Twitter's influence

Twitter


 
Twitter is a revolutionary social media network that allows people to post comments of up to 140 characters long.  The overall purpose of twitter depends on who you ask.  It is mostly used to stay up to date on what people are talking about and their reactions to current events.  It has been used to organize protests as in the case of the Arab Spring.  It has been used as a source for news and information.  It is also used to share ideas and discuss topics of interest.  Surprisingly, only 11% of twitters users are under the age of 17.  Twitter's main demographic is adults and especially women.  Businesses have used twitter as a form of recruiting and watching trends in better hopes to stay up to date with current fads and consumer needs.  However, Twitter is mostly used as a kind of voyeurism into other people's lives.  For example, the following people are ranked from most twitter followers to least:
1.) Lady Gaga
2.) Justin Bieber
3.)  Katy Perry
4.) Rhianna
5.) Brittney Spears

This evidence leaves me to believe that twitter can be rather jejune and that people use it mainly for muck-raking and gossip.  Who honestly cares what Lady Gaga has to say about the 2012 presidential election? 

Twitter was created in 2006 by Jack Dorsey who is a St. Louis native.  He went to Bishop DuBourg if you wanted to know because high schools seem to be a priority here in St. Louis.

I am a current user of twitter and I use it mostly to follow other people who I find interesting.  I use it for laughs, information, links, insight, and gossip.  Professionally I can't see communicating with students via twitter since it is illegal in Missouri.  I think that educators can use twitter to follow groups of like minded people who want to share ideas on education.  However, many scandals have arose from teachers tweeting comments demeaning to their students so I tend to keep my voice low on twitter.  I would love to see another service that could allow for teacher and student interaction with something as simple and addicting as twitter.

Here is the link: www.twitter.com