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Just a few years ago, the talking heads were fawning over a few politicians you might know, who claimed their social media strategy was the linchpin in winning

by zaroth 9y ago

Just a few years ago, the talking heads were fawning over a few politicians you might know, who claimed their social media strategy was the linchpin in winning the election. Political campaigns of a certain bend would brag about how rich their voter targeting data was and how much more effective they were with their advertising dollars online. What I’m trying to understand is if the average reader thinks these methods are bad in general, or just bad when the “wrong” person uses them well? Political advertising is actually important - we want issue focused ads helping communicate candidates stated positions on hot button issues. And yes, we even want the hit jobs when behavior warrants it and should be highlighted. Is “influence elections” supposed to be a scary way of saying getting your word out? If the ads were lies, report them to the FTC or FEC. If the ads were effective, isn’t that the whole fucking point?

jimmytidey 9y ago
1) Yes, there is a certain degree of hypocrisy in commentators lauding the sophistication of the Obama campaign machine and then complaining about the Republican strategy. At the same time, some of the most celebrated aspects of the Obama campaign were not about social media. This is not (or should not be) treated as a partisan issue. 2) Political advertising is beneficial to democracy only if it improves voter's ability to vote in an informed way, which might not be the case. 3) If all competitive candidates require huge advertising budgets, that limits who can run and makes them beholden to sponsors. 4) The particular concern here is the lack of transparency. However much advertising helps inform voters, if voters are also able to understand what advertising strategies are being used they will be more informed. Social media seems particularly opaque with regards to what has been paid for, manipulated or occurred organically.
- chimeracoder 9y ago
  > Yes, there is a certain degree of hypocrisy in commentators lauding the sophistication of the Obama campaign machine and then complaining about the Republican strategy. The complaints are generally with respect to a targeted effort to direct people towards sites publishing outright false information[0] as propaganda, and doing so by coordinating with a foreign government. There is no such claim about the Obama campaign machine - certainly that's not what people laud when they talk about it. [0] Not misleading or biased, but completely false - as false as the headline "Humans Land On Mars", or "Moon Landing Revealed to be Hoax" would be.
  - jimmytidey 9y ago
    If you want a non-partisan debate, which I do, I think you have to look past this kind of 'who was worse' debate. Even if there is an answer to 'who was worse', trying to reach a conclusion will just descend into meaningless point scoring. So, rather than saying that there is or isn't hypocrisy, I guess it would have been better for me to say that I don't care.
    - chimeracoder 9y ago
      > If you want a non-partisan debate, which I do, I think you have to look past this kind of 'who was worse' debate. You can have a "non-partisan" debate while recognizing that there's an important distinction between applying data to disseminate information in good faith to potential voters and applying data to intentionally disseminate misinformation in concert with a foreign government.
      - tatersolid 9y ago
        Your typical Democrat enthusiast considers the entire Republican platform “disininformation”. And vice versa. That’s truly the root of the problem here: none of the “fanatics” who control the various political organizations on left or the right actually want informed debate. They want to censor the other side entirely.
oldsklgdfth 9y ago
I think the notion of political advertising is to some extent unethical, because it relies heavily on marketing candidates rather than presenting their positions. It's on thing to have the relevant information made easily accesable and another to push a rhetoric and narrative that is purpusefully manipulative. I would say that an effective ad is manipulative, thus has no place in the conversation of governance. My main concern - which I haven't seen mentioned as much - is not how this data is being used to target voters with ads. At the end of the day if i can convince you of something with words that's fair game. I am concern with how this information is used to manipulate the voiting system - GERRYMANDERING. I can ignore political ads. But if they know enough about me to classify me into a party AND control districting that's a problem. I encourage open political discussion, but it seems like that is being exploited and commotatized with big data to our disadvantage. Finally, the big winners aren't gop/dems. It's the people selling them this data and lining their pockets with money.
- smsm42 9y ago
  > it relies heavily on marketing candidates rather than presenting their positions That's the same thing, only one is said in nefarious tone and then the same is said in neutral tone. If you are trying to convince somebody to change their mind (and that's the purpose of having political ads - if everybody already agrees with you, why waste any time?) you need to say something that would change their position. Which, described in nefarious tone, is "manipulation". Of course, if my team does it, it's "education" instead. > GERRYMANDERING Facebook or any social media has zero influence on districting. It's wholly in the hands of local politicians. If you want it to change, some "manipulative" ads (or other ways of explaining, like pamphlets, in person conversations, articles, books, marches, whatever works) are needed to elect different politicians or cause the current ones to change their actions out of fear of not being elected again if they don't. I don't see any other way of doing it, do you? Of course, if everybody follows your example and ignores political ads (and other political persuasion content, as being "manipulative"), then any change would be impossible - everybody would be convinced in the same things today as they were yesterday, and everything would remain the same. Maybe some hugely significant and catastrophic events would cause some people to change their minds, but without them being able to persuade their peers, it would be mostly insignificant.
musage 9y ago
> If the ads were effective, isn’t that the whole fucking point? The point of "might is right" and totalitarianism? Yes. The point of democracy? No. > Nowadays, all you do is hear the media's description of what the candidate is saying, and one of the strange things about it is that politics is now presented in terms of politicians and not politics. I don't think the media is interested in politics, they're interested in politicians, which is a wholly different subject... who's doing this, about their private life, about their background, about what they must be thinking, might be thinking when they said something, why did they say it; but what they say is very, very hard to hear. And I think this is, in a sense, indeed quite deliberately, destroying the genuine democratic base on which people are elected. -- Tony Benn

