How is that an innovative country?
Posted: Thu Feb 13, 2025 4:15 am
Imagine: a dark room at the liberal headquarters in The Hague. Dozens of young men and women, at long tables full of laptops. Feverishly they look at data about the election campaign, which shoots across the screens in real time. Is this about an election campaign in 2016? Or 2020? In Chicago they know better.
Obama's Digital Team
At the headquarters of the most powerful man on earth, more than a hundred members of the 'digital team' have been doing nothing else for months. In shifts, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, analyzing data from social media, blogs and forums. Until the re-election of their president is a fact. Or not, of course.
In 2008, Barack Obama was already using Twitter, Facebook and MySpace. Four years and millions of users later, the president is also taking things a step further: the digital team has been upgraded from 100 to 150 people and a real data science chief has been appointed to manage the campaign staff at the headquarters in Chicago.
Red roses
Back to the Netherlands. For the fifth time in ten years, the billboards have been taken down from the attic and covered with party posters again. And prominent PvdA member Ronald Plasterk (number 3 on the electoral list) is walking around the Albert Cuyp on walking boxes and wearing his characteristic hat, handing out red roses again.
These kinds of contrasts in political communication between the Netherlands and the US were discussed last week at a breakfast seminar by public affairs consultancy Weber Shandwick . The central question in The Hague: is political communication changing due to the increasing use of social media? An interesting and topical question. After all, elections are coming up in both countries: we will be able to elect 150 members of parliament on 12 September, the Americans will elect their new president on 6 November.
Two prominent speakers gave their views on political communication in this digital india telegram data age: Colin Moffett , adjunct professor at Georgetown University and digital public affairs expert from Washington, and Boris van der Ham , outgoing D66 MP and named the most active internet politician in the Netherlands in 2006 and 2010.
Digital strategy
Colin Moffett made a clear argument comparing the presidential election to the Olympic Games: the same event every four years, with fixed rules but different players. “This year, however, there is a big difference: the media landscape has changed dramatically. Now that people are online all the time and everywhere on their smartphones, campaign teams need a digital strategy to reach voters. Everything is happening much faster than in 2008. Communicating in real time puts a lot of pressure on the Obama and Romney teams. They have to switch and react super fast.”
Moffet mentions a number of highlights of the digital strategy in the current campaign:
Obama's Digital Team
At the headquarters of the most powerful man on earth, more than a hundred members of the 'digital team' have been doing nothing else for months. In shifts, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, analyzing data from social media, blogs and forums. Until the re-election of their president is a fact. Or not, of course.
In 2008, Barack Obama was already using Twitter, Facebook and MySpace. Four years and millions of users later, the president is also taking things a step further: the digital team has been upgraded from 100 to 150 people and a real data science chief has been appointed to manage the campaign staff at the headquarters in Chicago.
Red roses
Back to the Netherlands. For the fifth time in ten years, the billboards have been taken down from the attic and covered with party posters again. And prominent PvdA member Ronald Plasterk (number 3 on the electoral list) is walking around the Albert Cuyp on walking boxes and wearing his characteristic hat, handing out red roses again.
These kinds of contrasts in political communication between the Netherlands and the US were discussed last week at a breakfast seminar by public affairs consultancy Weber Shandwick . The central question in The Hague: is political communication changing due to the increasing use of social media? An interesting and topical question. After all, elections are coming up in both countries: we will be able to elect 150 members of parliament on 12 September, the Americans will elect their new president on 6 November.
Two prominent speakers gave their views on political communication in this digital india telegram data age: Colin Moffett , adjunct professor at Georgetown University and digital public affairs expert from Washington, and Boris van der Ham , outgoing D66 MP and named the most active internet politician in the Netherlands in 2006 and 2010.
Digital strategy
Colin Moffett made a clear argument comparing the presidential election to the Olympic Games: the same event every four years, with fixed rules but different players. “This year, however, there is a big difference: the media landscape has changed dramatically. Now that people are online all the time and everywhere on their smartphones, campaign teams need a digital strategy to reach voters. Everything is happening much faster than in 2008. Communicating in real time puts a lot of pressure on the Obama and Romney teams. They have to switch and react super fast.”
Moffet mentions a number of highlights of the digital strategy in the current campaign: