MyDD :: Obama, Facebook, and Threesomes

Obama, Facebook, and Threesomes

by Luigi Montanez, Fri Jan 26, 2007 at 02:48:32 PM EST

Both Adam Conner and Matt Stoller have recently blogged about the "1 million strong for Barack" group that's popped up on Facebook. All the talk about reaching over 100,000 members (now at 113K) so quickly reminded me of another Facebook group-building effort a few months ago.

Last October, a student named Brody Ruckus from my alma mater (Georgia Tech) started a group called, I kid you not, "If this group reaches 100,000 my girlfriend will have a threesome". As Brody explained on the group page, his girlfriend was astonished that several groups over 100,000 members were being created on Facebook (many of them titled something like "The Biggest Facebook group EVAR!"). Brody knew it was easy to do, and he bet his girlfriend that he could do the same. And if he won the bet? Every college guy's dream come true...

Follow me after the jump to find out what happened.

And so the group grew. Explosively. In a week, it passed 100,000. Then in the next week (after pictures of the encounter were promised if the group grew more) the group was at 400,000 members -- a much higher rate than the Obama group is currently experiencing.

It all came to a crashing end when it was exposed that Brody Ruckus was a hoax, perpetrated by a Napster-like music service called Ruckus Network that marketed to college students. Read about it on Wikipedia.

And so are the numbers being generated by the Obama group all that significant? Clearly, the promise of a guy in Georgia having a threesome is more compelling to college students than the promise of transformational, historical president.

What if Adam and Matt were blogging about the Brody Ruckus Facebook group? Their words would sound kind of silly:

But whatever way you look at it, it's remarkable. And clear proof that something is happening on Facebook with threesomes. And I'm sure the 1,614 people who joined the group in the time it took me to write this would agree with me.

That was taken from Adam's post, now Matt's:

I don't know if the Threesome Facebook group is a movement so much as it is a statement of hunger for sexual fantasy. It's quite a sight to behold, but what's also clear is that it's not that hard to build. The right message can just create a lightning bolt and a self-organizing group of hundreds of thousands or millions of people. Look for these organic groups to grow and atrophy, as the notion of membership becomes even weaker and more diffuse.

As an addicted Facebook user in 2004 when it first came out, I can say with certainty that this group really won't mean that much, just like every other group on Facebook. Groups on Facebook are easy to invite people to, to join, and even easier to forget about.

It's too bad for the Obama campaign that the group organizer didn't put a hard ask on the top of the page to join the Obama email list. They've lost out on thousands of potential subscribers...

Tags: Obama, Facebook (all tags)

Permalink :: 12 Comments :: Post a Comment

Re: Obama, Facebook, and Threesomes (none / 0)

I don't use any of these sites - and don't really understand the point - but I was surprised how with two clicks of the mouse on myspace you can go from upstanding person to seedy stuff.

I'm sure the MSM will have a piece about Obama and Facebook/myspace,, but it's unclear how it tranlsates into votes or door knockers.

"Lobbyists Represent 'Real' Americans" - Hillary Clinton

by TarHeel on Fri Jan 26, 2007 at 07:32:18 PM EST

Re: Obama, Facebook, and Threesomes (none / 0)

Tarheel, Facebook is different than MySpace.

Join us at Show Me Progress!

by clarkent on Fri Jan 26, 2007 at 08:01:47 PM EST

shows my social networking ignorance (none / 0)

I clicked around myspace once upon a time and didn't really get why I needed "friends"..

I thought facebook was for college kids or something?

I'm ignorant on this stuff.

"Lobbyists Represent 'Real' Americans" - Hillary Clinton

by TarHeel on Fri Jan 26, 2007 at 08:57:20 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Obama, Facebook, and Threesomes (none / 0)

Perhaps this shows my penchance for bad TV, but the threesome thing reminds of an episode of "Just Shoot Me" where legions of men went out of there way to help Finch score a threesome. But that said, we political junkies have to remember that there are people out there with lives that don't revolve around elections. No, no really.

by Jim Treglio on Fri Jan 26, 2007 at 08:08:54 PM EST

Re: Obama, Facebook, and Threesomes (none / 0)

In agreeing to a threesome it might be best to know who the third person would be....

