Posts tagged social media

Twitter Threat, Twitter Promise, During Breaking News Events Via Mathew Ingram: That said, however, there’s no question that Twitter is one of the best tools for breaking-news delivery since the telegraph. Unfortunately, it is also a great tool for distributing lies, speculation, innuendo, hoaxes and every other form of inaccurate information. I’ve argued before that this is just the way the news works now — the news wire and police scanner are no longer available only to journalists, but to anyone who cares to listen. And so is the ability to republish. Should Twitter do more to verify sources, or highlight accurate information, as some have suggested? It’s an appealing idea. The service could try to use geotagging to identify those who are close to the scene, or some other method to determine credibility — something third-party services like Sulia and Storyful also try to do through a variety of methods. But is that really Twitter’s place?… …Why don’t we get YouTube to verify the source of videos as well, like the ones that are posted from Syria or Egypt? Or get Google to sort the news it pulls in based on the likelihood of it being credible? The simplest answer is that this isn’t what those services are for — they are distribution engines, or pipes (a series of tubes, if you will). Asking them to become news entities is a little like asking AT&T to eavesdrop on phone calls in order to figure out who is a terrorist. Rather than relying on Twitter to do this, I think it’s far better to accept the somewhat chaotic nature of the medium, and rely on journalists — and not just the professional kind, but the amateur kind as well — to filter that information in real time, the way Andy Carvin did during the Arab Spring (by using Twitter as a crowdsourced newsroom) and others did during Sandy and the Colorado shootings. Over time, I believe, Twitter becomes a kind of self-cleaning oven, as writer Sasha Frere-Jones put it. Image: Screenshot, Twitter post by Geoff Grammer.

Twitter Threat, Twitter Promise, During Breaking News Events

Via Mathew Ingram:

That said, however, there’s no question that Twitter is one of the best tools for breaking-news delivery since the telegraph. Unfortunately, it is also a great tool for distributing lies, speculation, innuendo, hoaxes and every other form of inaccurate information. I’ve argued before that this is just the way the news works now — the news wire and police scanner are no longer available only to journalists, but to anyone who cares to listen. And so is the ability to republish.

Should Twitter do more to verify sources, or highlight accurate information, as some have suggested? It’s an appealing idea. The service could try to use geotagging to identify those who are close to the scene, or some other method to determine credibility — something third-party services like Sulia and Storyful also try to do through a variety of methods. But is that really Twitter’s place?…

…Why don’t we get YouTube to verify the source of videos as well, like the ones that are posted from Syria or Egypt? Or get Google to sort the news it pulls in based on the likelihood of it being credible? The simplest answer is that this isn’t what those services are for — they are distribution engines, or pipes (a series of tubes, if you will). Asking them to become news entities is a little like asking AT&T to eavesdrop on phone calls in order to figure out who is a terrorist.

Rather than relying on Twitter to do this, I think it’s far better to accept the somewhat chaotic nature of the medium, and rely on journalists — and not just the professional kind, but the amateur kind as well — to filter that information in real time, the way Andy Carvin did during the Arab Spring (by using Twitter as a crowdsourced newsroom) and others did during Sandy and the Colorado shootings. Over time, I believe, Twitter becomes a kind of self-cleaning oven, as writer Sasha Frere-Jones put it.

Image: Screenshot, Twitter post by Geoff Grammer.

