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Lightning Rod

Obama Pens First Tweet in 3rd-Person

By John Hudson on January 19, 2010 2:01pm

Pool/Getty Images

In a first for the American presidency, Barack Obama sent a tweet on Monday, thumbing a message on the American Red Cross account, @RedCross:

President Obama and the First Lady are here visiting our disaster operation center right now.

While Twitter users are famous for the banality of their tweets ("I just ate a Pop-Tart," "I love the new J-Lo single," etc.) the president and First Lady had stopped by the American Red Cross headquarters and were giving encouragement to the staff and volunteers coordinating the Haiti relief effort.

Politicos like Tony Fratto, a former Bush spokesman, largely welcomed Obama's maiden tweet saying, "Welcome to Twitter, Mr. President - I'll follow you if you follow me." Tech blogs, on the other hand, chuckled at the president's detached Twitter voice: "Yes, he tweeted in third person," squirmed MG Siegler at TechCrunch.

Either way, the president's move signals a warming up to the social media tool. In November he said his fingers were "too clumsy" to tweet. Looks like he is capable of on-the-job training.