In the Twitter World, It’s all About the Credit

Professional bloggers, newscasters, authors, politicians and students find themselves in this vacuum of a race to find information. The one that “tweets it out” gets the street credit for finding that information. This creditability is desired to either look important or smart, or to look “cool” and “savvy.” This is not a situation limited to only younger twitter users. Even those in professional fields sometimes find Twitter being just as competitive as their professional expertise. The race for say sales and ratings then manifests itself in the race for tweets and followers.

In the Twitter world, much creditability is given to the person that finds something interesting online, and becomes the first one to tweet it out. The “retweet” function then only advances this desire for attention. Being “retweeted” shows that not only is this person following you, but is a vote of approval that they liked what you posted. Those person’s followers then get to see that you are the “smart” or “cool” or “savvy” person that found that information. It sometimes can grow into a rivalry that boarders on immature, but yet even the most professional bloggers and tweeters use the same tactics.

I have seen two elected officials tweet and @reply each other in a hostile tone, I have seen people call others out for tweeting something first, and I have had two personal examples of friends (and fellow Tweeters) who have competed with me for Tweet credit.

Not only is something interesting found online limited to a video, or a blog post, or a good article. The race extends to those who can come up with something funny, or captures something with camera phone and then posts the picture on their Twitter. Maybe to embarrass someone else, or just for a laugh, but the race to be the first one to coin the joke, or post the picture is as intense as the more material Tweets.

I notice it even with stupid examples. A friend of mine and I were walking through campus when we noticed a typo on a sign. As I pulled out my phone to take a picture, he started to get mad thinking I was going to upload the picture to Twitter, and thus take credit for seeing the sign and I guess somehow get the “laugh credit.” Really he saw the sign first, so he thought he was entitled to have the option of posting it first if he chose too. You can see how idiotic sometimes this becomes. But he was so angry that I tried to take the picture that he blocked my shot and then took out his iPhone to take the picture. The photo generated numerous views and @replies so he was satisfied with his credit.

In another example, another friend coined a certain phrase in one my tweets. It was a hashtag, and he insisted that I say in my tweet that he was the one to come up with it. If was very funny and we could tell that it was going to stick as a joke, so he insisted that even though I was the only one with my phone, that he be mentioned for the credit.

These behaviors are very annoying, but since much of the Twitter action I follow is professional, I can understand the natural desire to have due credit. The other examples show how stupid and trivial things can become.

Brush up on your Twittequette before you become a serious user.

Obama and Twitter

Sometimes I get annoyed at stupid things. Things that at one time or another seem like a big deal, and then become not important at all when you look back at them. I feel like this post will fall into that category when I look back at it in the future, but here and now it’s annoying me.

For some reason I was annoyed by President Obama last week saying that he never used Twitter. Now, I am not naive enough to think that he actually maintained his own Twitter throughout the course of the election, but his entire campaign prided itself on this new era and new modes of campaigning. They used the internet to raise money, organize volunteers, and advance his cause, name and agenda better then any campaign ever seen. While I’m not mad that he didn’t necessarily use the account, I am shocked that in the same statement, he seemed to have only minimal knowledge of the tools used to help get him elected. Base on his answers to the questions, I came away with the impression that he only had a conversational knowledge of what mechanisms helped get him into the White House.

"Let me say that I have never used Twitter," Obama said in response to a question from a Chinese student about using Twitter freely in China. Obama continued: "I noticed that young people - they're very busy with all these electronics. My thumbs are too clumsy to type in things on the phone."The other account is @WhiteHouse, which was first set up to send out news about H1N1. @BarackObama has close to 2.7 million followers and @WhiteHouse has over 1.4 million followers. MG Siegler of TechCrunch, a non-partisan blog that reports on social media, wrote today, "Obviously, he had a killer team around him that was able to embrace the web...Still, it's somewhat surprising that he never sent any of his own tweets during the primaries."

While all of this is interesting, I think the larger issue here is who is allowed to run these accounts. The people that run these accounts have very powerful tool at their disposal: The namesake of the President of the United States. The people who run these accounts could advance anything they wanted to the millions of people that follow him on the various accounts. I wonder what the back-scenes workings are for his tweets. Is it one staff person who writes them? It is a team? Is it some intern who has the access to inform millions of people something? Who knows the passwords to the accounts? Etc.

As a citizen, it makes me uncomfortable to think that the mantle of the President could be used by a staff member. I understand maybe signing his name on a letter, or releasing a statement on his behalf, but both of those examples are forms of communication that have been vetted for decades. What are the modern media rules that the White House uses? Also all citizens should be concerned that it may take a mistake (of varying size)to prompt of series of rules to be put into place.

Hostage

The article that was assigned this week, “The Youtube Election,” shined a light on a particular example of how then-US George Allen was defeated for re-election after someone caught him on video calling someone a “macaca.” Well whatever a macaca is, the video went viral on Youtube, and was a great contribution to the Senator’s defeat in the 2006 race. In one moment, the Senator made one misstep, it happened to be caught on tape, and his career was over.

