Over the past few months I’ve been following the presidential race offline and online. I’ve been fascinated how each candidate leverages technology to communicate with their supporters. You can find all of them on today’s popular social networking sites getting their messages out and recruiting voters. After looking at the candidate’s presence on the web it had me wondering if their social footprints are metrics that could potentially predict the presidential seat.
Candidates Social Footprints
NOTE: These numbers may have changed since time of publish.
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| Candidate | Subscribers | Videos | Most Discussed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Barack Obama | 47,241 | 935 | 9,114 Comments |
| Hillary Clinton | 13,313 | 339 | 1,683 Comments |
| John McCain | 4,408 | 189 | 3,806 Comments |
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| Candidate | Supporters | Wall Posts |
|---|---|---|
| Barack Obama | 786,811 | 175,624 |
| Hillary Clinton | 149,460 | 294,027 |
| John McCain | 116,085 | 13,273 |
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| Candidate | Friends | Comments |
|---|---|---|
| Barack Obama | 355,255 | 57,911 |
| Hillary Clinton | 198,149 | 19,582 |
| John McCain | 49,538 | 6,214 |
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| Candidate | Followers |
|---|---|
| Barack Obama | 25,281 |
| Hillary Clinton | 3,274 |
| John McCain | What are you doing, John? |
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| Candidate | Connections | Recommendations |
|---|---|---|
| Barack Obama | 9,495 | 0 |
| Hillary Clinton | 1,309 | 0 |
| John McCain | 1,923 | 7 |
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| Candidate | Posts Tagged |
|---|---|
| Barack Obama | 77,717 |
| Hillary Clinton | 59,443 |
| John McCain | 23,868 |
Campaign Finance
Based on FEC Filings here is a breakdown of the money each candidate has spent for their campaign. All data is as of February 29, 2008.
| Candidate | Money Spent |
|---|---|
| Barack Obama | $158,509,859 |
| Hillary Clinton | $140,700,709 |
| John McCain | $58,432,608 |
Conclusion
Based on these findings it is apparent that the social web tends to be more democratic than republican and each candidate has spent a crap load of money to become our next president. It’s also obvious that Barack Obama has the largest social footprint. Can this data be used to predict the presidency?
Technorati Tags: John McCain, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Social Web
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2 Comments
On Monday, April 28, 2008 at 9:09:am
When I read the title I knew who the findings would lead to - Barack Obama. He’s the only one I see on Digg that gets positive comments, but I wouldn’t vote for McCain or Hillary either.
Too bad about Ron Paul, he was the most popular on Digg last, he seemed like a really nice guy
On Friday, June 13, 2008 at 3:54:pm
I’m not from the US, but this election has got the world talking, I think Obama is a shoe in for the job.
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