Social Media Impact

I looked at the article on the New York Times Web site about San Fransisco Mayor Gavin Newsom. Newsom is the most followed mayor in the country on twitter and has used many other social media outlets such as Second Life. Coincidentally, the New York Times retrieved this article from a blog in the bay area.
However, the article acknowledges that Newsom is sending out less and less tweets and his staffers are sending out more. This highlights a problem we have mentioned in class numerous times. You can never be certain who is actually behind a twitter post. However, Newsom does still send original posts such as tweets directly from his daughter's birth.
I do not think that staffers posting is a huge problem. No matter the medium politicians will always pre-package quotes and often they will run them by their staff or allow their staff to make the comments on their behalf. The extension of this to twitter, though it can be a problem with the site, is more an extension of the relationship between politicians and the media than a direct problem with Twitter. The fact that he is still tweeting original things such as his daughters birth point to the fact that it is indeed his twitter account and not someone posing as him. Even if staffers are posting on his account it is still at least with his permission. Thus if cautious of this fact reporters should not have a problem using his posts.

****Reminder: 2 extra credit points, Error of Fact in the lantern about the half time score of the Illinois Basketball game and the error on ESPN.com recaping the same game that had the wrong day for the Buckeyes next game.