Twitter: Social Media Scares the S#*t Out of Me
Setting up accounts for social media is terrifying. My dad is adamantly against all forms of online information sharing. Read: my dad hates the internet and everything associated with it. My mom doesn’t hate social media, but is not interested in spending time learning how to use it. So besides my Facebook account, I have remained what is considered in the 21st century to be fairly anti-social.
However.
For the purpose of understanding how social media might help libraries connect with the public, I have decided to start building my social profile.
The first social media platform I have joined is Twitter. I don’t get the draw to it; reading random comments from people I don’t even know is unappealing to me. I have heard that many Twitterer’s (what an awkward term to work with) don’t tweet at all, that they simply use it as a way to stay up-to-date on news and hot topics. Is this the new form of newspaper? Does the 140 character limit on tweets not make it difficult to report the news? I will find out.
I signed up for Twitter using my laptop (maybe during class, maybe not). After the standard questions about my name, email, city, etc, I was asked to create a user name.
I like to keep things simple, so I typed in Jocelyn. Apparently only Jocelyn_253490375 was available. So I tried Jocelyn_McKay. Again, my choices were limited to Jocelyn_McKay 239859834 or Jocelyn_McKay 5523456. Who on earth is going to remember that name? How will my friend ever find me in the sea of Jocelyns (which, by the way, I always thought was a pretty unique name. Thanks Twitter for making me feel common).
If the whole point of Twitter is to connect, how will anyone connect with such a absurd user name?
I literally spent 10 minutes trying every modification of my name I could come up with. So here’s the name I settled on:
@Eff_user_names
Moving past the frustration of joining social media platforms, I realized how frightening it is to enter personal information into a form that connects to the internet.
For instance:
Why does Twitter need to know my phone number? At what point would it need to phone me? And who would do the calling? One of the four founders? Probably not.
How does entering my phone number make my account secure?
Perhaps the creepiest part of signing up for Twitter was the list of “friends” it generated for me. I recognized a few of the individuals, but many were people I have never met before. To top it off, Twitter generated the list from “people who have you in their address book”. HOW AM I IN THEIR ADDRESS BOOKS?
Having just finished doing some research for another class, I was further upset by the list Twitter created for me of Twitterers that I should follow. One of the suggestions was for a feminist I had just been researching! Does Twitter have access to my google search history?? How is this legal?
Yes Twitter, I would like to follow Clementine Ford. But I’m upset that you knew that.
I am still unsure whether I am happy I created an account or not. Either way, the fact that the site collects information on its users, even before they have signed up, is something a library should consider before joining.
Jocelyn this is a very important set of observations, many of which I share.
I hope you peers see this and comment. If not, feel free to share it during class.
I wonder how this would change if you were to open an “institutional” account? Dean
I have only been a twitter user since 2012. I signed up while I was in living in Japan so I couldn’t really read what information they were gathering on me. Nowadays I’m often a lurker on it, but Twitter is always “reading” my online footprint to suggest accounts and hashtags for me. I think this is one of the reasons why I don’t use it often. For me, when I use Twitter, it seems like I have no control over my tweets, privacy, or the personal boundaries for Social Media I keep. Because I don’t know what people, future employers, etc, will search Twitter from me, I simply have decided not to actively participate on the platform.
Hi Jocelyn! I enjoyed reading your post.
I’ve been on Twitter for several years now, and although I definitely agree with you on the privacy concerns, there are other things I’ve really enjoyed about it. Here are a few that I thought I’d share:
-One of the areas in which Twitter really seems to shine is for news stories that are developing, especially if they’re small/niche. For example, I remember hearing about a fire down at the Port last spring. I was in class and knew my route home would be affected, if not completed detoured. When the regular news sites weren’t updating quickly enough for me to re-route my way home, I turned to Twitter and it gave me instant updates. I just searched the hashtag (yes, hashtags develop that quickly). I was so thankful for Twitter!
-I love following live-tweeting events, whether it’s getting updates on something I can’t attend (a certain conference or rally) or just being part of the conversation (something lighthearted, like seeing others’ reactions when watching the Golden Globes). It makes me feel included in the conversation and adds another dimension to watching events.
-Seeing how hashtags can actually make a real difference in social movements is fascinating! (For example: http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2014/12/03/the-5-biggest-social-media-movements-of-2014/ and https://www.asc.upenn.edu/news-events/news/social-movements-slacktivists-matter) At the very least, I think it’s changed the way we think about certain terms; for example, identifying as feminists seems to be much less stigmatized and more celebrated.
-I also like to use it as a public platform for some of the content I create for my freelance writing, and connect with others who do the same.
Whew! That was longer than I thought it would be. Let me know if I’m not making sense, or if I can clarify something. 🙂
Hi Leah,
Thanks for your comment! The articles you posted links to are really interesting! The idea of having news updated faster via twitter than news channels or online newspapers is fascinating. It really becomes a useful tool when, like you mentioned, you need up-to-date (and continuously updating) information in order to make decisions.
Hello Jocelyn! Great blog. I agree with you completely. Even facebook suggests pages for me to like based on my google searches. I am not sure how to react to that as well. Based on Dean’s comment, wouldn’t it be funny to see an institution’s twitter or facebook page. You can see what they search for ahahaha. Simply stresses that we need to create several digital identities to separate professional from personal. This in my opinion is the biggest obstacle of social media. Because all you need is one bad post and you are finished.