{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,3,26]],"date-time":"2026-03-26T12:03:25Z","timestamp":1774526605921,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":28,"publisher":"SAGE Publications","issue":"7","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2013,11,11]],"date-time":"2013-11-11T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1384128000000},"content-version":"tdm","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/page\/policies\/text-and-data-mining-license"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["journals.sagepub.com"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["New Media &amp; Society"],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2015,8]]},"abstract":"<jats:p> This article evaluates the potential that Twitter affords politicians to communicate to citizens directly, through messages that they broadcast to users who follow them, and indirectly, to the extent that their followers autonomously re-circulate politicians\u2019 messages to their own contacts. Analysis of more than 2 million accounts of followers of 10 national party leaders during the Italian 2013 general election campaign shows that most users are rather inactive and have very small followings. Moreover, the most followed politicians have on average the least active and followed users, and vice versa. Users\u2019 activity and followings are also unevenly distributed, with very tiny minorities accounting for the vast majority of tweets and followers. The most followed followers of politicians are celebrities in realms other than politics, or people who are already highly visible in the politics-media ecosystem. Our findings suggest that most of the potential for indirect communication may lie in the \u201cvital middle\u201d of the Twitter population who are more active than average, but are not part of the restricted elite of high-impact outliers. <\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1177\/1461444813511038","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2013,11,12]],"date-time":"2013-11-12T02:24:20Z","timestamp":1384223060000},"page":"1025-1042","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1177\/sage-journals-update-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":94,"title":["Follow the leader! Direct and indirect flows of political communication during the 2013 Italian general election campaign"],"prefix":"10.1177","volume":"17","author":[{"given":"Cristian","family":"Vaccari","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Royal Holloway, University of London and University of Bologna"}]},{"given":"Augusto","family":"Valeriani","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"University of Bologna"}]}],"member":"179","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2013,11,11]]},"reference":[{"key":"bibr1-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/1940161211415519"},{"key":"bibr2-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/0002716206292266"},{"key":"bibr3-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1093\/oso\/9780195151558.001.0001"},{"key":"bibr4-1461444813511038","volume-title":"Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association","author":"Bode L","year":"2011"},{"key":"bibr5-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1080\/13608746.2013.775720"},{"key":"bibr6-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1080\/17512786.2012.663610"},{"key":"bibr7-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1609\/icwsm.v4i1.14033"},{"issue":"1","key":"bibr8-1461444813511038","first-page":"9","volume":"5","author":"Chadwick A","year":"2009","journal-title":"I\/S: Journal of Law and Policy for the Information Society"},{"key":"bibr9-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/1940161210384730"},{"key":"bibr10-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1080\/10304310903003270"},{"key":"bibr11-1461444813511038","first-page":"160","volume-title":"Mediated Politics: Communication in the Future of Democracy","author":"Delli Carpini M","year":"2001"},{"key":"bibr12-1461444813511038","volume-title":"Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association","author":"Freelon D","year":"2013"},{"key":"bibr13-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1002\/asi.21344"},{"key":"bibr14-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1080\/17512781003640703"},{"key":"bibr15-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1515\/9781400837496"},{"key":"bibr16-1461444813511038","volume-title":"Personal Influence: The Part Played by People in the Flow of Mass Communication","author":"Katz E","year":"1955"},{"key":"bibr17-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1075\/pbns.39.10kol"},{"key":"bibr18-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1145\/1397735.1397741"},{"key":"bibr19-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.4135\/9781452233475"},{"key":"bibr20-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/1461444810365313"},{"key":"bibr21-1461444813511038","first-page":"32","volume-title":"Esprit 13: Workshop on Ethnographic Studies in Real and Virtual Environments: Inhabited Information Spaces and Connected Communities","author":"Mason B","year":"1999"},{"key":"bibr22-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1007\/978-1-4471-0057-7_6"},{"key":"bibr23-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/1750481312437441"},{"key":"bibr24-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1017\/CBO9781139878425"},{"key":"bibr25-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1017\/S1537592710001210"},{"key":"bibr26-1461444813511038","volume-title":"Camgirls: Celebrity and Authenticity in the Age of Social Networks","author":"Senft T","year":"2008"},{"key":"bibr27-1461444813511038","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1080\/19331681.2012.758072"},{"issue":"3","key":"bibr28-1461444813511038","first-page":"325","volume":"43","author":"Vaccari C","year":"2013","journal-title":"Rivista Italiana di Scienza Politica"}],"container-title":["New Media &amp; 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