Twitter

I'll be the first to admit that I don't use Twitter, and I have no intention to. I've tried to hop on the bandwagon and start tweeting, but I don't feel like it's really of any use for a person like me. I mean, who cares what I'm doing today? Do I really even want to be reading a bunch of Facebook-style status updates from people I know and consider them to be truly relevant? Not really.

Looking at the growing interested of Twitter I may be one of the few that feels this way. Maybe I just don't 'get it.' But, after the recent Tiger Woods fiasco and the constantly changing stories published through the website, I'm sticking to my guns. I think Twitter started out as a valuable tool to break stories, but now it has essentially turned the public into paparazzo and creative writers.

The Media can use Twitter for "good," by posting important updates on world events. Things like bills being voted on, election results and breaking headlines. "Hard" news stories, if you will. However, Twitter is also meant for entertainment on some level. Recently it's become a portable TMZ/National Enquirer/Weekly World News, even when from more reputable sources like The New York Times. It's also become the perfect place to advertise: "Twighlight New Moon Coming Out" blah blah blah. I'd argue that most of the legitimacy of Twitter as a tool to inform people of the news is pretty much gone.

Is this a bad thing? I don't really think so. There's constantly new social networking applications and websites becoming available, and there's pleanty of places to turn to for the news. Am I sick of hearing about the 50 different scenarios surrounding Tiger Woods' car accident? Definately. Nobody at this point really knows what happened, so what good is it to me when six different twitter feeds tell me six different things? Addicted to meds! Cheating on Wife! Domestic Abuse Victim! You never know what's true or not.

For a majority of people, I don't think having this gray area is really a problem. However, there are always going to be the few that believe anything they read and will spread the word as quick as they possibly can for attention. It's these people who see TMZ and Enquirer reports as legitimate and are the reason the odd fixation on celebrity and athlete breakdowns is a successful media venture. I don't really think much can be done for those types of people, though. Twitter isn't a tool of evil that completely destroys journalistic merit, but at the same time it's not what I would turn to while expecting 100% truthful reporting a second after it happens. Twitter just encourages speed, speed, speed and with competition in media so vicious, what you see isn't necessarily what really went down.