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January 8, 2008New Media, New Voters: The 'Giant Conversation' on ABC and Facebook Comes Up Short |
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From Ascribe Newsfeed: Following is commentary by Tova Andrea Wang, Democracy Fellow at The Century Foundation, and Michael Cornfield, Adjunct Professor at The Graduate School of Political Management (GSPM) of The George Washington University and director of the Pew Internet and American Life Project. - - - We have seen several experiments in old media/new media debate format fusion, and we will probably see more before the election. But last Saturday 's ABC/Facebook mash-up of a televised debate and an online chatfest occurred at a special moment in the presidential contest. Thanks to the Internet, ABC and Facebook had a chance to move this word of mouth affect from the offline world to the online by creating an interactive environment for viewers of the televised debate. If you participated, your word would have gone forth, and maybe back and forth with other debate watchers, and best of all, maybe back and forth and outward to members not already tuned into the debate and the Web page. More than one million people activated the Facebook application, we were told. But during the debate, ABC gave the Facebook connections about as much time and seriousness as a couple of advertisements - perfunctory invitations to participate.
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