International Law

ReadWriteWeb discusses the rise of Twitter as a platform for serious discourse:

Twitter is fast becoming a serious platform for discourse and discussion. More than a status app, it is being used as a first alert mechanism for the dissemination of news and for immediate discussion surrounding that news. It is the coverage of news events and the continued emergence of citizen journalism that will push Twitter toward the mainstream this year.

The post goes to explain why Twitter works for news: it's fast, it's open, it's two-way, and it fills a void.  Of course, some weaknesses are also identified: it can be too fast, it can be muddled, and it can be hard to navigate.  That said, I am finding more and more that I find out about breaking news on Twitter first, and I can then go and find more information online or elsewhere; the most recent example for me being the unexpected death of Heath Ledger.  As Patrick Ruffini (from techPresident) says, Twitter is built for the new news cycle:

Traditional news operated on a 24-hour cycle. Blogs shortened this to minutes and hours. Twitter shortens it further to seconds. It's not right for every piece of information. It's certainly not well suited for longer analysis. But when it comes to instantly assembling raw data from several sources that then go into fully baked news stories, nothing beats it.

However, with the speed can come inaccuracy.  Again, as an example, I received a tweet today seeking verification of a rumour that Wayne Carey had committed suicide.  I quick search found nothing and it was dismissed as being nothing more than a hurtful rumour, but it highlights the potential risks of instantaneous news reporting, especially when that reporting is being done by so-called "citizen journalists".

Overall I do think Twitter will take off in a big way outside the geek community in 2008.  Simply the way my friends are addicted to Facebook Status Updates suggests that this form of micro-blogging has a role to fill.

Anyway, read the full ReadWriteWeb post here.