NYTImes - How Obama Tapped Into Social Networks’ Power
A nice piece, The Media Equation in the NYTimes, examines the Obama campaign's highly effective use of social networking to power their campaign.
Its a lot more optimistic than the assessment I made yesterday about how the campaign used technology.
As I argued yesterday, the article points out that Obama's use of social networking has created (if not exactly delivered) an expectation of two-way interaction in the political process;
"...the electorate enters a new phase. There is sense of ownership, a kind of possessive entitlement, on the part of the people who worked to elect him. The shorthand for his organising Web site, “MyBO,” says it all.
“People will continue to expect a conversation, a two-way relationship that is a give and take...People who were part of the campaign will opt in to political or governing tracks and those relationships will continue in some form.”
There are some interesting insights into how, early in Obama's campaign thinking, the strategic use of social networking was (tapping Marc Andreessen for advice in early 2007, for example).
However, the hopes for public participation come from pundits in the story - there are no direct quotes or campaign promises on how this network of contributors and activists will be used through the administration.
I'm pretty bullish about this; I think there will be more two way dialogue than we've seen previously, although there is the alternative model where the administration uses their social network as a disinter-mediating media outlet, bypassing the news media, and using a million distributed, true believers as local 'spinners', pushing the administration's agenda to friends and neighbours.
Spotted on Techmeme
