Here we go with some more Facebook Groups. I've been doing some thinking about how I structure these Facebook Groups and thought that it might be a good idea to have somewhat of a theme going on any particular day. So today's theme is going to be Politics and in particular the 2008 Presidential Election. I'd like to make it absolutely clear right now that this entry does not reflect my own or The College Answer's opinions on the Presidential race, I'm merely sharing what I have found on Facebook Groups, something anyone can do and laying it out there. I still encourage you to Contact Us with any ideas or groups that you would like to see in particular. In reference to today's groups, We will be looking at the Democratic side of the race, and particularly the way that Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are depicted on Facebook. I will go through my analysis in the same manner as I have done for the past two days, and do not warrant this as an endorsement for either candidate. Let's begin.
Stop Hillary Clinton: (One Million Strong AGAINST Hillary) (Found by searching "Hillary Clinton" and selecting the first Global group. Groups are ordered on Facebook by membership)
So here we have a group that is apparently against Hillary Clinton becoming President of the United states. The group is labeled as "Common Interest - Politics" and I think that makes the most sense. To begin, let's take a look at the description of the group.
Democrats, Republicans, and Independents can now unite behind a single cause- that of ensuring Hillary Clinton is not elected President of the United States.
Whether you are supporting Rudy Giuliani or Mitt Romney, John Edwards or Barack Obama a single goal exists, to ensure that another Clinton is not put into the White House.
Join today and invite your friends!
Based on the description it appears as though this group isn't purely endorsed by Republican supporters, but also Democratic supporters who prefer other candidates like Obama or Edwards as was referenced in the description. The creator of the group is Stephen DeMaura, hailing from the Concord, NH network. There are two other administrators of the group, including Marc Line (Grand Valley State network) and Rob Lemieux (Kenne State). I will get back to you about his possible relation to NHL star Mario Lemieux. There are a bunch of officers in this group, but unlike other more fun groups, they all have similar Officer titles. Based on the network on Facebook that you belong to, that is the title of your officer position. For instance, if you are from the Clemson network, you are called the Clemson Chair. A little uncreative if you ask me, but I suppose this group is trying to keep things as civil as possible, although they're bashing another opponent.
The group also has an interesting goal of collecting together 1,000,000 people who are against Hillary Clinton enough to join a group on Facebook and promote it to their friends. Stephen DeMaura, the creator of the group, has also established milestones of time intervals at which he would like to meet certain membership quotas (I presume DeMaura set it up, because he is the creator, I could be wrong).
Goal
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To develop a network of online volunteers to stop Hillary Clinton from becoming President!
Milestones
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100 Members- February 20th GOAL MET 2/19
1,000 Members- March 20th GOAL MET 2/20
10,000 Members- April 15th GOAL MET 2/28
50,000 Members- May 8th GOAL MET 3/15
100,000 Members- May 22nd GOAL MET 3/26
250,000 Members- June 5th GOAL MET 5/7
500,000 Members- January 8th, 2008
1,000,000 Members- November, 2008
All of the goals have been met ahead of time. The next milestone to reach is of 500,000 members. There are currently 462,651 members of this group, so I think they have ample time to meet their next goal by January 8th, 2008. The main photo used for the group is a picture of Hillary Clinton with a stern look on her face, as if something has gone terribly wrong. It doesn't promote her very well. Aside from that, there are no videos, links, or pictures posted, and The Wall has been disabled.
Barack Obama (One Million Strong for Barack) (Found by searching "Barack Obama" and selecting the first global group)
Similar to the last group, this group has been categorized as "Common Interest - Politics," which I will again agree is a fine grouping for it. Let's get into the description a little:
BARACK OBAMA IS HEADED TO THE WHITE HOUSE...BUT WE NEED HELP... YOUR HELP to get him there.
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- INVITE YOUR FRIENDS - (in 3 easy steps)
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(1) Find the Barack's picture - on the right,
(2) Under the picture, click "Invite People to Join",
(3) Check the names of your friends
DONE - they are invited.
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THE GOAL
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The goal here is simple, lets get One Million Strong in support of the next President of the United States.
Lets reach this goal, then set a new goal.
What I find most striking about this description comes at the very end, and that is the call to add Barack Obama as a friend on Facebook. That is pretty cool if you're an avid Facebook user, which most people who join are, and that Obama has one. I took a quick look at it, and its quite impressive. I'm sure he has someone on his staff constantly updating it with news stories and the like. He filled in his profile too with real stuff, or at least stuff that he'd like to share with people, but isn't that what we all do? If anything it makes him appear very human. The part that doesn't make him look human is that over 15,000 people have written on his wall. He must spend a lot of time having to reply, let alone run the state of Illinois. Gosh!
The group was created by Farouk Olu Aregbe from the Washington, DC network, and has two other administrators: Lindsey Christine Carpenter (Westminister UT) and Ken Stokes (Drexel). The contact information for this group is also interesting. The e-mail address to contact them is onemillionstrong@gmail.com. I have to imagine that this is pretty legitimate. The website is www.BarackObama.com, which makes perfect sense. What's interesting, however, is the Office location. In this area a YouTube movie is referenced. The YouTube video that it takes you to is entitled, "Meet Barack Obama," and is a five minute video showcasing Barack, his history, his vision, his supporters. The movie has been viewed 208,327 times, has 1,192 comments, and been favorited 2085 times.
Under the Recent News section, you can find every resource you can think of for Barack Obama, and many of them are through Facebook directly, including Barack TV, News, TShirts and Merchandise, and Obama Events. At the bottom of the Recent News section is an area entitled, "Rules for the Group." Farouk Olu Aregbe has the last two posts in this group that outline being respectful, no cursing, ad posting images that do not defame Barack's image. Classy move Farouk, very classy.
I think that the most interesting thing to point out initially is that the first Global group for Hillary Clinton was defamatory, whereas, for Barack Obama it was in support. I had to actually look quite hard to find a positive Global group about Hillary Clinton. This may have to do with Barack Obama's ability to enthrall young voters, but who knows really. I suggest you check these groups out and get a sense of them for yourselves! Be smart. Be aware. Be the solution.
This post was originally written by The College Answers University of Michigan · Organizational Studies · 10 Oct 2007
