What To Do About Twitter

Do you remember where you were when you first heard about Twitter?

I do. I was listening to "The Regular Guys"  on Rock100.5 in February 2008. "The Regular Guys" were Larry, Eric, Southside Steve,  and Big Fat Tim.  It was a radio show marketed to guys. Since I am a guy, I listened to it.

One morning, Eric (who is the brainiest high school dropout ever) announced there was a new web site called "Twitter" and you can post your thoughts on it except your thoughts were called "Tweets" and there was a character limit for your tweets.  The tweets were supposed to be, in a word used a lot back then, pithy.

Well since that time in early 2008, Twitter has evolved into a worldwide phenomenon. You "follow" people and people can follow you.  This enables you to see the tweets of some very famous people and you can tweet back at them. Sometimes, they will tweet back at you.

Here's a list of famous people who have tweeted back to me when I tweeted to them:  Larry The Cable Guy, Jimmy Fallon, Colin Quinn, Hugh Hewitt, and Larry Sabato (he's a presidential historian at the University of Virginia).  You see I run with a fast crowd.

However, Twitter has some problems.

Twitter is basically a gas station bathroom wall put in cyberspace. For every nice thing you see on Twitter, you see a hundred not-so-nice things. Oh yeah, do you remember a world in which women didn't swear?  That world doesn't exist on Twitter.

Part of the problem is that unlike Facebook or real life, Twitter allows you to use a nom de plume and you can have as many accounts as you want. It also allows "bots"  which "autonomously perform actions such as tweeting, re-tweeting, liking, following, unfollowing, or direct messaging other accounts".  

A topic that is popular on Twitter is said to be "trending" and it really is a big deal to have a "trending" topic because for some reason journalists don't investigate any stories, they just look at what's trending on Twitter.

Let's say somebody starts a topic #Alanstinks. If a couple of bots get a hold of it and cause it to trend and soon the news media starts reporting that I stink.

But a big problem now involves (of course) the President.

Recently, Twitter and Facebook have decided to "fact check".  That is, you just can't post a meme or an article because it might not be true and people could die.  At least, I think that is the reason. You could post a meme about how wearing masks should not be mandatory because it leads to kooties and Twitter will "fact check" you because somebody might not wear a mask and then grandma gets Cornavirus and dies.

Here is an example of a meme that appeared on Facebook in the 2016 election.

This meme had The Lord and Satan arm-wrestling over the election. I'm certainly no Bible scholar, but I don't remember it saying this is the way the future is determined. Supposedly this was placed in Facebook by the Russians. This is how the Russians interfered with the election. 

Twitter has decided to fact check President Trump, because, well, you know.

I object to the fact-checking for a couple of reasons. 

One, I learned as a student at Wheeler High School ("Where The Students Of Today Are Talking About "Bad Company" Because "Bad Company" Rocks")  to not to believe everything you read. I'm sort of insulted that Twitter and Facebook believe I can't decide for myself what is accurate and what is not.

Like I said, I am a graduate of Wheeler High School AND Kennesaw State University.

Two, I have a sneaking suspicion that Twitter will be fact-checking conservatives more than they will liberals. Conservatives don't believe in "science" and will have to be watched. Liberals, on the other hand, are full of goodness and light and won't need such scrutiny.

However, President Trump is wrong to threaten Twitter.  He is part of the reason, even before he became President, Twitter became popular.  Trump can't shut down Twitter any more than I can shut down Twitter. If he's so steamed about Twitter, he should vote with his feet and stop tweeting. That is more than we can ask for.

Here's what I would do with Twitter. I would ban the bots. I would make people use their real names. Finally, I would make sure it was one individual, one account.

There are some positive things about Twitter. There are some incredibly funny people on Twitter. "Super70sSports" and the Iowahawkblog are two of my favorites. Plus, Twitter is home to my favorite animal program "Jonah Goldberg's Dogs".  Make sure you catch their "treat time". 

#Bestdogsever