Last summer, I told my friend Barber that Twitter was a sign of the apocalypse and would probably take over the world. On Wednesday, I became a genuine hypocrite and created my own account. I'm going to try to explain myself.
(ironically, my desire to defend joining twitter via an online message to a loose collection of people I communicate with primarily over the internet is just further evidence that I've sold out to the 21st century philosophy of "inundate people with your inane opinions as often as you can.")
I think two big reasons why Twitter often evokes a negative response from people are 1) They don't understand it, or 2) They understand it to be a shameless means of self-centered promotion. Unfortunately, reason number two is somewhat correct. At least, correct for a great many Twitter users. But before addressing why I think Twitter can be used in a constructive way, I think I should clear up the trouble with issue one.
Twitter is a website where you can post a message. The only rule is that the message has to be longer than 140 characters. When you post a message, everyone who is "following" you can see your messgage. It's kind of like being friends on facebook, and in fact the whole system works just like the facebook "status" system.
When you post a Twitter message, you can add a "hash tag" to the end of it. This effectively categorizes what the message is about. So, if I tweet something about electric vehicles, I add the text "#EV" to the end of my tweet. Once it has been hash-tagged, people who search "#EV" can see my tweet, along with the tweets of all the other people talking about electric vehicles. But who cares what every Joe on the internet is saying right? Well, if you give it a bit of time, you can usually identify some people who know what they're talking about, or at least have interesting ideas. Then, you sign up to follow them and receive all their tweets. This, I feel, is where Twitter has real value. Effectively, it allows regular people to receive up-to-the-minute information on a topic they care about from people who have devoted their lives to analyzing it.
What made me come around on Twitter is the view expressed to me by a classmate of mine at the University. Twitter is basically a more effective, more efficient way of doing what I (and, maybe, some of you) already do on the internet. I have a few websites I check regularly. I have some columnists or bloggers that I read. I have areas of interest that I like to get information on. With Twitter, I can aggregate a lot of this information into one place.
After trying it out for three days, I see advantages and disadvantages. Twitter has lead me to a host of interesting articles and studies that I probably never would have known about otherwise. On the flip side, it has become one more thing demanding my attention as I sit at my computer. Between following recent tweets, checking email, paying attention to facebook updates, etc., I feel like I'm approaching the thin line between "well-connected" and "addicted to information." Furthermore, Twitter may simplify the information aggregation process, but it also lets choose, very specifically, what information you're getting. I worry that I, and others who may increasing get content mostly through Twitter, will lose the valuable ability to be subjected to alternative opinions. If I follow people talking about renewable energy, for instance, then I'm likely to get a pretty constant stream of "good news" tweets pointing me to this success story or that breakthrough. I'm less likely to see negative analyses or hear naysayers. Twitter, if not used carefully, can certain contribute to the "echo chamber" effect that people describe when one gets all their content from sources that are ideologically similar to themselves.
I'm gonna stick with Twitter. Maybe it will keep me more up-to-date on topics I care about, maybe I just can't refuse another information pipeline. Probably both. Just one piece of advice: if you take the Twitter plunge as a means of enriching your intellectual life, avoid tweets from user DanielHoCo.
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