Washington, DC – One of the missions of this blog is to initiate a dialogue about how new media communications developments are and will affect political campaigns and politics. New media communications, for those still learning what that exactly means, as we all are, includes social networking, online communications, mobile devices and broadcast messaging.
I was reading the New York Times online today and saw this story, http://www.nytimes.com/external/readwriteweb/2009/02/08/08readwriteweb-a_journey_of_a_thousand_miles.html, about a man who is using Twitter to travel across the world. He is broadcasting his status as he travels in hopes of delivering his message, in this case, "I am traveling across the world and I am within 48 hours of your town," to Twitter subscribers and followers. His goal is to connect with people across the world on Twitter who are willing to house and support his travels.
The reason I thought this was interesting is it provoked the following questions: One, how will campaigns for public office use Twitter in the future? Two, how much will broadcast messaging be used in campaigns moving forward?
To the first point, it seems to me that individuals running for public office could use Twitter to take political organizing to one higher step than Barack Obama did by using Twitter. Volunteers and supporters can "follow" the candidate and, as the candidate makes his/her travels within their district, state or the country, the candidate can organize events on a grassroots level by "tweeting" their followers to an upcoming event. Further, Twitter allows community and grassroots organizers to create and build events and activities on their own in a much faster, viral way than an eVite or Facebook event. A grassroots organization can have on their "volunteer cards" a box for "follow our campaign on Twitter" and that way, organizers can sign supporters up and get dialed-in to instant communications. The end result? Campaigns and organizing will move even faster in the future.
To the second point, running a successful campaign is all about delivering the correct message to a targeted audience. Barack Obama was brilliant at this by delivering his message simultaneously to the religious groups and liberal civil rights activists, simultaneously by using social networking groups like, "Conservatives for Obama," or "Veterans for Obama," or "Women for Obama." These groups tuned-in to the message delivered to their group. The next step in this, with regards to broadcast messaging is, does a candidate create separate Twitter account for each of these voting blocs? I think, yes, they have to. If a candidate broadcasts one message, it may alienate a particular group. And, in the day in age of large persuadable voting groups, a candidate must be careful and precise with their message and its delivery – the cardinal rule of political campaigns.
If you aren't familiar with Twitter or what broadcast communications entails, I encourage you to visit www.twitter.com or reference the Wikipedia entry for "new media," http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_media.
Other related articles of late include:
"Why Television Still Shines in a World of Screens," The New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/08/business/media/08digi.html?_r=1&ref=technology
In other news, me and my roommate are just wrapping up the finishing touches on moving in to our new apartment. This past weekend our furniture arrived and we painted a wall. Here are some pictures from the painting project: http://picasaweb.google.com/nick.kowalski/AdministrationWashingtonDCMovingInFebruary2009#
If you have any thoughts on this post or others, please feel free to post your comments. Storytelling is a collaborative relationship between narrator and audience.
-NFK
