The amazing #UniteBlue storms Twitter: Week end review 3/2/13

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The hashtag #uniteblue and its associated web site, http://uniteblue.com, has galvanized a lot of liberal discussion on Twitter.  It’s an incredibly clever way to not only coordinate messaging but a way to increase the clout (and, of course, Klout) of liberal Twitter users.  If you haven’t looked into it yet, do so right now.  I’ll wait.  There’s so much more to it than what I’ve just described.

OK, back?

So what kind of impact has Unite Blue had on Twitter? In the last week, the volume of messages tagged with #UniteBlue is pretty amazing:

Click to Enlarge

Click to Enlarge

What’s especially amazing is the consistently high number of “new” tweets — that is, updates that are neither retweets or replies but are original compositions.  That level of creative activity is very high for Twitter.

Some people are very active on the hashtag. The top 10 users of the tag are:

Total Tweets User
690 AlAlekhine
682 ArthurA_P
652 UniteBlue
496 tsj_washington
417 AdamLowisz
389 TheWrightWingv2
371 VTwinCrucible
367 NativeSonKY
363 Rebecca810
350 BreitTwit1

Clearly there’s a dedicated group of people using the tag.

But even so, the number of duplicative tweets (usually, but not always, retweets) is comparably small: 

Number of Times Sent Text
208 RT @TheNewDeal: “If we’re going to end welfare, the rich should be the first to lose it.” – Mac Morgan #CorporateWelfare #UniteBlue #p2 #tcot
163 RT @TheNewDeal: Dear America, You Elected Barack Obama as President TWICE. The #Sequester is the GOP Punishing You for That. #UniteBlue #p2 #tcot
94 RT @UnitedLiberals: The Annual deficit since #Obama has shrunk from 1.3 trillion to 845 billion RT THIS AND SPREAD THE WORD #uniteblue
94 RT @140elect: Why I founded #UniteBlue, and a response to smear attacks against it. http://t.co/2YLGddb5yb
76 RT @Ziggy_Daddy: #JobsNotCuts, because the role of government is to help the lives of its citizens, not hurt them. #UniteBlue
74 RT @oopsieee: Keep the immigrants. Deport the Republicans. http://t.co/XHD6oudx5A #UniteBlue #ConnectTheLeft
73 RT @TheNewDeal: 2004: US Consulate in Saudi Arabia Attacked. 8 People Killed. GOP Didn’t Say a Word. #Benghazi #UniteBlue #p2 #tcot
69 RT @maddogg2463: If homosexuality can affect your marriage then one of you is Gay. #UniteBlue
66 RT @BradTracy2032: I believe Dwight Eisenhower, war hero and Republican, has something to say on the #Sequester. #uppers #UniteBlue http://t.co/cNer2CD9Im
66 RT @jxjs12: Please proceed Republicans… #UniteBlue  We will remember in 2014 Record Voter Turnout http://t.co/5vjDtEV9Km
64 RT @UniteBlue: #UniteBlue is here to protect everyone on the Left, whether you join or not. Attacked by RWNJs? Let us know. We are here to help.
63 RT @UniteBlue: Why I founded #UniteBlue, and a response to smear attacks against it. http://t.co/c5nfzaxttz via @140elect
61 I want to join @UniteBlue
60 RT @Politics_PR: How to Stop the GOP from Stealing the White House http://t.co/bIXBr7Djva via @waxwings2 #NPV #UniteBlue #tcot
58 RT @UniteBlue: How does that sound as a goal #UniteBlue? Are you in?! RT @UniteBlue: Our Mission For 2014: Turn Red States Blue.
56 RT @betseyross: Ted Cruz is one of few in DC actually doing his job. Must be why @ABC @NBC @CBS @CNN hate him so much #uniteblue #tcot #TGDN #ncpol
51 RT @TheNewDeal: 2008: US Embassy in Yemen Attacked. 10 People Killed. GOP Didn’t Say a Word. #Benghazi #UniteBlue #p2 #tcot
50 RT @TheNewDeal: Not All Republicans are Racist, but All Racists Seem to be Republicans. #JustSayin #UniteBlue #VotingRightsAct #p2
46 RT @TheNewDeal: 2002: US Consulate in Pakistan Attacked. 10 People Killed. GOP Didn’t Say a Word. #Benghazi #UniteBlue #p2 #tcot
46 RT @SayethSimon: “I know someone shot your child, but protecting guns is more important.” #ThingsYouWillNeverHearObamaSay #UniteBlue

