Canadian Politics in 140 Characters: Party Politics in the Twitterverse‪.‬

Digital technology has had profound impacts on political communication. This article focuses on one digital technology--Twitter. It is part of a broader technology trend called Web 2.0 which harnesses the Web in a more interactive and collaborative manner. Many authors have argued that Web 2.0 is closely related to e-democracy and stress the importance of enhancing the role of internet users. E-democracy strives to involve cyber-citizens in the political process, new Web 2.0 applications can augment their impact on the democratic system. This paper argues that though many Canadian politicians are using Twitter, it is mostly used to broadcast official party information. Their use of Twitter so far shows little evidence of embracing the characteristics of Web 2.0. **********