The article also mentioned how Youtube hurt Senator Joe Lieberman in 2006. Lieberman was a Senator who drew a primary challenge because he was deemed “too close” to the Bush administration. His primary opponent kept using a picture of Lieberman will President Bush in TV commercials and internet ads and was trying to insinuate that because the two were photographed together, they must be in cahoots, so Lieberman lost the democratic primary. The “netroots” grabbed on to this images a sledgehammer to hit Lieberman over the head with. Lieberman would win the general election though as an independent.

These two examples, each complimenting the class reading, show a drastic change in the political, and more broadly, the career ramifications of a single moment (which could be easily taken out of context) going virtual online. With Allen some guy showed up at his rally with this camera and was heckling him from the audience. Allen was caught on tape calling the guy holding the camera a macaca. What even does that mean? But because some made it seem like it was a racial statement, he got burned for it and once it got out online he was finished.

With Lieberman, a photo of President Bush was used to show how close the two were. But in actually, probably every US Senator has a picture with every President, regardless of party. But the photo was taken out of context and cost him the race.
What these two examples are creating is mindsets were people are starting to greatly insulate themselves from anything that they deem might come back to hurt them. They are cautious about writing two controversial of papers in college because they fear they can be uncovered. People are of course cautious of Facebook pictures and how those might give off a certain impression. But all this guarding and protection is starting to take it’s toll on liberty.

People are becoming too concerned with an “online imagine” and we are now all held hostage over the fear of online embarrassment costing us something we want. We may be looking for a job, and we see where Allen and Lieberman lost theirs in similar situations. Invisible audiences include people that make powerful decisions about our futures. We should be mindful of them, but sometimes I feel I am their hostage.

Twitter Drama

Every couple of days there is a classic version of Twitter drama. Someone makes a point or a statement and someone replies and everyone following gets to follow the entire dialogue. People jump in with their own two cents and either takes sides, or just throw more flames on the fire. Tweet pics and “tagging” someone in a tweet, using @____, brings tweets to certain people’s attention. My mentioning them in the tweet then makes them see it, and the conversation, even if they previously weren’t following it. These varying tricks allow certain things to become “big twitter news” as people have the ability to monitor picture and tweet views. The more people that look at a picture or see a controversy, makes it a bigger deal. “It was all over Twitter today” comes out of my mouth probably twice a week. Adding in a certain #’s also lets you take a jab at the person, like “hey great job. Not. #fail.”

An example of this exploded yesterday afternoon. The day before yesterday, a friend of mine went to the library to ask a question about where to find a certain book. The librarian she asked gave her an answer, but seemed very annoyed at having to answer what the librarian thought was a very simple question. After some good tweet investigation by a friend of ours, he actually found the librarian’s personal twitter, and found that she mocked (mocked!) my friend for asking such a question.

When my friend found this she immediately contacted the library twitter, via @cualibraries, with the following public tweet:

Hi @CUALibraries, I'm a big fan, but can you ask your employees not to mock a legitimate question I had ab the stacks? http://bit.ly/1cArCd

The link use to take you to the librarians’ tweet, but the librarian has since taken it down. When we all saw this people started to retweet it until the library came up with a response as to why a student can be publicly mocked for asking question on how to find a book. I was so insulted for my friend that I tweeted directly to the librarian herself, but again in the public setting that is twitter.

I said:

Hey @bookbloom, you better watch what you tweet! http://bit.ly/1cArCd Do you have a mocking quota? Gross and unprofessional #cua @cuatower

I mentioned the librarian to single her out, and I mentioned the CUA Tower to bring it some attention. I used the #CUA in order to include it with anything CUA related being discussed on Twitter so people could become made aware of what was occurring.

My friend Alex eventually got this publicly tweeted apology:

@AlexandraCSmith We're sorry! We love our students and are happy you're a fan! We want you to feel comfortable asking Q's - lesson learned 4:12 PM Nov 12th from TweetDeck in reply to AlexandraCSmith

Lesson learned for the library, and lesson learned for the tweeters. Be careful what you tweet, anything can be found.

Times Change: Tweet Instead of Blog

Sometimes I hate doing this blog. For some reason I find it so difficult to come up with a “substantial” post that has something to contribute to our discussions on new media. I do the readings, and enjoy the course discussions, but when it just comes to sitting here trying to type something out, I find it very unappealing. I realize that it is because of new media, that I am bored of new media.

Coming up with so much commentary sometimes feels very forced. It feels like I am being made to meet certain requirements only to satisfy a rubric, and not actually explore the genre. For example, I consider myself a fairly active Tweeter. I use twitter all the time, usually having somewhere between five to ten tweets a day. In addition to always using Twitter, I check my Facebook constantly, and use features like messaging to actively communicate with people and make plans. I have an application for both on my Blackberry, which makes using new media a frequent part of my day. But for some reason I can’t sit here and come up with a few paragraphs of commentary. I attribute this to the “micro-blogging” movement started by Twitter.
Blogging is old school. Micro-blogging, largely via twitter, is the newest way to post commentary.

