“I began my presidential campaign here to remind the country that we, as citizens and as a government, have a moral responsibility to each other, and what we do together matters. We must do better, if we want to live up to the great promise of this country that we all love so much.
“It is appropriate that I come here today. It’s time for me to step aside so that history can blaze its path. We do not know who will take the final steps to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, but what we do know is that our Democratic Party will make history. We will be strong, we will be unified, and with our convictions and a little backbone we will take back the White House in November and we’ll create hope and opportunity for this country.”
Analysis: John Edwards was the first candidate to announce his bid for the presidency in 2008. He did so on YouTube first, while working to rebuild New Orleans–with his own hands. Below is that video. Edwards provided a strong voice for the poor of this country and took a courageous stand on not receiving money from lobbyists. My guess is that the timing of his departure — before Super Tuesday next week –may be intended to help Barack Obama do better against Hillary Clinton.
News: You can download from the link above my latest report on the use of videos on YouTube by the presidential candidates. The study was completed before the New Hampshire primary.
Analysis: Here are my 3 key findings:
(1) Republican candidate Ron Paul continues to be, by a wide margin, the most popular candidate on YouTube, in terms of the average number of views per video (105,908 views per video) and the number of subscribers to his YouTube channel (42,858).He also has the most total views (9,320,763) on YouTube for any presidential candidate (although he does not have the most viewed single video on YouTube—Mike Huckabee does).
(2) Republican candidate Mike Huckabee has experienced a dramatic growth in the popularity of his videos during November and December 2007.He jumped from close to the worst in average number of views in October 2007 to the second most views per video by January 4, 2008, with 27,818 views per video.Most impressive of all is the fact that Huckabee is the first candidate with a video that has generated over 1 million views on YouTube.
(3)Finally, as the primary season has begun, the candidates’ YouTube videos have seen a huge increase in the number of views than in previous months.
News: I hope to have another official report on the popularity of YouTube videos of the presidential candidates soon. There’s been a lot of movement, especially by Mike Huckabee. You can view my past reports here. In the meantime, I will be posting the campaign videos of the key contenders each day until the New Hampshire primary. Here are Saturday’s videos:
News: Barack Obama is now in a statistical tie with Hillary Clinton in Iowa.
Analysis: Oprah is an excellent campaigner. The Clinton camp should be hitting the panic button right now. This will be their toughest challenge for the Democratic nomination.
News: The Edwards campaign is going on the offensive on YouTube, with this attack ad on Hillary Clinton, who had a shakier performance in the last debate (as shown on the video).
[DISCLAIMER: This is not an endorsement of any candidate.]
News: The Utube Blog’s second report on the presidential candidate videos on YouTube is now available. Ron Paul continues to blow by the entire field of candidates, both Democratic and Republican. Newcomer Fred Thompson had a disappointing first month on YouTube.
(1) Republican candidate Ron Paul continues to be, by a wide margin, the most popular candidate on YouTube, in terms of the average number of views per video (85,194 views per video) and the number of subscribers to his YouTube channel (29,658).He also has the most total views (4,344,904) on YouTube for any presidential candidate (although he does not have the most viewed single video on YouTube—Hillary Clinton does).
(2) Republican candidate Fred Thompson has drawn only a relatively few number of YouTube viewers in the first month of his campaign, maintaining a very low average number of views per video (3,780 views per video).He gained only 581 subscribers to his YouTube channel.His most watched video captured over 55,000 views.
(3)Overall, the videos of all the presidential candidates have drawn only a relatively modest number of views on YouTube, both in terms of the actual views per video and the average number of views per video.
News: For the past couple months, I’ve been collecting data on all the presidential candidates’ videos on YouTube. Today, I’m publishing my first report, “Analyzing the Presidential Candidate Videos on YouTube August 2007.”
The report reaches two basic findings for the presidential candidate videos thus far:
(1) The presidential candidates have gained only a relatively modest amount of views and subscribers to their YouTube videos; and
(2) Republican candidate Ron Paul is, by a wide margin, the most popular candidate on YouTube, in terms of the average number of views per video and the number of subscribers to his YouTube channel.He also has the most total views on YouTube for any presidential candidate.
Here’s one slice of the report:
View the report: Click here. I’ve also set up a new blog called The YouTube President with a copy of the report. I’ll be collecting my reports there.
(Copyright permission: Please feel free to copy the report and re-use it, including the graphs, in other works, as long as attribution is given to Professor Edward Lee and The Utube Blog. Thanks.)
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