Campaigns and Elections

How to Tell the Difference Between Real and Fake News Online

November 18, 2019 By Patrick L. Burns Leave a Comment

In this day and age of information at our fingertips, 24/7 updates, and social media, it is easy to get overwhelmed and loose track of what news is coming from where. This is when people begin to react with their emotions over their logic. Someone may see a headline that sparks a reaction in them, and they immediately share it on social media. Many times, they will not even read the article or check the source, they simply see a headline, react, and share. This often results in the spread of fake news, and many of these false stories even end up going viral.

Fake news is nothing new, it has always been around to mislead or sway people towards a certain belief or action. The difference is now, with the internet and social media, fake news can be spread quickly and reach millions in minutes. There are many reasons why people share fake news stories, and they aren’t always bad intentions. Many people will see a story that supports their views, opinions, or beliefs and without looking too much into it, will share it.

With most of the world getting their news online and through social media, fake news is never hard to come across. It comes in many forms; but will always have an eye-catching headline that tells a story without the reader needing to read the rest of the article. Even if a reader does decide to read the article, these stories are made to seem credible and true. They may even take a story that is real news and change important details to spin the story to the desired view.

This is why readers need to take time and do a little research to verify the news they are reading and sharing with others is, in fact, real news from a credible source. Below are a few steps you can take to make sure the information you are receiving and sending is reliable and true.

Be sure your news is coming from a credible source.

Pay close attention to the source your story or information is coming from. Is this a credible source? One way to determine this is to look at the author of the piece. Many fake news stories tend to have “staff” or even no author listed. Once you find the author, do a quick search on that author and see what else they have published and if there are any complaints about them producing fake news.

Another big indicator is the domain name, as many websites have been made to mimic true news sources. Watch out for anything with a “.com.co” at the end of the URL, this can be done with well-known news source names to trick readers. A quick web search of the domain name can give you more insight into whether the site is a credible source for news.

One more thing you can do to determine a websites credibility is to check the rest of the website. Do they have sources cited on their stories? Do they have legitimate contact information? Are they well-known or lesser known? Have they covered well-known news stories or do all of their stories appear in a clickbait fashion? These determinates can help you discover whether the site you are reading news from is credible and dependable for future news.

Read more than just the headline and sub-headline.

A big problem with the spread of fake news is that so many people will see a catchy or controversial headline and immediately share out of an emotional reaction. Others will click the link and maybe scan the article quickly, decide it appeals to their views, and share it without ever checking for credibility. This is where a major problem lies and how false stories get spread so quickly by so many.

Take time to go to the story and read through it carefully, maybe even more than once. Check the credibility of the author and website as laid out in the first step. Sometimes you may find the story behind the headline is something completely different from what it was made to sound like. Other red flags may be bad grammar or misspellings throughout the story, this could point to a fake story as credible pieces are proofed quite thoroughly. Check to see if any facts or quotes shared in the story are cited at the end of the article, and if so, are those sources credible as well. This may sound like a lot of work, but it will help to protect your character and credibility as well as make sure you are getting reliable and correct information.

Is the information being reported by multiple sources?

When you find a news story of interest, check and see if it is being reported on by multiple news sources. Usually, if a story is true and timely, it will be covered by more than one news source. It is very rare that a story that is capable of making the news will only be reported by one publication. If it is a national or international story, check with trusted major news organizations to see if they have any mention or information on the story. If you are reading a local story, check with other local publications or get in contact with your local publication and see if they have heard anything about the story in question.

In addition to this, make sure the story you are looking at is timely. Sometimes an old story will begin to circulate attempting to pass as a new story. There may also be an attempt to falsify this information, which is why it is always good to cross examine with other news sources.

Check Your Story with a Fact Checking Website.

With so much information available the internet, it is not always possible to do in depth research for every story you come across. If there is a viral story you come across, there are fact checking websites that do this research for you. Websites such as www.snopes.com take viral news stories and let you know whether they are real or fake, and if they are real, if the facts presented in the story are accurate. There are many websites like this online, so it also wise to make sure you are using one that is credible and non-biased to get accurate information.