It will be interesting to see how far the group can go and how high its volume of tweets will grow.  So far, it’s been amazing.  I haven’t seen any other interest group organize this well on Twitter…

Medicaid aids Scott on Twitter in February 2013

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February was shaping up to be a quiet month on Twitter for Florida’s sitting governor, Rick Scott, and his possible contenders … until Scott announced his support for Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion:

Guess when Scott OK’ed Medicaid? Click on image to enlarge.

 

Well that certainly set the agenda for the next week!  Interestingly, sentiment on Twitter was positive, on balance (though sentiment is notoriously hard to measure accurately).

What about the rest of the possible 2014 contenders for Scott’s office?  It’s hard to see them as more than noise after Medicaid, but if you take Scott out of the picture you can see a bit more about how they’re performing:

For Crist, it was Greer and Bear it. Click to enlarge

For Crist, it was Greer and Bear it. Click to enlarge

Charlie Crist got a lot of activity early in the month in relation to Jim Greer’s trial and guilty plea.  Alex Sink made some news where she stepped back from the race.  And Will Weatherford, speaker of Florida’s house, suddenly became a contender for 2014 as a primary challenger against Scott (H/T St. PetersBlog.  NB: The stats here only started tracking him as of 2/23).  For Nan Rich, unfortunately, Twitter is still mostly terra incognita.

It’s still too early to draw any conclusions — but it’s interesting to see that for both Crist and Scott, a lot of Twitter activity was controversial in nature. Will Scott controlled the timing of his announcement, it’s clear that the conversations about both Crist and Scott are being driven by external events.  Let’s see if, over time, they can start to define their own narrative on Twitter.

So, about that #NotSerious thing

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You know, the big conservative push to hashtag all their tweets about the State of the Union speech so people can see the massive disdain on social media?

Yeah, well, here it is:

ovsns

Oh dear. are they in there?  Maybe a percentage plot:

percentage

 

It would be ironic if, in total for the day, the number of #NotSerious tweets were 1% of all the tweets about Obama.  But, alas, they only made it to 0.65%…

Who Rick Scott Follows on Twitter is Completely Irrelevant. Ce n’est pas un faux pas.

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I was amused (and annoyed) to see a somewhat excited news article entitled “Gov. Scott’s Twitter Faux Pas“.  The article suggests that because Governor Rick Scott’s twitter account follows some possibly unsavory Twitter accounts it’s “curious” and “plain disturbing”. And it goes on to urgently recommend that

[…] someone on his staff should monitor everyone who follows him and everyone he follows. Any offensive or questionable account should immediately be unfollowed, and the user should be blocked from following him. It’s Twitter 101, people.

I’ll give the writer some benefit of the doubt — she says she hasn’t been able to get through to the Governor’s staff to find out why he follows all those accounts.  But in turn, the writer should have given the Governor the benefit of the doubt, too.

Because it’s easy to see what’s happening without having to ask: Rick Scott’s official account is followed by 34,160 Twitter users.  Of those, his account follows 21,514 back.  In the other direction, Rick Scott’s official account follows 24,001 Twitter users. Of those, 21,514 follow him back.  In other words, Rick Scott’s official twitter account has obviously automatically followed back anyone who followed him — right up until the point that he hit the limit of followers that Twitter would allow him.

