Blog #7: Twitter and Politics

Dear Readers,

I am not a big fan of Twitter. The social network’s purpose is for users to be able to answer the question “what are you doing”? This is what the intent of creators was, and this is what it is used for.

So, people are using Twitter as a mode of self-promotion, and yet their similar interests as expressed in their ‘Tweets’ align them. Cool. My argument against using Twitter was the fact that I thought it would bring on the burden of people “tweeting” that they are eating a ham sandwich. I get enough of that on Facebook…  (note that I have continued to boycott using Twitter. I made an account and have not logged on since the day I created it).

However, reading about members of parliament (MPs) in the UK who have begun using Twitter as a means of updating the public about their political lives intrigued me, because although it could still be this same self-promotion that bothers me when it is done by ordinary people (i.e. guy eating the ham sandwich), I think self-promotion in the political arena is a great idea. Not only does it give potential voters a closer look at the candidates, but also, it allows these political figures to have even more power over their own image. That is, however, until mistakes are made… one example from the UK is the mistaken Tweet made by Britain’s secretary of state, Chris Huhne, in 2011: “From someone else fine,” it said. “But I do not want my fingerprints on the story C.” Although no one was sure what the message meant at first, it was obvious that it was intended to be private, and the rumor mill began in full force. This is a prime example of just how dangerous the personal usage of twitter by less tech-savvy politicians can have negative consequences as well.

For the one day that I used my Twitter account, I followed Obama’s page, and realized his page is not truly updated by him, but instead by his constituents. I was a little disappointed. But to be fair, he is a busy man. And having such a strong presence in new social media must involve a lot of upkeep. Today in my social media and governance class, the professor showed us a video that I thought was a great way to ‘showcase’ Obama’s successful presence on new media platforms, and I could not resist the temptation to post it (The link can be found below). 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YO5T1beyRA0

This video shows many social media platforms used by the Obama administration, and Twitter is included in these. Micro-blogging can be a great way to build identity and positively influence a politician’s self-presentation. But seeing examples of user error, such as that of Britain’s secretary of state Chris Huhne, shows the possibility of harm to a politician’s reputation. The social media footage shown in the above video was put together by the Obama administration, not Obama himself. This being said, it is probably smarter that politicians, especially those with such important positions such as Barack Obama, stay away from personal Twitter account posts, etc in order to avoid potentially damaging user errors. Or, if they are politicians with slightly less sway than Obama (i.e. the members of parliament) then perhaps they should have a little crash-course on using these platforms.