like none other, and citizen media is going to play an even bigger role then ever before in an election (At least in the United States).
And so, Barack Obama has already set part of the tone for this election cycle. Remember blogging politicians where such a novelty in the 2004 election? That was nothing. This time around, most candidates should have blogs (whether or not they understand how to best utilize the medium or not) and many candidates are already picking up on the use of podcasts and streaming video.
If they haven't started already, most of the major candidates should now be scrambling to create social networking services for their campaigns. This is a huge space right now that I'm sure a number of companies have anticipated demand for this election cycle, and we should be hearing about companies coming out of stealth offering social network building tools to campaigns in the next few weeks and months.
Whether or not you are into Barack Obama or not, you should take some time to check out his website. What's going on is bigger then any individual candidate and could signal a change in the way engaged citizens participate in civic processes.
I have alot to say on this topic, so expect to hear more about this as time goes on.
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