There are fact checking websites run by non-profits, educational centers, and libraries. These are usually the most reliable ones to gather information from.

In Conclusion

When gathering your news from social media and online sources, your critical thinking and attention to detail will go far in detecting fake news. Often fake news stories are made to drive emotional responses and are written in such a way to do just that. Practice taking the time to check sources, research the story, and use fact checking sites to weed out the fake news from the real news. With time, you will begin to see a trend in how fake news presents itself and will be well equipped to avoid it. By following these simple steps, you can help prevent the spread of fake news and misinformation and help your credibility in the process. In a time of unlimited information, make sure the news you are getting is credible and dependable.

7 Ways to Use Facebook Hashtags in Politics

September 6, 2013 By Patrick L. Burns Leave a Comment

With the introduction of hashtags and graph search by Facebook, hashtags have grown in their effectiveness as an advocacy and mobilization tool. Hashtags have long been an effective tool on Twitter, helping to organize people by shared interest. Facebook, which has organized people by shared connection, had an inability to mobilize people by shared interest. With hashtags, Facebook allows users the ability to connect by interest in an expansive way.

With over 1 billion users, Facebook has a dynamic network in which a campaign or organization can utilize hashtags to reach extended, adjacent and far-off networks of people with similar interests. Once only great to organize people online and offline after you make a connection, Facebook with hashtags is an effective tool in organizing people of a shared interest, value or belief who are not yet socially connected.

Here are some tips for incorporating hashtags into Facebook page posts to promote your political content and connect with those of a shared interest.

1) Ideology: One of the easiest ways to promote your organization’s content is to reach those of a like ideological mind. The most popular ideology hashtags are #tcot, ‘top conservatives on twitter” and #p2, “progressives who prioritize diversity and empowerment” and #tlot, “top libertarians on twitter”.

2) Party affiliation: Although there is a close correlation between ideology and party identification, in order to ensure that you reach all of those with a shared party affiliation, include a reference to your local, state or national party. The most popular hashtags are those associated with the respective state parties. For example in Georgia, the Republican Party hashtag is #gagop and the Democratic Party hashtag is #gadems.

3) Issue: In the promotion of a issue or policy, utilization of a hashtag to build support for the issue is an effective tool. Providing quality insights and updates on timely issues is a way to build supporters and followers. The Google QDF rule (quality deserves freshness) applies to search on social media networks by hashtag. People hunger for meaningful content on timely issues and will search to find it. For example, #Syria, is one of the most popular hashtags on social media, due to it being a timely and relevant issue as the U.S. considers military intervention there.

4) Location: Geolocation is critical in social media. As social, location and mobile merge together, the ability to connect with those in your immediate vicinity is important in the promotion of a post. Placing a hashtag that indicates your location can not only build credibility in your posts, but can draw the interest of those in your local area. People hunger for local news around them, and the power of connecting with people in your local area on social media cannot be underestimated. For example, state and local specific hashtags such as #gapol and #atl ensure that you are reaching people in your local area. If you are attending a place, event or conference see if there are hashtags that have been developed for that specific site. For example, at the national party conventions last year, #gop2012 and #dnc2012 were the respective hashtags for these events.

5) Social TV: There is a strong correlation between live television and social media. People love to share insights on TV programs on their 2nd screen and watch alongside others online to see their feedback. During last year, some of Twitter’s most trafficked moments occurred during the Presidential debates between President Obama and Governor Romney that aired on live TV. Utilizing hashtags for specific events that air on television is way to connect with followers and audiences and promote your posts. During the first Presidential debate, the Obama-Biden campaign utilized #ForwardNotBack effectively in promoting their candidate.

6) Look to the Past: History and sentimentality about the past is a fundamental part of the human experience. People love to remember and are drawn to content that reminds them of the “way things were”. Our civic institutions and political parties have a rich history in which content can be pulled. One of the fundamental parts of being a candidate is telling your biography and life experience. Utilizing a hashtag such as #TBT (Throwback Thursday) or #FBF (Flashback Friday) can be very effective in gaining followers as they are some of the most popular hashtags on social media.

