Newark Mayor Cory Booker and San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom are blazing a new trail in political discourse from opposite sides of the country in social media.
AP Saturday, June 06, 2009
NEWARK, N.J. — Newark Mayor Cory Booker and San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom are blazing a new trail in political discourse from opposite sides of the country as they build huge Internet followings on Twitter’s fast-growing social network.
They don’t lead the biggest U.S. cities — San Francisco ranks 13th and Newark 64th — but have gained prominence by replacing heavily vetted, sterile political prose with personal missives on the stream of consciousness confessional. So much so, that they now have more followers on Twitter than all other mayors, all 435 members of the House of Representatives, 99 of 100 U.S. senators, and 49 of the 50 state governors — among users carrying the “political” tag on the Twitterholic tabulation site.
Online social networks are rapidly making traditional political advertisements obsolete, said veteran political strategist Joe Trippi, who used Internet fundraising to propel Howard Dean’s 2004 presidential campaign. The social networks are giving elected leaders like Booker and Newsom a new way to satiate the public’s hunger for transparency.
To read more, click here: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/06/06/politicians-building-huge-followings-twitter/
