Citation: boyd, danah (2008). "Digital Handshakes in Networked Publics…

Citation: boyd, danah (2008). "Digital Handshakes in Networked Publics: Why Politicians Must Interact,
Not Broadcast." In Ben Rigby (ed.), Mobilizing Generation 2.0. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.


The Big Picture

Digital Handshakes in Networked Publics: Why Politicians Must Interact, Not
Broadcast

Essay by danah boyd

Much to my dismay, American politicians primarily treat the digital world as yet another
broadcast medium. They seem to think that they will be worshipped online if only they
port their TV-styled material to the Internet. With this framework in mind, they pay
consultants to build structured, formalized content for citizens to passively consume.
When these endeavors fail to capture massive attention, politicians blame the medium.

Even in 2004, when politicians everywhere were discussing the potential of the Internet
thanks to Howard Dean, most political campaigns only recognized digital citizens to the
extent that they typed in their credit card numbers to support campaign finance. They
never seemed to understand that there were people behind those wallets. Of course, I
cannot fully blame the campaigns ­ they were trying to do what the e-commerce
entrepreneurs tried a few years earlier. Yet, as venture capitalists learned the hard way
with the burst of the tech bubble, there's a lot more to the Internet than online shopping.

By and large, two practices dominate everyday people's use of the Internet: information
access and communication. Both are about interaction and engagement - with content
and with other people. The result of everyday participation is the collective formation of
networks ­ networks of people, networks of information, and networks of people
juxtaposed with information. As such, the Internet is not simply a broadcast medium, but
a "networked public." Just as with the offline equivalent ­ parks, malls, town squares,
etc. ­ people come together for a variety of different purposes including socialization,
status negotiation, consumption, and civic engagement.

The manifestation of networked publics is most visible with the current wave of online
communities ­ social network sites like MySpace and Facebook, media-sharing sites like
YouTube and Flickr, and blogs. These sites are not simply spaces for information
dissemination; they are networked publics where people gather en masse to do the things
that they would normally do in public places. In doing so, they help construct a new
public sphere.

To their credit, political candidates understand that the services that help construct
networked publics are important. They are rushing to social network sites to mark their
turf and using YouTube to spread their message, but, all too often, their awkwardness
shows. They know that the sites are important, but they don't seem to know why or what
to do with them. While it is certainly possible to grandstand in networked publics, the
social norms demand authenticity, a quality that is typically hammered out of most
candidates at a young age.
Citation: boyd, danah (2008). "Digital Handshakes in Networked Publics: Why Politicians Must Interact,
Not Broadcast." In Ben Rigby (ed.), Mobilizing Generation 2.0. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.


Consider the "friending" phenomenon, in which social network sites allow participants to
list others as "Friends." The concept of Friends can be confusing because most people
don't use this feature to list their closest and dearest; they list all of the people that they
envision as part of their imagined audience. If they imagine that their profile will be
viewed by just a few, they're likely to only list close friends while those seeking mass
attention are far more likely to nurture thousands of connections. Not surprisingly,
politicians are seeking fairly broad audiences so they (or at least their interns) run around
trying to collect as many Friends as possible. The problem is that their enthusiasm more
closely resembles a dorky 14-year old boy trying to appear popular than a celebrity
supporting and nurturing fans. Their profiles have no life to them ­ no one wants to have
a Deatheater as a Friend.

It is critical to understand the reasons for why people collect strangers and celebrities (of
which, politicians are typically one or the other) on social network sites. The primary
reason has to do with signaling identity information. A connection to Barack Obama or
John McCain or even Stephen Colbert signals political affiliation, political engagement
(or lack thereof), and philosophical bent. The second reason is to create an open channel
for communicating with the public figure through comments. In other words, citizens use
politicians for their own purposes, not to validate a snazzy new media campaign.

Having millions of Friends means nothing if politicians don't create a platform where
they will listen to and validate people's woes. The primary place for said interactions is
through comments. On MySpace and Facebook, Friends can leave comments or Wall
messages ­ pithy remarks that are publicly displayed on an individual's profile. Getting
comments makes a person look cool, but comments are also embedded in a social
contract of reciprocity. Comments are not left on politicians' profiles simply to be
consumed by the aide who controls the profile; they are crafted to provoke a response by
the politician or by anyone visiting the politician's page.

Furthermore, comments are a form of social currency. Receiving comments from cool
people makes the recipient look cool. Imagine what would happen if politicians sincerely
reached out to some of their Friends and began commenting? Whenever bands do this,
teens go wild and tell all of their friends. For some of the most politically engaged young
people, this would be a huge energizer. All of a sudden, the candidate would go from
being one of 9,000 Friends that a person has to someone who leaves a message and is
visible by all of that person's Friends, many of whom are probably not connected to the
candidate. The key is that these need to be genuine messages rather than mass-produced
spam. Sadly, we see no such effort by politicians on social network sites. They think
their profile is a way to advertise themselves, rather than a jumping off point to engage in
a networked public.

Politicians stand little chance of activating Friend connections if they fail to nurture those
relationships or understand the social norms that exist in networked publics. A Friend
online does not automatically mean a vote offline. Simply having a digital presence
doesn't convert people. Having a MySpace profile that looks like an ad campaign
doesn't convince anyone to vote for you.
Citation: boyd, danah (2008). "Digital Handshakes in Networked Publics: Why Politicians Must Interact,
Not Broadcast." In Ben Rigby (ed.), Mobilizing Generation 2.0. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.




Whenever I encourage campaigns to reach out and connect to the citizens of the
networked publics, I'm told that politicians don't have time for this or that it's easier to
broadcast. There's no doubt that broadcast is easier, but it's not nearly as effective as
meaningful encounters. Politicians know that even in an era of TV they have to travel
state-to-state to talk to people on their own terms in their own world. They also spend
countless hours on the phone nurturing potential donors. For many young adults today,
public life is primarily experienced online. By not taking the time to engage in networked
publics, politicians are failing to engage those who spend much of their day there. It's
time to start acknowledging networked publics and begin digitally shaking hands.


danah boyd is a PhD candidate at the School of Information at the University of
California-Berkeley and a Fellow at the Harvard University Berkman Center for Internet
and Society. Her research focuses on the role of social media in public life.