Tweet Me A Story! Media Meditation #5

The first time I heard of Twitter was in 2008. I remember reading a CNN article about a kid who basically tweeted his way out of an Egyptian prison; by alerting his friends and family via twitter about his predicament, he was able to get help quickly and efficiently.

I still thought twitter sounded pretty stupid.

But then I made a twitter, and now I am in love. This isn't a crush of any sort, oh no. This is true blue, 100% love, complications and all. Woody Allen might make a movie about us soon.

(Or maybe not. Sorry to hear it, Woody.)

I've found it to be probably the most useful social networking tool I've become a part of. It gives my neocortex and limbic brains so much to do: there's so much to see, so much new visual input and new information from people I choose to get information from! Limbic brain loves twitpic (a method of sharing pictures via tweet) and customizing the visual aspects of twitter, while neocortex is fascinated by things like debates between friends about the film "Kick-Ass".

Twitter isn't without its share of controversy, however. I recently got into an argument with a friend (via facebook) about twitter's usefulness. His arguments sounded like Miley Cyrus' reasons for deleting her twitter:



"It's horribly misused, no one cares about what you're doing at all times, you get nothing out of it, it can get addictive, facebook statuses are the same thing", and so on. I'd heard it all before, and I was ready.

I've found that Twitter is actually a really good way to stay updated and keep in touch with people you wouldn't ordinarily talk to. You get information from people you choose to get information from in an instant, and the 140 character limit makes it so that you're getting the bare bones instead of a 9 page status update.

And it isn't all just random; a lot of it is in who you follow. If you follow Shaq (whose typical tweet is something like "Guess what people i am still KAZAAM") you're not really getting anything out of it. But following people involved around campus has let me know about a lot of cool media events around campus, updates on projects, etc.

I love Twitter. I probably don't use it to its full potential and I'm not here to say that 90% of the tweets people make aren't ridiculous, but I really like what Twitter does for me and in the world of "web 2.0" and the constantly evolving web, I think it's becoming a necessary way to sort of market yourself.

Even the government is taking notice.
(Though this does bring in the question of ownership: are my tweets mine? Who is going to look at them? It's a question frequently asked with this kind of technology.)

So I'm here to stand up and make a case for Twitter. Even though one of my last tweets was "I love nutella", I still believe in the power and importance of twitter. It's a blast, I stay connected, and it might even help me land a job one day. So four for you, Twitter! You go, Twitter!