I admit, I have not been following the Ron Paul campaign much besides the mobilization of Digg users and some of the ads I’ve seen on sites which normally do not host political advertising, like v7n Forums.
But today I was exposed to the “Google Ron Paul” campaign for the first time, when an early model Ford Explorer, probably driven by University of South Florida students, aggressively passed me on the highway.
Unfortunately, I did not have my camera with me, but did come home, ‘Googled’ Ron Paul, then Flickr’d ‘Google Ron Paul‘, and found some examples of the campaign via rooftops, signs and sidewalk chalkings.
I’m not sure if this grassroots campaign will help Ron Paul win the race for the Presidency, but it is an excellent thought provoking and educational initiative, especially in its usage of Google as a verb.
By the way, Google is the top contributor to the Ron Paul campaign, with $22,250 donated by the search company, but given Google’s own campaign to not use ‘Google’ as a verb for ‘search’, it is entirely doubtful that this ‘Google Ron Paul’ movement was an official Google brainchild.
If the car passing me on the road said ‘Search for Ron Paul’ or ‘Yahoo Ron Paul’, I would never probably open up my laptop when coming home to perform the action. But asking me to ‘Google Ron Paul’ hit a nerve, what are the Google results for Ron Paul and are any of the candidates taking advantage of this campaign?
After a search on Google for Ron Paul, I found it a nice example of Google Universal search in action, with results from Google News, YouTube and Google Maps added to the mix.
In addition, no candidates or anti-Ron Paul sites are ranking in the top ten or really taking advantage of Google AdWords.
