Brennen Schmidt

English 251-001
April 9, 2010

Rethinking Twitter: An Enhancement to Conventional Forms of Communication

One cannot watch the news today without hearing something about Twitter, the latest since

sliced bread in the ever-changing world of technology. An online social media utility, Twitter

wants its users to answer one simple question: “What are you doing?” There is one catch,

however; you must communicate, or “tweet,” your message in 140 characters or less. Although

this limit can seem like an insufficient amount of space to write a message, it forces the user to

be concise. In a world filled with superfluous amounts of information, it is reassuring that such a

social networking utility exists; this utility follows the “less is more” line of thinking. Although

some “tweets” must be truncated to preserve space, there are concerns that the use of such words

as “w8,” instead of the word “wait,” are contributing to the rapid degradation of the conventional

use of English. This unconventional form of communication may not appeal to those devoted to

the formal use of the English language, but these social media utilities have completely

revolutionized the way that communication over the Internet occurs. Although Twitter does not

follow conventional forms of communication, this social media utility illustrates how

communication can be made more concise, and its information spread to a vast audience.

Moreover, Twitter should not be considered to be another threat to the English language; rather,

it should be considered as a complement to its traditional use.

With Twitter becoming one of the fastest-growing forms of social media in the world, it is

not surprising to say that almost everybody I know is using this new technology. In fact, Twitter
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has grown to include organizations never thought to hop aboard the ever-changing channel of

technology. Political organizations have harnessed the social media trend, including that of

Twitter, and have been reaping the rewards ever since. As an example, U.S. Presidential

Candidate, Barack Obama, led the 2008 campaign trail not only with the number of votes that he

had, but also with the number of Twitter followers; leading his opponent, John McCain, by

approximately 75 per cent. One could argue that social media, especially Twitter, contributed to

Obama’s success in attracting the support of younger voters in the 2008 election. Obama’s

campaign following social media trends is one of the many examples of how utilizing these

online technologies can pay off in the long run.

The use of Twitter is even evident in the medical community; operating rooms once

thought to be living in a world of their own are now tweeting what is happening during a

patient’s surgery. The doctor is the one telling the “tweeter” what to type, of course; there should

not be any concern over the patient’s safety, as the surgeon has both hands on the patient while

performing his or her procedure. Although this idea of doctors “tweeting” procedures over the

internet seems like too much of a drastic change, it has completely revolutionized the way in

which people can receive short messages. I have yet to follow a live conversation during a

patient’s surgery, but I feel it is nice to know that if I have any questions about a certain

procedure, I can tweet my question and expect a reply in a very short period of time. Although

this new use of Twitter in the operating room would seem abstruse to those not from the medical

community, this new technology might inspire a someone to want to become a doctor, or

surgeon, because of the in-depth tweeting of medical procedures.

Twitter serves as more than a stand-alone system, that is, where a user simply reads tweets;

instead, Twitter is a collaborative system that allows a user to interact with other “tweeters” in
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ways never thought possible. Since the Internet was introduced to the world over twenty years

ago, the amount of information that is available to the world seems infinite. With this increase in

the amount of information that there is on the Internet, Twitter makes it very easy to filter

information, such as that of a query that one would use when searching for a specific piece of

information in a database. “Hash tags,” or the use of a pound symbol before any word or phrase,

allows users to follow certain trends occurring live on Twitter. As an example, watching the

Government of Saskatchewan’s Budget address, I was able to follow what various Twitter users

were saying, live, about the address by typing in “#skbudget.” Never before have I been able to

access such a large amount of information on a particular topic, in such a short amount of time.

In a world where there is so much information available to us, it is nice that these online

technologies, such as Twitter, are making it easier for us to group relevant information together

for easy, and live, access.

Although these examples are still difficult to digest for those devoted to the formal use of

the English language, these suspicious individuals should be reminded that Twitter is only

supplementary to the traditional use of the English language. In addition, one should note that the

truncated nature of “tweeting” messages via Twitter is still understandable; it is merely another

way to deliver a message in a shorter fashion. Although linguists may not agree, and would

rather see the extension of this character limit to ensure “proper” English is used, it should serve

as a challenge for us to shorten up some of the messages that we are communicating. We live in

a world that is filled with a great amount of information, so it only seems right to think that such

short messages in Twitter would be beneficial for those wanting to catch a glimpse of what other

“Tweeters” in the world are talking about. For example, reading the news is much easier for me

on Twitter because of how all news stories are of a concise and succinct nature. News headlines,
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followed by their respective links, make it easy for me to access news information that is

relevant to me. Never before have I been able to search for news headlines, other than using the

search engine, Google. Although these news headlines posted on Twitter may contain

unconventional abbreviations, the message is still conveyed to the user in a way that can be

easily understood. It seems interesting to say, then, that the unconventional utilization of the

English language can still communicate its message to those unfamiliar with the “changed”

language, or online jargon. If anything, this new form of communication should be embraced, as

well as appreciated, because of the fact that Twitter may be one of the many utilities that will

solidify the use of the English language for, perhaps, thousands of years.

Although the jury may still be out as to the effectiveness of Twitter communicating its

messages in a clear fashion, it is reassuring to see that such unconventional uses of the English

language can still transmit their communication in a fashion that can be easily understood, for the

most part, by those that speak the English language. Moreover, it should be noted that Twitter is

not going away any time soon, and if anything, Twitter will grow even more in its use in today’s

society. I would not be the least bit surprised if classes at the University of Regina will

eventually use Twitter in the classroom. Although this use of Twitter may not branch out to

include a 140-character essay for student research, it may serve as a great utility for students to

communicate discoveries to their peers during class. Language fanatics beware, as you might just

learn a thing or two about the effective use of unconventional forms of communicating messages

in less than 140 characters!