Twatter - twitter for Map Twats

Cynical Ben is a bit annoyed by Twitter. He's absolutely right. It's been around for quite a while, but it first came to my attention in 2007 when Alan Johnson MP used it for his doomed campaign for the Labour Deputy Leadership - though John Edwards also used it for his (also doomed) presidential campaign, starting in 2007. The idea is that you're closely entwined with the daily lives of distant individuals - which is close to Sartre's idea (in Huis Clos) that hell is other people. Check out these guys' Twitter feeds: 'Spending the day in the department having meetings with Ministerial colleagues and officials'. This isn't empowerment, education or building an informed electorate - it's utterly banal. It is, in fact, perfectly Baudrillardian: the simulation of exchange rather than the symbolic exchange which constitutes true communication. It's too short for meaningful communication and it's unidirectional and linear - it's a fraud. 

OK, some of the better-informed amongst you will whinge, didn't Twitterers beat the media when that plane ditched in the Hudson the other day? So? I'm pretty certain that plenty of journalists noticed a massive plane go for a dip, and I'm not bothered about immediacy anyway. New journalism is about informed analysis. Any moron can text their friends about an event - it takes training and a brain to contextualise and discuss the significance of an event. Sure, Twitter might announce a death or a story first - but that's just data - it's not communication or wisdom (although it is what my university seems to care about).