Critical Analysis of Twitter

Juliana Recino 4/20/10
Business Computer Applications, Mr. Elsesser Period 3

“Critical Analysis of Twitter”

One cannot watch the news today without hearing something about Twitter, the latest since sliced bread in the ever-changing world of technology. An online social media utility, Twitter wants its users to answer one simple question: What are you doing? There is one catch, however; you must communicate, or tweet, your message in 140 characters or less. Although this limit can seem like an insufficient amount of space to write a message, it forces the user to be brief. In a world filled with extra amounts of information, it is reassuring that such a social networking service exists; this utility follows the less is more line of thinking. Although some tweets must be shortened to preserve space, there are concerns that the use of such words as w8, instead of the word wait, are contributing to the rapid degradation of the conventional use of English. This unconventional form of communication may not appeal to those devoted to the formal use of the English language, but this social media shows how revolutionary the way that communication over the Internet occurs. Although Twitter does not follow conventional forms of communication, this social media utility illustrates how communication can be made more concise, and its information spread to a vast audience. Moreover, Twitter should not be considered to be another threat to the English language; rather, it should be considered as a complement to its traditional use.
With Twitter becoming one of the fastest-growing forms of social media in the world, it is not surprising to say that almost everybody I know is using this new technology. In fact, Twitter has grown to include organizations never thought to hop aboard the ever-changing channel of technology. Political organizations have adapted to the social media trend, including that of Twitter, and have been gathering the rewards ever since. As an example, U.S. Presidential Candidate, Barack Obama, led the 2008 campaign trail not only with the number of votes that he had, but also with the number of Twitter followers; leading his opponent, John McCain, by approximately 75%. One could argue that social media, especially Twitter, contributed to Obama’s success in attracting the support of younger voters in the 2008 election. Obama’s campaign following social media trends is one of the many examples of how utilizing these online technologies can pay off in the long run.
The use of Twitter is even evident in the medical community; operating rooms once thought to be living in a world of their own are now tweeting what is happening during a patient’s surgery. The doctor is the one telling the tweeter what to type, of course. Although this idea of doctors tweeting procedures over the internet seems like too much of a drastic change, it has completely revolutionized the way in which people can receive short messages. I have yet to follow a live conversation during a patient’s surgery, but I feel it is nice to know that if I have any questions about a certain procedure, I can tweet my question and expect a reply in a very short period of time. Although this new use of Twitter in the operating room would seem abstruse to those not from the medical community, this new technology might inspire someone to want to become a doctor, or surgeon, because of the in-depth tweeting of medical procedures. Twitter serves as more than a stand-alone system, that is, where a user simply reads tweets; instead, Twitter is a two-way system that allows a user to interact with other tweeters in ways never thought possible. Since the Internet was introduced to the world over twenty years ago, the amount of information that is available to the world seems infinite. With this increase in the amount of information that there is on the Internet, Twitter makes it very easy to filter information, such as that of a question that one would use when searching for a specific piece of information in a database. A hash tag, or the use of the pound symbol before any word or phrase, allows users to follow certain trends occurring live on Twitter. For example, if one wanted to follow a Government’s Budget address, they would be able to follow what various Twitter users were saying, live, about the address by typing in #budget. Never before have people been able to access such a large amount of information on a particular topic, in such a short amount of time. In a world where there is so much information available to us, it is nice that these online technologies, such as Twitter, are making it easier for us to group relevant information together for easy, and live, access.
Although these examples are still difficult to digest for those devoted to the formal use of the English language these suspicious individuals should be reminded that Twitter is only supplementary to the traditional use of the English language. In addition, one should note that the shortened nature of tweeting messages via Twitter is still understandable; it is merely another way to deliver a message in a shorter fashion. Although linguists may not agree, and would rather see the extension of this character limit to ensure proper English is used, it should serve as a challenge for us to shorten up some of the messages that we are communicating. We live in a world that is filled with a great amount of information, so it only seems right to think that such short messages in Twitter would be beneficial for those wanting to catch a glimpse of what other Tweeters in the world are talking about. For example, reading the news is much easier for me on Twitter because of how all news stories are of a short and snappy nature. News headlines, followed by their links, make it easy for me to access news information that is relevant to me. Never before have I been able to search for news headlines, other than using Google. Although these news headlines posted on Twitter may contain unconventional abbreviations, the message is still conveyed to the user in a way that can be easily understood. It seems interesting to say, then, that the original use of the English language can still communicate its message to those unfamiliar with the changed language, or online terminology. If anything, this new form of communication should be embraced, as well as appreciated, because of the fact that Twitter may be one of the many utilities that will solidify the use of the English language for, perhaps, thousands of years.
Although the jury may still be out as to the effectiveness of Twitter communicating its messages in a clear fashion, it is reassuring to see that such unconventional uses of the English language can still transmit their communication in a fashion that can be easily understood, for the most part, by those that speak the English language. Moreover, it should be noted that Twitter is not going away any time soon, and if anything, Twitter will grow even more in its use in today’s society. As you can see Twitter helps us to stay involved in news, entertainment, businesses, and so many other important aspects of daily life. And with the use of this social networking website, so many opportunities become open up for communication and networking and I think in the future its popularity will get much stronger because of the many different ways it can be used.

Work Cited
http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/60-second-science/post.cfm?id=twitter-what-is-it-good-for-2009-02-13
http://www.centernetworks.com/twitter-what-is-it-good-for
http://www.lostartofblogging.com/twitter-guide