Portfolio at NYU

Posted 07.08.05
John Kerry is your Friendster (Salon.com)
Revelations from John Kerry's Friendster profile (Originally published on March 23, 2004.)

By Scott Lamb

In the post-Howard Dean era, no area of campaign politics is more fertile than the fledgling territory of iPolitics. Weblogs such as Dean's Blog for America and MeetUp are just the two most visible tools recent candidates have taken up in the rush to turn new technological ground; last week, the Bush Web site took down a feature that allowed visitors to create their own campaign posters because pranksters discovered they could insert potentially damning slogans of their own.

John Kerry's official Web site, JohnKerry.com, is meanwhile asking supporters to join online social-networking groups and stump for the candidate in what seems like a new twist on viral marketing. "Sites like Friendster, Tribe and Ryze are great places to reach out and build your network of supporters for John Kerry," reads the section devoted to networking on the "Online HQ" page of the site. "Create your profile, download a picture, post information about your support for Kerry and upcoming events. By providing information, links to the Web site, issues and updates more people will learn about John Kerry and get more involved in the campaign." Among the sites listed as potential places to start are Friendster, Tribe, Ryze, LinkedIn and Everyonesconnected.

As Business Week Online mentioned a few weeks ago, the senator has already taken his staff's advice: There's a John Kerry profile, complete with windsurfing action shot, on Friendster. And, surprise: As opposed to the other 99 percent of the famous-person profiles on the site, this one is the real deal. Erin Hofteig, who works on Web-related initiatives for Kerry's campaign -- and whose profile pops up as the moderator for the "Kerry in 2004" group on Tribe -- said Kerry "had a hand in writing it, and all the information on there is true. It's a really good way for people to get to know John Kerry as a person."

Which raises the question of whether online profiles are ever a really good way to get to know someone as a person. In true Friendster fashion, Kerry's profile seems as meticulously composed as any East Village hipster's, though his tastes are different: He's interested in windsurfing, writing, hunting and, "protecting the environment, Medicare, overtime"; he like the Beatles, Bono and the Boss; his "More About Me" section walks that thin line between charming openness and dorky confession -- "I love Hostess chocolate cupcakes, although Teresa tries to limit them."

Friendster, known for its vigilance in purging fake profiles, talked to the Kerry campaign and other candidates last November to ask them for official profiles before taking down any fakester candidates, though others have sprouted up in the meantime. (Kerry has had a harder time staying on other sites; MySpace erased his profile, apparently not believing it to be real.)

Friendster spokeperson Lisa Kopp says the Kerry campaign has been using the site actively. "I'm on his Friend list now," she says. "I think he realized how useful Friendster could be. Bulletins come out every day -- he's really communicating with his friends." The "Bulletins" show up on your Friendster home page after you've added "John" as your friend. They're usually short messages or calls to action; a recent post asked recipients to sign a Democratic unity pledge written by James Carville, and asked that you "Repost this message here on Friendster and everywhere else you go online."

Friendster also bends the rules for Kerry, as it did for all the candidates with profiles on the site. "They do us the favor of allowing him to have more than the usual number of friends," said Hoeftig, referring to the limit of 500 connections for regular users; Kerry's profile currently lists 1,820 friends. He's also allowed more than the usual number of testimonials, most of which are endorsements like, "John's the type of dude where you're like 'that guy can be our president.'"

As Kopp points out, Friendster is nonpartisan. "We talked to the president's people," she said. "It turned out they weren't that interested."