Why I love UGC

The real bonus with Web 2.0 is that it easily facilitates ordinary web users to create their own content and contribute to campaigns. This was forwarded to me by one of my students, no name! I guess they lean away from the Conservatives!

After a little investigation I found a lot of different posters, all of a similar vein though perhaps less blunt, floating around on Twitter. The site where these originate is very simple and allows anyone to generate the words to fit around the now famous, possibly airbrushed, picture of Cameron. It is a creation of Andy Barefoot who supports neither Labour or Conservatives, maybe a Liberal Democrat (??) and his site has a few more sophisticated versions. But the power of these is that all those online activists can create them, circulate them, some may go viral, a lot of people have a laugh but, in political terms, it may have an impact on overall perceptions of David Cameron. This may not be based on the message itself, though they may be reminders of negatives linked to Cameron's history or persona, the above links to the Labour 'Dave the Chameleon' video and his background in public relations as negatives. But such offhand allusions to a negative message that makes this powerful; impact is based mainly on the fact that people we know (our friends on Facebook, Bebo and social networks or those we follow on Tumblr and Twitter or email contacts) do not like Cameron and oppose him as prime minister. I wait to see the same done to Labour and Gordon Brown, or is deemed too easy a target?

Its going to be a dirty fight

There is a lot of money being spent on playing up the Conservatives, with a glossy backlit ad dominating Piccadilly Circus at one point over Christmas. But the majority of campaigning, in this period of phony campaigning, is on the cheap and on the web and via email. The above is from Labour which I have been forwarded twice this morning already. This will perhaps be the major impact the Internet will have on election campaigning. YouTube allows anyone to get a video out to an audience (few may watch it but it is a route to publicity). Facebook and Twitter does the same with these photo-shopped ads. It may replace the street hording as it is possible to target them a little better, but may get the same views. They are only peripheral cues, reminders of campaign messages and slogans that will only appeal to those already converted, but they will be used and lot and may encourage some to turnout if they are worried about Cameron caring for the less well off or Brown's various (in)competences!

Will online campaigning make a difference?

It seems there is a received wisdom that the Internet played a crucial role in the 2008 US Presedential campaign - and everyone is asking much the same of every other country's election. In this vein, there is a fascinating article on the Channel 4 news site which asks whether online campaigning will be an important feature of the forthcoming General Election campaign. There are real advocates who proclaim that the Internet could fundamentally shift the style of campaigning. Toby Flux from Labour Matters says in the piece that hits, clicks and tweets really count and that 2010 will be the "first general election of the social network age" he, like Labour's Twitter Tsar, believes news stories which break online will dominate the campaign. Others are more circumspect, Iain Dale and Guido Fawkes suggest much of what happens online will be swamped by the deluge of coverage across mainstream media, and I guess their websites also which can steal the audience away from the parties.

It almost seems that Labour want it to make a difference, though perhaps this is dangerous unless they have an online strategy that is yet to be launched as the Conservatives are massively ahead in terms of the blogosphere and the sophistication of their homepage - not to mention the number of MPs using social networks or microblogs. While Kerry McCarthy may be right in saying that online tools can reach younger voters, she may also contradict herself when observing that too much online political communication is in-fighting. It can, as Fawkes says, mean that bloggers (MPs or not) are simple preaching to the already converted and not really encouraging anyone else to become involved.

The key thing seems to be Obama, everyone wants to emulate him and his success. The Conservatives have already tried to create an Obama-esque social network and many consider his model of campaigning to be something to emulate. This misses the point in a number of ways. Former Liberal Democrat communications manager Olly Grender argues in the piece that the campaign "has to have the charisma and hope and excitement of the Obama campaign to add magic dust and that is nothing to do with new media"; it was the man, his image and what he stood for that drew in the audience not his social network. One must precede the other! Also the campaign organisation was very much a grassroots operation that empowered activists, some of this work could be done online, so it worked, but you cannot contrive that and create an activist base (Shane Greer agrees, he just said so on BBC News 24) - perhaps the Conservatives will garner both the enthusiasm and the will to create an offline and online activist base that will push MyConservatives as an important tool - Perhaps! Labour have a less public network for supporters, perhaps avoiding the fanfares and brickbats such tools can bring you.

