Politics & Elections Blog: May 2010

Politics and Elections Blog

Trends, tools and news from the Google Politics & Elections team

Google Moderator on YouTube enables real-time feedback from your audience

Thursday, May 27, 2010

[Cross-posted from the YouTube Blog.]

YouTube is about starting a conversation. Every day, hundreds of millions of videos spark dialogues on everything from the future of the African continent, to what should be done about the oil spill, to the best slam dunk of all time. But until now, it’s been difficult to harness those free-flowing discussions.

That’s why, starting today, we’ve integrated the ability to use Google Moderator into every single YouTube channel. Moderator is a versatile, social platform that allows you to solicit ideas or questions on any topic, and have the community vote the best ones up to the top in real-time. We previously used Google Moderator as part of our interviews with President Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

Here’s how it works: You set the parameters for the dialogue, including the topic, the type of submissions, and the length of the conversation. Watch as submissions get voted up or down by your audience, and then respond to the top-voted submissions by posting a video on your channel. The platform operates in real-time, and you can remove any content that you or your audience flag as inappropriate. You can also embed the platform on your own website or blog.
For more details on how to set up your Moderator series, visit youtube.com/moderator. And please note that in order to participate in a Moderator series, you'll need to be logged into a Google account that is linked to a YouTube account. To see how 12 YouTube users, including Michael Buckley, the New York Times, Stanford and Howcast, are using the feature, check out the YouTube Blog.Posted by Olivia Ma, YouTube News Manager, and Ginny Hunt, Product Manager, Moderator

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Labels: moderator , Politics & Elections Blog

Bring Moderator More Places: Facebook, Maps, Android and More

Thursday, May 13, 2010

We created Google Moderator to empower citizens across the world to directly connect with their government officials, and part of that mission is making Moderator available to as many people as possible. Last month, we powered the YouTube/Facebook Digital Debate in the UK, where over 10,000 people participated in asking and selecting questions via YouTube and Facebook for party leaders David Cameron, Nick Clegg, and Gordon Brown. This is the first time we've brought Moderator to Facebook, and we're excited to be making it available to more people.

We've also been hearing from people who want to tightly integrate Moderator into their own sites and apps. To make that possible, this week over at the Google Code Blog we announced the new Google Moderator API, which allows you to create custom interfaces for Moderator. Inside Google, we've already used it to build an Android app, a Wave gadget, and a visualization of where questions came from when Moderator was used to interview President Obama.

We're excited to see what you can build, so read the announcement for more details and check out the API to get started!

Posted by Eric Hysen, Public Sector Team