So, despite the article’s author’s excitement that Rick Scott’s account follows an alleged porn account, there is nothing more than mindless automation at work.  Rick Scott is not scanning all 24K accounts he follows for a salacious tweet out of the tens of thousands his list generate every day.

Now, is it really Twitter 101 that Rick Scott needs to have someone spend time weeding out the one or two unsavory followers? Let’s be clear, as a Florida taxpayer, I do not want Rick Scott to spend my money on having state employees scrubbing Twitter’s lists of users.  Let Twitter do that themselves.  So, no.  No state employees need to do this. Rick Scott may have many faults, but wasting taxpayer money is generally not one that comes to top of mind.

As for the suggestion that these unsavory followers “should be blocked from following [the governor],” I have to ask, why?  Does the writer not know of Florida’s sunshine laws? Blocking someone from following you is the same as blocking them from reading you.  That seems completely at odds with the principles of transparent government, doesn’t it? Yes it does.

Let’s all remember Twitter 102: Follows != endorsements.  The governor can put that on his Twitter profile, if that will help people remember that rule.

In the mean time, can we get back to the issues that confront our state?  Because who Rick Scott follows is not one of those issues.

Florida’s 2014 Governor Race on Twitter: January 2013 Stats

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What a difference a month makes.  In December, Charlie Crist dominated Twitter with talk about his registering as a democrat.  Last month, it was pretty much all Rick Scott, with conversation about Medicaid and dogs:

201301

Click to enlarge

For Crist and Sink, it’s obscurity in comparison.  Just looking at the two of them, we can see that Crist is still leading in Twitter mentions:

Click to enlarge

Click to enlarge

(Next month I’ll add Nan Rich into the charts.)

One important thing to note: Neither of the two of them are active on Twitter at this point, so all mentions are in response to news and commentary from others.

Some unsolicited advice to the candidates:

Rick Scott:

Try to find ways to make the conversation on Twitter about you more positive.  Find things that are symbolic grand gestures.  Something like saying that you want the state to pay the tuition of all Florida high school graduates who undertake a $10K college degree program in state.  That ought to consume a whole month or two of twitterdom.  Do that sort of thing once a month up to November 2014, and there’s no oxygen left for your competitors.  Call it your theme a month program.  Just be creative.

Charlie Crist:

Were you thinking of tweeting this year? That might help. Just tweet pictures of you doing whatever you’re doing  Find ironic or teasing things if nothing else: “Here’s me and my dog.  Yep, we’re going to keep her.” Or “Here’s Carole and me in front of the Governor’s mansion. One of these years I should probably give her a tour of it.” And may I point out that you and Carole are extremely photogenic?  No shame in selfies.

Alex Sink:

At least Charlie Crist tweeted more than once last year.  If it weren’t for your fans you’d be absent from Twitter.  Just tweeting links to articles about you that you half-way like would be a start. Since you’re the ex-CFO, why not talk about the state’s finances for a while?

Buddy Dyer:

At least Alex Sink has a twitter account. You could have fun with it. Get a twitter account and start with things like “Day 1: no tweets from lobbyists telling me how to vote. Is this thing on?” and “Day 2: If I have a campaign event with food, is that a large group feeding?” I assure you you will have thousands of followers in no time. You can become dull and safe later on.

Nan Rich:

You’re the most active person on Twitter of the democratic contenders. You win the gold star social media awareness. But very few people are following you — you need to work on getting your engagement higher. Start putting some hashtags into your tweets.  At the very least, tag every tweet with #sayfie to get it in front of the Florida political junkies.  There’s a lot more you can do. Remember, Marco Rubio snuck up on Charlie Crist by winning over social media.  You can do it too.

Final notes …

It’s still early, but now’s the time for the candidates to invest in building a social media presence.  In the thick of the campaign, when it’s needed, it will be hard to get attention and hard work to grow it.  Get it ready now when there’s time and it will pay dividends right through November ’14.