It’s been a tumultuous week in Australian politics - at times for all the wrong reasons -, and social media have played an important role in the events. My take on the impact of Twitter on the Liberal leadership crisis and political reporting has now been published at ABC Unleashed , and I’m reposting it here. I think I like my original title better…

Coalition All Atwitter over Climate Change

The extraordinary events in the Liberal party room over the past few days are destined to enter the annals of Australian politics for a number of reasons - not least because of the unprecedented flow of up-to-the-minute, first-hand, indeed first-person information through the short messaging service Twitter to the waiting journalists and the wider public beyond.

News about the latest statements for and against the CPRS from individual MPs, and updates on the numbers supporting or opposing Malcolm Turnbull were received and retweeted within seconds of their arrival, and at times one could form the impression that those waiting for a resolution had a better sense of Turnbull’s numbers than the Opposition Leader himself.

Finally, Turnbull’s antics at his press conferences, and the statements of politicians and pundits during various subsequent interviews, also found an instant audience of commentators, often responding to blatant inaccuracies and naked spin in the way they wished journalists would.

Read more…

Liberal Party, journalism, politics ABC Unleashed, Australia, climate change, Liberal Party, Malcolm Turnbull, politics, Twitter

Cardiff.
Taking time out briefly from the Future of Journalism 2009 conference here in sunny (really!) Cardiff (you can follow my liveblog here), I notice that the ABC has picked up on the developing story around Joe Hockey’s tweeting from the parliament floor. This ties straight into our discussion of political uses of social media in the paper Jason and I wrote for the e-Democracy conference in Vienna earlier this week, of course. For more on this, see the ABC story, which includes some insighful commentary from Jason. But be warned: it also contains a photo of Hockey… Read more…

politics e-democracy, Jason Wilson, Joe Hockey, parliament, politics, Twitter

Sorry to be absent for a while - the whole teaching thing tends to get in the way of blogging.

I’ve offered my take on Twitter and Iran over at the ABC’s Unleashed site. A sample:

It seems the whole world is talking about the role Twitter has played in the aftermath of the Iranian elections. Although some have claimed that this is the “big one”, and “the first revolution that has been… transformed by social media”, it may be best for the time being to be a little more measured in assessing the difference Twitter is making.

For the rest, head over and join the fray at Unleashed.

politics, social networking ABCUnleashed, Iran, politics, Twitter

(Crossposted from snurb.info.)

Time to catch up with a few publications - our recent work is featured in a number of new collections:

Mobile Technologies: From Telecommunications to Media, edited by Gerard Goggin and Larissa Hjorth, collects some of the best papers from the Mobile Media 2007 conference (which I blogged about at the time) in Sydney. Looks like a fabulous collection, and I’m delighted that an article by former QUT Visiting Scholar Liu Cheng and me about SMS news in China has been included. We’re looking especially at the experience at Yunnan Daily Press, where Cheng led the roll-out of SMS news functionality, and we’re including some staggering statistics about the growth of Internet and mobile use in China as well (I wonder how they’ll be affected by the global financial crisis…).

Read more…

blogging, citizen journalism blogging, books, community, mobile, news, politics, youdecide2007

Opinion piece in the ABC’s Opinion section here.

With the US election likely to be decided today, it’s a good time to have a look at the way social media’s been used in this campaign. From the massive fundraising of Obama’s microdonors, to the fact checking of candidates, to the raving lunacy of the wingnut fringe, this election has really brought social media’s promises and pitfalls to the fore.

The exemplar of a successful political campaign’s use of social media is, barring a sudden upset, Obama’s campaign. Foregoing public funding and the big money of lobbyists, Obama has raised enormous amounts of money from primarily small donors, at last count over $US390 million. Obama claims this will allow him to reduce lobbyist influence in government, though inevitably, the truth is somewhat more complex than that.

Obama’s campaign has also make powerful use of social networking tools such as Twitter, MySpace-style social networking sites and even an iPhone application. This commitment to using tools to engage with a primarily younger, tech savvy audience, combined with an commitment to Network Neutrality and a progressive tech policy (Barack Obama on technology and innovation - PDF) has certainly helped his support amongst younger voters. McCain’s admission that he doesn’t know how to use a computer hasn’t helped his regain any of that support.

Read more…

Uncategorized abc, Barack Obama, democracy, e-democracy, election, McCain, Obama, politics, psephology, QUT, social media, social networking, USA