A graph indicating the frequency of the term “#tweetdebate”

Last night’s debate was truly an interactive experience for all. Although I setup some guidelines to score the candidates, things quickly took on a life of their own as the group formerly known as the audience assigned their own scoring –and the #tweetdebate tag was used for a variety of observations. Current TV overlayed tweets live on their TV station (see these pics of Al Gore) which I found interesting at first –then extremely distracting as the letters floating near the chins of the candidates and I eventually switched back to CNN.

The Tweetdebate game morphed and evolved to something far bigger and greater than I intended, and although the graph above shows a real spike in activity, it’s truly organic in how it was used. I think for the next three debates we can continue to use the tag, but I won’t be doing anything as formal.

We should expect to see advanced sentiment monitoring tools by the next election that will track opinions, tone, and attitudes in real time from microblogging, social networks, and whatever comes next.

The bottom line? TV is no longer a lonely experience –anyone with a cell phone or internet connection can now participate and those that listen can benefit from learning, adapting, and in some cases, appeasing.

(…and yes, if you’re not from the United States, we’re an interesting culture)

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UPDATE: McCain has committed to join.

Why: Why let the media pundits and political analysts have all the fun? You can now be an armchair critic, all you need is a twitter account, a TV, and internet access.

[On the first Presidential Debate on Sept 26, 2008, YOU get to be the armchair political analyst and use Twitter to score the candidates]

What is it: With the success of the previous Twitter SuperBowl ads rating last Jan, let’s repeat this community based voting event for the upcoming presidential debates, this time, you’re in charge.

When:
9PM Eastern. September 26, 2008: Presidential debate with domestic policy focus, University of Mississippi, Oxford, MS. More details available from the commission of Presidential Debate.

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Rules:
You’re the judge! In your opinion, score points to the two candidates and tweet it

A) Score the candidates ability to debate
Using twitter, you can score the candidates with this handy scoring guide.

-3 for a personal attack
-2 for a false statement
-1 for avoiding the issue, or not answering the question
+1 for a successful assertion
+2 for a successful counterpoint to opponents assertion
+3 Quotable sound bite

B) Use Twitter to tell the world (use the hash tag)

Example: A proper tweet is: “Mccain +1 for articulating his energy policy #tweetdebate”

Example: A proper tweet is: “Obama -3 for calling McCain an old fart #tweetdebate”

Example: A proper tweet is: “Mccain +3 for great line: “It’s the economy stupid” #tweetdebate”

C) See what everyone else is saying

A good practice is to open another tab on your browser, and watch what others are saying on twitter search, tagged with the keyword #tweetdebate.

D) After the Debate, Tally your score, then leave a comment
At the end of the debate, count up your score, your twitter handle, then leave a comment on this post.
Tip: Enter your score into a spreadsheet in real time, saving you time to tally.

Example:
My twitter handle is http://twitter.com/jowyang

Obama scored a total +25 and McCain scored a total of +26

Then create a percentage: Obama scored 49% and Mccain 51%

Then soak in your glory of being a true armchair political analyst (and argue the scoring of the other twitter pundits)

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Future Debates: Come back to this site for discussions

October 2, 2008: Vice Presidential debate, Washington University, St. Louis, MO

October 7, 2008: Presidential debate in a town hall format, Belmont University, Nashville, TN

October 15, 2008:Presidential debate with foreign policy focus, Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY

Despite that I work at a research firm, this event is entirely for entertainment, and some education, and won’t be used in any formal studies –have fun.

Input from Zack Reiss-Davis

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Post Event Findings:
The game started out with folks scoring as suggested above, but soon, the scoring became pretty lax, then many just used it as a way to track conversations. Current TV was showing tweets live on TV, which at one point, overwhelmed their system, resulting in no tweets showing. Twitter’s infrastructure withstood the onslought –I think they’re finally starting to see their opportunity as a major communication device.

We started out strong scoring the sound bytes and assertions, but soon the threshold to score became too difficult. I suspect folks were also interested in Current TV, The Drinking Game, the Friendfeed debate room, or just used the tweetdebate tag to track all their responses. In any case it was all good –watching any event is no longer a lonely event –we participate and mainstream media is watching and adopting.

A graph indicating the frequency of the term “#tweetdebate”

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I had a great time on Mario Armstrong’s Digital Spin Radio (NPR Affiliate) which was joined by KickApp’s Michael Chin (who has a cool accent). He saw my post on Social Marketing from Democrats and Republicans, which kick started this conversation. Also, McCain has launched a new social network, using KickApps, which has caused a flurry of online discussions

And yeah, they had to patch me onto the show, they must have had me on mute –insert joke below in comments, I need a bit of humility once in a while.

