Twitter As Enforcer

When I’m not churning out these biweekly pieces, I spend a great deal of time reading articles on Grantland, Deadspin, and ESPN. As some of you may know, these sites have posted an article or two (sarcasm) regarding the Donald Sterling fiasco and what it means for basketball. Recorded telling his mistress not to bring black people to Clippers games and not to take photos with them, the business magnate and former attorney was on Tuesday banned from the NBA for life and fined $2.5 million. Soon he may be coerced into selling his team. From “despicable and prejudiced” (his wife’s words), to a “piece of human waste,” Sterling has deservedly taken on many labels in the past few days.

Virtual Reality But Real Consequences

More than usual, these past few weeks in the United States have been a time of sheer idiocy. A woman tried to throw a shoe at former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Some moron placed a fake bomb at the finish line of the Boston Marathon. Bubba Watson ate at a Waffle House. But the pièce-de-résistance of this festival of stupidity must have been Twitter user @QueenDemetriax_’s contribution. On Sunday morning she tweeted the following to the American Airlines corporate account:

The 10 People You Meet On Twitter

As I wrote in my last column, Twitter has existed for over eight years, and in that span of time the microblogging site has accrued a user base that consists of everyone and his mother. Having spent a substantial amount of time on the social media platform for this column and to promote my own #brand, I’ve noticed that most users can be sorted into just a few select categories.

A Matter of Opinion

As Twitter swiftly approaches its eighth birthday (the underwhelming first tweet was posted on March 21, 2006), it’s important to look back to how we got here. During its first years of operation, the site has stockpiled accomplishments, blowing past 500 million users, launching an IPO, and most monumentally of all, returning twelve search results in the Harvard Course Catalog. When I was eight, my biggest accomplishments to date were cutting duct tape out of my hair and stealing the girls’ kickball at recess.

Twitter issued a less start-uppy mission statement when the newly-public company officially filed for the aforementioned IPO, but the original objective simply read, “[Twitter’s goal is] to instantly connect people everywhere to what’s most important to them.” On all accounts, the site has remained true to its word, providing tweeps the virtual domain necessary for engaging in the dialogue that “is important to us.” But by deeming particular topics more “important” than others, Twitter users are inadvertently squandering a previously unimaginable opportunity to better public discourse.

Throwing Back to Kony

Seeing as this column is focused on Twitter and its social media counterparts, I figured it would be fitting to incorporate at least one #tbt-style article, or “throwback Thursday” if you’re reading the print version (even though today is a Friday).