Obama campaigned – and won – on the core promise of change. And even before he moved into the White House, he achieved many firsts. Among them was being the first American leader to understand the power of new media and to use it effectively to harness both campaign contributions and, eventually, votes.
On 6 November 2008, soon after the election results were confirmed, we noted how Obama had just been elected ‘President of the New Media world’. I explained: “Obama’s rise has epitomised change in many ways. Among other things, he is the first elected leader of a major democracy who shows understanding and mastery over the New Media World, which is radically different from the old media order.”
Of course, others had different takes on the same outcome. One of the funniest was by The Onion, which proclaimed: Black Man Given Nation’s Worst Job.’ It read, in part: “African-American man Barack Obama, 47, was given the least-desirable job in the entire country Tuesday when he was elected president of the United States of America. In his new high-stress, low-reward position, Obama will be charged with such tasks as completely overhauling the nation’s broken-down economy, repairing the crumbling infrastructure, and generally having to please more than 300 million Americans and cater to their every whim on a daily basis.”
The sheer magnitude of Obama’s challenges has become clearer in the weeks following the historic election. While the economy will certainly dominate his agenda, he will also have to live up to the many expectations of hope that his campaign sparked off in hundreds of millions of people — and not just in the United States.
How will the ‘President of the New Media world’ remain engaged with the millions of conversations taking place 24/7 on the web and through mobile devices? Is this realistically possible given his roles as the chief executive of beleaguered America, Inc., and commander-in-chief of the world’s only superpower?
Already, there is much interest whether security concerns and legal requirements will allow Obama to keep using his BlackBerry, to which he admits being addicted. “I’m still clinging to my BlackBerry,” Obama said only a few days ago in an interview with The New York Times. “They’re going to pry it out of my hands.”
Remember how his comments about “bitter” small-town Americans clinging to their guns and religion — uttered at a ticket-only and supposedly no-media San Francisco fund-raiser during the campaign — came to be publicised? And that, too, by a pro-Obama blogger writing on the openly pro-Democratic blogger site Huffington Post!
Then there’s the power of moving images moving around online as broadband rolls out across the planet, and speeds improve to support real time video-watching. The day Americans went to the polls to elect Obama, we recalled the hugely popular Obama Girl (‘I got a crush on Obama’) – an internet viral video, first posted on YouTube in June 2007 – and asked Can this little video change history? We had our answer within 24 hours.
While Obama Girl was a well-edited, slick campaign-boosting video released online, the thousands of citizen-filmed videos being posted online are not. And yet, in that no-frills mode, some bring out public interest concerns that have implications for public policy debates and/or law enforcement.
A current example is the sad case of Oscar Grant, a young, unarmed black man who was fatally shot by police officers while laying face-down on a BART subway platform in Oakland, California, on 31 December 2008. Several citizens filmed the incident on their mobile phones. Three separate videos, circulating online at a rapid pace, show various angles and stages of the incident. See one of them here. These have already put the spotlight on police conduct and may influence the judicial process.
President Obama arrives at the White House to lead the executive of a nation that is unlike any his predecessors faced. His inauguration will be the most digitised, but that’s only the beginning. For four or eight years, Obama’s every move, word and gesture will be captured, dissected and debated to exhaustion by admirers and detractors alike. And his administration will be under scrutiny by thousands of citizen journalists who don’t share much except the digital platforms and social networks on which they post their impressions.
Welcome to the New Media Presidency. The hard work – and real fun – begin now!
Watch this cyberspace…
Open Minds! (formerly: Moving Images blog) 
And I suppose YOU approved of LIZ TROTTA asking for his assassination on the FEAUX, ‘er FOX network during the early days of the “run” ? Is it maybe the FACT that WILL NOT be lead by media JUDAS GOATS as SO many of this type of “journalistic” wanda-bees wish to profit from. This DEAR READER is what is called CHANGE.
Getting used to improvement may be DIFFICULT, nes’t pas ?
Omegetymon,
I’m not sure what I said inspired your comment. For sure, Obama’s rise to power has not been universally acclaimed. But that’s only to be expected: In pluralistic societies, there will always be detractors — including, alas, those who advocate violence to achieve their wishes. And there will always be the partisan media outlets like Fox News; we can now find their equivalent also in the blogosphere.
As for where I stand in all this, you can easily discern by running a simple search for Obama on this blog. I have always been an admirer and supporter of Obama. One of my most visited blog posts last year was published on 30 August 2008, where I remarked on the uncanny similarities between Obama and the character Mays Gilliam, played by actor Chris Rock, in the 2003 movie Head of State. See: https://movingimages.wordpress.com/2008/08/30/from-chris-rock-to-barak-obama-will-life-imitate-art/
My views on the mainstream media, sometimes called Mediasaurus, are also found in several blog posts, most recently in my tribute to writer Michael Crichton, who died on the very day Americans were electing their new President. See: https://movingimages.wordpress.com/2008/11/08/michael-crichton-1942-2008-foresaw-the-fate-of-mediasaurus/
This comment better suits the past blog on august 30. But today will be a good time to recall some of Chris Rock’s remarks he made 13 years ago. Even in his wildest dreams, Chris Rock may have not thought this dawn will arrive in his lifetime. He reasoned why America will never even have a black vice president.
Chris Rock’s first major- HBO televised stand up act took place in washington DC in 1996. It was called ” Bring Back the Pain”.
” you know they say Colin Powell should run for president. yeah right, Colin Powell has a better chance of winning the bronze medal in female gymnastics at Olympic, than becoming the president of United States. White people will never vote for Colin Powell. Then they say may be he should run for vice president. get the f.. outta here man, they will never make a black guy the vice president.
you wanna know why? cause some black man will kill the president. thats why. s… I’d do it. if there was a black vice president, I can’t wait to kill the president.
what are you gonna do to me? send me to a jail where the rest of the inmates will treat me like a hero for the rest of my life?
what if I get the death penalty? then what
GET PARDONED BY THE BLACK PRESIDENT!!!
Nalaka,
I wish Barack Obama well and safe passage to see his words (as outlined below) arrive and take residence in every port of call.
It would be wise fur the UNEP to take heed of his example.
” However long we are keepers of the public trust, we should never forget that we are public servants, and public service is a privalege,” Mr. Obama said.
Mr. Obama issued new instructions on how to interpret the Freedom of Information Act, promising that neither he nor any former president would be allowed to withold information without approval of the attorney general and White House counsel. “Starting today, every agency and department should know that this administration stands on the side of not of those seek to withold information but those who seek to make it known”.
(The Times)
The new Obama Administration has a busy time ahead. Its tasks will include enrolling the support of Congress to cut US greenhouse gas emissions, while any new international post-2012 climate treaty will have to gain the approval of Senate.
But the new President takes office with the promise of new environmental leadership from the White House.
“When I am President, any governor who’s willing to promote clean energy will have a partner in the White House,” he told governors at a climate change conference on 18 November. “Any company that’s willing to invest in clean energy will have an ally in Washington. And any nation that’s willing to join the cause of combating climate change will have an ally in the United States of America.”
(http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?DocumentID=556&ArticleID=6040&l=en)
Thomas
P.S. –
Still no answer from the UNEP regarding the elusive truth to our simple question… ” Who is the tru original creator of the character “Ozzy Ozone”? There must be a “name with a face” to whom is responsible for this innovative conception, of which “Ozzy Ozone” truly is! Why, the UNEP cast a veil of secrecy around the identity of a cartoon characters creator is beyond comprehension? Strange.