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User-generated electioneering

by amnesia on April 8, 2010

Every election these days is called ‘the internet election’, and not surprisingly since each election brings new innovations in social media. Howard Dean did really well out of e-campaigning in 2004, although he was probably less enthusiastic about it once ‘the scream’ appeared all over YouTube. MyBarackObama.com was a cracking success, expanding into a SMS programs, 2,000 YouTube flicks, 3 million online donors, 5 million ‘friends’ across Facebook and other social sites. In Australia, Labor claims a lot of its success is due to marshalling support through digital, and the Coalition admits they didn’t make the best use of it, falling before the bold and youthful Kevin07 brand.

There’s one month of furious electioneering to go in the UK before folks head to the polls, and we’ll see how the parties make best use of digital and social in particular in these next few weeks. Already, my Facebook news feed has changed. Status updates allow everyone you know to see your opinions, comment, and get notifications of others’ comments. It wasn’t that long ago that these were about X Factor, but political conversations are taking their place – people are linking to opinion pieces on the economy and social policies, and the same political discourse is all over twitter too.

But what I’ve found most interesting is how user-generated content has already made a big splash. Following the launch of (Conservative leader) David Cameron’s much mocked airbrushed billboard campaign, Tory-bashers are giving those ads an amusing PhotoShop once-over at mydavidcameron.com.

Labour had an official crowd-sourcing poster competition won by a 24 year old’s entry depicting ‘Nice Dave’ sitting on a 1983 Audi Quattro (below), recalling a character from recent BBC drama Ashes to Ashes in which a police officer inexplicably wakes up in 1981.

The ad was launched last Saturday by Labour’s agency, Saatchi & Saatchi, but immediately repurposed by Euro RSCG (the Tories’ ad agency) to great effect (more on this here).

Clearly crowd-sourcing hasn’t paid off in this example (more of an own goal really), but I’m looking forward to more UGC in the coming weeks.

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Visualising all those billions

by amnesia on August 16, 2009

The talented visualisers at Information is Beautiful have created The Billion Dollar Gram.

It’s an attempt to help all of us wrap our heads around the obscenely large numbers thrown around the news of the world.

“Billions spent on this. Billions spent on that. What does it all look like?”

http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/2009/the-billion-dollar-gram/

You’ll need the full size view to read the labels: http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/the-billion-dollar-gram/

@iclazie

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Who is Fake Stephen Conroy? Full list of Suspects.

by eunmac on March 9, 2009

This week the “REAL” Politician, Senator Stephen Conroy acknowledged the “FAKE” Stephen Conroy (http://twitter.com/stephenconroy) via (article on SMH) as “healthy satire” so we thought we would start the cheeky hunt for the person behind the mask. We don’t really want the person ‘outed’ per se as it’s much more fun not knowing, but below is the list of 25 suspects to date:

Name: Fake Stephen Conroy
Location: Canberra
Bio: I’m a 45 year old politician who’ll do anything to please you, baby. Don’t worry girl, I gots “protection”, and it’ll degrade my performance all night

Firstly, let us pay homage to the Fake Stephen (FSC). He’s actually pretty funny, satirical and most agree that the character is very well written. So… who’s doing the writing? We suspect it’s someone who’s already active on Twitter already – ie; they have two accounts running. At time of posting FSC is only following 69 people so we suspect that the guilty person may be linked to many of these in some way. We trawled various stats, engines and monitored conversations as well as looking through the #nocleanfeed list to come up with the following suspects…

Update : Although we did discover the real identity of Fake Stephen Conroy during the compilation of the list, we did not include him in there. Unfortunatley the attention appears to have forced his hand and in fact FSC outed himself a few days ago as Leslie Nasser from Telstra (http://www.linkedin.com/in/leslienassar)

The Suspects behind FST (Fake Stephen Conroy):