Micro-blogging is even more user friendly then blogging itself. It is shorter, and is much easier to do while on the go. With schedules like most people have, sitting done and writing something (at a laptop, which even laptops are starting to sound old school) doesn’t sound like the most effective way to communicate. Using micro-blogging allows information to be shared faster and smarter.

My Twitter the updates are short and sweet. Here, in 140 characters or less, is what I have to say. Here is a picture I want you to see, here is an article I found, or here is a point I want to make. Trying to sit here and fill a section of my blog is tedious and makes me stretch ideas to try and fill space. Maybe future classes should be required to make a Twitter. X number of updates a week, X number of hash tags, X number of @ replies, X number of tweetpics, ect.

Manufactured Usage vs. Actual Usage

As a politics major and someone who has met a fair share of politicians, I can honestly say that only a small fraction are “the real deal.” Many are interesting, some entertaining, but several times I find myself not 100% satisfied with what a candidate brings to the table. I guess in a way this is a good thing. After all, who wants to blindly follow someone? However, after a while of meeting a number of individuals, and learning more about the business, I find myself getting annoyed more frequently. Classmate Stephanie Brumfield summed it up very well in her article which addressed older people resisting new technology. This has become a frustration of mine as well, particularly with politicians who “fake it” and try to use new media to get votes.

The onset of the new media age has, of course, dramatically affected the political classes. Politicians need to master this form of media in order to reach voters and serve constituents. It’s no different from the invention of the television. When television was created, politicians needed advertising experts to master commercials. Television did away with some of the older, more classic, models of campaigning, such as going door-to-door, or trying to gain the support of unions to organize large numbers of voters. Television is not what it used to be. Viewership on the “big stations” is way down. People now have hundreds of channels to choose from and are no longer only concentrated on a few. And honestly, who watched commercials anymore with TIVO and DVR? Television is getting much less attention from candidates while new technology is. But with a television you actually had to be the candidate in the advertisement. You had to speak, interact, and make your case to the camera. With new media, the personal involvement of the candidate is not nearly as significant. A twitter update, a note on Facebook, a friending spree on Facebook, a follow request and the like, can all be manufactured through someone simply posing as the candidate. An intern sitting in the back office can take an impersonal statement handed to them, and put it online to make the candidate look like they are lively and active on new media.

Congressman Jason Chaffetz is a noted tweeter which Politico took note of in their recent article on the issue:
“There’s a method to the madness here,” Chaffetz says. “If you can break bread with somebody, if you can laugh with somebody, then you open up a door in order to talk to them seriously about public policy.” “It only works if you do it yourself,” Chaffetz told his colleagues. “If you have your staff [do Facebook and Twitter on your behalf], it’ll be lame, and everyone will know it. I really feel like most members do a pathetic job of being accessible and real to their constituents."

Chaffetz hits it right on the head. When using new media you must be REAL. Phoniness is very detectable.

How a Politician Used Wikipedia to Poison the Jury Pool

Joe Ferriero was once one of the most powerful men in New Jersey politics. He was Chairman of the Bergen County Democratic Organization, which served as the political arm of one of New Jersey’s most powerful counties. Every statewide office holder needs to win in Bergen County. Without the support of Bergen, and Ferriero, a candidate cannot run up the margin to win the office. He turned Bergen from having a republican in every local office and sending several to the state legislature, to defeating almost all of them, and replacing them with democrats loyal to his machine. He raised millions of dollars over his tenure running the county. When his candidates were financially well off, he would loan money to other counties and candidate and further advance his clout. Hillary Clinton, during her primary campaign for the democratic nomination for president, personally came to Bergen County to accept Ferriero’s endorsement in the race. Her “kissing the ring moment” with Ferriero secured his endorsement, and thus she won New Jersey on Super Tuesday in 2008. Ferriero was a big deal. Today though, he sits up and edits his Wikipedia page.

Indicted in 2008 on corruption charges, Ferriero was forced to surrender his post. So what did the powerful political mogul do to prepare for his trial? In addition to spending probably hundreds of hours with legal counsel, Ferriero created a Wikipedia page for himself.

In a clear attempt to begin to cast himself in a more positive light, after weeks of negative press following the indictment, Ferriero and friends (according to politicsnj.com) created a Wikipedia page that highlighted his softer side. It made mention of his alter sever days, of his charity giving, of how he cared for older family members, etc. Politicsnj.com called the page “a clear attempt at image manipulation.” While making a Wikipedia page is no crime, it is when you mock portions of the trial. The page, in edits defending Ferriero, mocked Chris Christie (the US Attorney) for indicting Ferriero as political payback. Christie was a republican appointee, and now happens to be running for governor. Such commentary was thought to be interfering with the trial, and affecting the jury pool, and the Judge ordered the Wiki, and other online mentions and discussions of the trial, halted.

Ferriero was convicted this week on three of the eight charges against him, including the most serious charge carrying a possible 20 year prison term. Following the conviction another technological hand was played to Ferriero’s benefit, a website raising money for an appeal.