7) Humor: Humor disarms and is a powerful weapon to articulate a point of view to someone who may or may not agree with you. Use of humorous hashtags can enlist followers and supporters for your cause in more subtle way. For example in the 2012 Presidential election, the Obama campaign utilized the #Romnesia hashtag to describe Governor Romney’s inconsistent policy stances over the years. Many hashtags or slogans that are started in earnest by a campaign or group can become hijacked by the opposite side who use the hashtags in a humorous way. In the 2012 campaign, the Obama-Biden team had put out the hashtag #forward, a key campaign slogan. The RNC quickly utilized the #forward hashtag to describe moving “forward” to $491 billion in higher taxes for Obamacare; deficits over $1 trillion; and $1.9 trillion in higher taxes.

With the continued integration of search and social, hashtags are becoming an increasingly important part of content and social advertising strategies for Facebook. The use of hashtags can connect your organization in a timely manner with the audience you are trying to reach and promote your content. So don’t forget the #hashtag in your next post.

Social Data and the Future of Politics

May 31, 2013 By Patrick L. Burns Leave a Comment

Arc 3 Communications recently participated in Big Data Week in Atlanta. The goal of Big Data Week was to hold community events focusing on the social, political, technological and commercial impacts of Big Data. One of the many discussion items of the week among data scientists, marketers and social media experts was the impact of social data, primarily in the examination of consumer behavior and the ability to predict sales and craft marketing messages.

However, social data is also a powerful tool for understanding the American voter, and like traditional phone surveys can help in the understanding of voters’ opinions on an issue and their intensity. Social data which consists of the analysis of tweets, posts and discussion items on social media channels, forums and blogs, may also be a future indicator in predicting voting behavior. A recent study by social scientists at Indiana University of 800 competitive Congressional races in 2010 and 2012 revealed that getting more tweet mentions relative to your opponent meant higher vote margins. The social scientists found that the frequency with which a Republican is named correlates with the Republican vote margin in the subsequent election, independently of other factors such as incumbency, media coverage, partisanship and demographics.

While the ability of tweets to predict the vote is a topic of much discussion, the use of social data as a tool in understanding the opinions of voters and how to develop targeted messaging to them is well established after the last election cycle. The Obama 2012 campaign through its 200 digital and 50 analytics team members was able to utilize social data to develop effective message development and targeting strategies while also identifying advocates for the campaign.

In the area of advocacy, the Obama campaign developed an algorithm to score over 5oK accounts by political id on Twitter. This identification of accounts favorable to the President utilized the text of the tweets and did not look at @mentions. The analysts at the Obama campaign discovered that @mentions referencing the President were largely negative. However through text analysis of tweets, the Obama campaign was able to identify Twitter users favorable to the President. The Obama campaign also looked at Twitter influence (number of tweets and followers) to score and identify favorable accounts. The Obama campaign then sent a direct message on Twitter from President Obama to the scored accounts asking them to advocate for the campaign, which in turn many of them ended up doing.

Another powerful use of social data for advocacy by the Obama campaign was the development of a Facebook App that enabled supporters to match their Facebook friends with the Obama campaign’s various lists and then send a message to undecided voters in key swing states asking them to take action such as sharing viral content, signing up for the campaign or voting on Election Day. This tactic known as Facebook targeted sharing, was developed by the Obama team to offset the 50% drop in landline usage among 18 to 29 year olds. Despite being difficult to reach by phone, 85% of this same group were friends with an Obama 2012 Facebook App user. Through the Facebook targeted sharing app over 600,000 Obama supporters were able to reach over 5 million people by Election Day. 20% of the 5 million reached took some action, such as registering to vote. Hundred of thousands used the tool in the days leading up to the election. The Obama campaign’s Facebook targeting app represented a significant advancement in voter contact – overlaying traditional voter file data with social graph information and relationships.