Do Social Media Sites Like Tumblr Need Their Own News Publications? We learned last week that Tumblr is shutting down Storyboard — the news blog responsible for reporting on creative and noteworthy posts by Tumblr users. Tumblr’s cofounder, David Karp, posted his explanation for Storyboard’s closing on the site’s staff blog, saying: “What we’ve accomplished with Storyboard has run its course for now, and our editorial team will be closing up shop and moving on.” Karp mentions that Storyboard partnered with the likes of WNYC, Mashable, Time, etc. and was even nominated for a James Beard Award (to name a few accomplishments). So, why is it best to “move on” when the project has been so successful?  The consensus (here, here, and here) seems to be that Tumblr needs to downsize to turn a profit this year. However, in an interview with The New York Times, Charlie Warzel, deputy technology editor at Buzzfeed, suggested Storyboard is closing because there’s no point in writing about what you can just go and see for yourself. He said: It is always peculiar when a social network branches out into publishing, it just seems odd to bring on even excellent editorial talent to cover what is already going on organically. And he’s not the only one who shares the sentiment.  The New York Times calls attention to Dan Fletcher (a journalism school graduate) who quit his “amorphous” job as managing editor of Facebook in 2012. His position required him to write about FaceBook trends. He said that reporters aren’t needed on FaceBook and that articles detract from user activity that is “inherently more interesting” than the articles themselves. FJP:  Why is it “peculiar” that an excellent editorial staff would be reporting on the “organic” events of social media communities? Isn’t that what journalists do? Just because social media communities exist in the cyber-verse doesn’t make them less newsworthy. Admittedly, Storyboard and other social media news blogs (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest) aren’t exactly watchdog reporters (they want to talk about the posts that make themselves look good, after all), and that should make us question whether these publications can really be “journalistic.” But social media news is in its larval stage. Maybe, in the future, social communities will be publishing articles about juveniles who break copyright laws, and sites will be locking people’s profiles in cyber-jail-blocks for weeks due to hazing. Surely, social sites are gonna need some objective, guardian watchdogs for that, right? Eh? — Krissy Image: Screenshot from Storyboard.

Do Social Media Sites Like Tumblr Need Their Own News Publications?

We learned last week that Tumblr is shutting down Storyboard — the news blog responsible for reporting on creative and noteworthy posts by Tumblr users. Tumblr’s cofounder, David Karp, posted his explanation for Storyboard’s closing on the site’s staff blog, saying: “What we’ve accomplished with Storyboard has run its course for now, and our editorial team will be closing up shop and moving on.”

Karp mentions that Storyboard partnered with the likes of WNYC, Mashable, Time, etc. and was even nominated for a James Beard Award (to name a few accomplishments). So, why is it best to “move on” when the project has been so successful? 

The consensus (here, here, and here) seems to be that Tumblr needs to downsize to turn a profit this year. However, in an interview with The New York Times, Charlie Warzel, deputy technology editor at Buzzfeed, suggested Storyboard is closing because there’s no point in writing about what you can just go and see for yourself. He said:

It is always peculiar when a social network branches out into publishing, it just seems odd to bring on even excellent editorial talent to cover what is already going on organically.

And he’s not the only one who shares the sentiment. 

The New York Times calls attention to Dan Fletcher (a journalism school graduate) who quit his “amorphous” job as managing editor of Facebook in 2012. His position required him to write about FaceBook trends. He said that reporters aren’t needed on FaceBook and that articles detract from user activity that is “inherently more interesting” than the articles themselves.

FJP:  Why is it “peculiar” that an excellent editorial staff would be reporting on the “organic” events of social media communities? Isn’t that what journalists do? Just because social media communities exist in the cyber-verse doesn’t make them less newsworthy.

Admittedly, Storyboard and other social media news blogs (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest) aren’t exactly watchdog reporters (they want to talk about the posts that make themselves look good, after all), and that should make us question whether these publications can really be “journalistic.” But social media news is in its larval stage. Maybe, in the future, social communities will be publishing articles about juveniles who break copyright laws, and sites will be locking people’s profiles in cyber-jail-blocks for weeks due to hazing. Surely, social sites are gonna need some objective, guardian watchdogs for that, right? Eh? — Krissy

Image: Screenshot from Storyboard.

New World Order calls out Facebook’s “Corrupt Agenda”

The New World Order is a group of anonymous people who claim Facebook (among several other sites and organizations) is corrupt and dangerous. The video cautions against using Facebook due to qualms with freedom and privacy.

Check out The New World Order’s Facebook page?

