Just saw this article about the rising importance of social media in political campaigns: MA Senate Race Poll- Scott Brown trounces Martha Coakley The numbers they show are interesting, but they only look at Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube statistics.
If we go by the article's numbers, Scott Brown should win by a landslide, but the polls show a much more balanced election. This shows that rough statistics aren't very reliable as far as determining a candidate's chance of success. What's more important are the finer details.
Numbers only show the number of followers/mentions that the politician has generated. What they don't show is where these followers come from, who these people are, or what these mentions were referring to. In many ways, this particular election is a good case study, since it's a local election with a national reach. Many of the followers and mentions on these pages are very likely to have come from places outside of the voting districts, seriously skewing the results.
However, the raw data still shows some interesting trends. Political momentum is important in running a successful campaign, and the immediate availability of the data allows for fast political action. In the fast-moving political landscape of today, monitoring these statistics is vital.
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