Obama most popular with tech savvy voters

Filed under: Internet, Social Software, web 2.0

Obama most popular with tech savvy voters

by Christina Warren Jan 8th 2008

As you may know, the New Hampshire primary for the US 2008 Presidential election is today. Although web 2.0 itself has not been positioned as a major campaign issue, the power of the web and social networks has played a large role in not only individual candidate campaigns, but in the debate process itself. Additionally, with his victory in the Iowa caucus, Democratic candidate Barack Obama has become the first candidate leading in Internet metrics to pull off a major victory. So this begs the question, are Obama's fans the most savvy and "connected" supporters? Well, in addition to having the most friends on MySpace and supporters on Facebook, Sen. Obama is also leading in the war of campaign widgets.

According to Widgetbox, a major distributed widget marketplace, Obama has nearly double the number of widget impressions as his nearest opponent. In fact, he has almost as many impressions as his two nearest competitors combined! These widgets are embedded on personal web pages, blogs and social networking sites. This certainly gives additional (if ancillary) credence to the idea that Obama is the most plugged-in candidate.

Widget Impressions from Widgetbox Widgets

What effect, if any will the candidates online popularity have on the polls? Keep checking the news, and DownloadSquad, to find out!

Tags: barack obama, BarackObama, campaign 2008, Campaign2008, data, facebook, fred thompson, FredThompson, hillary clinton, HillaryClinton, mike huckabee, MikeHuckabee, polls, web 2.0, Web2.0, widgets

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

tcgiant said 10:24AM on 1-08-2008

what *effect*

erroneous editor said 10:31AM on 1-08-2008

This post is only half the truth. Objectively speaking (purely using polling statistics) the most popular candidates among tech savvy voters is in this order:

#1 Ron Paul
#2 Kucinich
#3 Obama

While i personally am a-political and don't particularly support any candidate, i find it interesting that you neglected the #1 & #2 spots.

Remember - i lie by omission is still a lie.

Kelly said 10:49AM on 1-08-2008

Well it just makes sense. Obama is the youth candidate (under 35) because he's able to pander to that age group most effectively. Tech savvy folks tend to be...under 35.

Daniel Aluma said 11:07AM on 1-08-2008

This gives further credence to his message of change. He has embraced the web 2.0 change more than any of the others; you can extrapolate this to other areas of the human experience.

brooks.williams said 11:21AM on 1-08-2008

Ummm... Ron Paul?

Brian said 1:36PM on 1-08-2008

Odd. Most people I know working in IT are Ron Paul supporters.

dave said 2:48PM on 1-08-2008

As usual, Ron Paul is left out, I guess he's just meaningless, and that $20 million he raised just came out of thin air.

Don't start reporting half reports downloadsquad. That is not the whole story and you know it, You are better than the damn mainstream media.

Grant Robertson said 3:34PM on 1-08-2008

We didn't have any data on Ron Paul. If we did, we'd have gladly posted it. Certainly, Ron Paul has his own massive internet savvy success story, WidgetBox or no WidgetBox.

Unfortunately, this post isn't about general internet promotion, it's about the use of WidgetBox widgets. You're probably right that Ron Paul was worth a mention, but it would have only been as an aside (since we lacked data on Ron Paul's WidgetBox success, failure or otherwise) and thus, really wouldn't have counted for much.

If you really want to complain to someone about lack of Ron Paul resect, I'd start with Fox News.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2008/01/ronpaulreigns.html

Thanks for reading us (and for telling us we're better than the mainstream media).. we got all fuzzy inside when you said that. *blush*

RP said 4:13PM on 1-08-2008

Perhaps the Ron Paul supporters don't use WidgetBox. Maybe they're too busy posting to Digg day and night.

Perhaps they're even more tech savy than Obama supporters, such that they don't need dumbed-down widgets? Who knows.

David said 4:04PM on 1-08-2008

Were is Ron Paul in this, we all know he is all over the Internet. So why is he not even listed.

Grant Robertson said 5:07PM on 1-08-2008

Read comment above?

Rumble said 8:21PM on 1-08-2008

It's true, Obama has a commanding lead among Democrats. On Facebook, 60% of Democrats support Obama. On the other hand, Paul has the lead among Republicans with around 35%. This survey or whatever it is doesn't count in my book, but whatever. It pleases the mainstream.

Ron Paul 2008! Be informed!

JerryChance said 12:59PM on 1-09-2008

I don't care who the next President is as long as George Bush is dispensed with !

angrykeyboarder said 2:43AM on 1-15-2008

I don't get why so many on teh Internets are so gaga for Ron Paul. I've not been impressed myself.

I'm 47 and quite tech savvy and I'm for Barack Obama.

Please God, let us get a Democrat back in the White House!

phoenix said 10:34PM on 1-17-2008

Honestly Ronulans, when are you all going to get it through your heads:

No. One. Cares. About. Ron. Paul.

He's going to lose the primary, he's going to lose your inevitable, sad, write-in campaign, and he won't be president. Sorry, but the lot of you need beating with the reality stick.

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