News Is Bad For You

Apparently, the more mobile devices you have, the higher your perceived value of media is. According to BCG’s recent study, Through the Mobile Looking Glass, when you get a second mobile device, there is a 41% increase in perceived media value, a 40% increase when you get a third, and a 30% increase when you get a fourth. 

Which makes sense, if you’re spending your days juggling four mobile devices and consuming media on all of them. What could be more important than the information nuggets you’re eating all day long?

Hopefully a lot of things, considering that the nutritional value of all the information we’re consuming could be very low.

The Guardian’s Rolf Dobelli explains:

In the past few decades, the fortunate among us have recognised the hazards of living with an overabundance of food (obesity, diabetes) and have started to change our diets. But most of us do not yet understand that news is to the mind what sugar is to the body. News is easy to digest. The media feeds us small bites of trivial matter, tidbits that don’t really concern our lives and don’t require thinking. That’s why we experience almost no saturation. Unlike reading books and long magazine articles (which require thinking), we can swallow limitless quantities of news flashes, which are bright-coloured candies for the mind. Today, we have reached the same point in relation to information that we faced 20 years ago in regard to food. We are beginning to recognise how toxic news can be.

Dobelli goes on to provide illustrative examples of the following:

  • News misleads.
  • News is irrelevant.
  • News has no explanatory power.
  • News is toxic to your body (literally).
  • News increases cognitive errors.
  • News inhibits thinking.
  • News works like a drug (you begin to crave it).
  • News wastes time.
  • News kills creativity.

Dobelli wants us to go without news. To be clear, he’s not arguing against ALL journalism. He supports investigative journalism, long-form, and books, but for the last four years has entirely removed the consumption of other (shorter) news from his diet. He’s since experienced: “less disruption, less anxiety, deeper thinking, more time, and more insights.”

FJP: Firstly, journalists simply can’t afford that kind of lifestyle and anyone active on a social network can’t avoid it. And great, illuminating, informative, well-reported, well-presented journalism is out there. But if we set aside the details of his argument (over which we could debate at length), Dobelli’s larger point (that our news consumption habits aren’t very healthy), coupled with the fact that we of the mobile generations perceive the value of media so highly, raises the most important question of all for people living in 2013: How can we construct healthy, anxiety-free, informative, enjoyable news diets that help us live better lives and understand the world better? News literacy. Just like we ought to do with food, practice consuming with balance and intention.—Jihii

Why False Rumors Spread on Twitter During Times of Crisis Yasuaki Sakamoto, assistant professor at the Stevens Institute of Technology, conducted an experiment in behavioral psychology to test rumor-spreading on Twitter during times of crisis. The original hypothesis was that if a person read a rumor-tweet and then read a rebuttal tweet that criticized the rumor immediately afterward, the rumor-tweet would then have lower perceived importance, anxiety, and overall accuracy — meaning a person would be less likely to continue spreading the rumor-tweet. To test this, 87 Japanese undergraduate and graduate students were exposed to 20 rumor-tweets and then 10 rebuttal-tweets about the 2011 Japan Earthquake. The researchers discovered that when someone’s tweet is met with a criticism, it gives the tweet less credibility — making a person less inclined to spread the tweet associated with a criticism. The amount of people who stopped rumor-tweets actually increased 150% when people were exposed to rebuttal-tweets.  So, basically  the original hypothesis was right. When people hear opposing views, they will be less inclined to spread rumors during a crisis. Spectacular. Funny thing, though… via iRevolution: “Whether a receiver is exposed to rumor or criticism first makes a difference in her decision to spread the rumor. Another interpretation of the result is that, even if a receiver is exposed to a number of criticisms, she will benefit less from this exposure when she sees rumors first than when she sees criticisms before rumors.” So, even when someone is exposed to another point of view after she’s exposed to a rumor, the perceived importance, anxiety, and accuracy of the rumor will still be higher than that of the new opposing point of view. She’ll STILL be instinctually inclined to spread the rumor-tweet just because she heard it first. With that in mind, one can assume that in times of crisis (when people’s perceptions are most likely influenced by belief or emotions), these people will be inclined to believe the first thing they read regardless of its validity.  FJP: So, how do we attempt to solve this issue?  Verily is a platform (currently in development) that will directly connect rebuttal-tweets to rumor-tweets with the intent of decreasing the spread of rumors during disasters.  Verily’s plan to connect contradicting tweets is a step in the right direction, but even if a rebuttal-tweet is a criticism, it doesn’t mean it’s a valid criticism. Is it any better if people believe the second tweet they read, if it’s just as incorrect as the first one? How do we make sure that these tweeters can think critically and/or draw their own conclusions about a rumor-tweet without the helpful contradiction of rebuttal-tweets?   Michael Shammas of The Huffington Post thinks integrating philosophy into American education is the answer: While some philosophies obviously conduce toward peace more than others, while some philosophers (Marcus Aurelius) seem kinder than others (Nietzsche), the open-minded study of different philosophies at least opens one up to the possibility that one is wrong. One realizes, like Socrates did, that knowledge is anything but certain, that true wisdom lies in realizing how much one does not know, in understanding that our knowledge of the universe (and therefore of earthly things like politics) is utterly inadequate, perhaps comparable to the area of a pin’s tip against a table. This realization makes one less angry when confronted with opposing views, replacing counterproductive anger with productive curiosity. Is it better to combat ignorance and gullibility in the schools, or in the cyber-streets? Both? Both. — Krissy Image: iRevolution

Why False Rumors Spread on Twitter During Times of Crisis

Yasuaki Sakamoto, assistant professor at the Stevens Institute of Technology, conducted an experiment in behavioral psychology to test rumor-spreading on Twitter during times of crisis. The original hypothesis was that if a person read a rumor-tweet and then read a rebuttal tweet that criticized the rumor immediately afterward, the rumor-tweet would then have lower perceived importance, anxiety, and overall accuracy — meaning a person would be less likely to continue spreading the rumor-tweet.

To test this, 87 Japanese undergraduate and graduate students were exposed to 20 rumor-tweets and then 10 rebuttal-tweets about the 2011 Japan Earthquake.

The researchers discovered that when someone’s tweet is met with a criticism, it gives the tweet less credibility — making a person less inclined to spread the tweet associated with a criticism. The amount of people who stopped rumor-tweets actually increased 150% when people were exposed to rebuttal-tweets. 

So, basically  the original hypothesis was right. When people hear opposing views, they will be less inclined to spread rumors during a crisis. Spectacular. Funny thing, though…

via iRevolution:

“Whether a receiver is exposed to rumor or criticism first makes a difference in her decision to spread the rumor. Another interpretation of the result is that, even if a receiver is exposed to a number of criticisms, she will benefit less from this exposure when she sees rumors first than when she sees criticisms before rumors.”

So, even when someone is exposed to another point of view after she’s exposed to a rumor, the perceived importance, anxiety, and accuracy of the rumor will still be higher than that of the new opposing point of view. She’ll STILL be instinctually inclined to spread the rumor-tweet just because she heard it first.

With that in mind, one can assume that in times of crisis (when people’s perceptions are most likely influenced by belief or emotions), these people will be inclined to believe the first thing they read regardless of its validity. 

FJP: So, how do we attempt to solve this issue? 

Verily is a platform (currently in development) that will directly connect rebuttal-tweets to rumor-tweets with the intent of decreasing the spread of rumors during disasters. 

Verily’s plan to connect contradicting tweets is a step in the right direction, but even if a rebuttal-tweet is a criticism, it doesn’t mean it’s a valid criticism. Is it any better if people believe the second tweet they read, if it’s just as incorrect as the first one?

How do we make sure that these tweeters can think critically and/or draw their own conclusions about a rumor-tweet without the helpful contradiction of rebuttal-tweets?  