	Suspect	Modus Operandi	Suspect Rating
1		DuncanRiley Tipsters think that Duncan is a hot candidate for FSC. That cheeky smile which looks almost identical to FSC’s may hold the key.	9/10
2		Warlach A serious suspect, Warlach has been around long enough to know the tricks. Known to have created fake twitter accts in the past. Is FSC his creation?	9/10
3		FullTimeCasual A new entry on the list but a red hot suspect. His suspicious lack of a photo in his twitter avatar may mean he can slip into the darkness easily if found guilty.	9/10
4		DHughesy We have been informed that this infamous Aussie comedian may be practicing using FSC for some cool new comedy about Twitter. We suspect FSC’s words are too big for Hughsey, but he still makes the list.	8/10
5		BarrySaunders Normally gets highly involved in twitter conversations but not with FSC. Makes him look like a real suspect in this case.	8/10
6		Servantofchaos Respected blogger and Tweeter, possesses a similar sense of humour to FSC. A prime suspect.	8/10
7		TrevorYoung FSC insiders say suspect is based in Melbourne. Trevor Young’s writing skills certainly fit the bill as a PR WARRIOR…	8/10
8		Mspecht Definite candidate for the job and big nocleanfeed enthusiast. No twitter history with FSC makes him a suspect.	7/10
9		Turnbullmalcolm What better way to oust the current government than being the mastermind of the FSC twitter account? Must be a suspect.	8/10
10		Wolfcat Should have been in the list earlier – has been active on Twitter for a while and knows the tricks.	8/10
-		cameronreilly Top 5 Tweeters according to Grader.com, long history in the interwebs and definitely would have no fear of being FSC.	8/10
-		JonoH First person who FSC followed. Must be a prime suspect.	8/10
-		Jimboot One of the more active people in ‘nocleanfeed’ a hot tip to be FSC.	7/10
		renailemay The only published interview with FSC was conducted by the Editor of ZDNet.com.au. This makes him an instant suspect. Is this man the Peter Parker of Twitter? Hmm…	7/10
-		Silkcharm She has her mitts in everything else social so makes the list by default. Very few msgs to FSC makes her a prime suspect.	7/10
-		Jimboot One of the more active people in ‘nocleanfeed’ a hot tip to be FSC.	7/10
-		Trib With a mass of followers and outspoken character, he’s conveniently located in Canberra. Is he the real FSC?	7/10
-		Mspecht Definite candidate for the job and big nocleanfeed enthusiast. No twitter history with FSC makes him a suspect.	7/10
-		JJprojects With 3000+ followers, a twitter junkie, nocleanfilter advocate put JJ high on the suspect list.	6/10
-		Nickhodge Microsoft’s local pin up Twitter Star has a dry earthy wit similar to FSC. Talks to FSC a lot, but could this be a cover?	6/10
-		andrew303 Known to have more than one twitter account, is Australia’s most followed person on Twitter the guilty party?	6/10
-		Stephen Conroy (the real one) The perfect double bluff? You see… he’s not on Twitter, …or is he?	6/10
-		Bronwen Describes herself as combatant, maybe FSC is Bronwen’s side project. No contact with FSC to date – is this an alibi or evidence?	6/10
-		Aramadge News.com.au reporter that may see FSC as an interesting side project for a forthcoming story.	5/10
-		Granleese First person to respond to my request for information and leads about FSC. Makes him an instant suspect.	4/10
-		Mpesce One of the last remaining people with a cross on their avatar’s mouth, is this inventor the real inventor FSC?	4/10
-		Mumbrella Journo Tim Burrowes loves controversy so why not create it himself? Perfect motive with timing similar to launch of his mumbrella blog. Did FSC attract a few extra visitors?	4/10
-		Acatinatree Filmmaker. Active, lots of followers. Has a sense of humour. FSC might just be a side project for her…?	4/10
-		markpollard Strategist, highly active in Twitter, His no fear cheeky sense of humour puts him on the list.	3/10
-		KevinRuddPM He doesn’t use his own Twitter account too much – possibly because he’s so busy running the FSC twitter account.	3/10
-		eunmac As the author of this post, this could just be a diversionary tactic. Maybe I am FSC, or maybe not? Hmmm.	3/10
-		OzDJ Came up as the first suspect when I used a Twitter tool to find similar people to FSC.	3/10
-		Eskimo Sparky Husband, Father, Political impersonator? Is an instigator of prior twitter crimes such as Velociroflcoptersaurus.	3/10
-		Stilgherrian Political, outspoken, but would he send so many tweets to FSC?	3/10
-		Likeomg Social Media Advisor at Amnesia and copywriter. Would certainly possess the skills but may be too occupied by other things.	2/10
		JoelyRighteous Has not been posting much recently. Possibly to distracted by his FSC account?	2/10
		Davidlmorris Very quick to dismiss some of the suspects on the list. Is this the real FSC revealing himself inadvertently?	2/10
		LesleyWhite Conveniently “wishing” she was on the list may make her an outside possibility.	2/10
-		Julian Cole He manages to get his name on every other list so may as well stick him in this one just in case he is FSC…	2/10
-		DanWarne Another journalist for the SMH active on Twitter. Pops up on FSC’s follower list too. Is he just interested , or IS IT HIM?	2/10
-		SpellrUs Claims he should be a suspect. Always struck me as being too much of a nice guy, but you then again, those are the ones you have to watch…	2/10
-		ProBlogger Too busy tweeting tips to be a real suspect, but may be a dark horse in the matter.	1/10
		InJoke There is no chance that InJoke is the real FSC, but they felt that it would help them with the ladies if they made the list. OK good luck with that…	0/10

