Obama's social networking forays grow

Last Updated: Monday, February 1, 2010 | 3:08 PM ET

CBC News

The U.S. President Barack Obama took questions Monday about his State of the Union speech — on YouTube.

The popular social networking site broadcast the president's responses, highlighting once again the White House's departure from traditional modes of communication.

"It's this kind of transparency and direct access to information that we believe represents the promise of platforms like YouTube to improve our politics," the networking site said in a release.

In the past month, Obama has tweeted on micro-blogger Twitter, taken questions on the White House's iPhone application and been videostreamed live on YouTube. Recently, he has had his speeches streamed via Facebook.

Monday's broadcast appeared on CitizenTube, YouTube's political platform. The president read through a selection of questions about his State of the Union speech last week. They were chosen YouTube moderators from the top tier of the 11,000 questions submitted over the past five days.

It was the first time Obama had taken questions since giving the speech Jan. 27.

Obama first tweeted on Twitter on Jan. 18 at the headquarters of the American Red Cross.

Last week, the White House launched its official iPhone app, which provides live video streaming of public events and press briefings.

The administration plans to introduce mobile.WhiteHouse.gov in the coming weeks, "a mobile-ready version of WhiteHouse.gov that is optimized for any internet-enabled mobile device, including many other phones," according to the White House's blog.

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