As I understand it, the Republican Party partly interprets their failure in this cycle as a failure to effectively harness this century’s technology. According to this narrative, Obama won because he understood how to maximize the power of Facebook, text messaging, and real-time data mining much better than the competition. Therefore, the Republican Party can counter by embracing the next great technology.
Somehow, they decided that Twitter represents this next wave. (I guess the idea might have been: “Well, we see communication getting quicker and simpler, so let’s embrace the most extreme version of current trends.” And then you get senators Twittering from the Green Zone.
What the Republicans, and most people, do not realize is that Twitter sucks as a medium unless your goal is to indulge your ego. Twitter has no avenue for self-expression except the twit, so all people know about you is what you twit and, crucially, how many other people want to read your twits. And in 140 characters, the maximum amount Twitter uses, one cannot say anything of substance. You cannot discuss policy, you cannot formulate complex ideas, and you cannot have a conversation; about all you can do is tell people exactly what you are doing right now. It is the most ephemeral form of communication possible. If your goal is to win votes and push your agenda through Congress, partial sentences abbreviations are not the way to accomplish that.
Side note: I intentionally used the word “twit” and not “tweet,” which is the common term for a message sent by Twitter. The service is not called Tweeter, so I do not understand why one sends “tweets.” If I drive for a living, I am a driver; if I enjoy talking, I am a talker; likewise, if I twit, I am a twitter. By extension, there is no such thing as a twitterer.
0 Responses
Stay in touch with the conversation, subscribe to the RSS feed for comments on this post.