EM’s post today made me wonder if we’re placing too much hope in Thompson? I’m not backtracking on my excitement over Fred’s unofficial announcement, but just wondering if we’re putting too much pressure on his campaign.
From a tech perspective it’s relishing to have a candidate who not only supports web activities but seems to actually understand them. Thompson plans on blogging and has already used video successfully. He’s the first candidate to truly embrace the web and not simply put up with YouTube because it’s a good campaign tactic. He’s also the first candidate to build an e-campaign that actually gives him a shot at the nomination.
But will we expect too much out of him? Like Christians who scrutinize every celebrity who meets Jesus, how closely will we judge Thompson’s campaign? Will the bloggers pounce on his every mistake? Will his online success translate into offline action (the million dollar question)? Is Thompson our Obama?It does look like he’s putting a good team into place. According to Politico, Michael Turk is getting the campaign started and possibly staying on longer. Turk was one of the nice individuals who helped this grad student with her thesis, so I have a lot of respect for him. It’ll be interesting to see who else he brings on board.
I guess I’m starting the criticism. Why is Thompson’s twitter profile blank? Is that his official profile?
I think a better question might be to ask is at what point do these things become important? I mean, surely there should be a bit of a grace period for this sort of thing (especially since it’s such unknown territory), don’t you think?
I’d say give it a few weeks, maybe a month, and if there’s nothing substantively different from the basics that the other candidates have online, then his handlers need to be slapped for wasting time and money.
My $0.02