March 17, 2010

• A little birdy told me…

“Heard in front of the coffee machine:Sarko+Carla=Over. From now on Carla+Biolay=big love.” March 9th

It was the above statement that sent cyberspace into a furore of gossip, babble and accusations of adulterous rendezvous on the part of first lady of France, Carla Bruni and her husband, Nicolas Sarkozy. Posted by Franck Rieusset, an intern at Warner Bros near Paris, on the social networking and micro-blogging site Twitter, his offhand tweet sent the cyber rumour mill into overload, with the gossip spreading like wildfire amongst Twitter users and inevitably being picked up by the media.

The sultry Bruni supposedly having an affair with singer Benjamin Biolay, whilst her husband turns to his junior ecology minister, Chantal Jouanno, for comfort. Following the Twitter frenzy, the weekend tabloids and broadsheets alike allocated some hefty real estate to the gossip. This is a testament to the power of the Twitter network - rambling cyber gossip to global headlines in a matter of hours…With such a powerful and public platform, should there be regulation on what can be ‘published’ by twitterers? Surely Franck Riesset never expected his impromptu tweet to ignite such a whirlwind of controversy. Should it be possible for the Sarkozys to sue for defamation of character? The future will surely see increased control and regulation of social networking sites, as similar controversies emerge, but for now it seems, the cyber rumour mill keeps spinning.

RT@Alyssa_Milano: “Chile was just hit by an 8.5 magnitude earthquake. I wish the earth would stop moving.” Feb 27th

Chilean twitterer ‘Conycampus’ retweets the above, reporting to followers and to the world, that Chile has been hit by a devastating earthquake. Retweeting, a way to repost another twitterer’s message, highlights a post, whether the post be very funny, very interesting or in some cases, breaking news. ‘Conycampus’ continues reporting in real-time, from the epicentre of the disaster, uploading Twitpics of the devastation. Many other twitterers in the disaster zone do the same, creating real-time news feeds and updates before the media has reached the scene. This is where Twitter becomes more than just the incessant ramblings of the digital generation. It is proving to be a very useful tool in emergency situations. Twitterers tweet and retweet emergency numbers, names of the missing and injured, and vital information such as aid collection points and hospitals in urgent need of blood donations. It is instant, effective and global. Twitterers can tag their tweets with hashtags so that a search for a certain topic (ie.#Chile) will generate a list of all tweets with this tag. In the aftermath of the Chilean earthquake, #Tsunami and #Chile, allowed the public to access vital information on Tsunami warnings, evacuation zones and access to aid. Twitter is not just a social network, but has become an information network and an indispensable resource for future emergency situations.

“From Orbit: Launch was awesome! I am feeling great, working hard and enjoying the magnificent views. The adventure of a lifetime has begun!” May 13th 09

Mike Massimino aka ‘Astro_Mike’, NASA astronaut and ‘twitterholic’, reports from outerspace to cyberspace. Famed as the first ‘tweet from space’, I was decidedly disappointed when I discovered that Mike relays his tweets to mission control at NASA, who then tweet in nearly-real-time on his behalf. Despite this Mike has amassed over 1,300,000 followers on Twitter, many of whom I’m sure are under the illusion that Mike is tweeting directly from outer space!

Businesses, politicians, charity organisations and celebrities alike use Twitter as a promotion and branding tool, - its quick, simple and most importantly, it’s free. Who can afford not to use it? Well, me. I don’t tweet and feel a certain twinge of resentment at the thought of my cyber self taking on a bigger role in my life. It brings to mind Avatar, where Jake Sully climbs into his pod and lets reality wait while he lives out a virtual life through his avatar character. While I lmao or rofl, my real life waits, and beckons. Should I join the flock, could I be so narcissistic as to think that people should be interested in what I had for breakfast? With a user retention rate of approximately 40%, I believe that I too would be a twitter quitter, quickly overwhelmed by tweet traffic jams and (useless) information overload. I would then suffer a cyber power outage and jolt back to reality, leaving my avatar behind and returning to my senses.

Grainne McCarthy - Creative

grainne@threesixty.ie