The Nexus of 2024

“Yes We Can” do grassroots campaigning for Obama on Facebook

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jon
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The Yes We Can/Sí­ Se Puede video’s already got at least a million hits on YouTube — 566,000 for the one I linked to here, a couple more instances with 285,000 and 140,000, and then a long tail curve …

How many people will watch it if we get it all over Facebook? I dunno, but it seems worth trying to find out. So after some consultation with a friend, late last night I put a message on the Obama discussion board with these suggestions:

Here’s how you can help:

1) post it (using the “posted items” link in your applications list on the left hand side). This way, it’ll be on your profile and in your feed.

2) tell your friends about it, and ask them to do the same

3) if you’re in any Obama groups on Facebook, please post these instructions in their discussion boards and wall.

4) if you’ve got a blog, blog about it

Thanks!

I also send a handful of PMs, including one to a 20-person “friend list”, and put it in the One Million Strong for Obama group. [In the process, I ran into a couple of people with complementary ideas — I’ll add those to the comments here.]

Within fifteen minutes, two people replied in the thread saying “done”. By the time I woke up this morning, there were ten replies in the two threads … as they say in election season, “early returns are promising”.

So please: take a moment to get involved and help!

Comments

11 responses to ““Yes We Can” do grassroots campaigning for Obama on Facebook”

  1. jon Avatar
    jon

    A couple of similar grassroots campaigning ideas I ran into while doing this:

    Tony from University of Minnesota Morris suggests adding it to your iLike: go here and click ‘Add VIDEO to Profile’

    Ken from Drexel started a campaign to get the video on TRL on MTV. Hey, you don’t even need to be on Facebook for this!

    Reply
  2. Liminal states » Archive » … or can we?

    […] got up this morning pscyhed to follow up on my “Yes We Can” do grassroots campaigning for Obama on Facebook idea.  I quickly sent PMs saying “thanks” to the people who had replied in the threads […]

    Reply
  3. jon Avatar
    jon

    As of noon, there are about 1.2 million views on the three highest-ranking pages on YouTube. There are also over 100 video responses posted.

    The video’s fairly quiet on Digg, at 3204 diggs, up from 3100ish last time I checked. What’s striking, though, is the Digg US election video page. Ron Paul, Mitt Romney, and Jon Stewart (mocking CNN) each have one entry there, as does the chain of custody in the New Hampshire election. The Ron Paul edit of the Republican debate tops the chart with 5200 diggs. Mike Gravel has two, one attacking Bush and Giuliani, the other on the oppressive nature of religion.

    There are three videos about Hillary Clinton; one Keith Olbermann “blasting” her on Iraq, one on Wal-Mart, and one with the title “Hillary Clinton: Every Nation Must Be With Us Or Against Us” which in this context doesn’t come across as well as her campaign might have hoped.

    In contrast there are five videos about Barack Obama: his response to the State of the Union address, his victory speech after South Carolina, Ted Kennedy’s endorsement at AU, “Yes We Can”, and “ABC: Every Soldier I talked to is for Obama”. There’s also one about Michelle Obama that links off to a CNN story about “Obama’s secret weapon”.

    At least on this snapshot, the different approach the Obama campaign took online really seems like it’s paying off.

    Reply
  4. jon Avatar
    jon

    There’s beautiful “long tail effect” in the list of YouTube videos matching Barack Obama Yes We Can.…

    (update, 10 minutes later oops, on closer inspection, it tails off much more rapidly than a classic long tail curve.)

    And it just cracked the top 25 Barack Obama videos on YouTube. #1 is “laughing babies”, added a year ago, 7,669,662 views. #2 is “I Got a Crush…On Obama” By Obama Girl, added seven months ago.

    Reply
  5. jon Avatar
    jon

    The video’s now over 2,000,000 views on YouTube; the top three instances are at 1,020,000, 600,000, and 200,000.

    And while the statistics still haven’t updated, I think this will puts the most-viewed instance in the top 10, almost catching up with Obama’s Response to the State of the Union address at at 1,036,000 (up from 1,007,000 when I checked earlier this afternoon). Four (!) of the ones ahead of it are by ObamaGirl. Maybe they should have asked her to do a cameo?

    Reply
  6. jon Avatar
    jon

    At 7 a.m., the numbers are 1,205,000; 865,000; and 226,842 … which probably puts the total somewhere around 2.7-2.9 million. That’s a lot.

    Reply
  7. jon Avatar
    jon

    At 1:30 p.m., probably 3.2-3.5 million views. The top three are at 1,357,756, 1,134,809, and 252736. #2’s views increased by 30% as opposed to 12.5% for #1. One difference is that #2 has “by will.i.am” in the title, so people searching for him are more likely to find it. Also, this is the one that Tony was using for his iLike campaign on Facebook. Not sure if there’s any way of estimating the relative influence of these things — or what else contributes to it.

    The video has now cracked will.i.am’s top 15, although has a long way to go to catch up with Fergie, perched comfortably in the top four slots on this list.

    Reply
  8. jon Avatar
    jon

    quick update because I’m tracking primary results:

    1,618,361; 1,548,959; 291,501

    rough change since last post: +25%, +36% (!), +17%

    I did a quick scan through the “tail”, and it’s a little over 400,000 (although soem of the numbers may be old), so the total somewhere in the 3.8-3.9 million range.

    Reply
  9. Liminal states » Archive » The post-super Wednesday thread!

    […] Yes We Can video: activism campaigns and statistics, […]

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  10. jon Avatar
    jon

    1,846,345; 1,828,213; 327,430

    so probably 4.5M total. Growth may be slowing …

    Reply
  11. jon Avatar
    jon

    Also, stats from Tony on iLike: more than 7,600 dedications!

    Reply

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