Breaking Update:
Suspects were seen changing their avatars to that of Stephen Conroy’s – presumably to protect their real identity.

Above: View in Tweetdeck as some of the accused changed their avatars.

If you are on the list but you strongly wish to deny that you are not fake @stephenconroy post a comment with your full denial and alibi.

If you really are fake @stephenconroy (and not on the list and would like to be, follow @eunmac on Twitter and DM a message. We will keep it a secret.)

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If acceptance speeches were honest

by amnesia on November 27, 2008

[youtube=http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=y39vdTFQLos]
In your face!

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Lessons in Twitter Ghostwriting from Britney Spears and Malcolm Turnbull

by eunmac on October 20, 2008

Updated 23/10:
I’m glad to see @therealbritney has seend the light. Twitter posts now contain the posters name (see below) and it appears thay Britney is new posting. Be interesting to see if she replies to fans directly…

end update/

The day started well for Britney Spears on Twitter…
http://twitter.com/therealbritney

Ahhh, but there’s the problem – it’s not really Britney, it’s just her marketing / PR team copying and pasting. No, “NOT the real Britney” and it didn’t take long for people to wise up:

“I’m following the BS PR team. I’m just a pop culture twit, what can I tell you?”

Oh dear. Britney (or her agency) has misunderstood what Twitter is all about – real people, real conversations, monologues, not dialogues.

Malcolm Turnbull (http://twitter.com/turnbullmalcolm) on the other hand – Australia’s opposition leader/politician is having a better time so far:

Yes, Malcolm appears to be entering the conversation as himself and interestingly he has managed to attract a lot of the major digital influencers with Problogger and NickHodge firing a few questions at him. Hey I even threw one at him myself today to see if he’s reply. This could prove to be a lot of work for Malcolm but at least he’s giving it a go – and yes we all know he’s busy (urm, his Dog Blog is clearly consuming a lot of his internet time).

Summary:
Be real on Twitter, the agency cant’ do it for you, no matter how much they charge you.

Want to get started on Twitter – here’s some light reading
Read the Rules: http://www.caroline-middlebrook.com/blog/twitter-guide/
Then Break em: Scobleizers 10 rules of Twitter

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"Barack-Rolling".. and the Google Elections Video Gadget

by amnesia on August 13, 2008

Most of you internet pranksters (and victims) out there will be familiar with the bait-and-switch concept of “Rick-Rolling“.

Hugh Atkin, a Sydney local, has posted on his blog – an appropriation of this concept, using footage from Barack Obama’s U.S. Presidential Campaign.

The result is the “Barack-Roll”:

Video’s like this are popping up around the place, making use of Google’s new “Elections Video Search” gadget.

The gadget makes use of speech-to-text technology and allows you to search for a word or sentence – and if one of the featured Politicians has said those words in one of the countless videos on file – it lists them for you and highlights at what point in the video the relevant text is spoken.

Google Elections Video Gadget

Whilst the speech-to-text technology for the gadget is by no means perfect, it definitely does the trick for sourcing the goods for little meme’s like this one.

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Jason Wood, Australian Politician speech goes terribly wrong. Very funny.

by eunmac on August 8, 2008

From the Australian Parliament, possibly the worst reading goof of all time. The word ‘implication’ was a struggle but the word ‘organism’ came out about as wrong as it gets! This clip is doing the rounds via email as an attachment at the moment so thought it was worth a post. Nice come back from Kevin Wood in the interview at the end.