The supplementation of a voter file with social data will become the norm by the 2016 election cycle and innovative campaigns are already taking this task on for 2014. One of those chief innovators on the Republican side is U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky whose campaign is creating a statewide voter file that adds social data so that the campaign can track and target individual voters based on what they’re saying online. According to Senator McConnell’s campaign, it has already matched the voting records of close to 40 percent of Kentuckians – more than 1 million voters – with their online persona. Senator McConnell’s campaign plans to monitor in real time the social and online outputs of voters in Kentucky in order to understand voter perceptions about issues and the candidate. Through this process, the campaign will be able to measure voter sentiment and the level of engagement on various issues.

Social data is the future of campaigns and a powerful new tool that can help a candidate understand voter opinions on key issues and serve as an advocacy tool. In time, social data may be able to accurately predict voting behavior in a race. As campaigns begin to experiment with social data, it will be critical that the proper metrics and algorithms are established. Campaigns will need to ensure that they connect their social media and social data operations to their off-line grassroots and get-out-the-vote operations in a meaningful way that translates into supporters and votes. This will become an increasing challenge for national and statewide campaigns in the immediate future.

The Top Ten Most Social Media Savvy U.S. Politicians

January 11, 2013 By Patrick L. Burns Leave a Comment

Social media played an important role in helping to secure the re-election of President Barack Obama in 2012. President Obama’s utilization of social media also played a key role in his defeat of Senator Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primaries and then Senator John McCain in the general election in 2008. In 2012, President Obama essentially took up where he left off in the last Presidential election and developed a decisive advantage in the area of social media over Mitt Romney. The Obama-Biden campaign’s utilization of social media for get out the vote efforts and its analysis of social data for the prediction of voter behavior, targeting of messages and media buying was truly remarkable.

But who are the other success stories in social media amongst politicians besides President Obama? Through the analysis of Klout Scores, Facebook Likes and Twitter followers amongst politicans across the country, Arc 3 has compiled the top ten most social media savvy politicans. In order to qualify for the list you must either have held elected office or been a candidate for elected office within the last year.

1. Barack Obama (Klout Score 99): President Obama maintained a substantial lead in both Facebook likes and Twitter followers over Mitt Romney. By the end of the campaign, Obama had 22.7 million followers and 32.2 million likes, compared to Romney’s 1.8 million followers and 12.1 million likes. The Obama-Biden campaign’s posting of an image of Barack and Michelle Obama in an embrace, accompanied by the message, “Four more years” set two social media records, receiving more Twitter retweets (755,000) and Facebook likes (3.5 million) than any other post in history.

2. John McCain (Klout Score 92): The U.S. Senator from Arizona and former Republican Presidential candidate in 2008 shows considerable strength in social media, outscoring both Vice President Joe Biden and Mitt Romney. Senator McCain has 880,594 Facebook likes and 1.7 million Twitter followers. His independent streak and reputation for bluntness are highly suitable for the medium of social media.

3. Joe Biden (Klout Score 90): Vice President Biden’s social media presence benefited from being a part of a very gifted Obama-Biden campaign digital team. Vice President Biden had 555,571 Facebook likes and 116,900 Twitter followers. Biden is known to be prone to verbal gaffes in the real world, but his digital world is very disciplined and tame in comparison.

4. Mitt Romney (Klout Score 89): Throughout the Presidential campaign, Romney’s number of followers on Facebook and Twitter were greatly outpaced by President Obama. At the end of the campaign, Romney had 1.8 million followers on Twitter and 12.1 million Facebook likes. The President had 12 times more followers on Twitter and 2 times more followers on Facebook than Romney. It was not all bad news for Romney’s social efforts, as Romney’s Facebook strategies did at times have him leading President Obama in Facebook engagement with his “People Talking About This” numbers being higher.

5. Nancy Pelosi (Klout Score 89): The current Democratic leader in the House has a solid social media presence consistent with her wired constituents in her San Francisco Congressional District. Pelosi has 285, 926 Twitter followers and 67,776 Facebook likes.

6. Newt Gingrich (Klout Score 88): The former Republican House Speaker and Presidential candidate had one of the strongest presences on social media out of the Republican candidates for President in 2012. Winner of the first Republican Presidential primary in the South, South Carolina, Speaker Gingrich has 292,262 Facebook likes and 1.4 million followers on Twitter.

