[digg=http://digg.com/software/Politics_and_online_Communities_who_s_good]

Great examples of community often come at the intersections of passionate debate. So in the spirit of taking a look at communities from an “analytical” standpoint, I thought a great issue to follow would be the race for the US presidency in 2008. Below is a list I compiled that I think captures at least everyone who has declared intent to run for president. I’m sure I missed someone, so feel free to add to this list. That said, if I did miss someone, you might argue they are already in trouble – too hard to find!

Democrats:

Tom Vilsack: http://www.tomvilsack08.com/

Bill Richardson: http://richardsonforpresident.com/

Barack Obama: http://www.barackobama.com/

Dennis Kucinich: http://kucinich.us/

Mike Gravel: http://gravel08.us/

John Edwards: http://johnedwards.com/

Christopher Dodd: http://www.chrisdodd.com/home

Hillary Clinton: http://www.hillaryclinton.com/

Joe Biden: http://www.joebiden.com/home

Republicans:

Rudy Giuliani: http://www.joinrudy2008.com/

Samuel Brownback: http://www.t-worx.com/Default.aspx?alias=www.t-worx.com/brownback

John Herman Cox: http://www.cox2008.com/cox/

Duncan Hunter: http://www.gohunter08.com/Home.aspx

John McCain: http://www.exploremccain.com/?sid=msn

Tom Tancredo: http://www.teamtancredo.org/

To be fair, this will be far from the first elections to embrace communities and social networking as part of their campaign strategy.

For an illustration of how online communities are already impacting the process, check out the following article: “Obama backers find voice on Facebook."  A quick look into takes you to the following ,  where you’re presented with the following facts about this grassroots effort:

THE STATS (on the Obama facebook community)
=======
Created January 16th, 2007
100 - (Jan 16th) Reached. Within 1 hr!
1,000 - (Jan 19th) Reached. By Jan 17th
10,000 - (Jan 26th) Reached. 6 days early!
100,000 - (Feb 1st) Reached. 1 week early!
250,000 - (Feb 5th) Reached Feb. 10th
500,000 - (Mar 10th)
750,000 - (Apr 10th)
1,000,000 - (May 10th)

A further look at www.barackobama.com shows you this on the front page:

Nice range of community features, including discussions, networking, personalization and a connection from online to offline (Find supporters near you). And obviously this scales the fund raising process like crazy!!

I also like the notion of McCainspace to at: http://www.johnmccain.com/Connecting/. Enables quick supporting web site creation and YouTube town halls for outreach.

John Edwards has been active here too.  But, his model appears to be the shotgun model, sprinkling across everything with unclear focus almost by design. - I don’t think I like this.

Now, DO NOT read this as an endorsement of Obama, McCain or anyone else (I’m a very undecided voter – and this is not a political blog)…but my short inspection of the list above suggests that as of today Barack Obama has tapped into communities perhaps the strongest at this point.

I’d love your input on this.

Who else here do you think is doing a great job with online communities and why?

Let’s keep watching this as the month’s progress and see how moods shift across candidates. As fast as communities can lift you, they can even more quickly sink you in the political realm.  I’d caution in this whole area to think hard about brand association as when you are a political candidate "you" are the brand and as others associate with you, they impact your brand (positive or negative).

Interesting? Digg it!

Sean

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