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Above: The Social Technographics of Voters, read Josh Bernoff’s Analysis which further segments the behaviors of McCain vs Obama supportersa

In this post, I’m going to make some observations from my network, but my only caveat is, this is not representative of the whole tech industry. First, we should ask some questions about what I’m seeing:

Does the Social Media Space tend to skew Democratic?
I’ve noticed for some time that the web industry tends to skew very liberal and democratic, you certainly see elements of this within Digg, for example, I did an advanced query of dugg (voted) stories that got on the front page, (title only) and McCain has 42 pages (many stories are negative), and “Obama” has 65 pages (mixed bag of content).

Does sentiment tell us much?
Yet frequency isn’t telling, and sentiment is. Last night, I asked the community around me in Friendfeed to list out three keywords what come to mind in this association test for both parties. You can read the Republican, and Democratic responses –nearly opposite.

Update: I’ve asked my Friendfeed network to think about why there’s strong liberal sentiment in FF, read their responses.

Why does the social space (or at least my network) tend to skew so left? It could be a number of factors from age, willingness to adopt change, or that the ideology of the very social web in it’s essence could be core to liberal beliefs. In fact, if you read a book on blogging or social media marketing, you could quickly transplant the words “company” for “government” and the book would still read very logically.

Is it because there may be many Republicans in Silicon Valley?
Yet despite this lean from the left within my social media network, I do remember during the last election that a great deal of republican votes came from the Silicon Valley. I remember my friends who worked at NASA, Boeing, Lockheed, that were strongly encouraged by their management to vote Republican, as it would increase the eventual spending in the aerospace and hi-tech sector. Many of these companies have large headquarters in the Mountain View area, with thousands of companies supporting this eco-system, in fact read this 2004 article from the last election which profiles ’sheepish republicans’ in Silicon Valley, it’s an interesting mix here in the valley as while folks make swing left in ideology, many are very wealthy.

Is it adoption of Obama and McCain Social Media?
Not all is lost by the Republicans in this space, this article by Techpresident (Which is indexing and commenting on the the digital marketing efforts of each candidate) suggests that even though Obama may have a grass roots lead within social media and dedicated staff (including Facebook co-founder), McCain’s supporters could master the tide by creating an API and encouraging the movement to create their own applications.

Or is it speed of adoption of these tools?
If speed is any type of indicator of adoption of social marketing, McCain just launched their online community on the campaign domain, called McCain Space, Yet Obama’s campaign has been up and running with MyBarackObama for some time.

So what is it that fuels the social media space to appear to be more active for the Democrats vs the Republicans? Let’s focus on data:

Some Answers May Lie with the Technographics of Voters (see above graphic)
In Josh’s analysis, he points out that the tendency to Join (be in a social network) between Obama supporters and McCain supporters is nearly a margin of 13%, which isn’t a lot but given that across the board Obama members are more particiaotpry in soical technographics than McCain supporters they’re more able to energize their base. Perhaps the most telling is the Spectator behavior, which indicates which support group is more likely to consume citizen created content. Nearly tho-thirds of Obama, (59%) consume social content, and less than half of McCain (44%) supporters will consume social content, a margin that straddles the half way mark.

Data about overall existing behaviors of users (technographics) are perhaps a key indicator that demonstrates why one party may have an advantage in social marketing.

In typical internet humor, a meme called “Little known facts about Sarah Palin” continues to spread throughout twitter. Given her largely unknown background, the twittersphere has had fun creating her background for her.

The above is just cursory observations, had I more time I would love to do a more formal study on this specific vertical, maybe in four years.

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In this above video (If you’re in a feedreader, or email, click here) John McCain admits to not knowing how to use a computer, but does it really matter?

Although 71% of Americans use the internet (Internet world stats -2007) 70 year old John McCain isn’t unlike other Americans his age, in fact, only 22% of Americans 65 and older use the Internet. (Pew Research -2006) So does it matter if he, potentially the next President of the United States used the internet?

This video has spurred up some discussion in twitter, Julie suggests that understanding modern ways is key:

“re: McCain - it’s not just about need. It’s about 21st century culture and new ways of thinking and communicating.”

