A few months ago, the Daily Kos front-page editor Scout Finch wrote a diary about Twitter, the latest and most hyped social networking tool.
I was taken aback by some of the amazingly vitriolic backlash against Twitter in that diary. So much so that I, too, wrote a diary trying to explain that it was more a tool, a medium, than the OMGDOWNFALLOFCIVILIZATION.
Weary though I am to touch upon that very topic yet again, I'd like to present some examples of Twitter uses that may change your mind. Of course, you can also dismiss this diary as something written by a douchey twenty-something who always hops on the latest bandwagon, including this new one where people just exchange constant updates on the frequency and nature of their bathroom visits; that's your right.
And so below the fold, I've presented in alternating order, some of the comments made about Twitter on this very site, and some actual Tweets. Have at it.
You can't say anything meaningful in 140 letters
have no more news from uni dorm. i must go to pray now. today we will need god. #Iranelection
Twitter is bullshit.
The best I have seen it described is it seems to be an unusually "high noise to signal ratio". All updates, no substance.
cannot get line out on my mobile for past 30 mins. either too many users or jammed network by gov. #Iranelection
tehran is like war zone. it is unbelievable. i have not seen this for 30 years. fires everywhere. shooting, people shouting. #Iranelection
I can have the pleasure of typing in words and sentences on a 10 character key pad. "Hey Guy! What are ya doin'?"... "I dunno, what are you doin? LOL" Well, can't have that so why not spend $300 for an iPhone and make it even easier to say and read nothing to and from nobody.
5:26AM I'm praying to GOD they leave us be! we should get Reza to a hospital Asap, he has some bad wounds. #iranelections
When the president is giving a speech, I really don't care what a bunch of ADD sufferers in congress are IMing to a website.
we have now some students with urgent need of medical attention I'm calling out to all ppl who can come here don't leave us #iranelection
SNORE! BFD! Social experiment? I DOUBT it.
tomorrow in 19 cities we march. world will see that ppl of iran are brave. we will defeat dictators. #Iranelection
Let's call twitter what it is folks: A last ditch effort by the dying media to grasp onto some hope of remaining relevant. Twitter is stupid and the media will never convince me to use it. Every time I turn around CNN, NBC, ABC, Fox, etc is asking me if I twitter. No I don't twitter and I refuse to follow your lame asses. Just another way for them to control the message as they find it harder and harder to do so with the internet.
They tried their damnedest to bring down Obama with Bittergate, flagpin, Plagiarism, Lipstick on a pig, Bill Ayers, Acorn, etc...I could on forever folks. Don't twitter. If you have an account close it. If every single traditional media outlet is promoting a single website, run the other way. Bullshit, Bullshit, Bullshit. FUCK TWITTER AND THE TWITTERING CLASS.
all university's own security and personnel already evacuated by police, there are only us students in here right now. #iranelection
bastards just attacked us for no reason, I lost count of how much tear gas they launched at us! #iranelection
I brushed my teeth after my tuna sandwich, and I'd really like to tell you more about my day but turns out I've reached the limit of my tweet.
occasionally hear gunshots in distance. no idea where. seems to be all over city. just like 79. #Iranelection
It's like an electronic parole bracelet, except it's cool, hip, and twendy.
As with Facebook, no doubt in my mind it's a huge intel collector, gathering up realtime details of peoples' daily lives at a moment-by-moment level of granularity that would have left Orwell speechless.
It has a built-in bias toward the trivial.
Try expressing anything profound in 140 characters.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Ri-" Character limit exceeded!
I am accessing twitter from [IP HIDDEN] in tehran. you can avoid gov filters from here. spread to others. #Iranelection
Functioning Iran proxies 218.128.112.18:8080 218.206.94.132:808 218.253.65.99:808 219.50.16.70:8080 PLEASE RT#iranelection #iranwantsFREEDOM
Guy beaten to death video is up again http://bit.ly/... #iranelection
With all the two-fingered cell phone button punching going on, all the ear-bud listening taking place, all the device clutching in hot fists, or pressing earward, does anyone look up and greet their fellow living and breathing man eye-to-eye any more when out in public?
Students & people fighting back a large group of police & Basij right now at university of physics! I'm going to join them. #iranelection
citizens in Tehran leave doors unlocked so demonstrators have place 2 hide when police come #IranElection
You know, if I didn't know any better, I'd say that these individual messages from Iran are providing a visceral and honest real-time account of what's an event of most likely historical significance.
But fortunately I've already been set straight.