BlueSunbelt.Com Netroots for the Sunbelt states robwire.com My personal blog

by robliberal on Fri Jan 26, 2007 at 10:58:14 PM EST

Re: Obama, Facebook, and Threesomes (3.00 / 1)

Even groups that are created on facebook such as "For Every 1,000 People that Join This Group, I'll Donate 100 Dollars to Darfur" exacerabate the problem with my generation. We find these ways to feel socially benevolent when we haven't really done anything ourselves; we join a facebook group with a click of a button and some other person donates the money. Obama's campaign may be popular on facebook, but the popularity among college students rarely translates into much. In fact, the best thing this might do for him, as other posters have suggested, would be to give him a potential media story and create the sense of "electability" because of his internet support (see; Clinton, Hillary).

by circlesnshadows on Sat Jan 27, 2007 at 03:24:41 PM EST

Re: Obama, Facebook, and Threesomes (none / 0)

I don't know where you're from, but in the Northeast, college students are the best base of volunteers that exists. I can think of no campaign that I've helped with where college students didn't play a major part, up to the level of paid staff in every case.

by CT student on Sun Jan 28, 2007 at 02:40:17 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Obama, Facebook, and Threesomes (none / 0)

I'm a college student in MA who volunteers a lot thru our College Democrats, and yes, students are a powerful political force -- but there's a big difference between the committed kids who come out to support a candidate, and the random schmoes who join a facebook group. For instance, our College Dems chapter will routinely turn out 50-100 people for an important canvass; but our corresponding facebook group has almost 1000 people, most of whom have never shown up to do a damn thing. I think that's the above poster's point: facebook groups naturally inflate to epic proportions (since it takes zero effort or commitment to enter them or stay in them), and so the numbers they display have little correspondence to reality.

by MarkusRTK on Sun Jan 28, 2007 at 01:35:32 PM EST
[ Parent ]

More important and more difficult than you suggest (none / 0)

Either politics are easy to promote with the college internet crowd or it's hard. Either way it's a win win for us when an Obama group attracts attention. It is a classic case of the medium being the message. It is showing either a lot of support of politically hip people or the ability of Obama to reach the awareness of the apolitical.

If it was so easy to create these groups then the one created for McCain should also soon reach 100,000. So far it is not even close to being on track to do that.

Jeff Wegerson - PrairieStateBlue

by wegerje on Sun Jan 28, 2007 at 11:52:24 AM EST

Re: It's actually very easy (none / 0)

I agree that Obama is definitely the "it" candidate with young people, and will be for this cycle. I also do think that he has the ability to reach the apolitical. But I don't think the growth of a Facebook group proves that.

Another misinterpretation I'd like to debunk is that the organizer is "creating" the group. It's actually a terrific example of crowdsourcing, and the designers of Facebook should be commended for making the invitation process so easy.

In order to invite someone to a group, the following steps occur:

1) Click the "Invite" link on the group page. You're presented with your friends list (usually hundreds of people)

Check off each of your friends that you want o invite
There is no step 3. No "submit" button. No review screen. The invitation gets sent the instant you check off your friend's name.

This is repeated over and over by thousands of people, and ultimately a group of that size gets created.

There are a lot of progressive students out there on Facebook, and they like joining huge, crowd-sourced progressive groups (although none I found so far are as big as Obama's):

Legalize Same-Sex Marriage: 100,000 members
Americans for Alternative Energy: 92,000 members
Support a Woman's Right to Choose: 84,000 members
Support Stem-Cell Research: 77,000 members
Abolish Abstinence-only Education: 76,000 members

Leftmost Bit

by Luigi Montanez on Sun Jan 28, 2007 at 03:24:07 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Obama, Facebook, and Threesomes (none / 0)

I think the talk of this being too easy misses the point. No one thinks this Facebook group is full of people who will be committed volunteers for the campaign, or even people who will support/vote for Obama in the primaries. However, it could inspire a few more of those folks and it was free, so it's certainly good for him in that sense.

But beyond that, this is like saying TV ads are meaningless because they won't affect the majority of people who see them. Or that they're stupid because the number of people who see them isn't anything close to the number of people who watch the Super Bowl.

Facebook groups like these are about advertising, helping to sell the idea that Obama is cool, and getting some folks who spend a lot of time there (many, MANY college-age people) to spend at least a few seconds thinking about him.

The Facebook is a social space like any other. It's certainly worth getting a foothold there, even if it won't generate committed netroots folks. That's not all there is to the world, after all.

by Baldrick on Sun Jan 28, 2007 at 02:24:48 PM EST

Re: Obama, Facebook, and Threesomes (none / 0)

it's now close to 150,000 ... which is a 50,000 increase over the weekend ... Tancredo is up to 37 .. lol

John McCain: Bush right to veto kids health insurance expansion

by Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle on Sun Jan 28, 2007 at 03:20:51 PM EST

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