Twitter to Play Crucial Role in South Carolina Republican Debate ~ Pare News

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Televised Republican debates are about to heat up — not only between the remaining five party presidential candidates — but between viewers using Twitter. Fox News hopes to open up the digital floor for comments during Monday’s Republican debate in Myrtle Beach, S.C., with a live Twitter debate.

Viewers are encouraged to share their thoughts over Twitter in real-time during Monday’s 9 p.m. ET debate. They can use the debate’s official hastag #scdebate as well as #answer and #dodge to convey sentiments about individual candidates. Simply attach a candidate’s name to #answer — if he has answered the question well — or #dodge — if he has diverted from the topic completely — and the Twitter data analysis system will do the rest. The results will be displayed on FoxNews.com.

Fox News Digital’s Vice President and General Manager Jeff Misenti told The New York Times that questions or concerns attached to these tweets will be incorporated into the conversation.

Fox’s Bret Baier will moderate the debate between former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, Rep. Ron Paul from Texas, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Texas Gov. Rick Perry. The debate follows former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman’s withdrawal from the presidential race and announcement that he will funnel support he’s seen during the race toward Romney.

SEE ALSO: Fox News, Google Join Forces for New Hampshire Primary

Twitter has stated that the use of social media during political debates gives the U.S. people a way to direct the conversation to topics of interest. The hot topic of the debate tonight may be South Carolina’s 10% unemployment rate. Will that be the center of the digital conversation? We’ll be waiting to find out.

Twitter has also set up a list of politicians, journalists and U.S. election staff for viewers to follow so they never miss a beat The list features Democratic strategist Donna Brazile, Fox’s Greta Van Susteran, Bret Baier and CNN Chief White House Correspondent Jessica Yellin.

This is not the first time the social media world has meshed with the political sphere on TV. Fox News and Twitter tracked live reactions during the Iowa debate on Dec. 15. NBC and Facebook also teamed up last week to host an online stream and conversation with a comment widget and digital polls.

Will you be tuning into Monday night’s Fox News debate and contributing your thoughts on Twitter? Let us know in the comments below.

Image courtesy of Flickr, IowaPolitics.com

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