It’s been almost four years since we wondered what would happen when the social networking generation started running for office, since there would almost certainly be a digital record of activities that historically would have been buried and/or lost to history for most candidates. It seems that we’re already starting to see what happens with some younger candidates. Earlier this year, we mentioned one candidate who dropped out of a race after “racy” Facebook photos popped up. MediaShift is now taking a look at the issue and finding that more and more candidates are dealing with this issue, though often in different ways. One embraced it, saying that the photos showed he was a real person and approachable. Others try (usually unsuccessfully) to scrub their digital histories. As this becomes more common, though, it seems likely that even as opponents try to exploit these sorts of things, most people will put the photos in context and not be all that concerned about them.
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