Marketing &Media &Uncategorized 26 Jan 2009 05:45 pm
President Obama & His BlackBerry
Last week I wrote about President Obama and the debate over whether or not he was able to keep his BlackBerry now that he has been officially sworn in as President. As of Friday, the decision had been made and it was publicly announced that President Obama is going to be the first to email while living in the White House.
It only made sense that he would be able to keep it. He had just run the most technologically sophisticated presidential campaign in our nation’s history. Then, as soon as he won, he was asked to give up what helped get him into office in the first place. The rest of the White House has email and Obama’s aids all have a BlackBerry. Members of Congress were all given the device after 9/11 when it was realized that even after cell service had failed, BlackBerrys still continued to work. If everyone else is able to communicate online, the President certainly should be able to do the same.
In order for him to keep the device, he made a deal that it would only be used on a limited basis and to communicate with friends and some senior staff members. He will mainly use the device to read incoming messages and then later respond to them once he has access to a computer. Security has also been increased on the device to prevent others from hacking into his account and information from being leaked to the public.
Now that the president can officially communicate using the technology that the rest of the country depends on, it made me think about how this could increase the popularity of the already popular communication device. The device has been mentioned a great deal lately in the media nationwide; from a Public Relations perspective, this is good marketing. All of this exposure could interest the public to get a BlackBerry of their own. I mean, who is a better individual to create interest in the device than the President of the United States?
Amanda Deluca
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