A US Guru on social networking

I attended a very interesting meeting this morning at Westminster hosted by the social networking site 'Bebo', and addressed by Joe Trippi - the mastermind behind Howard Dean's famous use of the internet in his US presidential bid, and now one of the advisers to the John Edwards campaign.

Joe Trippi's view was that social networking would turn politics upside down. He said we have been used to a small number of 'Goliaths' but now we will have a large number of 'Davids' shaping the political scene. He reckoned that political parties which embrace this culture will prosper, but those who wish it would go away may die!

When questioned about the 'digital divide' and people being excluded, he pointed out that coverage of mobile phones is very extensive and that increasingly people will access the internet through this route. He also said that although the initial contact may be through the internet, the US experience was that 'online' activity quickly translated into 'offline' meetings etc. which could involve a much wider group of people. His view was that this was all good for democracy - whereas for 30 seconds on TV politicians could get things past the public, in an online community with ongoing dialogue, authenticity would win out.

On a more challenging note, he said that political parties needed to be less jealous about controlling their message, and let people shape it and disseminate it for themselves. As he said, at the moment, we are all "pioneers". Scary territory, but something I think we have to embrace.