LJWorld.com weblogs Lauren Keith
Posted
by Lauren Keith
November 2, 2009 at 9:08 a.m.
We the Tweeple
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Twitter was the first social media that I was ever skeptical of. Maybe it was something in the way that every CNN broadcast had to include something stupid about it. Maybe it was because I already knew what my three friends who were using the service had for breakfast. Maybe it was because I knew if I looked at one more cute guinea pig photo, I would have to officially declare my life a waste of time.
As I spent more time with Twitter, I was finally able to unlock its potential.
From the beginning, the Internet was hailed as this great technology that would bring us information and bring us together. At first, the Internet didn’t seem to bring us much: porn, videos of dancing hamsters (RIP Geocities) and the breakfast updates of friends far and near.
But then the Internet grew up into something more meaningful. It became the way for people to check into the parts of the world that they couldn’t see at the moment.
As the Internet grew, it became harder to see what my next door neighbor was doing. Where Google failed us, Twitter stepped in.
I spent a few months completely out of my element in Germany this summer, and when I came home, I was desperate for a sense of community. It was something that I hadn’t ever felt before, and I wasn’t sure where or if it could be found.
Twitter has provided that for me. Through the #Lawrence hashtag and the new lists feature, I can check the pulse of what is happening in this community and check in with people I know and people I don’t.
In the broadest definition of the word, news is what people are doing. Twitter is the best, although still very selective, aggregator of news in a place.
The Tweeple of Lawrence might not be journalists, but that’s not the argument. I learn more about the people who live here from Twitter than I ever could watching or reading the news or even from another social media service.
— Lauren Keith
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ashleym (anonymous) says…
I was very skeptical of Twitter as well. I've only recently begun to get over the feeling that Twitter is simply an outlet for celebrities and middle-aged people to post the equivalent of Facebook statuses or for news stations to find filler for their cable broadcasts.
I now see that Twitter fulfills a need for community in a way facebook doesn't and that, on occasion, it can be journalistic as it was for many Iranians.
I may just have to admit I was wrong and give it a try.