It seems the media are playing up the idea of an online because it is new, and it is in many ways as the advances in online technologies have facilitated a higher level of use to make it a way of reaching a lot of people. But you cannot guarantee an audience. Perhaps Iain Dale is right, confirming the Downes and Mui thesis that email is the killer application - if you have a big enough database you can reach a lot of people and mobilise them. Perhaps they can also be pulled to other online campaign tools and drawn into the campaign. The Conservatives are far more organised in using email strategically. I hear from them once a week, I signed up to Labour from three emails and have received nothing - either I am on a blacklist or they just don't want to talk to me, or they are not using their database very well (anyone from Labour know the answer?). Liberal Democrats are less frequent and the e-newsletter is less flashy, but they also seem to have grasped email.

Online campaigning needs a pull - an audience needs to be drawn to the sites of parties, their social networks and their Twitter feeds. Obama provided a pull unique to him it could be argued (I think it was unique to the time and mood); in the context of low trust in politicians generally; when the party leaders have been around for a while; when support is not unequivocal for either party and many may be voting for the least worst option, parties in the UK need a big pull factor if the Internet is going to be a vote winner either as a tool for activists or for voter engagement.

Aww Cute

As part of a research project I have the (perhaps) uneviable task of coding a sample of party and candidate websites. A little mind-numbing at times but illuminating also. It is the fun things that stand out, so there may be a lot of observations popping up here over the rest of the week. One thing that surprises me is how dull most websites are, they have the air or something that is a secondary communication tool, something many parties and candidates (especially candidates) feel they need but are not sure what to do with. The most interesting are those that offer a little of a personal touch. On which note full marks to Rupert Matthews, one of the five Conservative candidates for the EP in East Midlands. Part of his site shows the Blue Bear on tour, as below Blue Bear visits Ashbourne and, perhaps less wisely, looks like it has been nailed to a chalet door on the Isle of Wight - made me chuckle! Probably sad but hey, its getting late in the day and i've been at this since 8am.

The power of prayer - and a good website

On one page of the Christian party's campaign site for the European Parliamentary Election was the message 'pray for a good result'; while my colleague was going through all the party sites he passed it on. However, it seems the power of prayer is not working as since this afternoon their site as exceeded its bandwidth and is now offline. Clearly they now need either a lot of prayer or, more likely, cold hard cash! A shame as it was actually quite a well put together site. Unlike that of WAID 'Your Decision', (a shot of which is right) it is cheap and functional, but anything but aesthetically pleasing. Does it matter, if we do live in a visual world where image is more important than function then it possibly does. True, they do not have a great chance of making any impact; but it may prevent them getting their message out to anyone who stumbles across the site or visits out of vague interest just because their home page looks too amateurish. Well that is my view anyway!

If Mr McBride had been a better adviser...

One of the most prescient comments, one that all political campaigners should read, was made with reference to what is now known as #smeargate, in an Observer editorial: "The command-and-control approach to information, mastered by New Labour, looks outdated in the digital age. If Mr McBride had been a better adviser, he would have told Mr Brown that long ago". It has become increasingly impossible to subdue any information and emails are far too easy to leak - often by accident by the originator. Government needs to be open, not just in releasing information on cumbersome websites, but accessible to the citizens. Some are hailing what Obama is doing as a move in the right direction, maybe that is something our governments can learn from but, independent of the current scandal, governments current and future need to respond to the way society is communicating and leave behind the notion of central control of information that only works in societies that have a similar system of control in all walks of life.

Solution or Smokescreen?