On the other hand Russpage says he’s got plenty of staff to help him, computer ability isn’t important:

“A president almost never uses a computer. What for? Email? He has people who do it for him. People do everything for him“

Despite the ranging views, this blog is about how companies use the web to connect with customers, it’s not a political blog, I do talk about the many presidential candidates using social networks to get their message out, and how the web reacts to the political discussion.

Yet the question remains, and I’d like your answers:

Is knowing how to use a computer and use the internet a job requirement?

Does it impact a leaders ability to manage the country and impact the world?

Does it influence your vote, if so, why?

What do you expect from your leaders? CEO? President?

Although I’m a technologist that works for a technology research firm, I don’t believe it’s a critical job requirement, despite it being a very powerful intelligence gathering and communication tool.

Few minutes later: As expected in the fragmented ‘web’ the conversation has spread to Friendfeed .

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I was watching the chatter, and participating in the conversation, with great fascination. I’ve recorded some data using free social media tools (minutes after Obama left the stage), that look at keywords on twitter, as well as ‘traffic’ to websites of the runners. I rarely place much weight in any single use of these tools, but there is a clear trend towards Obama getting a great deal of activity. Is this telltale to the future? I’m not sure.

Above: Twist provides activity of keywords over last 7 days. I recorded this immediately after Obama spoke. No surprise that Obama frequency would be higher during this event centered on him.

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Above: TweetVolume, date range unknown, making it difficult to place any weight on the value of this graph

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Above: Tag clouds comparing the three keywords, interesting, but not telling much, other than idea association, of course, context is everything, so the terms could be used in a negative way.

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Above: Blog Activity Over last 30 days, this is telling, Obama keywords much higher frequency.

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Above: Alexa Website activity to Candidate sites, Obama has higher traffic

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Above: Compete website activity to Candidate sites, again Obama

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Related Forrester report from Josh Bernoff: The Social Technographics® Profile of Voters. Love to hear your analysis on this. Also, leave comments below if you know of other websites that are tracking the web strategy of the campaign.

Was this interesting? Share with others by Digging it. Also, see this analysis on viral videos.

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If you’ve read the Cluetrain Manifesto, you’ll know how the internet empowers individuals and smashes barriers. I had the opportunity to interview Rey Ramsey, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the One Economy Corporation, he shares his passion for his program to deliver access to the internet to low-income communities.

One of the outputs of the One Economy corporation is the beehive is a community website that provides resources as:

“We created the Beehive to be the place to go for information and resources around the things that matter in our lives: money, health, jobs, school and family. And, we’d like you to have a little fun while you’re here so, we’re throwing in some games and quizzes to keep it interesting.”

Townhall, a medium for civic journalists, community advocates and youth to engage provides “It uses technology to make it easy for people to share ideas, discuss topics and learn about issues.”

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I’m not sure how many times we’ve heard in the first wave how online pornography was the driver for innovation during the first wave. I worked at Exodus Communications from 2000-2003. I distinctly remember hallway chatter of the executive staff finding out that a major portion of the content that was hosted at Exodus was adult related. Apparently, the CEO decreed that we remove all porn related customers, apparently when the financial analysis came back it would have destroyed the business. Exodus, of course was an amazing bankruptcy (Chapter 11 –twice) but that’s another story.

It’s now 2007 and I’m seeing a tremendous amount of innovation being done from Presidential candidates who know to reach a wide audience that’s influential, online and educated, that having a solid social media strategy is more important.

Barack Obama, John Edwards have a stronger social media presence than many of today’s Fortune 100 companies.

With last week’s YearlyKos presedential debates we’re seeing an incredible amount of innovation as they adopt live video streaming for the debates, John Edwards has live video chats online, the YouTube debates and many other strategies for the presidential election (see my ongoing list).

It’s pretty clear that these mobile and active organizations are using the tools of information (I suspect they’ve many college interns) that know how to use these tools effectively.

[The American Presidential candidates are adopting social media as a core communication strategy, much faster and more effectively than most Global Fortune 1000 companies]

I need to credit to colleague Jennifer Jones for the insightful conversation that yielded this blog post, she’s been covering this topic from her podcast series. Also worth noting her latest blog post on Marketing Profs about Strategic Marketing is worth a read –I learn from her.

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There are over 2500 people watching this Ustream video of the Yearly Kos convention.

The CEO of Ustream Chris Yeh emailed me and suggests that “By the way, I checked, and right now C-SPAN is running the House of Reps,
C-SPAN 2 is running some author named Mike May at a Borders. That means that Ustream is, as far as I know, the ONLY live video coverage of this
event.”

