Twitter Elections

With the presidential election coming up this year, it will be interesting to see how social media influences the young voters. Facebook and Myspace were both around during the last presidential election, and they both had a large influence on the young vote, but now that Twitter is around, the whole game may change.

Twitter is different than Facebook and Myspace in the way that Twitter tracks the specific topics that are being talked about – trending topics. How will that affect the election? Easily. People on Twitter will be more apt to discuss the issues they find important. Not only can the create these trending topics, but they can direct their followers to the articles that influence their views.

This will be beneficial, for sure. Now people will be able to read certain topics for themselves, rather than have their views shaped by traditional media. Social media, especially Twitter, can help users put short term thoughts into long term memory – meaning that Twitter users have the potential to learn more about many of the issues facing Americans today.

The downside to this is that most Twitter users are only in the younger generation. Middle-aged to the elderly will not have the same opportunity to learn about these issues through social media, and they will most likely be stuck in their voting habits.

It’s amazing to know that the younger generation will truly know more about the issues in America than the older population – that is, if the younger generation takes the time to learn more. It’s still awesome to know that the younger generation will play a MUCH bigger role in this election than in elections past.