Social Media and Immersive Worlds: Why International Place Branding Doesn’t Get Weekends Off

Abstract

On 29 December 2008, as tensions heated up around renewed conflict in the Gaza Strip between Israel and Palestinian militants, the Israeli Consulate of New York City made an unusual announcement. They would be taking questions about the conflict the next day via Twitter – the purported first-ever Twitter press conference (Cohen 2009). Twitter is an asynchronous messaging tool in which users post notes using a maximum of 140 characters. People can “follow” other Twitter users by visiting their Twitter page. Most Twitter pages are publicly viewable on the internet, thus making them available to millions.