Attended an interesting event on Tuesday organised by the Hansard Society, the purpose of which was to discuss the online campaign and models of its application to politics in terms of it offering a solution to questions of engagement, interest and involvement or was a smokescreen that, in my interpretation, makes parties and MPs appear to want to engage more but without actually doing so. The presenters were LibDem Head of Innovations and Editor of LibDem Voice Mark Pack, Conservative Home Editor Jonathan Isaby and Labourlist creator Derek Draper. It was not hugely insightful, but there were some gems that grabbed my interest and so I thought I would share them. This is what I took away from the event and not designed to be a definitive account in anyway - so no "cybershit" ( a term introduced to proceedings by Draper) if you disagree.

Firstly the answer to the overall question is it is neither! The Internet provides an additional method for communicating to certain audiences, and perhaps an optimum route to some audiences, but is not a solution to the wider problems identified with political engagement. However this may change, so hence it is not simply a too for perception management. Both Draper and Isaby hinted at a restructuring of the membership model that may be weaker but learned from foot in the door persuasion techniques - asking for small actions from joining a Facebook fan group up to working as an activist but with various level of exit points. However for Pack and Draper it appeared that the most powerful objective for using online communication tools was to feed the news agenda and that from this function there could be a reshaping of politics, possibly as the public begin to engage with strong and engaging party and MP presences across different parts of the WWW. Draper, however, went further to suggest that in a close contest a few hundred votes in a dozen seats could be decisive, hence it could be argued that an engaging presence, a persuasive message, third-party (voter) promotion, endorsement and amplification and highly targeted strategies of mobilisation then there could be an argument that it was 'the web wot won it'! Thus we may see a marginal seat strategy that employs the Internet far more ruthlessly at a local level than simply one national strategy as has been seen previously.

Much of this sounded a little Obama-esque, and a question posed by a representative of Hustings (on whose website all the presentations can be watched) asked if this 'may look like your dad dancing at a wedding'. Obama as an example was played down, and parties seem to recognise that it was the right candidate with the right message that was influential not his skills to adapt to Web 2.0. However it is clear that lessons have been learned and there will be techniques that worked for Obama that will be adapted to a UK context. YouTube may surpass television as a way of getting videos viewed for example (mine based on a comment of Ivor Gaber's in the queue to get in. But the local aspect is seen as important. Obama allowed social networking within his website via the http://www.mybarackobama.com/ area, this put supporters in touch with one another. Isaby suggested a similar technique that may be appropriate for the UK. Candidates should use Facebook, but not just as self-promotion tools but to identify active groups within an area and identify with their campaigns - perhaps this will surpass the old technique of reading the local newspaper or be a useful supplement.

Another interesting gem is the notion of the online active public being an elite. But Mark Pack made the interesting point that this is actually fairly open compared to many other ways in which the public can participate in politics. Draper agreed, reinforcing this by noting how few people attend any political event, yet still more may do so online. A fact sadly, I heard that one candidate selection meeting was attended by five people!

So overall food for thought, lots of titbits despite the sense that no-one wanted to reveal too many aces despite the fact that they are all probably the same cards. Two final things on this, innovation is driven by election failure, so whatever happens in online campaigning it will be determined by the goal of electioneering! Secondly, and more trivially, what ever some people have claimed Derek Draper publicly admits he does not have a monopoly of wisdom!

Power!

The beauty and the danger of the Internet is that anyone can say anything and it can gain some element of credibility if enough people are willing to view it and then share it. Here is a prime example of a viral message that I have 14 links to this morning from a range of people within the PR industry, media as well as amused students and one anti-flying campaigner. The beauty is its simplicity, humour and believability; Ryanair's latest PR disaster is to suggest it may charge £1 to use the in-flight toilet on the basis that during a short flight there is no requirement to supply a free service - they did not get much good media coverage and the 'court of public opinion' was deemed to be unsupportive. The implications of the ability to create and share material are obvious and of course it does not have to be outraged customers or satirists. Who would benefit most from this: a competitor obviously. So if you want to 'dis' your opponent you need a viral Internet campaign - this may well be a feature of the forthcoming local and European Parliament election in June, after all all it takes is a little know-how, some cheap software, and a web user with access to a network. Anything could be influential in the new media age!

