Media, Politics

Newt Ahead In Twitter Primary

-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger

Newt Gingrich has what appears to be an insurmountable lead over his Republican rivals in the number of followers on Twitter. Gingrich has an amazing 1,325,903 followers whereas Mitt Romney and Michele Bachmann haven’t even cracked 100,000. Gingrich complained that the elite media are ignoring his Twitter army.

There’s just one problem, most of his prodigious following is fake.

A former staffer ratted out Gingrich by revealing that his campaign hired a firm to boost his follower numbers:

About 80 percent of those accounts are inactive or are dummy accounts created by various “follow agencies,” another 10 percent are real people who are part of a network of folks who follow others back and are paying for followers themselves (Newt’s profile just happens to be a part of these networks because he uses them, although he doesn’t follow back), and the remaining 10 percent may, in fact, be real, sentient people who happen to like Newt Gingrich.

POLITICO even ran a puff-piece on Gingrich’s massive Twitter following. Emily Schultheis, the author of the piece, will be spending a lot of time getting the egg off her face. POLITICO fancies itself a top-tier news organization.

If Gingrich did juice his numbers it would be easily confirmed. Take a statistical sample of his followers and check for odd names, no posts, no followers, no personal information, and a small follow list. It certainly explains why Gingrich has twice the number of followers as Sarah Palin.

Interestingly, there are firms that actually make money getting Twitter followers for the pathetic.

H/T: Gwaker.

42 thoughts on “Newt Ahead In Twitter Primary”

  4. Guys – check out the twits followers – most of them are phoney. He has hired PR companies that create followers, often by paying people. There are several good write ups on his phantom followers. The whole thing is a phoney are Newt is.

    It is a classic example of neoconservative campaigning though. Convince the rubes that everyone else is in the club & they are missing out. My rhetoric teacher termed this “eat shit, 100 billion flys can’t be wrong” propaganda.

  6. Blouise,

    Sorry to hear about Tex….if you wanna give me a shout, I’ll respond…How is the Granddaughter….

  8. President Barack Obama takes debt battle to Twitter, loses more than 40,000 followers in one day

    While his follower number appears to have taken its biggest dive in recent memory, Obama’s Twitter account still had a whopping 9,362,880 followers at 7:30pm Friday night, down from 9,402,898 Friday morning – and he’s still the third-most followed person on the planet.

    Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/tech_guide/2011/07/29/2011-07-29_bams_spam_president_barack_obama_takes_debt_battle_to_twitter_loses_more_than_20.html#ixzz1TsmvAFeS

  9. Anyone who considers POLITICO a serious news organization needs to have their head examined.

  11. …and he is using the campaign to fuel his prodigious ego. -rafflaw

    …and I’m guessing that money figures into it, as well. He’s shameless.

  12. Because AN instead of oats he feeds on twits….and in the Teaparty there are so many to choose from…..

  13. Why this man isn’t out in a pasture somewhere feeding on oats is beyond me…

  14. Gingrich is a joke. He has zero chance to win the Teapublican nomination and he is using the campaign to fuel his prodigious ego.

  16. “You may deceive all the people part of the time, and part of the people all the time, but not all the people all the time.
    Abraham Lincoln”

  20. Nal,

    “Newt Gingrich has what appears to be an insurmountable lead over his Republican rivals in the number of followers on Twitter.”

    It’s understandable because Newt’s such a twit.

Comments are closed.