Obama And Social Media

Some of us love Obama. Some of us like McCain. A few of us are probably still wishing the West Wing’s Jed Bartlett was available for a real-life term or two.

Regardless of your politics, there’s a lot we can all learn from how the Obama campaign has used social media.

Thinking about a cause-related marketing campaign? Then this article from the Atlantic Monthly is a must-read for how to use online to get people engaged and moved to action.

Today one of my favorite new bloggers, Liz Gannes at NewTeeVee, has a great post with more details of how the Obama campaign is using social media.

12 Billion Good Reasons To Watch Online Video (And One Horrible One)

If you haven’t been keeping an eye on online video, there are more and more reasons to pay attention. The first 12 billion reasons come from WebTV Wire. Some highlights:

• ComScore says 12 billion videos were watched in the US in May, up 45% since last year. This includes YouTube and streaming TV ventures like Hulu.
• ArsTechnica says in the same period there were 142 million unique viewers. If so, 3/4 of all US Internet users have watched video online.
• Average user watched 85.3 videos during the month
• Top 3 sites: Google (includes YouTube), Fox (includes MySpace video), Yahoo.

Will This Super-Villain Be A Hero?

Few people have the cult audience that Joss Whedon does. And far fewer have the nerve to take the creative and business leaps that he does. His latest experiment is Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog: an online musical about a super villain.

Great post from GigaOM here, with details of how it was funded, promoted, etc. Whether this succeeds or fails, it will tell us a lot about what’s possible in online video.