Social Media: Maybe not as Great as we Think

As I sit here late at night on a Monday, I am reminded once again why I so love being an American.  I have just returned home from a night at the baseball field; by far one of my favorite places.  The first thing I did when I got home was to check my Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other social media applications.  Of course, I had been checking them regularly on my smartphone all night, but what could another check on the ole' computer hurt.  As I begin to write a tweet about something of probably minuscule importance, a thought comes to mind.  I am reminded about an article recently read for class that deals with Twitter and the Iranian revolution in 2009.  After reading this particular article, which deals with the role of Twitter in the 2009 uprising, I am forced to reevaluate my views about social media as a tool for protestors in autocratic regimes (a subject of one of my earlier blog posts).

Ohh and to clarify what thought reminded me of why I was glad to be an American, for tonight it was the fact that I can post a tweet about my baseball game without worrying whether or not the government is going to use it to spy on me.  More importantly, I would be able to post a tweet critical of President Obama without the government being able to use it against me.  This is something we in the United States so often take for granted, yet it is something that not all people in the world enjoy.  But, I digress.

What struck me about this recent article that I read was the fact that repressive regimes, such as the one in Iran, can use Twitter as a weapon against their own people.  This article explained how the government was using Twitter to track the people posting anti-gvoernmemt messages and then tracking them down.  This is something I had not even though about in the past.  In fact, in my last blog post I railed about how important of a tool social media was in these uprisings.  I'm not completely changing my stance on this, I'm simply tailoring my position.

Do I think Twitter and Facebook are indispensable sites for protestors seeking change in severely repressive regimes? Of course I do.  However, I also think that we must be careful when we push these protestors to post their videos, pictures, or even live updates on these sites.  What we in the United States often fail to realize is that posting a status for some of these people could very easily put their lives in danger.  I think it is shameful for a government, such as Iran, to try to limit the free discussion of their people through violent deterrent tactics.  Further, I think it is completely inappropriate for these regimes to use social media sites as means for hunting down those prostetsors simply seeking to have a free government and to have their voices heard.

So, whats the point of this random rambling?  The point is that we often want to look at all the good the internet has done in the world and ignore the bad that it has created.  Heck, I'm as guilty of this as anyone.  I regularly tout the internet as a great resource and tool, especially for protestors.  However, as we see with Iran in 2009, a repressive government can also us the internet to hunt down and harm their own people.  Before we just expect protestors in other countries to tweet about their every action, we need to consider the consequences they face for doing so.  The right we have to freely tweet in the United States is a lot greater than we realize.  I think we all take rights like these for granted.  Maybe its time we start being thankful that we, in the United States, can use the internet freely as we please, without fear of the government hunting us down.

I will now step down from my soap box.  Sorry for the long post.

Tweets v. Likes

Tweets vs. likes: Ana Analysis of Monkey Cage Data

Joshua Tucker on February 26, 2012

Joshua Tucker, writer for the Monkey Cage once posted a question about why some blog posts are more likely to be “tweeted” and why others are subject to being “liked” on Facebook. Later, Georgetown student compiled data from the Monkey Cage and made an analysis of why certain blog posts are tweeted or liked.

The student’s analysis theorized that blog posts are liked based upon their graphical content. Blogs that have graphics or graphs are more likely to be “liked” on Facebook because of this social network’s graphical and picture orientated nature. On the other hand, blogs with more “wonkiness” received more tweets as Twitter is a text based network.

This basic study reveals some insight about the orientation of both social networks. Facebook is highly dependent on graphics and pictures for their internet traffic. Twitter is based on amusing, witty, and short “tweets.”

Another aspect of the tweet and like war is the public versus private spheres. Twitter is seen more as a public forum while Facebook has some “perceived” privacy towards your own friends and family. Due to this difference, Tucker commented that he is much more likely to post highly partisan ideas on the semi-private Facebook wall than on Twitter’s public forum.

He believes that this certainly has some impact on political behavior over social networks. Tucker theorizes that the difference between the public v. private domains of Facebook and Twitter will help differentiate the effects of social media on the audience.

Social media seems to counter act the hypodermic reception theory. Because users can be more selective in their media source options, the audience is more active and is not a passive recipient. The internet also balances the “agenda setting” behavior of televised news. The “agenda” on social media sites is entirely set by the users, not by the company trying to make profits off of popularizing a particular view. Therefore, social media and media on the internet may allow its audience to become more active and aware members of society.

Politicians and Their Cringe-Worthy Tweets

I'm going to say something that will make me sound like a bitter luddite -- but what are blogs for if not for self-indulgent, peevish pontifications?

I'm kinda nostalgic for the pre-Twitter era.

There's no doubt that Twitter has given those without a voice a public arena in which they can express informed opinions, coordinate opposition movements , and break news happening in real time (examples of each linked). However, I think you and I both know that Twitter is also responsible for introducing you to the most inane thoughts of your friends, neighbors, and even celebrities.

Besides being newly privy to what my 61 year old Uncle Bob thinks of the new Nicki Minaj video, Twitter is also guilty of something much worse. It's responsible for confirming a frightening suspicion all of us have had about our elected officials: they can be idiotic sometimes, just like us.

For example, just yesterday through The Hill's "Twitter Room", I was able to read Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa's valuable opinion on the recent UN-Syria Resolution debacle. Though I join him in condemning Russia and China for their veto of the resolution that asks President al-Assad to step down from the Syrian government, I do not join him in taking to my Twitter account to rattle off a hasty, misspelled, and politically incorrect tweet. The tweet read:

"I app laude Amb Susan Rice strong statement abt Soviet Russia and Red China veto of Syria resoluition at U.N."

Soviet Russia? Red China? Don't even get me started on his mixed policy of letter allotment and lack of possessive modifiers.

Perhaps I'm mercilessly nitpicking at an older man who should be app lauded for using such a progressive tool of civic engagement. And you maybe be right. But there's no excuse for behavior like that of Congressman Anthony Weiner who in 2011 accidentally showed all of his twitter followers his package, or for politicians like Congressman Dana Rohrabacher who settle petty disputes via twitter feeds. What's more frightening is that in January, Twitter CEO Dick Costol called 2012 the year of the "Twitter Election" : "...if candidates don't tweet, they're going to get left behind in the new digital age of microbloggin". What do you guys think? Is this truly the age we're headed towards, where politicians get left in the dust if their thoughts don't get published to the internet? Is this necessarily a bad thing? I'm wary, but I'm up for hearing an argument as to why this is a good thing.