One use for Facebook

Mention Facebook as a tool of political communication and you get very mixed reactions, and loads of issues emerge. The jury is certainly out on whether risks outweigh benefits, whether it represents reaching out or dumbing down or, perhaps most importantly, if it is about individuals communicating with individuals or individuals marketing themselves to potential voters. They are all accepted arguments for and critiques against! Here is an interesting example. With the European Parliamentary Elections on the horizon the Green Party are organising and one part of their mobilisation strategy is via Facebook. Their party group has been going for just short of two years, there is an active group that share links, event and campaigning ideas via the wall, it has 2,260 members and the admins include current MEP and party leader Caroline Lucas who is also an individual member. All good but nothing special one could argue.

But as the election nears what the party is looking for are activists, in fact messages from the group invite volunteers willing to do: "leafleting, mobilising members and potential supporters, writing letters to the local press, helping to create events for visiting Euro-candidates, watching for hustings opportunities…" The email calls it an Obama-style ground-level campaign and is aimed at the student activist seeking to add to their CV, but it also represents a way of targeting the people they need to. If they are prepared to join a 'Green Party' group and publicise their support they are likely to be at least interested in the idea of greater involvement and hence willing to be be encouraged to take part. So while it easy to condemn Facebook as mind-numbing and a thief of time it is enabling communication between the Green Party and a group of supportive individuals that may be hard to replicate if social networks did not exist. So, based on that argument, could an MP not also gain s similar support base within a constituency via Facebook that could be encouraged to be actively supportive at times of an election?

Chances are your MP is not on Facebook - but should they be?

It is always good to see an academic article generating debate and Andy Williamson's report for the Hansard Society has done just that in certain quarters. Well it will if you spin it a certain way. Andy's report is based on research among MPs to discover how they use the Internet. The findings are not earth-shattering though very interesting to those into such things. The conclusions are equally highly sensible; he argues for MPs to have a clear policy and strategy for going online, one linking with offline communication strategy, that MPs should think about the multiplier effect when using social networking (that one reader may tell another 10 or so), and to think about engaging with the communities that are key to them. That broad brush was spun by Emily Bell to argue that most MPs do not want 'connectivity' and 'avoid using Facebook or even email' and suggests that MPs who do not 'get' the Internet are about to be kicked out of their seats.

The most interesting thing about Bell's article is the comments it has generated, a 100 to this point which can be separated into a couple of camps broadly: the sceptics that think 'connectivity' is a good thing for MPs but something they would never consider - Almosta argues "they are scared s***less of being confronted by real people". Then there are those who suggest Facebook is the wrong place for politicians or indeed anything serious citing research to suggest it creates an audience of attention deficient and selfish individuals. Some of the inaccuracies are wonderful, such as the delightful comment by TristramShandy that "Lynn Featherstone, is great at responding promptly and constructively to emails - precisely because she's not the kind of bandwagon-hopping moron who thinks the illusion of accessibility is more important than the reality", sorry Tristram, Lynne is one of my friends on Facebook and quite and active user! But at the heart of the debate is the age old question of what is appropriate for political communication, is it the latest public fad or the old tried and tested methods? Facebook is not elitist, it may well be changing the way children interact, but if it was not the current sites it would be others. Should MPs embrace where the people are and will not doing so make them appear aloof and out of touch? Williamson's report shows some interesting data and raises interesting questions particularly about the future - email was once a minority communication tool among MPs, as were websites; now they are common and expected of all including parliamentary candidates. Will the future demand MPs have a version of Facebook or Twitter or something we have not yet even thought of, or should they resist and leave such innovations to the 20% or so early adopters? Big questions!

Is the web being taken seriously?

The hype, not just from the media but from all parties, is that the web is the new battleground. This is not just a post-Obama phenomenon, from Labour's Big Conversation to WebCameron to the invasion of Facebook by MPs and parties the Internet is being used more and more to promote parties.

