Twits…

Apparently, @tonybenn who has been Twittering all week isn't really Tony Benn. As if anybody could seriously think that the great man would fall for such inconsequential nonsense. Benn is (as the video clip demonstrates) is a fan of Youtube and web journalism as ways of 'speaking truth to power', but the idea that someone who has sat down with tea, pipe and tape recorder for fifty years would suddenly decide that SMS-length updates is appropriate is laughable. Though he does have his own very outdated website.

To me, Twitter is the triumph of medium over message - the fetishisation of technology. Does anybody remember Alan Johnson's Labour deputy leadership campaign Twittering? Never was a noun so apt. Tony Benn, love him or loathe him, is a thinker - and few things in life are so simple that they can be reduced to a text-message (perhaps 'I love you' or 'You're dumped'). What you get when people like Johnson Twitter is 'Visited primary school. Proves triumph of socialism. Had rice pudding' (I exaggerate slightly). Perhaps a few skilled poets can distil meaning into few words, but most people expose the superficiality of their thoughts… and that's what blogging is for!