As Election Day comes closer, you’re likely seeing political ads everywhere you turn — on front lawns, in newspapers, and on television. You’re likely also seeing them on Facebook, and not just for President Barack Obama and Gov. Mitt Romney. Two researchers studied the Facebook ads placed by a candidate running for a state legislature position, seeing if they helped his name recognition or likeability. Unfortunately, in this case, the Facebook ads barely moved the needle for the candidate.
Lisa Raphael (left), the social media producer at Katie Couric's daytime talk show Katie, is one of our featured speakers in Mediabistro's upcoming Social Media Marketing Boot Camp, an online event and workshop starting June 6, 2013. Lisa will share a case study on how the hit show uses Twitter to build interest and buzz around upcoming segments. Learn more about our our twelve event speakers and register here. 
Takeo, a city located on the island of Kyushu, Japan, has totally replaced its city government website with a Facebook page, and is the first to do so in that country.
You can’t fight City Hall, the old saying goes, but communications with municipal governments can be easier with the use of the Citizen Request Tracker Facebook application from CivicPlus.
The small country of Iceland is crowdsourcing its constitution.
Facebook Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg wants to return to China, but has yet to set a date and an agenda for such a trip.
Columbus, Ohio officials are setting up a Facebook fan page to record citizens’ reports of the state of the city’s roads.
The minister of education in Zambia has been using the social network to announce a series of important government policies.
Should prospective employers be allowed to look through your personal Facebook page prior to hiring or recertifying you? Maryland’s Department of Corrections seems to think so.
State and local governments now have the same terms for pages that the U.S. government does, and that could prompt a surge in page creation by entities that had been holding back until now.
Did you know the American Government is now monitoring social networking sites to try to identify immigration fraud? As The Huffington Post puts it, Big Brother really is watching you!
