If you even have the slightest interest in news and current events you’ll have been hard pressed not to notice the media’s emerging use of Twitter. Despite having been around since 2006 it is only in the last 6 months that the media have caught on and started featuring it prominently.

I believe the event that kickstarted the mainstream use of Twitter was the American election campaigns. My first knowledge of the website came about after the notorious Twittering that went on during Obama’s address to congress earlier this year.

Imagine a bunch of old people in a room with their Blackberries out sending sms’ to the Internet whilst the president of the US makes a speech. Yeah, I’ve got no idea how it made news either.

Following this event Twitter seemed to become cemented as a staple of news media offerings worldwide.

A little worrying for us Australian’s was the recent announcement of a free Blackberry Bold for every federal MP in Australia at a cost of $200,000 – complete with free unlimited data transfer.

Supposedly to be used as an communications tool between politicians, I get the feeling rather that there’s probably more then a few kids out there hotwiring their parents Blackberries to Utorrent and downloading a few terabytes of ‘linux distributions’ every month.

Getting back the media’s use of Twitter though, originally the uptake was slow and consisted of breaking news updates; sort of like a news RSS accessible from any PC without having to install a RSS reader.

This I have no problem with as it actually serves a purpose and can be useful. I still check news companies websites for breaking news but I appreciate the value others might get from Twitter for this service.

What has left me at a loss these past few months is the increasing frequency we’re seeing stories that make front page news nationally that are nothing more then X person twittered ‘blahblah’ and then a 100-200 word analysis of what they said.

Here’s a quick example from the 1389 results for ‘Twitter’ on news.com.au (most of which are thankfully ‘follow our Twitter blog’ type results and not actual news stories):

• Even twits on their tweets agree Kerri-Anne is the goods – Caroline Overington writes about a failed Twitter scandal she tried to start involving Kerry Anne Kennerly. If you don’t know Kerry Anne is, imagine a film crew following your grandmother around for a few decades and the footage popping up in the most random and annoying of places.

• Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore threaten to stop Twittering – This made front page news nationally, it’s a story about Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore threatening to stop using Twitter if Twitter went ahead with plans to make a reality tv show involving users tracking down celebrities.

• Guy Sebastian and Twitter find guitar in New York taxi – Guy Sebastian was Australia’s first Australian Idol winner. He’s in the US trying to make it big and lost his guitar in a Taxi. He tweeted about it and the guitar was promptly tracked down.

• Twitter insults exchanged between Kyle Sandilands and Dave Hughes – Two breakfast radio hosts exchange insults over Twitter. Guilty as charged, I myself couldn’t resist and wrote about this. Shame shame shame.

• Lily Allen says Susan Boyle’s over-rated – Pop singer Lilly Allen tweets about one British Idol contestant being more talented then another contestant = BAM INSTANT NEWS ARTICLE!

And so it goes. The common theme (with the possible exception of the Kerry Anne example) is that news organisations see something on Twitter and then construct an article around it. It’s dirt cheap to do and if they put enough of a slant on it, the piece can appear scandalous enough to garner widespread attention.

A new age of ‘news’ is upon us and I don’t like the way it’s heading. Twitter news stories are like a viral ‘reality tv’ infection slowly eating away at informative journalism. Now I’m certainly not claiming that news.com.au was the bastion of journalistic integrity to begin with but the rise of Twitter stories certainly isn’t helping.

News outlets need to get back to reporting actual news. If it’s a slow news day well that’s ok too, just twiddle your thumbs or something in the news room until something happens but please don’t give us anymore mind numbing Twitter stories.

I’d love to meet the person who’s life is enriched by reading an article on the candidates in the race for one million Twitter followers, if for nothing else then to punch them in face and make them apologise.


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