Now live, from the team behind Twitter: a site for tracking "tweets" pertaining to the fast-approaching U.S. presidential elections. Enter an election-related post on the page and it will appear in the continually-updating feed, which also aggregates other Twitter posts that contain election-related terms like the candidates' names.
In July, Twitter announced that it had acquired Summize, a popular search tool based on the Twitter application program interface (API). Now called Twitter Search, the Summize technology appears to be behind the filters on the election site.
If the 2004 elections hailed the debut of bloggers and the 2006 mid-term elections were when YouTube popped onto the scene (just ask former Virginia senator George Allen), it's looking like 2008 will be the election cycle where Twitter sped to the forefront of the political Web. The campaigns of both Barack Obama and John McCain have created Twitter accounts for up-to-the-minute news and updates--the most recent updates are featured at the top of the Twitter election site--and the micro-blogging site has proven to be a must-use tool for opinionated news junkies and aspiring pundits.
But Twitter is still small enough so that it's possible to generate a simple "election feed" without encountering too much noise or irrelevant banter.
Twitter has also partnered with experimental news network Current TV on its election coverage, and selected live "tweets" will be displayed on-screen during its coverage of the presidential debates. Those are slated to start on Friday night, but Republican candidate John McCain's participation is still up in the air due to his announcement that he would suspend his campaign to focus on the ongoing Wall Street calamity.
Will he debate or not? Check that nifty new election page on Twitter. They're talking about it.