“The political influence of the Internet continues to grow with each election year. Whereas 3% of Americans listed the Internet as their primary source for political information during the 1996 U.S. presidential campaign, 40% said the Internet was their main news source during the 2008 election” (Pew Research Center, 1996,2008).
A 37 percent increase in 12 years is a huge jump. In 1996 the internet wasn’t in nearly every home like it is these days. Many people only news source is by using the internet. I know mine is for the most part. I don’t get a paper because I can read it online. I do occasionally watch the local news, but I would say I get most of my news from the internet. Anything new on politicians is usually reported right away on the net.
The down fall I see as using the internet as your only source on what’s going on is, there seems to be a lot more misleading information that gets posted.
Being an election year, people are going to be flocking to their computers to read about the politicians. “During the 2008 campaign, 78 percent of those getting online political information will use non-traditional sites such as Weblogs” (Parmelee, Davies, & McMahan, 2011, p. 627). I think the problem with using any kind of blog is anyone can post their opinion, and not everything mentioned will be facts. Some Weblogs have fact-check mainstream media coverage. I have learned that because something says it’s a fact, doesn’t mean it is indeed the truth. I don’t think this is any worse than watching a bias news program. With news channels favoring a certain party, they will try and persuade its viewers.
The social media sources are another avenue for people to get political information. Sites like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter have reached out to millions and millions of people. It’s no wonder politicians have turned to these sites to get their political agenda out. “During the 2008 election just over 55% of the adult U.S. population sought some level of online involvement; 45% of Internet users watched videos online, a more traditional form of political content consumption (Pew, 2009a).
In the months leading up to the November 2010 elections, 22% of adult Internet users engaged with a political campaign on Twitter or social networking sites; 8% of online adults posted political content, and 7% started or joined a political group on a social networking site” (Himelboim, Lariscy, Tinkham, & Sweetser, 2012, p. 93).
It is apparent that the social media played a huge role in the 2008 elections; and I can see these numbers being higher in the 2012 elections. We are in a world where technology is our everyday life. Politicians know that the best way for them to get elected is by their involvement with technology, computers, and social networks.
Between 1996 election to 2008 election, we saw a huge increase in people going online to get their political information. A big reason for the dramatic increase is that in 1996 there wasn’t internet in nearly every home or phone. More and more people are discovering social media sites like Facebook. Therefore more and more politicians will use these sites to get their agenda to the people.
2 comments:
I agree that the use of social media for political campaigning will continue to increase for the foreseeable future. The major problem that I see with the use of social media is that the potential audience is somewhat limited to those that already are supporters or followers. A traditional media advertisement reaches people of all political leanings during the commercial. Outreach through social media, particularly Twitter, may serve to motivate followers but does little to distribute the message to a diverse audience. Facebook can be a more successful means of getting a message out because friends of followers will see the postings and other political activities that are liked by followers.
I think political campaigning via social media is actually a better outlet than TV or newspapers. Not only is the cost outrageous, most people don't take the time to be anything more than annoyed by political advertising during their favorite programs. Via the internet, we can research it on our time, get the thoughts of many or just those of people we respect and care to listen to (our Facebook friends). TV, print and electronic media will all be biased--that's not going to change. But reading blogs or comments to political views online could be a way for people to vet through the actual issues at hand. Kind of like reading online reviews before you buy or checking out what the critics say about a movie you wanted to see.
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