PR and the Social Web

A session with the founding President of Facebook and the former Vice President of the USA is the sort of one off experience that on its own can justify the trip to Austin. The excitement in the vast auditorium was palpable.

This was a tour of the history and future of democracy and how it might be shaped by the social web. The Athenian ideal and the importance of the Gutenberg press were the scene setters. Gore remains the master of the sound bite. He illustrated the impact of print on the spread of democratic ideas with the line “Thomas Payne’s Common Sense was the Harry Potter of the18th Century”.

There was agreement between the two that democracy in the US in its current form is deeply flawed. The ability of people to promote and publish on-line may have an even more significant impact than the arrival of the printing press. Whilst the people in power don’t really understand the power of the social web says Sean Parker “we may have an opportunity to take back the system.”

Gore is a great orator but at times he seemed unaware that for this audience Parker was the person that many of the SXSW audience came to hear. That said when the the “Nerd Spring” arrives and the history of democracy and the web is written both of these men will be cited in dispatches.

Since the then newly crowned PM Tony Blair invited Noel Gallagher to Downing Street,  politicians have been trying to borrow cred from the music business.  Who can forget (if you are old enough to remember) Neil Kinnock singing and swinging to the beat of D:Ream’s  “Things Can Only Get Better” after the ’97 Labour election victory?

Gordon Brown’s was famously said to have a soft spot for the Arctic Monkeys but when challenged by a men’s magazine, he was unable to name a single track from their debut album.  To be fair to Gordon he apparently was asked to choose whom he preferred The Monkeys or James Blunt.  Fair call Gordon.

Today a new political threat emerged from the social web.  Apparently the Prime Minister has been professing his love for Manchester icons ‘The Smiths’.  It’s not impossible that he does quite like them, he was just seventeen when they released their first album.  However the band’s guitarist isn’t having any of it.  He tweeted today “David Cameron, stop saying that you like The Smiths, no you don’t. I forbid you to like it.”

Not much chance of gaining any reflected cool when the band so publicly disowns you.