Thanks to POLITICO

On Wednesday, President Barack Obama picked an unconventional setting for a town hall promoting his deficit reduction plan…Facebook.

The discussion was broadcast through the website from Facebook headquarters in Palo Alto, CA and moderated by Facebook CEO and President Mark Zuckerberg (who wore a tie!).

Obama took questions submitted online along with a few from the audience made up of the company’s employees.

Though maybe not the intent, the event highlighted the importance of Internet-based companies like Facebook and YouTube.

Facebook has promoted Obama’s visit as a major honor, a validation of the firm’s influence as a communications platform. The White House has boasted that the audience it will reach through Facebook’s live video broadcast is comprised largely of middle class, typically younger Americans who would be harder to approach through traditional media.

In the 2008 campaign, Obama used social media in ways no campaign had ever see before. As 2012 quickly approaches, the question becomes, will he still have the advantage?