There’s a lively political twitter community in Oxford. About 16 City Councillors are on twitter, most of them active and more than ready to respond, interact and debate with each other (you know who you are!) and with ordinary Joes like me. The same goes for the County Councillors I follow. In contrast these collective accounts are rather dull. I feel they exist because the organisations they represent think they should “do social media” without really understanding what do do or how it could (should?) be a key part of their communications. Which of them makes the best attempt? In my impartial and inevitably subjective view I give top place to @OxfordCityTory, which is why they head the list. Although there’s some logic behind the order in which the others appear don’t read too much into it – treat it as “in no particular order”!
- Identifies itself both as Oxford East Conservatives and Oxford City Conservatives. Part of Oxfordshire County Conservatives. Also incorporates Oxford West & Abingdon Conservative Association, Oxford University Conservative Association and Oxford Brookes Conservative Association. A moderately active account with over 1500 followers with whom it interacts.
- www.facebook.com/OxfordEastConservatives and oxfordshireconservatives.com/main/
@nicolablackwood (Oxford West & Abingdon constituency)
- Official account for Oxford West & Abingdon constituency’s MP. It has the highest number of followers (2884) of any of these accounts but only tweets intermittently. Account was silent from 16 May 2010, waking up again in April this year since when it has averaged about 7 tweets a month, all ‘corporate’ announcements in the third person linking to the website.
- www.nicolablackwood.com/
@OurOxford (Oxford city)
- An inactive account – last tweet was 1 July 2012. Neither twitter bio nor website identify account as Conservative either in words or branding, but website links redirect to:
- www.ouroxford.org/
- Defunct account set up by OUCA. Only one tweet (25 Feb 2010).
- A moderately active account with 669 followers. Most recent activity relates to the Save Temple Cowley Pool campaign.
- www.oxford.greenparty.org.uk/
- A moderately active account with 635 followers, publicising Green Party activities in and around Oxford and Oxfordshire. Heavy on re-tweets of other Green sources, light on original content.
- www.oxford.greenparty.org.uk/
@Oxford_Labour (Oxford city)
- The Oxford & District Labour Party. Moderately active with 762 followers; no regular interaction with others.
- oxfordlabour.org.uk/
- Sporadically active account with 706 followers; the OU Labour Club’s account. Occasionally interacts with others. Website link on twitter bio is to OULC blog.
- lleft.blogspot.co.uk/
- Appears to be an abandoned account for the OU Labour Club. Last tweet was 10 March 2011, but still has 1290 followers. Was quite active until then. Website link on twitter bio is to up-to-date OULC website.
- oulc.org/
- Official account run for Andrew Smith MP. Infrequent tweets of activity with occasional re-tweets but no interaction with its 303 followers.
- www.AndrewSmithMP.org.uk
- Occasional tweets from The Oxford Brookes Labour Club plus re-tweets of other Labour accounts. 272 followers.
- www.facebook.com/groups/brookeslabour/
- A sub-group of OULC. An inactive account with 132 followers: last tweet was 10 Dec 2011. Twitter bio says they are on facebook as Ladies in Red but I can’t find the account.
- [Update 10 Feb 2013: This account has officially closed. A new account @OxUniWomenLab has opened in its place – see below.]
- The replacement account for the one above. At 10 Feb 2013 it had 30 followers and had tweeted 25 times (including re-tweets) since starting on 27 January 2013.
- oulc.org and facebook.com/groups/2202046408/
- An account with 56 followers which only tweets once daily to link to paper.li news aggregation site “Oxford LibDems Daily”. No other contact details in twitter bio.
- This account started on 21 Aug 2012. It has only tweeted 15 times and has only 25 followers.
- oxwablibdems.org.uk/en/