Twitter is great for watching uninformed panics unfold live

This is extremely funny but at heart it raises some serious questions about "citizen" journalism and confirms, for me, at least, that crowds are almost never wise and that all technology is only as safe and as useful as the people who use it.

The beauty of this is that social media allows us to laugh if we choose to and at the same time, sift through the useless information to get to the good stuff. The choice is ours and no one is interrupting us with their opinions.

Jerry,

Your concern is well founded.

Even before "the internets" there were "sheeple" that took rumors and ran with them. There are instances during the French Revolution, Witch-hunting here in the US, and others instances where whole communities reacted badly upon half-truths.
Even in a fully-informed universe powered with the Internet there is cause to be alarmed when information is disseminated that has the possibility to cause harm.
I think a large threat in communities like Twitter has cropped up thanks to @oprah and @aplusk which has introduced noobs to the social medium without actually understanding its use.

Just today on THE VIEW, Joy Bayhar <sp> said that she wanted the Twitter president to remove all fake celebrity accounts and build a better way for people to certify who is who. She is afraid that someone may register an account with a name similar to hers and then pretend to be her.

Twitter was never about authenticated users in the past. It was about creating a medium for all people with all voices to speak with eachother and share information with those they find interesting. If you like to follow the dialogue of the fake Joy Bayhar and not the real Joy Bayhar, you should be allowed to do so.

I am afraid that @Ev will start to move Twitter to be more what Hollywood wants it to be versus what he initially intended.

 

Stolen from xkcd: http://www.xkcd.com/574/

You're right, Alex.  Andrew should have given a hat tip to http://www.xkcd.com/574/ which appears to be the original source.  Stealing is common on the web but it's nice to give credit where credit is due.

Interesting discussion all. To me what this really points to is the fact that there seems to be a tendency today to NOT question what we see, read and hear in the media (or anywhere for that matter). Mainstream media is as guilty as Twitter for spreading sensationalized fear - because it attracts audiences and advertisers. The antidote for all of this is to encourage and educate people to dig deeper, check multiple sources, question the motives of the information provider and come to their own conclusions. Twitter is not to blame for this phenomena - the dumbing down of the American intellect is.