Social Media to Play Significant Role in General Election Debates

  • Yahoo, AOL and YouTube are working together with the Commission on Presidential Debates to launch “The Voice Of” depots for the general election debates, allowing people to watch the debates live and interact via online tools.
  • “The 2012 debates can be the foundation for a season of conversation, and the Internet initiative will provide unprecedented access for citizens to participate in that conversation,” explains CPD co-chairs Michael McCurry and Frank Fahrenkopf in a statement.
  • A counter will keep track of how many viewers are tuned in via the depots. “For example, if 100,000 people are watching, the headline on the sites will read ‘The Voice Of 100,000,'” reports Politico.
  • The debates will also showcase the debut of Microsoft’s Xbox LIVE Election, which allows subscribers to watch a raw feed of the debates while using motion sensors or Xbox controllers to register moment-to-moment reactions,” notes the article.
  • Facebook hosted three-and-a-half hours of live programming the night before the first presidential debate, featuring notable guests and panel discussions. Questions were submitted by Facebook users for panelists and interview subjects.
  • And according to Politico: “While the rest of the social media crowd is striving to be nonpartisan, the news-sharing site Reddit is using the debates as a moment for tech-industry and Internet freedom activism. Reddit is co-sponsoring the Internet 2012 Bus Tour, an eight-day, nine-city tour from Denver to Danville, Ky., the site of the vice presidential debate on October 11.”
  • The bus will stop for community events along the way to promote “more high-skilled visas for tech companies and better trade agreements to benefit American startups,” while highlighting concerns about legislation that could threaten Internet freedom.

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