Are CU students using Facebook and MySpace to learn about politics
Facebook and Myspace may not be the best place to learn about politics.
Presidential candidates are using social networks such as Facebook, MySpace and YouTube to reach out to young voters.
Candidates Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John McCain all have Facebook application pages specifically dedicated to their campaign. The only candidate who did not was Republican Mike Huckabee, but Huckabee does have a Facebook group. Dozens of groups either support or denounce each of the candidates as well.
The candidates’ Facebook pages show thousands of supporters.
On the night of Super Tuesday, Obama’s official Facebook page said there were 381,179 supporters. The next morning, that number jumped to 384,904 supporters.
The number of supporters for the Democratic candidates, Obama and Clinton, outnumber the number of supporters for McCain and Huckabee. McCain’s Facebook page had 44,848 supporters the morning after Super Tuesday. Huckabee’s group had 37,144 members.
The candidates’ official MySpace pages have many supporters as well.
Like Facebook, the Democratic candidates’ MySpace pages had more “friends” than the Republican candidates. Obama had 258,530 friends the morning after Super Tuesday. Hillary Clinton had 178,370 friends.
Huckabee had 34,682 friends on MySpace, while former candidate Romney had 370,099 friends. There was no listing for friends on McCain’s MySpace page.
The candidates’ Facebook and MySpace pages have many different resources for users.
The candidates’ MySpace pages have links to different Web sites, to volunteer or donate for their campaigns. They also have separate links for people to read endorsements for the candidates, or links to their positions on issues like health care and the war in Iraq.
A few of the candidates’ pages also include personal information.
According to Huckabee’s MySpace page, his favorite movies are “The Godfather,” “Citizen Kane,” “Casablanca” and “To Kill a Mockingbird.”
Clinton’s MySpace page mentions that her favorite reality TV show is “American Idol.”
YouTube also offers users the chance to connect with their candidates.
A new program called “You Choose ’08” lets viewers upload campaign videos to a specific channel.
The Obama channel is ahead of any other candidate still in the race with 613 uploaded videos. His channel has also had 11,819,871 channel views, well above any other candidate.
The runner up is Clinton’s channel with 243 videos and 1,297,337 channel views.
McCain and Huckabee’s channels have had similar results, with 166 videos on McCain’s page and 180 videos on Huckabee’s. The McCain channel has had 586,229 channel views, and the Huckabee channel has had 443,220 channel views.
The YouTube “You Choose ’08” channel also has links on the page for issues. Users can click on education, energy, health care, immigration, Iraq or the economy to see the candidates’ positions. There are also links to watch broadcasts of the Republican and Democrat CNN/YouTube debates.
Though the candidates’ profiles have many “friends,” some CU students say they do not use the profiles to learn more about the candidates.
“I would look (at the profiles), but not use them as a source of information,” said Kyla Benson, a sophomore film studies major.
Jenna Brooks, a junior English major, said she wouldn’t use Facebook as a political source.
“I would definitely go to The New York Times before Facebook,” Brooks said. “People join groups on Facebook like ‘when I was a kid Pluto was a planet.’ It’s not a consistent source.”
Sophomore psychology major Alex Eichenbaum agreed.
“I would look at (the profiles) maybe, but there are better places you can get information than Facebook,” Eichenbaum said.
Contact Campus Press staff writer Marcy Franklin at marcy.franklin@colorado.edu.