I have had the fascinating (no sarcasm I promise) task of identifying candidates for the European Parliamentary election and whether they have a website. Here is something interesting, only the top six parties (Labour, Conservatives, LibDems, Greens, Scottish Nationalists and Plaid Cymru) name their candidates so far. But of those it is interesting how many, and indeed how few, have some form of web presence. For some it is a blog, for others a personalised website, and the minimum is a page embedded within the party website which offers some basic biographical details and an email or phone number. The Conservatives name 70 candidates, all of whom have some form of presence. Plaid Cymru similar have 100% presence, though there are only four in total anyway and the Scottish Nationalist party have four out of five. Next are the Greens, they are fielding 64 candidates of whom 47 are on the web, while of the 70 Liberal Democrat candidates 48 are immortalised online. But the losers in terms of a web presence are Labour. They field only 67 candidates and only 30, less than half, can be found to have a web presence of any sort at all. In fact the majority are identified only by a name on the party website with no details whatsoever. Now it may be the case that there is a lot of detail available somewhere for them all, and it is still early days, but if we take this as indicative of strategy, or the seriousness with which the party are taking the Internet, it is no surprise that the party is claimed to be lagging behind. Does it matter, well if there is anyone out there who is interested in the candidates and not only the party perhaps; or perhaps there is a broader symbolism, that it is an indication of the determination of some parties to be 'everywhere' (to steal the Obama line) and to take the election seriously.

Change.gov

Change has come to the US and the world, it must be true as every journalist says so. The actual nature of that change is to be seen, whether Obama is capable of delivering the change that his huge and diverse support now expects is a huge question but he has and continues to build expectations. In order to maintain interest and enthusiasm in him he has created a blog that allows his supporters, journalists and anyone interested to find out what he is saying and how is plans will evolve over the next 72 days before inauguration. The blog is Change.gov, and currently this includes links to videos of his speeches.

However this is not offering political Web 2.0 and appears to choose not to. It is a way of communicating unmediated messages directly to his audience. It does not allow comments on his news items or speeches, so ensuring total control over the message. There is an area of the site that asks for 'Your Story', "Tell us your story in your own words about what this campaign and this election means to you. Share your hopes for an Obama Administration and a government for the people". However this is appears arguably to be more about providing marketing material than involving the public directly in government, what Obama's election means to 'you', your hopes, can all be used as public endorsements of the campaign as they can be carefully selected and posted to offer the right impression. But perhaps the 'hopes' may also demand to be answered also and this blog could become a way in which Obama and his public can interact. At this point it is though a 'perhaps' and this is really a new way of communicating to (not with) the public and gaining endorsements.

The dirty politics of cybersquatting

Anyone can create a website and use any name they want, I think it would be a brave individual or organisation that would try to sue someone for breach of copyright over a name unless there already was the copyright in place. So if someone does create a site attacking you called http://www.yournameisatwat.co.uk/ don't think you have recourse to law. It is known as cybersquatting, taking over someone's name and using that to promote your message and not theirs. In politics it is becoming a well-used tool. In 2005 the Conservatives created http://www.libdempolicy.org/ to counter the Liberal Democrats' decapitation strategy. The same has been launched by Obama with http://www.johnmccainrecord.com/. The site offers "three things every voter should know about John McCain and... Iraq" for example. The simple message on most of the pages is that McCain is Bush by another name and so Obama and Biden are the candidates that offer real change - the ongoing narrative of his campaign pretty much.

So why is this not on his website, well it is, but why go cybersquatting? Well if a floating voter does go and Googles 'John McCain's Record' it comes up as the fourth hit. If Obama can get this to the top of the search results then voters will see his record before seeing that of McCain. I am not sure if McCain has a similar site, I saw this promoted via a premium ad on http://www.americanblogs.com/ at first I thought it was a McCain paid-for link, another way of capturing voters' attention. Such is the way the Internet allows for innovation in campaign strategy.

