blogonawire

It’s finally here. Election Day 2008.

Many people have called this election the most historic of our generation (which I think is yet to be seen - I’m planning on being around for a few more…) But I will certainly agree that it’s the most historic to-date in my generation.
And it shows. Spend 5 minutes this morning perusing your favorite social network of choice and, if you’re kind of a nerd like me, you’ll get really excited about the way social media has been used to encourage people to participate in democracy and celebrate the freedom we enjoy in America. Here are a few examples of how social media is being used to “rock the vote:”

Facebook:

Get to the homepage of Facebook and you’re greeted with this reminder

When you get to your Facebook homepage, you can see this counter letting you know how many people have voted. You can click the button to proudly claim that you’ve voted and a story will be published on your profile.

You can RSVP to the Election Event and invite your friends, and visit the election page where Facebook will help you find your polling place, as well as the closest Ben & Jerry’s which will be handing out free ice cream to voters. (Starbucks will also give you a free tall coffee but I didn’t see that incorporated into any of the social sites I checked - anyone else find it somewhere?)

You can even “donate” your status to your favorite candidate.

YouTube:

YouTube has created an entire channel called “Video Your Vote” where you can video yourself and your voting experience (in states that allow it) and categorize is as Early Voting, Notable Voter, Voting Perspectives, Voter Intimidation, Polling Place Problems, or Registration Problems and then the videos pop up on interactive map.

[*screenshot missing due to technical difficulties]

Myspace:

Similar to Facebook, Myspace’s homepage features an election section. You can find polling places, see video messages from celebs, get an “I Voted” icon and see what impact Myspace users are having on the election.

Myspace features polls for users to weigh in about their election decisions and feelings.

Twitter:

Twitter has been offering live election feed coverage of Tweets that reference any of the election keywords over the course of campaigns.

And now on Election Day, you can use Twitter to alert election officials of any voting issues you are having in real time. (Dustin blogged about Twitter’s Election Protection yesterday)

Digg & Current TV:

While major networks will definitely have 24 hour election coverage, Digg and Current have teamed up to put our top rated stories on TV at Current TV

StumbleUpon:

Their homepage reminds us to vote and links to election themed stories that have been Stumbled. If you click the red side of the button you get McCain stories, the blue side will show you Obama stories.

Google:

And here comes our old friend Google. It might be a stretch to call Google social media per se but it did feature an election themed home page with an easy to find link to find polling places via Google Maps.

I have to admit that watching the numbers climb on the Facebook vote counter over the past few hours this morning has given me a deep sense of pride. And I’m also happy to find sentiment like this floating around:

(Find more election themed cards to pass around at Someecards and encourage your friends to vote)

These are the main social initiatives I found this morning with relatively little effort spent looking…did anybody find anything else? Use the comments to share!