Limbaugh Clash Has Advertisers Recalculating Web’s Power: Tech

[pinboy3niner]

Source: Bloomberg

By Edmund Lee - Mar 14, 2012 9:01 PM PT

A day after Rush Limbaugh called Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke “a slut,” Angelo Carusone, a Washington-based activist, began contacting advertisers to boycott Limbaugh’s show -- over the phone, via e-mail, through Twitter Inc. and on Facebook Inc. (FB)

Twenty-four hours later, six companies, including Geico Corp. (156714Q) and Citrix Systems Inc., dropped their ads on the conservative radio program. After three days, 18 more companies, including AOL Inc. (AOL) and Sears Holdings Corp., pulled their marketing. Before the week was out, 27 more, including Netflix Inc. and Capital One Financial Corp., cut spots from “The Rush Limbaugh Show,” heard by more than 13 million listeners daily.

“The boycott wouldn’t have had the same effect without Twitter or Facebook,” said Carusone, campaign director for Media Matters for America, which is dedicated to “monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media,” according to its website. He was careful to add that others across the Internet fueled a campaign that thus far has prompted at least 51 advertisers to cut ties to Limbaugh -- in less than eight days.

While threats of boycotts over content are as old as old media, online social outlets have matured -- both in use and perception -- to the point that major corporations now weigh these campaigns more seriously and with an urgency not seen before. The collective power of social media to specifically target a group of companies has never been more dramatically on display than in the Limbaugh incident, shaking companies as diverse as San Diego-based ProFlowers and Dearborn, Michigan- based Ford Motor Co. (F)

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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-15/limbaugh-clash-has-advertisers-recalculating-web-s-power-tech.html

[madrchsod]

1. facebook--us and world wide traffic-number 2 with almost 7 million linking pages

twitter-number 8 in us traffic and number 9 worldwide