Have you been tweeting about the US elections? If so, you’re part of the 39 percent of US adults who use social media to discuss politics. So how is all of this online political activity affecting the presidential elections?

OpenSite has prepared this infographic that explores the impact that social media has had on politics.

It reminds us that 2008 was called the “social media election”, with 1.8 million tweets sent on election day… and that now, in 2012, there are 1.8 million tweets sent every six minutes.

Barack Obama’s appearance at the Democratic National Convention caused over 52,000 tweets to be sent, on average, every minute, resulting in about 4 million tweets total during his 39 minute speech.

And other representatives are jumping on social media too: 9 out of 10 Senators and Representatives have their own Twitter accounts.

The infographic also points out that 4 out of 10 people will use social media to help them make a decision come election day – so the candidates had better do all they can to present themselves in the best light, in 140-characters or less.