There’s an application on my phone that is getting more use than Angry Birds, a feat that I never thought would be possible. Tweetdeck is an application that fuses Twitter and Facebook, and allows the user to post on both social networking Web sites.

Yes, that means that I have succumbed to the Internet phenomena of Twitter. I’d like to preface this by saying that I am not proud of my new addiction, but I am also not about to stop tweeting anytime soon.

Twitter was founded in 2006, and is a service that offers individuals the ability to microblog.  Microblogging occurs in the form of tweets. Tweets are short messages from one user that is 140 characters or less. 

According to Pear Analytics, Tweets generally contain content in these six categories: news, spam, self-promotion, pointless babble, conversational, and pass-along value. Of these categories, conversational takes up 37.6 percent of Tweets, and pointless babble takes up 40.1 percent of Tweets.

What exactly do Tweets look like? Well, here are a couple of Tweets that I have made in the passed week.

“I wish owl post was possible – I want to receive hand written letters and howlers! #harrypotterisreal”

“Hope in reality is the worst of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man. #Nietzsche”

Now looking at these Tweets, you notice the #Nietzsche and the #harrypotterisreal. These hashtags allow the user to organize their Tweets, and tweet about similar things that other people are tweeting about.

They are visible links that can be clicked, and the user can be taken to a list of tweets that are about the same thing. This allows Twitter to organize tweets according to trending topics.

For a majority of users, their “goal” is to gain followers, and to follow other people. You can follow your friends, family, a particular business, or a celebrity. Twitter even confirms the accounts of celebrities so that the user can know they are actually following the real celebrity.

While this is a brief overview of Twitter, the point remains that Twitter is a device that connects people for better and for worse. Users should remain aware of the potential dangers of overusing Twitter to the point where it allows others the ability to stalk them.

For example, Tweets made from a cellular device can allow people to add their location to the specific Tweet. It will post the Tweet with the general (and sometimes specific) location of the Twitter user.

Users can also link their accounts with networks such as FourSquare. This gives them the ability to check into various places such as restaurants, bars, malls, or other businesses.  So if the user does not enable the ability to post their location to every tweet, the user can still be easily tracked based on the places they are checking into.

This ability is both a blessing and a curse. It can allow friends to easily meet up and communicate, but it can also allow anyone else the ability to find you if that was their goal.

The appeal of Twitter for me is the ability to follow politicians, comedians and news outlets. It is a fresh way of keeping abreast on current issues, and what people are thinking about them.

My Tweets are not always informative, which brings me to the other purpose of Twitter — it is also a good outlet for people to say anything that they want. Granted, people sometimes post and say things that they should not, but it is still a good tool for those who want to make any statement that can be considered worthwhile.

Twitter is a good tool to keep connected, but people should guard their activity and realize that it is an open forum. Anything that appears on the Internet can be seen by anyone else potentially, even if the accounts are guarded.

Be smart about the things you post in order to keep yourself safe, and everyone around you safe. 

 

To contact The Ionian’s Heather Nannery, e-mail her at [email protected].