7. Jerry Brown (Klout Score 88): The current Governor of California, home of Silicon Valley, logically has a solid social media presence. He is very strong on Twitter with some 1.05 million followers and has 136,190 Facebook likes. Governor Brown’s followers prefer Twitter almost seven times more than Facebook. A former Presidential candidate who earned the nickname “Moonbeam”, there is no shortage of content on his Twitter stream.

8. John Boehner (Klout Score 87): The current Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives has strongly promoted social media over years amongst his GOP caucus members. Once issuing a press release entitled “PWNED: House GOP Dominates Twitter, YouTube, Social Media in Congress”, he has taken the lead and shown his members how to be social media savvy. (Note: PWNED is trash talk that means you “owned” your opponent). Boehner has 320,479 Facebook likes and 220,763 Twitter followers for his campaign accounts.

9. Ron Paul (Klout Score 86): The former Congressman from Texas and Republican Presidential Candidate in 2012 has a considerable social media following reflective of the passion his candidacy generated among tech savvy millenials and libertarians. Paul has over 1.1 million Facebook likes and over 200,300 Twitter followers.

10. Cory Booker (Klout Score 85): The Mayor of Newark, New Jersey utilizes Twitter as a way to hear constituent concerns. The Mayor’s twitter account has become a civic reporting system that has been a better platform for consituent’s voices to be heard than the actual telephone at City Hall. Mayor Booker has over 1.3 million Twitter followers and 128,137 Facebook likes. Many constituents in Newark say if you want a pothole fixed you need to tweet to him about it.

At the start of 2013, these are the top ten most social media savvy U.S. politicians. Will they maintain their status or will new leaders emerge and enter into the top ten? Arc 3 will be following closely to see who comes out on top at the end of what is certain to be a year of innovation and enterprise in social media and politics.

The Ohio Vote for President 2012: A Choice Between Michael Jackson and The Beatles?

November 6, 2012 By Patrick L. Burns Leave a Comment

Is the vote in Ohio for President between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney really a choice between Michael Jackson and The Beatles? In a recent social data study by Arc 3 Communications of supporters for the two candidates for President, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, utilizing Facebook’s Wisdom app, it was revealed that despite a statistical deadlock in the polls, a cultural divide exists between the most ardent supporters for the two candidates for President in the state of Ohio.

With Ohio being the battleground state most likely to determine the Presidency, hundreds of traditional Presidential polls have been taken among Ohio voters to measure their candidate preferences. Polls have consistently reflected a very close race with the most recent poll by Rasmussen Reports reflecting a statistical tie among the candidates. However, through the use of Facebook social data, Arc 3 was able to identify a significant cultural divide among the most ardent Ohio supporters for the candidates for President that provides deeper insights into the race.

For the study, Arc 3 Communications examined the Facebook pages of the two candidates, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney utilizing Facebook Wisdom app’s detailed demographic profile data and breakdown of page likes. Arc 3 analyzed Facebook Wisdom Network data on basic demographics; political ideology and interests; sources for news; interests in music, television shows and authors; sports favorites; and consumer choices. Among the key findings in each category:

Supporters of Barack Obama and Mitt Romney have a four point variation along gender lines with more men supporting Romney and more women supporting Obama with slight variations in age and education level. However, significantly more supporters for Mitt Romney are married than supporters of Barack Obama.
The Obama and Romney groups break out along ideological lines with Obama supporters self-identifying as liberal and Romney supporters identifying as conservative.
Ohio supporters of the two candidates rely on very different news sources. Obama supporters’ favorite news source is National Public Radio, while Romney supporters prefer Fox News.
In the area of entertainment tastes, the candidates’ supporters differ in favorite musician/band, television show and book author. The Obama supporters favorite musician/band is Michael Jackson, while the favorite musician/band among Romney supporters is The Beatles. Obama supporters favorite television program is The Family Guy, while Romney supporters program of choice is House. Favorite authors for Obama and Romney supporters are Maya Angelou and James Patterson respectively.
A dichotomy exists in the preference for sports leagues – supporters of Obama are NBA fans, while Romney supporters are NFL fans. Obama supporters favorite sports team is the Cleveland Cavaliers , while Romney supporters favorite team is the Cincinnati Reds, with the Cleveland Browns being a very close second.
Both sides tend to agree in the area of prominent consumer choices, with both groups most favorite food and beverage product being Starbucks and favorite retailer being Walmart. Favorite restuarant of choice among both groups is Subway.