What's in a name

After some form of voting, the Conservative party have launched their blog: its name is THE BLUE BLOG - mmm. Content could be interesting: "The blog will start with a bang at this year's Conference, where we will be bringing you backstage news and views from David Cameron, the Shadow Cabinet, MPs, delegates and the occasional guest." Given the twittering of LibDems and the comparative silence from Labour, the Conservatives had to do something to maintain their status as the party most embracing technology (at the top level that is) and innovating. Not sure if this is simply a relaunch of WebCameron as that gets little media attention, an attempt to gain more interest in their e-communication, or something genuinely different. There is no link as yet, not even a holding page, their website does not advertise it but, as in the manner of modern politics, puts Brown and Darling centre-stage (right). Let's hope the Blue Blog will offer a more positive message about the party itself rather than attacks on opponents. The one problem, extrapolating from polls, Cameron has is that he is seen as better than Brown but there is little wide knowledge about his or the party's policies. A similar situation saw Neil Kinnock versus John Major, Major was then seen as the safer pair of hands. Perhaps the Blue Blog can get more policy out there as the media may not be doing Brown any favours at all but neither are they giving Cameron a platform.

Return on Investment?

The release of MPs expenses is often an occasion to marvel at either the strange, the exorbitant or the minuscule. With the Conservatives publishing the whole MPs expenses for the last three months (see here) as part of the transparency equals trust agenda, it is interesting to see how much MPs spend on communications. This category of spend is sadly most frequently an undefined general amount, so we know that Jonathan Djanogly spent £18 April to June; while David Davies (that's Davies of Monmouthshire) spent £7494.76. The problem is we do not know how that £7000+ is broken down. Other MPs are far more transparent and offer a full breakdown and this is fascinating in terms of their communication priorities and the potential return on investment.

Surprisingly, flicking through the report I estimate at least half spent absolutely nothing on communication, this suggests that either their communication (such as updating or maintaining a website) is free, or it is purely media relations and swallowed within the budget of a staff member. Staff may also be updating the website etc and so there is no extra cost. The major spend is the Westminster Report, the MP's newsletters which vary in frequency (2-4 per year) and in delivery method (TNT, Royal Mail). The average cost for this is £2796.

Websites are the next priority and, for those that have an associated cost, are far cheaper. While it is not defined exactly what the spend is, of the 17 that have a cost associated with the website all but three are below £1000, and seven are below £500. The disparity is interesting, one does wonder why Tony Baldry's website cost £1882.94, though an excellent site it does seem high. This is particularly when contrasted with David Cameron who pays £246.25 to Reaper Enterprises Ltd for his constituency website a separate entity to WebCameron.

For me this is interesting as it displays a shift in priorities to some extent. Interviewing MPs in 2002 as part of a project working for Ralph Negrine, few talked much about websites or constituency newsletters, the majority were concerned about media relations. The Liberal Democrats were alone talking about the Focus newsletter, this seems now to becoming a widespread practice. However the question is on return on investment. Is up to £5000 per quarter or per annum (I did wonder if some of the expenses declared were one-off or yearly payments; some say they are, some are unspecified) a good investment for something that may line a budgie's cage, cat litter tray or go straight into the bin? Well the answer is yes as somewhere in that process the recipient may recognise that their MP has communicated with them, assume this means they are working on their behalf, and so the MP gains an incumbency benefit. Equally, and aside from winning votes, it is a good thing that MPs demonstrate they are acting as representatives. But can websites overtake the newsletter? This would be highly cost effective and perhaps have more impact on that incumbency value. The few MP's websites I looked at are very good, very much about the constituency, but do they have a pull factor that will get a constituent visiting and interacting with the MP?

The dangers of inconsistency

There is an opportunity, but also a danger, with the Internet; unlike printed matter you can update it and revise it. So policy, theoretically, can quickly be changed. But printed matter can also disappear, it is much harder to broadcast a leaflet around the world to show an inconsistency. Websites leave impressions and so if you want to and have the right software you can very simply go back to a previous incarnation of a web page and compare it with the new version. John McCain has done just that. In an argument over Obama's fitness to rule there was some contestation about whether Obama claimed the surge strategy in Iraq was working or not. On July 11th he did say just that, by the 14th there was a slightly more complex argument on offer. McCain has posted the two sites side by side (view here, snapshot is below).

