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The Downing Street Twitter Feed has gone over 100,000 followers (i.e., readers) some time in the last few days. Here is a graph from Twittercounter.

That’s a lot, and an achievement not to be underestimated. It has been noted by a number of sites. The excellent Simon Dickson at Puffbox suggests that this is active interest in politics:

Even if there’s no future business model, we’re looking at a phenomenal opportunity here, today. The fact it may not be here tomorrow shouldn’t stop us exploiting it while it’s there. 100,000 people have signed up - actively, voluntarily - to hear from the heart of UK government. Now they’re actually listening, what should we be saying to them?

I’m an enthusiast (and a “booster“) for political participation, and I’m with Simon on “let’s use this opportunity”. But unfortunately the interest isn’t quite as “active” as he thinks, since a signup to the 10 Downing Street Twitter Feed is now part of the account creation process on Twitter. And it is even set as an “opt-in” option.