Yesterday I wrote about how the Facebook and ABC News partnership was receiving a lot of negative press. I even called the partnership irrelevant. Soon after I received an e-mail from Facebook’s communications department stating “your posting seemed to talk mainly about content distribution. The partnership is actually about starting and ongoing debate and discussion about the presidential election—both on Facebook with the US Politics application and in a real-world, televised debate on Jan. 5.”
Perhaps I missed some of the details surrounding the partnership but my position still stands: Facebook users don’t want to spend their time on Facebook discussing politics for the most part. I still stand by that position. Today, Facebook began promoting their politics application again via the newsfeed to try to encourage users to become more active. While I think this is a great idea I don’t think it’s going to hold. As always, it is easier to be a pessimist so perhaps this will eventually work.
The funny thing is that yesterday, one of the Facebook corporate communications representatives emphasized the telvised debate coming up on January 5th but I couldn’t find any mention of the debate anywhere on the application. Honestly, I just go to the traditional news sites as well as Memeorandum to keep up to date on what’s going on in politics. Do you think the Facebook politics application will gain any traction?
Do I think the application will succeed? If they internationlise it, focusing on US politics will limit its growth potential. What about UK politics for instance, the London Mayoral elections are next year (I'm sure I read that London has the second biggest network on there)? Shouldn't those candidates be available in applications like this? The recent Australian election being another case in point.They should also broaden out what they mean by politics to be single issue and campaign based. Take the pro Burma Monks support group, these attract well over half a million users, people use it to stay up to date and organise protests etc. That's real politics in action. Allow us to use Facebook as more than just support this or that American politician and yes it will succeed and have an important impact on the world in which we all inhabit.
Comment by leon — November 27, 2007 @ 9:26 am
Do I think the application will succeed? If they internationlise it, focusing on US politics will limit its growth potential. What about UK politics for instance, the London Mayoral elections are next year (I'm sure I read that London has the second biggest network on there)? Shouldn't those candidates be available in applications like this? The recent Australian election being another case in point.
They should also broaden out what they mean by politics to be single issue and campaign based. Take the pro Burma Monks support group, these attract well over half a million users, people use it to stay up to date and organise protests etc. That's real politics in action.
Allow us to use Facebook as more than just support this or that American politician and yes it will succeed and have an important impact on the world in which we all inhabit.
Comment by leon — November 27, 2007 @ 10:26 am
According to Facebook's blog, 1.5 million people used the 2006 version of "U.S. Politics." (The current "U.S. Politics," application incidentally was automatically installed on the profiles of many 2006 users.) One and half million people is a pretty good start — probably a bigger number than a lot of standalone political sites get.
Comment by Michael Bauser — November 29, 2007 @ 4:03 pm
According to Facebook's blog, 1.5 million people used the 2006 version of "U.S. Politics." (The current "U.S. Politics," application incidentally was automatically installed on the profiles of many 2006 users.) One and half million people is a pretty good start — probably a bigger number than a lot of standalone political sites get.
Comment by Michael Bauser — November 29, 2007 @ 5:03 pm