Twitter: First reactions

So, Twitter.

I had heard of it, but never really put much thought into it. This morning, I decided to explore the Twitter webpage and found it rather...cryptic. The Welcome page has this to say:

Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?

What am I doing? Well, currently I'm reading the Twitter page, but beyond that I have to wonder why anyone would care. My first reaction was that Twitter encapsulates the faux closeness that the internet provides, but then I got to thinking. What is the purpose of Twitter? 140 characters isn't long, so brief updates are the norm. Anything from, "I feel sick" to "I watched FoxNews for 6 hours and learned a lot about Obama's new economic team." Rather than closeness, Twitter acts as a platform for conversations that could be held outside of the Twitter forum. Much like a blog post lends itself to comments, Twitter starts conversations and allows people to glean information about someone else's life through conversational snippets.

The media cloud of blogs, comments on stories, and instant information gives a voice to those who may have felt disenfranchised by popular media. Twitter could possibly act as a conduit for those who like to stay instantly connected.

Conversely, Twitter reminded me of something that happened just the other day. My friend and I were Googling our names and the first thing that popped up for me was MY Facebook page. Caroline Mooney, Hartford CT. There I was. It made me feel like I was on the Truman Show, which, evidently, is a contemporary phenomenon fueled by Facebook newsfeeds and Google searches.

So, how will the media react to sites like Twitter if their popularity continues to grow, or even grows exponentially? What will the internet look like in 2012? Twitter, much like the Barack Obama text messages allows anyone you "follow" to immediately tell you whatever they think is important. If the Obama administration, MSNBC, FoxNews, or another person, governmental body, or media outlet got a Twitter page, much like the Obama Facebook page, it would allow them to enter your home and your daily life as seamlessly as a new friend does. The result is one we've talked about often in regards to blogs: short bits of information that feed into how the Google Generation looks for news. Maybe some would take the time to research the story, but imagine if FoxNews twittered (is that a verb?) headlines their followers:

"Obama's pastor gives vitriolic anti-American sermon."

"Obama's secret ties to Kenyan government."

"Obama uses cabinet appointments to further his liberal agenda."

Perhaps I'm paranoid, but I don't want anyone to know what I'm doing all the time, nor do I want to know what anyone else is doing all the time, nor every headline that comes across as a news alert. News organizations could certainly utilize Twitter to their great advantage. It seems like an interesting tool. And now, after Obama and McCain's webpage face-off, the internet will probably become an important tool to potentially reach the ever-apathetic youth voter. Maybe sites like Twitter will win the next election for whomever is savvy enough to get in on the ground floor.