A quick note about the Law of Unintended Consequences in action: A post on Crooks and Liars earlier this afternoon reported:

It appears that the RNC is pretty happy with the number of “friends” it has on Facebook. Their thinking apparently is that it bodes well for the November election, as they for the first time have more than the DNC. I’ve heard rumors they’re shopping that story to some friendly reporters. If you’d like to make them look ridiculous, you can join the Democratic Party’s Facebook group here.

Apparently, the RNC Facebook group, in the midst of a membership drive according the graphic on their page, had passed the DNC Facebook group at somewhere around the 11,000 member mark. A few hours later, Markos posted the news on a Daily Kos Open Thread, and the lead the RNC group had quickly vanished.

To pour salt on their Republican wounds, within two and a half hours of the Daily Kos post, the DNC Facebook group reached 15,000 members, the original goal of the RNC (which remains well under 12,000 at the time of this writing). A few lessons out of this, in no particular order:

• Daily Kos has a huge readership. A front-page post is seen by more eyeballs than most national organizations get when they send out email blasts.
• Don’t brag about social media numbers. They’re a fickle beast.
• Republicans can’t copy Democratic strategies and expect to win. Democrats own Facebook. Deal with it and move on to another battleground.

And so it goes, in the wacky intersection of politics and technology…

Cross-posted on Leftmost Bit.