This shows the dangers of saying something publicly, and especially on a website, then reversing that decision and trying to undo it. It is these moments when it is far easier to say actually I was wrong, but I suppose the risk is working out which will play worst in the perception of the voters: is it worse to (as McCain claims of Obama) he lied to make a political point; or is it worse to be wrong?

Politics 2.0

Already labelled DD2.0, David Davis for Freedom is now up and running (finally). He links to Twitter, Facebook and Youtube. A key aspect seems to be donations, though on that page less of a case is made of how the money will be useful to promoting the anti 42 days campaign. However the site is clearly geared to addressing issues relating to civil liberties and is maybe building a grand alliance: Tony Benn joined Davis in a debate, which seems an unlikely combination prior to his stepping down. Benn's endorsement: "This by-election will give the voters in that constituency an opportunity to register their view on this issue, through the ballot box, which is, and always will be, the ultimate guarantee of our fundamental freedoms in a free society" can do Davis' case little harm. How this hub will develop will be interesting, particularly interesting will be the extent to which the public and other interested groups participate. Opportunities are currently limited, I note one comment on his blog post; is this the start of a Politics 2.0 with this issue as a focal point?

How not to use Twitter!

Twitter is about giving constant updates to those who choose to follow you, followers have the updates delivered to PCs of whatever size and variety. With Downing Street, David Cameron and a number of the candidates in Crewe & Nantwich using it, it seems to be a fashionable tool for permanent and election campaigning. The one team who seem to have failed to grasp the idea a lot of the time is that of John McCain.

Despite being a pioneer of online campaigning, yesterday he sent out four updates one after the other, effectively appearing to be in several places consecutively. One wonders how many of his 660 followers were a little confused by this (I was), and how many followed the links (I didn't). If they had the reason for the burst of tweets would have been clear, the team had just uploaded several videos of him speaking and wanted to instantly inform the world. But to get impact they missed the point. A one hour delay between each may have got them all watched, the immediate release may have got one watched if lucky.

Right message, Right media

Advertisements leave impressions with the viewer, few are constructed to directly make people think or evaluate the argument but accept it, perhaps subconsciously, or want to find out more. Hence it is no surprise that the majority of advertisements shown so far in the race for the nominations in the US have remained concentrated on television. However there is a new function for the Internet, while Youtube can amplify messages by allowing them to be re-posted, advertisements, websites and social networking is all about donations. Hence perhaps, Obama, the man most active on the web has earned the most donations, Clinton had to dip into her own purse while McCain relies heavily on Republican money. As we move from the nomination race to a Presidential contest will we see the Internet becoming more important for both candidates or will Obama carry on outstripping his opponents: I guess the key question is how much money can Americans afford to give to a campaign?

Vote for me, I joined Facebook

Incredible to know but, what do Pakistan's Pervez Musharraf, Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi, Taiwan's Ma Ying-jeou, Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, George W. Bush and every major US presidential hopeful all have in common? Well like Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao they have a Facebook profile. Wen has 13,000 supporters, small considerign the size of the Chinese populace but significant when Internet penetration is considered. OK it is impossible to say how many have to be his friend, given the Communist Party's style of government, but there may well be a love for the 66 year old who earlier this week reportedly called by bullhorn to one child trapped in the aftermath of the earthquake 'This is Grandpa Wen Jiabao, hang on child, we will rescue you!'. Whatever the case, it seems that even in China being on Facebook is a must have political accessory and must be seen as a way of enhancing ones reputation for being real, authentic, in touch etc etc; all those things that are supposed to engender trust. Will it have the desired effect one wonders or will it become another tool that effectively cancels itself out but will be seen as necessary as to not have one would be too great a risk?