Michael Shammas of The Huffington Post thinks integrating philosophy into American education is the answer:

While some philosophies obviously conduce toward peace more than others, while some philosophers (Marcus Aurelius) seem kinder than others (Nietzsche), the open-minded study of different philosophies at least opens one up to the possibility that one is wrong. One realizes, like Socrates did, that knowledge is anything but certain, that true wisdom lies in realizing how much one does not know, in understanding that our knowledge of the universe (and therefore of earthly things like politics) is utterly inadequate, perhaps comparable to the area of a pin’s tip against a table. This realization makes one less angry when confronted with opposing views, replacing counterproductive anger with productive curiosity.

Is it better to combat ignorance and gullibility in the schools, or in the cyber-streets? Both? Both. — Krissy

Image: iRevolution

Twitter #music Twitter appears set to launch a music service although what it is is still under wraps. Yes, you can go to music.twitter.com (pictured above) but when you get there and try to sign in, nothing happens. Via the BBC: Reports suggest the new service will offer personalised recommendations on music through its own dedicated app. US celebrity host Ryan Seacrest confirmed the existence of Twitter’s new app on Thursday via a tweet: “playing with @twitter’s new music app (yes it’s real!)… there’s a serious dance party happening at idol right now” AllThingsD reports that the service will launch this weekend to coincide with the Coachella music festival.

Twitter #music

Twitter appears set to launch a music service although what it is is still under wraps. Yes, you can go to music.twitter.com (pictured above) but when you get there and try to sign in, nothing happens.

Via the BBC:

Reports suggest the new service will offer personalised recommendations on music through its own dedicated app.

US celebrity host Ryan Seacrest confirmed the existence of Twitter’s new app on Thursday via a tweet: “playing with @twitter’s new music app (yes it’s real!)… there’s a serious dance party happening at idol right now”

AllThingsD reports that the service will launch this weekend to coincide with the Coachella music festival.

Your Digital Afterlife Because, evidently, Google listens to Krissy, it now has a new plan in place should you, perhaps, not quite wake up tomorrow. Via Google’s Data Liberation Blog: Not many of us like thinking about death — especially our own. But making plans for what happens after you’re gone is really important for the people you leave behind. So today, we’re launching a new feature that makes it easy to tell Google what you want done with your digital assets when you die or can no longer use your account. The feature is called Inactive Account Manager — not a great name, we know — and you’ll find it on your Google Account settings page. You can tell us what to do with your Gmail messages and data from several other Google services if your account becomes inactive for any reason. For example, you can choose to have your data deleted — after three, six, nine or 12 months of inactivity. Or you can select trusted contacts to receive data from some or all of the following services: +1s; Blogger; Contacts and Circles; Drive; Gmail; Google+ Profiles, Pages and Streams; Picasa Web Albums; Google Voice and YouTube. Before our systems take any action, we’ll first warn you by sending a text message to your cellphone and email to the secondary address you’ve provided. FJP: Macabre, yes, but a reality that digital services need to pay attention to. Image: Pleasant Hill Cemetery, via Wikimedia Commons.

Your Digital Afterlife

Because, evidently, Google listens to Krissy, it now has a new plan in place should you, perhaps, not quite wake up tomorrow.

Via Google’s Data Liberation Blog:

Not many of us like thinking about death — especially our own. But making plans for what happens after you’re gone is really important for the people you leave behind. So today, we’re launching a new feature that makes it easy to tell Google what you want done with your digital assets when you die or can no longer use your account.

The feature is called Inactive Account Manager — not a great name, we know — and you’ll find it on your Google Account settings page.

You can tell us what to do with your Gmail messages and data from several other Google services if your account becomes inactive for any reason.

For example, you can choose to have your data deleted — after three, six, nine or 12 months of inactivity. Or you can select trusted contacts to receive data from some or all of the following services: +1s; Blogger; Contacts and Circles; Drive; Gmail; Google+ Profiles, Pages and Streams; Picasa Web Albums; Google Voice and YouTube. Before our systems take any action, we’ll first warn you by sending a text message to your cellphone and email to the secondary address you’ve provided.