While the many traditional polls conducted by various media outlets, universities and polling firms have left the American electorate stumped and full of trepidation as to the outcome of the race in Ohio, the additional layer of Facebook social data offers deeper insights into the race. The social data reveals preferences not only in ideology but attitudes toward cultural issues. Obama supporters clearly have cultural preferences indicative of urban tastes, while Romney supporters have cultural preferences indicative of suburban and exurban tastes. This points to and reaffirms the old adage in politics, that elections are truly about getting out the vote. If signs on election night point to high voter turnout in the urban areas of Ohio, such as Cleveland’s Cuyahoga County and Toledo’s Lucas County it may be a long night for Mitt Romney. However, if turnout is high in the suburban areas of Ohio such as Cincinnati’s Warren and Butler Counties and Columbus’ Delaware County, Romney may be the next President of the United States. With Ohio being decided by just 262,000 votes in 2008, it will be vital that each campaign turnout their base in those areas of the state where they are the strongest in order to win.

Arc 3 Facebook Social Data Study Tables

Basic Demographics

	Barack Obama	Mitt Romney
Male	54%	58%
Female	46%	42%
Married	36%	60%
Single	41%	25%
Average Age	33	39
College Education	58%	60%

Political Interests (Most Likes)

	Barack Obama	Mitt Romney
Ideology	Liberal	Conservative
Political Organization	Obama for America Ohio	RightChange
Government Official	Rep. Marcia L. Fudge	John McCain

News Sources (Most Likes)


Media/News/Publishing	NPR	Fox News
Magazine	Movie Drawer	Weekly Standard
News/Media	Yahoo!News	Newsbusters.org

Entertainment Interests (Most Likes)


Television Show	Family Guy	House
Musician/Band	Michael Jackson	The Beatles
Favorite Author	Maya Angelou	James Patterson

Sports Interests (Most Likes)

	Barack Obama	Mitt Romney
Sports League	NBA	NFL
Sports Team	Cleveland Cavaliers	Cincinnati Reds
Athlete	LeBron James	Michael Jordan

Consumer Interests (Most Likes)

	Barack Obama	Mitt Romney
Food/Beverage	Starbucks	Starbucks
Retail and Consumer Merchandise	Walmart	Walmart
Restaurant/Cafe	Subway	Subway

President of Arc 3 Communications Selected as a Delegate to the Republican National Convention

May 4, 2012 By Patrick L. Burns Leave a Comment

Our founder and President, Patrick Burns was recently selected to be a Delegate from the Sixth Congressional District of Ga. to the upcoming Republican National Convention in Tampa, Fla. The Republican National Convention will meet from August 27th to 30th at the Tampa Bay Times Forum where delegates will ratify the party platform and nominate a candidate for President and Vice President. The presumptive GOP nominee is former Mass. Governor Mitt Romney with the candidate for Vice President not yet chosen. Patrick is one of three delegates to the Republican National Convention from his home county of Cobb and one of three from his Congressional District. The Georgia Delegation to the Republican National Convention will be staying at the Grand Hyatt Tampa Bay. Patrick’s selection as a delegate was recently mentioned in the Atlanta Journal Constitution and the Marietta Daily Journal.

The Democratic National Convention will be held from September 3rd to 6th in Charlotte, NC. The first three days will be at the Time Warner Cable Arena with the final day being at the Bank of America Stadium. The delegates at the Democratic National Convention will also ratify the party platform and nominate a candidate for President and Vice President. The presumptive nominees for President and Vice President are Barack Obama and Joseph Biden respectfully.

Patrick is honored to have his 24 years of involvement in politics and campaigns recognized by the opportunity to be a National Delegate. Patrick served as an Alternate Delegate to the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York City which nominated President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.

