Commentary

Twitter Fights For Center Stage With Presidential Debate Streams

For better or worse, people are seriously pumped for the presidential debates. (Given the evident bloodlust, the Coliseum in Rome seems like an appropriate venue.)

To harness some of this excitement, Twitter will stream Bloomberg Television’s live broadcast of the brawls directly on its platform.

If you don’t recall, Twitter and Bloomberg Media first teamed up back in July so the social giant could stream select Bloomberg TV programs. The pair is thus calling this a partnership expansion. 

The streams will feature additional Bloomberg Politics programming 30 minutes before and after each of the four scheduled debates.

No one is discussing the financial terms of the deal, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Bloomberg sees it as purely promotional. While Twitter’s live video strategy remains a work in progress, it will obviously expand Bloomberg’s reach.

And Twitter executives make a pretty good case that theirs is the perfect platform for such a political spectacle. “Twitter is where the 2016 presidential election is happening every single day,” Anthony Noto, Twitter's chief financial officer, stated.

There were ten million tweets sent during the first U.S. Presidential debate of the 2012 election cycle, which was the most watched U.S. Presidential debate in history.

Earlier this year, meanwhile, tweets sent during the first Democratic and Republican primary debates surpassed a billion impressions.

Also of note, more than half of all tweets sent about the 2016 election are from people 25 years old and younger, by Twitter’s estimate.

In case you’re interested -- and I suspect that you are -- the stream will be available at debates.twitter.com, in Twitter Moments or on @bpolitics.

This column was previously published in Moblog on September 21, 2016.

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