by zaroth 9y ago

jimmytidey 9y ago

1) Yes, there is a certain degree of hypocrisy in commentators lauding the sophistication of the Obama campaign machine and then complaining about the Republican strategy. At the same time, some of the most celebrated aspects of the Obama campaign were not about social media. This is not (or should not be) treated as a partisan issue. 2) Political advertising is beneficial to democracy only if it improves voter's ability to vote in an informed way, which might not be the case. 3) If all competitive candidates require huge advertising budgets, that limits who can run and makes them beholden to sponsors. 4) The particular concern here is the lack of transparency. However much advertising helps inform voters, if voters are also able to understand what advertising strategies are being used they will be more informed. Social media seems particularly opaque with regards to what has been paid for, manipulated or occurred organically.

chimeracoder 9y ago
> Yes, there is a certain degree of hypocrisy in commentators lauding the sophistication of the Obama campaign machine and then complaining about the Republican strategy. The complaints are generally with respect to a targeted effort to direct people towards sites publishing outright false information[0] as propaganda, and doing so by coordinating with a foreign government. There is no such claim about the Obama campaign machine - certainly that's not what people laud when they talk about it. [0] Not misleading or biased, but completely false - as false as the headline "Humans Land On Mars", or "Moon Landing Revealed to be Hoax" would be.
- jimmytidey 9y ago
  If you want a non-partisan debate, which I do, I think you have to look past this kind of 'who was worse' debate. Even if there is an answer to 'who was worse', trying to reach a conclusion will just descend into meaningless point scoring. So, rather than saying that there is or isn't hypocrisy, I guess it would have been better for me to say that I don't care.
  - chimeracoder 9y ago
    > If you want a non-partisan debate, which I do, I think you have to look past this kind of 'who was worse' debate. You can have a "non-partisan" debate while recognizing that there's an important distinction between applying data to disseminate information in good faith to potential voters and applying data to intentionally disseminate misinformation in concert with a foreign government.
    - tatersolid 9y ago
      Your typical Democrat enthusiast considers the entire Republican platform “disininformation”. And vice versa. That’s truly the root of the problem here: none of the “fanatics” who control the various political organizations on left or the right actually want informed debate. They want to censor the other side entirely.

oldsklgdfth 9y ago

I think the notion of political advertising is to some extent unethical, because it relies heavily on marketing candidates rather than presenting their positions. It's on thing to have the relevant information made easily accesable and another to push a rhetoric and narrative that is purpusefully manipulative. I would say that an effective ad is manipulative, thus has no place in the conversation of governance. My main concern - which I haven't seen mentioned as much - is not how this data is being used to target voters with ads. At the end of the day if i can convince you of something with words that's fair game. I am concern with how this information is used to manipulate the voiting system - GERRYMANDERING. I can ignore political ads. But if they know enough about me to classify me into a party AND control districting that's a problem. I encourage open political discussion, but it seems like that is being exploited and commotatized with big data to our disadvantage. Finally, the big winners aren't gop/dems. It's the people selling them this data and lining their pockets with money.

smsm42 9y ago
> it relies heavily on marketing candidates rather than presenting their positions That's the same thing, only one is said in nefarious tone and then the same is said in neutral tone. If you are trying to convince somebody to change their mind (and that's the purpose of having political ads - if everybody already agrees with you, why waste any time?) you need to say something that would change their position. Which, described in nefarious tone, is "manipulation". Of course, if my team does it, it's "education" instead. > GERRYMANDERING Facebook or any social media has zero influence on districting. It's wholly in the hands of local politicians. If you want it to change, some "manipulative" ads (or other ways of explaining, like pamphlets, in person conversations, articles, books, marches, whatever works) are needed to elect different politicians or cause the current ones to change their actions out of fear of not being elected again if they don't. I don't see any other way of doing it, do you? Of course, if everybody follows your example and ignores political ads (and other political persuasion content, as being "manipulative"), then any change would be impossible - everybody would be convinced in the same things today as they were yesterday, and everything would remain the same. Maybe some hugely significant and catastrophic events would cause some people to change their minds, but without them being able to persuade their peers, it would be mostly insignificant.

musage 9y ago

> If the ads were effective, isn’t that the whole fucking point? The point of "might is right" and totalitarianism? Yes. The point of democracy? No. > Nowadays, all you do is hear the media's description of what the candidate is saying, and one of the strange things about it is that politics is now presented in terms of politicians and not politics. I don't think the media is interested in politics, they're interested in politicians, which is a wholly different subject... who's doing this, about their private life, about their background, about what they must be thinking, might be thinking when they said something, why did they say it; but what they say is very, very hard to hear. And I think this is, in a sense, indeed quite deliberately, destroying the genuine democratic base on which people are elected. -- Tony Benn