FJP: Macabre, yes, but a reality that digital services need to pay attention to.

Image: Pleasant Hill Cemetery, via Wikimedia Commons.

If You Drink and are Anxious, You’re on Facebook. Stoned? Not so Much Via ReadWrite: For his master’s thesis, Missouri University doctoral student Russell Clayton surveyed 229 college freshmen students living in dorms. He asked them to rank their perceived levels of loneliness, anxiety, alchohol use and marijuana use, then measured their “connectedness” to Facebook. Clayton found that students who reported higher levels of anxiousness and alcohol use “appeared to be more emotionally connected with Facebook.” What’s more, “people who perceive themselves to be anxious (in general) are more likely to want to meet and connect with people online, as opposed to a more social, public setting.” Clayton’s study also shows the power of persuasion: viewing status update photos of people drinking made individuals “more motivated” to drink themselves. Back to ReadWrite: According to the research, marijuana use “predicted the opposite: a lack of emotional connectedness with Facebook.” According to Clayton, “Marijuana use was negatively related to emotional connectedness to Facebook and unrelated to Facebook connection strategies. This indicates that the more a participant engages in marijuana use the less emotionally connected they feel toward Facebook.” FJP: We let you draw your own conclusions, just don’t Facebook drunk. Image: A beer, at a bar, by Michael.

If You Drink and are Anxious, You’re on Facebook. Stoned? Not so Much

Via ReadWrite:

For his master’s thesis, Missouri University doctoral student Russell Clayton surveyed 229 college freshmen students living in dorms. He asked them to rank their perceived levels of loneliness, anxiety, alchohol use and marijuana use, then measured their “connectedness” to Facebook.

Clayton found that students who reported higher levels of anxiousness and alcohol use “appeared to be more emotionally connected with Facebook.” What’s more, “people who perceive themselves to be anxious (in general) are more likely to want to meet and connect with people online, as opposed to a more social, public setting.”

Clayton’s study also shows the power of persuasion: viewing status update photos of people drinking made individuals “more motivated” to drink themselves.

Back to ReadWrite:

According to the research, marijuana use “predicted the opposite: a lack of emotional connectedness with Facebook.” According to Clayton, “Marijuana use was negatively related to emotional connectedness to Facebook and unrelated to Facebook connection strategies. This indicates that the more a participant engages in marijuana use the less emotionally connected they feel toward Facebook.”

FJP: We let you draw your own conclusions, just don’t Facebook drunk.

Image: A beer, at a bar, by Michael.

Welcome to Twitter, @prezbillyjeff

Stephen Colbert interviews Bill Clinton and helps him send out his first tweet.

Pinterest Design Ethos Echoes With Publishers

joshsternberg:

The visual Web continues to push forward, one publisher site at a time.

Publishers across the digital media landscape are redesigning their sites to mimic the photo-friendly grid layout of social sites like Pinterest. Media companies from The New York Times to CNN to Mashable are falling in love with the less-is-more design approach, both as a way to create a better user experience and a route to integrate ads less awkwardly.

“The holy grail is how advertising feels more integrated to the pieces,” said Dan Gardner, co-founder of design shop Code and Theory. “As a page becomes more visual, it allows advertising to feel more integrated. It’s not to confuse what’s advertising and what’s editorial, but advertising can now be more part of the experience.”

That experience is transforming websites. Instead of putting up blocks of text, publishers are understanding that big, bold, beautiful images attract more attention from visitors. The old-fashioned way of presenting information was to offer an inherent hierarchy: news story headlines get bigger treatment, other articles get smaller text. Visual approaches change that.

Click through to read what designers have to say about the Pinterestification of publisher sites.

Let’s Say Your Name is Mark Zuckerberg

Via MakeUseOf:

Since the rise of Facebook, and the thrusting of the founder into the public eye, Mark S. Zuckerberg has found him being confused for his socially awkward, sweatshirt donning namesake on a daily basis. He cringes whenever he hears the all-too-familiar phrase ‘are you that guy’?