Brad Hunstable the co-founder of Ustream is at the debate live streaming, he’s ‘jumping up and down’ trying to get his question asked.

Great lines from the debate with a tech focus:

Hillary Clinton: “The Architecture of the Internet needs to remain open”

Audience: Will the White House have a blogger?
John Edwards: “Yes, we will be hiring Elizabeth Edwards”

John Edwards’s Twitter message: “Just leaving the forum. Some great questions on media consolidation. On my way to the breakout session in RM s404 - hope to see you there.”

Barack Obama: “I’d love to answer everyone’s questions, but I won’t be able to, but that’s what the internet is for, hopefully we’ll have some back and forth there

Many of those from the audience who asked questions identified themselves as bloggers, and even said the name of their website.

It was interesting to watch folks in the chat, you can hear the voices of the people, their thoughts, what they thought was not authentic, their opinions. The voices of the people are talking back, influencing. Live streaming energizes the events of the world, this is why I advise this company, so exciting!

I’ve updated the list of Web Strategies of the 2008 Presidential Candidates, see how the battle is being waged online.

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I just got word from Chris Yeh, the CEO of Ustream (who I advise) that John Edwards will be on Ustream after his debate on CNN to answer questions from the Ustream community.

What is Ustream? It’s a live video stream on the web + chat room interaction (and other features). What does this mean? This means that everyone who tunes in will have an opportunity to ask questions, be part of the community and talk to John Edwards.

I’ve started a list of key web battles by the presidential candidates, be sure to check out this list. The web is empowering everyone to communicate and for figures in power to reach others, and be more human.

So what will you ask him? leave a comment.

Update: Here’s the site where John Edwards will be streaming from.

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(Above if you can’t see the player from your feedreader or email, please access the file)

Barack Obama wants to be my Facebook friend, John Edwards sends me Tweets, and Hillary wants to start a conversation with me.

Jennifer Jones interviews Peter Leyden who runs the new politics institute in San Francisco, and is discussing the battlefronts and tools used by today’s modern candidates.

What you’ll learn:

-Who’s using it
-Is it a generational thing?
-Which party is using the tools right
-Who’s in the lead?
-What to expect in the future

I’ve been keeping track of some of the major battles and Web Strategies of the political candiates of 2008, if you know of any specific things to add to that post, please leave a comment

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The largest battle ever fought on the web this decade will be for the office of President of the United States, check out the list of candiates.

Chris Salazar reports that Facebook users are using widgets and displaying banners of who they’re supporting, he’s got screenshots and links to other resources.

I’m also starting to see new levels of interaction as Democratic Presidential Candidate Senator Chris Dodd has started to Ustream (live video with chat), according to the official Ustream blog, a company I advise.

Did you know I’m keeping a record of all the major Web Strategies being deployed by candidates? Check out Web Strategies of the 2008 Presidential Candidates.

Side note: Remember how screwed up the counting process was for the last election? Well why don’t we use ATM machines? We trust them with our entire lives, why can’t we use them for secure voting?

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There’s a battle being fought between Generals and they’re using the internet as the battlefield. I’m using this post to track the Web Strategies (how organizations use the web to reach to others) of the 2008 Presidential Candidates. I usually focus on Corporate Web Strategies, but am fascinated by the political battles being waged. Learn more about me on my profile page, or subscribe to my blog if you are interested in Web Strategy.

[One of the largest battles of the 2008 Presidential War is being fought on the online battlefield. Various Web Strategy programs, attacks, and counter-attacks are being deployed]

Why the web? The web is faster, cheaper, national, and most importantly, where many votes spend their days and nights. We know that the Web is the number one medium in the workplace, and is quickly closing ground on TV at home.

Key Web Strategies and Battles of the 2008 Presidential Election:

John Edwards Web Strategy uses Social Media
I noticed that John Edward’s camp was one of the first to use Social Media features early on in his campaign. I’ve documented that he’s deployed: “John Edwards has this website, a group blog, his personal blog (does he write it himself?), podcasts, videos, and even a myspace page. Holy Geez, that’s more social media than I have!”

