Stephanie Keeney

COSC 321.001 Summer 2010

Article #1

June 1, 2010

REVIEW

On May 25, 2010, Marco della Cava, an author for USA Today wrote an article

titled “Twitter power: Learning from ourselves, in real time”. According to social media

blog editor Adam Ostrow, Twitter is a place “Where you can hear what millions are

saying and feel, unbiased and in that moment” (della Cava, 2010). As of the date of the

article, 114 million users have signed up for Twitter ranging from “CEOs to average

Joes” (della Cava, 2010). The article talks about how their success isn’t a shock, noting,

“a time-pressed global culture was bound to pounce on the free service’s 140-character

haiku format” (della Cava, 2010) as well as how users perceive Twitter and just what

kinds of things they’re “tweeting” about.

ANALYSIS

This article directly relates to this course, Computerization and its Impacts. The

socioeconomic impacts on organizations and individuals brought on by computer

technology can clearly be seen in this article. As a Twitter user, I can directly relate to the

article and see how this technology has transformed how I gather information as well as

what I share with the world, among many other things. “One need only observe a

teenager frantically instant-messaging her friends from a darkened bedroom to know that

while computer technology has surely given us great things, it has taken away something
as well” (De Palma, 2010 page 61). This quote can also be used to say that we can

observe students and business people tweeting from their smart phones and in the words

of Harvard statistician and co-founder of Crimson Hexagon, Gary King, “Some

anthropologists will tell you that the fundamental use of language was to gossip, and

while Twitter is becoming different things to different people, it fundamentally has

formalized what used to happen in our alleys and hallways into a global conversation”

(della Cava, 2010).

Things that people used to keep mostly to himself or herself, like where they

were, what they were doing, and who they were with has turned into a social media

frenzy. Twitter asks users “What’s happening?” and gives them 140 spaces to sum up the

who, what, when, where, why of whatever they want to say be it “At the beach with so

and so” or “Just read this great article, check it out!” or even for celebrities like Paula

Abdul to announce that she has “abdicated her seat [on American Idol]” (della Cava,

2010). Twitter has changed how we read news with trending topics and news outlet

tweets, where we go with friends based on promotion tweets, and has become “useful to

you, even if you yourself don’t have anything to say” notes Twitter’s co-founder Biz

Stone.

This article also touches on how Twitter is impacting society. Library of Congress

spokesman Matt Raymond tells della Cava that the library “plans to archive all the

world’s tweets”, also saying “it’s about having a record of what both the first-person

participants in history and its spectators were saying”. I don’t think there is a better

implication of how this technology has impacted our world. With letting anyone update

anything they want, “Twitter can make misunderstandings fly faster, which should train

us to be skeptical about what we read” (della Cava, 2010). A blogger may use Twitter to
tweet about something he heard from somewhere that turns out to be false but it’s already

been re-tweeted by thousands of people who believe it to be true. According to a blog

posted by Kevin Weil, a member of Twitter’s analytics team, they are seeing “50 million

tweets per day—that’s an average of 600 tweets per second” (Weil, 2010). 114 million

users around the world are tweeting an average of 600 tweets per second. Twitter is

essentially a time capsule of information that will be on the Internet forever, and of

course, in the Library of Congress.

In della Cava’s article, he quotes Jeff Pulver, a tech entrepreneur and founder of

#140conf, an annual conference on all things Twitter who says “Twitter is brewing a

social revolution”. This article brings about so many questions as to how a simple social

media site has brought about so much conversation that it needs annual conferences or

even if it will be around long enough to need such a thing. Michelle Betcher is quoted

saying “Personally, I’m still curious if Twitter will be a passing phase or a fixture of our

world” (della Cava, 2010) which brings me to wonder if it’s already a fixture given the

Library of Congress’ archival efforts. Is Twitter the new way to get your daily news and

updates on your friends while you’re on the bus to school or sitting in class? Has Twitter

surpassed Facebook in its efforts to connect millions of people from around the world? I

think that this article really summed up just how big Twitter has gotten over the last three

years and shows readers its impact on individuals and organization’s socioeconomic

statuses and developments.

REFERENCES

"Computers, People, and Social Participation." Computers in Society 2009-2010. Ed.

 Paul De Palma. 15th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill College, 2009. 61. Print.

Della Cava, Marco R. "Twitter Power: Learning from Ourselves, in Real Time." News,

Travel, Weather, Entertainment, Sports, Technology, U.S. & World –

USATODAY.com. USA Today, 25 May 2010. Web. 31 May 2010.

<http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2010-05-25-1Atwitter25_CV_N.htm?

csp=usat.me>

Weil, Kevin. "Measuring Tweets." Twitter Blog. Twitter, 22 Feb. 2010. Web. 31 May

2010. <http://blog.twitter.com/2010/02/measuring-tweets.html>.