Friday, May 11, 2007

Campaign Blog? Romney Wins this race

Although (all?) the candidates have a blog presence, Romney's approach appears to be a clever combination of new media and old family values. Called "Five Brothers", this is a blog by the sons about the father. If there is anything new media loves it is "sincerity", and unless the brothers come across badly this is likely to be a much stronger social media approach than the canned sincerity of professionals managing the other blogs.

Is it too much to ask that the candidates themselves participate more actively online? We'll see more of that as the election continues, but I think all the candidates are missing an incredible opportunity to more fully immerse themselves into the online world. Edwards and Obama have profiles on Twitter but it's not clear who writes them which for me raises as many questions about the candidate as bonus points for jumping on the social media bandwagon.

Where's Ben Franklin when you need him? He would have loved the new media and probably would already have built more than a few new companies based on the efficiencies of the internet.