Obama campaign site debuts social network

I noticed the my. link, when I was on BO’s website to watch the video from today. I was glad to see that they’ve expanded beyond the boring “bio” stuff that had been there before, but they’ve also been criticized somewhere (possibly the WaPo) for having the least useful candidate site.

So, I’m glad he’s doing better and I haven’t yet delved into the new features, but it would be interesting to see how it differs from John Edwards’ site. Right now and without any information, the JE site has long had a two-way vlogging feature (which I believe I first learned about on LR, last year) and they have real-time chat, but though I’m no expert on either of their sites, perhaps the networking of blogs would be THE feature from BO. Though, it may also not differ so much JE’s. I just don’t have enough information in hand.

Though, I will agree that this whole digital candiacy thing is the wave of the future. First we had Dean with his meet-ups, then Kerry did the best with what was available at the time (blogs & groups) and now, Hillary streamed “conversations”, John Edwards had his blog and vlog host operational between campaigns (so, it’s been through beta) and now somebody has sold Obama a package. I’m sure things will only get better with each passing day and every successive campaign.

Not to be too much of a cynic and I realize there’s an unexplained air about the candidate, but thus far, we’ve learned that you can put some cartoonish buttons on essentially the same thing that Kerry had in ’04 and it’ll get better press than the other candidate’s site.

Heck, we learned the same thing we Obama announced his exploratory committee; At first, it was just available as an unsharable video, then supposedly he signed a deal with someone, but he didn’t use that deal to webcast today’s announcement and somehow, the fact that this one guy had something embeddable, trumped the exact same thing done by the candidate’s who had previously announced.

I think we’ll learn something from everyone, much as whomever is heading the Obama web team learned from John Kerry’s people and they had learned from Howard Dean. And, though I’m not endorsing any candidate, I’ll reiterate that folks should look at what John Edwards has going. Though, I guess he just hasn’t caught the imagination, so he’s not going to get the press.

Why is it that I like Obama but don’t want anything to do with his “social network”? I guess because I don’t care that much to register my info with ANOTHER social network. Also, I generally don’t make up my mind on a candidate until closer to the election. I honestly would like to hear a debate first.

My view is that this will help him in the primary to build a huge base, but once the general election rolls around, your typical apathetic public won’t use it.

Hello!
I would like to discuss networking opportunities with you.
Respectfully,
Svetlana

Svetlana Toun
SVP – International Strategic Alliances
http://www.alansismedia.com
PH: 866-618-1950 x 5395
FAX: 480-452-0247
stoun@alansismedia.com