Patrick is looking forward to seeing old friends; attending the convention speeches and platform meetings; and voting to nominate the GOP Presidential ticket. Patrick will also be spending time on bloggers row and live tweeting from the convention floor.

Among the many exciting things at the convention, Patrick will also have the opportunity to check-in on his mobile device on the convention floor and earn a Republican National Convention badge on Foursquare issued by Time Magazine. Time has also issued a Democratic National Convention badge for Foursquare users who check-in on the convention floor in Charlotte.

Patrick has promised to provide updates to the Marietta Daily Journal and other local media about the many happenings at the convention. Congratulations on your selection Patrick!

Happy 4square Day 2012: The Power of Social Media and Gamification

April 25, 2012 By Patrick L. Burns Leave a Comment

This month marked the 2nd annual celebration of Foursquare Day on April 16th. The day honors the social media platform Foursquare and its users. Hundreds of cities around the world held Foursquare Day events from Kennesaw, Ga. to Portland, Ore. to Istanbul, Turkey.

What is Foursquare? Foursquare is a location-based social networking platform for mobile devices. Users “check in” on their mobile phone at different places visited, from restaurants to parks, museums and retails stores. Foursquare rewards users for checking in with badges, points and mayorships. Users can choose to have their check-ins, mayorships and badges posted on their Twitter and/or Facebook accounts.

Foursquare also allows users the ability to leave tips about a venue. People can leave tips about their favorite dishes, things to do, and how to get a discount. Users can also track things that they have done by clicking “I’ve done this” next to a tip or can add something that sounds good to their to do list. Lists are collections of tips and venues created by users. Lists range from the Best Museums of New York City to Gone With the Wind. Each is created by a local expert, giving unique insight into the best places to visit in a city

To get users interested in the social media app and to keep them checking in (and thus providing more data to the recommendation engine), Foursquare has developed a unique set of “games.” The badges, points and mayorships are ways in which users can compete against friends. The mayor is the person who’s checked in the most times at a venue over the past 60 days.

Foursquare was started by Dennis Crowley and Naveen Selvadurai in the fall of 2008 in New York City. Foursquare was launched at South by Southwest Interactive in Austin, Texas in March 2009.

Foursquare has grown into a community of over 20 million people worldwide with over 2 billion check-ins. Half of Foursquare users are in the United States while the other 50 percent are international. Over 750,000 businesses are using the Merchant Plaftform.

So, how did April 16 become 4sqDay? Back in 2010, Tampa, Fla. optometrist Nate Bonilla-Warford realized that 4² = 16 and that April 16 would be a perfect day to celebrate Foursquare. He got together with some friends and started putting together a worldwide movement. Other cities quickly joined in and parties were held all over the world that first year. It’s grown since then to include cities in every corner of the globe.

Foursquare Day is a worldwide movement and the social app is being embraced around the world by political leaders and the media. All major media and news outlets currently have a Foursquare brand page. In August of 2011, President Barack Obama joined Foursquare and other world leaders including Prime Minister of Great Britian David Cameron and French President Nicholas Sarkozy followed suit. All of these leaders are using Foursquare to check-in to places they visit. The Republican candidates for President, Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry joined Foursquare before the start of the first presidential caucus in Iowa. NBC News and Foursquare have teamed up to map out the 2012 presidential election. Visitors are able to see where candidates are making campaign stops in real-time, and where they’ve been throughout their entire election campaign.

In addition to checking-in at events, the gamification aspect of Foursquare is being used by politicians and the media in creative ways to engage the public in the political process. For instance, French President Nicholas Sarkozy recently rewarded campaign volunteers with cookies for checking into his campaign headquarters. Time Magazine will reward attendees to the respective Democratic and Republican National Conventions with a badge. NBC Politics recently established 3 badges for checking-in to Presidential campaign events.

In the same way that Foursquare makes buying a cup of coffee a competitive event, political operatives and the media are trying to harness the power of games to collect data and engage potential voters, readers and viewers. Foursquare and gamification can actually be a powerful tool for identifying and engaging the public. As the over 16,000 participants in Foursquare meetups around the world can attest, social media married with gamification is a powerful tool for mobilizing people and driving results for your organization.

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