London was abuzz last week on and offline, with the London mayoral contest, and the victorious Boris garnered some significant social media support from no less than Ian Dale and Guido Fawkes. Guido trumpeted his support and even went so far as to create an I’m backing Boris group, while excitingly Ian Dale scooped an important exclusive of the week with his Guto Harri interview – emphasizing the now-recognised clout of the political bloggers.
Alongside these social media big-hitters, ‘civilian’ social network users have also been busy. Whether you thought we needed to Back Boris or if now he’s in you want to keep an eye on him with Boris Watch, it’s good to see politics being discussed. I was impressed at the number of friends who rushed to join these groups, when they’ve previously shied away from politics.
If social networks are a way to get young people engaging with and discussing politics, even in a peripheral way, that has to be a good thing. Barack Obama rides high at the top of the Facebook fan pages, nearly double his closest rival, the slightly less PC Chris Moyles from Radio 1, who relentlessly plugs the group every morning.
So whether you think it’s Le succès de Boris le bouffon or not, as mentioned in a general political post this week by Danah Boyd:
“Politicians [need to] treat the online world as another form of public space where direct outreach and interaction is critical. If you see networked publics as a modern-day street, it only makes sense to login to the street and start shaking hands.”
I for one felt more engaged seeing friends get involved, and noticing presence for political causes and characters in my online habitat. It was exciting to see tip offs from the likes of Mick Fealty on Twitter, and entertaining to see friends getting passionate on the likes of ididntvoteforboris.
Interestingly, when Ken and Brian were debating with voters on the Guardian’s CiF blog Boris didn’t take part. The reason his PR team gave was that he was “out and about meeting real people”.
So maybe it seems Boris should follow Danah’s advice!
Hmmm…comments like that represent a PR blunder in my book, and an understimation of what good online networking can do.
But Boris did something right I guess!
Unfortunately Boris Watch was banned from Facebook for no good reason! http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=18723836564 has more details.
No way – Facebook works in mysterious ways!
[...] been a big year for global politics, economy and culture, and we were there for the elections (and these), the Olympics as well as the less serious end of social [...]