Campaigns Take a Step Back on Social Media

Clay Shirky: “Clinton used mailing lists in ’92, and every election since then — famously Howard Dean to Barack Obama — has involved considerably more imaginative use of social media. And this election has not. I’ve been quite surprised by that.”

“I had a student looking at Super PACs a while ago, and we said, ‘Let’s try and find out what the Super PACs’ social media strategy is.’ As she came back about 10 days later, she said, ‘I think I know what the Super PAC’s social media strategy is: Don’t use it.’ That’s exactly the whole point of being a Super PAC, to be able to spend unlimited money on the kind of media where no one has the right or the ability to respond, and to minimize transparency. This election feels to me, right now, more Nixon-Kennedy than Obama-McCain because television has become the tool of choice for the source of unlimited fundraising. Politicians like television better; nobody gets to yell back to you if you’re yelling on TV.”