Wednesday was a difficult day for The American Independent News Network, which is the larger entity that operates The Iowa Independent. Our chief executive and founder announced two of our sister sites would close and their content would be moved to The American Independent.
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U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley may make waves in Iowa and throughout the nation for his deftly abbreviated tweets, but it wasn’t enough for him to garner top billing in a new “digital IQ” ranking of Senate members.
The ranking, which is part of a new joint study by New York University professor Scott Galloway and George Washington University School of Business dean Doug Guthrie, is derived from a combination of scores from the senator’s Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, blog presence and site traffic.
The results might explain why many social media users are seeing red.
Although the great political path through social media might have been established by President Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign, those following most closely in his footsteps are Republicans. Topping the list is Arizona Sen. John McCain, Obama’s 2008 Republican rival, who is given a score of 156 and the label of “genius” by the study authors. Only a few steps behind are Republicans Jim DeMint of South Carolina and Scott Brown of Massachusetts, with 154 and 152 rankings, respectfully.
A three-way tie for slot four is where Democrats enter the list, thanks to efforts by Minnesota Sen. Al Franken and Nevada Sen. Harry Reid. The duo garner scores of 143, as does Republican John Cornyn of Texas.
Grassley, who is arguably the most active of all Iowa politicians in usage of social media, earns a digital IQ of 121, which barely places him in the “gifted” class, according to the rankings.
U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, an Iowa Democrat, has a digital IQ below 100, gets classified as “average” and placed as number 49 in the rankings.
On average, according to the study, Republicans have an average digital IQ that is 5.5 points higher than Democrats.
The gap narrows slightly among the 27 senators running for reelection, with Republicans registering a three-point advantage. Although the GOP gets a significant boost from Digital IQ leaders John McCain, Jim DeMint and Scott Brown, Republicans also come out ahead across categories including age, congressional cohort and time in office.
The Republican advantage is the result of more robust participation on Twitter and YouTube (average scores are 26 and 29 percent higher, respectively). Democrats maintain a marginal 5 percent advantage on Facebook scoring, and their senate.gov sites see more web traffic.
Another interesting finding in the study is that the 10 most conservative Republicans, based on their voting records, “outpace the rest of their party and their Democratic counterparts.” The 14 most liberal Democrats, however, garner digital IQs that are four points below the party average.
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