“Whenever I call my credit card company and they ask for my name, they hang up because they think I’m playing a prank… I was taking a flight and I went through security, and I had to show them my ID and the guy looks at me and says ‘Oh my God!’, he goes ‘Are you him?’, and I’m like ‘Do you think I’d be flying Southwest Airlines if I was him?’”

Mark S. Zuckerberg has completely lost his identity…

…[G]etting a Facebook account was by no means a trivial task. On the basis of him sharing a name with the founder, he had to send off copies of his birth certificate, driver’s license and even his Indiana bar association certificate just to even open an account. The process dragged on so long and was so tedious, he even had to go as far as to threaten legal action.

MakeUseOf, Banned: What Happens When Facebook Doesn’t Like You.

So if your phone doesn’t move from a single location between the hours of 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. for say a week or so, Facebook can quickly deduce the location of your home. Facebook will be able to pinpoint on a map where your home is, whether you share your personal address with the site or not. It can start to build a bigger and better profile of you on its servers. It can start to correlate all of your relationships, all of the places you shop, all of the restaurants you dine in and other such data. The data from accelerometer inside your phone could tell it if you are walking, running or driving. As Zuckerberg said — unlike the iPhone and iOS, Android allows Facebook to do whatever it wants on the platform, and that means accessing the hardware as well.

This future is going to happen – and it is too late to debate. However, the problem is that Facebook is going to use all this data — not to improve our lives — but to target better marketing and advertising messages at us. Zuckerberg made no bones about the fact that Facebook will be pushing ads on Home.

Om Malik, GigaOm. Why Facebook Home bothers me: It destroys any notion of privacy.

FJP: Note that these concerns can be applied to Google, Apple and the rest. Our phones, after all, are surveillance units. Just ask Malte Spitz. But the concerns Om raises here are important to understand if you’re thinking about installing Facebook Home on your phone.

Twitter Diplomacy Last week Egypt issued an arrest warrant for the comedian Bassem Youssef for insulting Islam and the country’s President, Mohamed Morsi. Jon Stewart, to whom Youssef is often compared, spent 10 minutes on his show Monday defending Youssef, talking about free speech and satire, and generally roasting Morsi. Yesterday, someone at the US Embassy in Cairo sent out a link to The Daily Show clip. Morsi’s office is not amused. Details at the New York Times. Image: Screenshot, Storify by Rami Reda Khanfar capturing the exchange.

Twitter Diplomacy

Last week Egypt issued an arrest warrant for the comedian Bassem Youssef for insulting Islam and the country’s President, Mohamed Morsi.

Jon Stewart, to whom Youssef is often compared, spent 10 minutes on his show Monday defending Youssef, talking about free speech and satire, and generally roasting Morsi.

Yesterday, someone at the US Embassy in Cairo sent out a link to The Daily Show clip.

Morsi’s office is not amused. Details at the New York Times.

Image: Screenshot, Storify by Rami Reda Khanfar capturing the exchange.

Twitter elicits a more poisonous information anxiety. It moves so fast that if I’m not continuously checking in, I completely lose track of the conversation — and it’s almost impossible to figure out what happened three hours ago, much less two days ago. I can’t save Twitter for later, and thus there’s always a pressure to check Twitter now. Twitter ends up taking more of my time than I’d like it to, as there’s a constant reason to check it rather than, say, reading a magazine article.

Ezra Klein, The Washington Post. The Problem with Twitter.

Klein is reacting to Nick Beaudrot’s piece about Twitter, which is an account of why he’s not returning to Twitter after giving it up for Lent until he can figure a way to sort the useless from the useful. Beaudrot graphs Twitter content as 10% links to interesting things and 90% faff, snark and debates better suited to blogging. 

FJP: Obviously Twitter has its unbeatable pros as well, and Klein does appreciate them. See reader comments on the piece for some organization solutions to his laments, one of which is to build lists. For tips on how to built newsy twitter lists, see our post here.