What Experts Say 2

Another article that deserves your attention is "The 2016 Presidential Campaign – a News Event That’s Hard to Miss" by Jeffrey Gottfried and his colleagues. The article makes an analysis of what sources Americans use to get information about the 2016 presidential campaign. The analysis employs recent researches and statistics.The authors show the percentage of US adults interested in elections, which is 91%. Furthermore, they divide this 91 % intocategories, based on what type of source adults uses. The analysis goes even further, the article shows what percentage of adults use different amount of sources for getting information about US presidential elections. This article in collaboration with content analysis would be able to roughly predict the future president of the US. Moreover, it gives a deeper understanding of what type of media is the most influential for certain age groups. The results of this analysis are truly intriguing and surprising. 

HERE IS THE LINK: http://www.journalism.org/2016/02/04/the-2016-presidential-campaign-a-news-event-thats-hard-to-miss/

What Experts Say 1

William Powers, the author of the article "Who is Influensing the Elections 2016", made a great analysis of how social media is involved in US presidential elections 2016. He constructed the article in the way that a person without political knowledge could easily become familiar with what is happening in US politics. William Powers starts with a question: "What is influence?" and shows from what sources public gets information. Moreover, he explains how the social media's involvement has changed the candidates' strategy. The most interesting part of this article is the rank of the influencial people of US presidential elections 2016. There one can find former presidents, social activists, religious figures and many other influencers. The author also describes this analysis project, which is quite interesting: "...our group has built an election analytics machine called The Electome. Funded in part by a grant from the Knight Foundation, the project aims to further public understanding of how politics and news are changing in the digital age, and to show how campaign journalism can move beyond the traditional “horse race” coverage." 
Please find the link below and check this article out.

https://medium.com/mit-media-lab/who-s-influencing-election-2016-8bed68ddecc3#.cnyxopat2

Current Event 2

Social Media acts as a free advertisement source for politicians and the president elections candidates. A tweet on Twitter, or a post on Facebook reaches millions of users. According to the "2016 Presidential Election Circus: Is Social Media the Cause?" article Donald Trump, the Republican party candidate, would have to pay $380 million, in order to reach his audience by using classical ads instead of social media tools. The huge audience that uses social media as a source of news and other information makes social media websites and applications a battle field of opinions. 

The current event that brought millions of active internet users to the social media battle field was Trump's claim about Muslim population is not going to enter US anymore. His claim brought great attention to his figure. Obviously, his statements are targeted to raise public's alertness and make his name known by everyone. Here, it comes to psychology of people's mind. Who would an American citizen vote for? For a person that brings up such an intimate and emotional question about Muslims in the country or for a less familiar candidate? Familiarity is social media's weapon and Donald Trump actively uses this weapon to make his political campaign to be heard. Moreover, opposing views on social media unite supporters and sometimes persuade the opposers are now right.

On the other hand, opposition unites as well and the battle between pro-Trumps and con-Trumps gets even worse. Great flow of criticism of Trump's claim turned Twitter and Facebook in political debate. In my opinion, it does not hurt the candidate's reputation, it just brings attention to his political career. This interest serves a purpose of making a candidate familiar to the public. The familiarity would be a turning point for those who will vote without knowledge about politics. As  history shows, the rest who have a certain political views (eg. republicans or democrats)  will vote for their party candidates.

Information link: http://edition.cnn.com/2015/12/07/politics/donald-trump-muslim-ban-immigration/

Current Event 1

Political Snapchatting

Ipsos Mori, the global research company published an article about UK elections and social media relations  and the author says: "..seven in ten Britons (71%) feel that social media platforms are giving a voice to people who would not normally take part in political debate. This is particularly the case for young people (88% of 18-34s, compared with 56% of those aged 55+)." This idea is applicable for US population and its' social media users. Politics engage the young population through such social media platforms as Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram and others. The trend of transferring politics into social media language became even a compulsory element of election campaigns. One can easily find Donald Trump's facebook account or Hillary Clinton's Snapchat profile (@hillaryclinton). 

Snapchat is one of the new triggers of political campaigns' activities. It allows to reach a younger audience of 18-34 years old users, rather than Facebook's 18-65+ audience. Hillary's Clinton appearance on Snapchat became a sensation for potential voters. Usage of Snapchat creates a feeling that a person you see on your screen presents in your life, you know him or her and even the features of the application create an emotional addiction to the ones you follow. These features are effectively used by politicians and their PR managers. Updates of your Snapchat friends that appear often serve to create a certain trust effect and even a feeling of friendship. Here it becomes obvious that one will vote for a candidate that he or she follows and watches the candidate's videos on a daily basis. 

Virtual friendship in social media shows one side of a candidate's life. We become familiar, for instance, with some family members of Hillary Clinton, her habits and free time spending. However, we have no clue about her political activity, and young people who tend to spend more time using social media and not being informed about political claims of a candidate would base their decisions on her personality, on her relationship with her kids and etc. Therefore, I can say that usage of social media by politicians could possibly create a veil that hides main characteristics, that should be took in attention while voting. 

Information link: http://www.techinsider.io/hillary-clinton-joins-snapchat-2015-8

Socia Media elects a president for us. Social media's influence on US Presidential elections 2016.

On November 8, 2016 United States are going to have the major event of the last 4 years. Presidential elections incorporate debates and old-fashioned posters on the streets, but they are in the process of being replaced by progressively developing social media platforms and websites. According to Statista, the statistical portal, 78% of US population have a social media profile. Therefore, the candidates by using social media websites could reach the majority of the voters.  Moreover, recent researches show that seeing posts on social media reflects on voting decisions of users. So, obviously social media influences on our thoughts and decisions we make. This statement brings up a question: "Who makes choices: social media or us?"

PHOTO EXTRACTED FROM: https://www.google.cz/search?q=media+and+elections&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiTntvc1aTMAhUB5xoKHWF3AacQ_AUIBygB&biw=1536&bih=778#tbm=isch&q=elections+2016+and+facebook&imgrc=CiMFXte6Imv7rM%3A