MySpace Politics: Uses and Gratifications of Befriending Candidates

This study examines the uses and gratifications (UG) of accessing political candidate profiles on social network Web sites. An online survey of visitors to the MySpace profiles of 2008 primary candidates revealed that voters are drawn to this source of political information mainly by the desire for social interaction with other like-minded supporters, followed by information-seeking, and entertainment. While information seeking and entertainment are common UG of consuming online political content, they were weaker factors compared to the social interaction factor that seems to distinguish MySpace, possibly SNSs in general, from other online sources of political content.