Blogger Relations
John Edwards was one of the first to invite bloggers along with him on the trail, he let PodTech’s Robert Scoble share his intention to run for presidency. Watch the PodTech video, where I work. -PodTech, Jan 07

Obama makes announcement using YouTube
I’ve documented this: “Obama has made a pretty important announcement by using Social Media. I enjoyed this comment: “Change happens at the grassroots”. It’s unclear what he plans are, but it looks like he’s doing an exploratory program. You can view all of Obama’s videos on YouTube on his YouTube profile page.” -Jan 07

Blog Widget Marketing for Fund Raising
I was one of the first to notice this trend about a year ago. Rudy has a widget that can be added to any blog, which helps him raise money. “To raise money, former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani is using one of the newer tech innovations, a “widget.” His site offers supporters computer code to paste on their own blogs. Blog readers who click on that widget are sent to Giuliani’s JoinRudy2008 site, where officials can collect their e-mail addresses and other information.” -USA Today, April 07

Hillary launched her campaign with video –deployment somewhat successful
The ‘viral’ video that Hillary launched did not have full social features, it was not easy to share. I documented on this post. Jan 07

YouTube attack against Hillary (Citizen Advertising)
“The political world was rocked two weeks ago when a video attacking Clinton spread from video-sharing site YouTube to blogs and then mainstream media. The video, dubbed Hillary 1984, a slick “mash-up” of Clinton speeches and a famous Apple TV commercial with an ominous Big Brother overtone, was produced by a supporter of rival Democratic candidate Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois.” Sadly, I learned the creator of the Advertorial left his job, details unknown -USA Today, April 06

Social Networking on Campaign Site
“Presidential candidates are giving their own sites a social networking spin. At My.BarackObama.com, supporters can create profiles and blogs, and link with friends.” -USA Today, April 06

Presence and Instant Messaging on Twitter
John Edwards was one of the first to have a Twitter profile, which is frequently updated. It is suspected that it is updated by one of his aids. Since then other candidates have jumped on the twitter bandwagon -March 07

John McCain’s MySpace Hacked
A vandal “enhanced” John McCain’s myspace profile: “Davidson decided to play a small prank on the campaign this morning as retribution. Since he’s in control of some of the images on the site, he replaced one that shows contact information with a statement:” -reports TechCrunch, March 07

Summary of Joe Biden’s Web Strategy
Biden has Twiter (joebiden). Video programing “headtohead08” via YouTube player. Blogger Relations: Responded to Jeff Jarvis’ (PrezVid.com) prezconference-tagged videos . MySpace and Facebook profile: “Recent news from the campaign seems to indicate they’re going to use the Democratic Party website’s social organization tool PartyBuilder for getting people together and organizing events.” -Shelbinator via comments:

Head to Head 08 (Video Battles)
Joe Biden puts his videos right up to other candidates on Head to Head 08, so direct sound bytes can be accessed and played on demand via YouTube. -Shelbinator via comments

Tech President
This is a very resourceful site that is tracking much of the battle, they’ve analysis that even compares the amount of myspace friends from each campaign group. Worth checking out the techPresident blog.

Chris Dodd uses Ustream for real-time conversation
The official Ustream blog reports that Chris Dodd takes real-time questions and has a conversation. Now we’re talking, (literally) as information moves faster real time and bi-directional. (I’m an advisor for Ustream)

Facebook users are sporting support banners
Facebook users have started their own campaigns by creating widgets in Facebook, Chris has the story.

Live streaming of the Presidential Debate Ustream will be streaming this event: “On Saturday at 1pm CST, Ustream.TV will stream LIVE the Presidential Leadership Forum (a Democratic Presidential debate) featuring all the big names: Sen. Hillary Clinton, Sen. Barack Obama, Sen. John Edwards, Sen. Chris Dodd, Governor Bill Richardson, and other candidates. Additionally on Saturday at 8am CST, Ustream.TV will provide LIVE coverage of the Ask The Leaders Forum featuring Bob Geiger, Rep. Rahm Emanuel, Sen. Charles E. “Chuck” Schumer, Sen. Harry Reid, and Speaker Nancy Pelosi.”

Breakdown of Social Media tools by candidate
I like this graph, that breaks out which candidates are using which social media tool. Barack Obama is clearly in the lead followed by Ron Paul. Democrats are using these tools over the Republican party.

Know of more? Add a comment
If you know of any other tactics use, feel free to leave a comment. This is NOT a political website, it’s a website focused on the tools used on today’s modern web, and is not intended to be a political debate.

Related Topics
I’m a Web Strategist, my mission is to help corporations understand and devise strategies using these tools. If this article was relevant to you, I also recommend you read:

The Many Forms of Web Marketing for the 2007 Web Strategist

10 Social Media Strategies for the Fortune 1000 Corporations

Corporate Podcasting Strategies for 2007

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