This Lifestyle Article is Written by:
Anita Dlamini
211510412@ukzn.ac.za
Twitter has taken the world by storm, with the title of fastest growing social network; one can’t help but question, what the big idea is? When it comes to surprises none have been as pleasant as that of the twitter coup over all smart phones. Twitter, as 200 million of us should know, is the new leader of social media. Everyone with or without a smart phone knows twitter to be a way to catapult ourselves into the internet that knows no bounds and restrictions. All you have to do is follow whoever you fancy. The twitter revolution is based on the notion that simplicity is best. The big idea for Jack Dorsey, Noah Glass Evan Williams and Biz Stone (the creators of twitter) was to collaborate micro-blogging and mass audiences. Twitter is like a miniature, micro blogging version of high school only without the barriers. The nerds, the first team captains and the celebrities can all bond over retweets, links, music recommendations and pictures.
Twitter is a cut above the rest because of its “twitterisms”, small characteristics that are unique to the website and imitated by other websites such as Facebook,Flikr and the fading dinosaur MySpace. The hash tag (#) phenomenon for instance allows for group posts on similar ideas. When Michael Jackson died everyone who twote (which
incidentally is the past tense of tweet) with the hash tag #MJ became a part of a global grieving group of Tweeps. Tweeps who were bonded by lyrics, memories and messages of condolences of the late musician. More recently media
personality and Cosmopolitan magazine twitter queen, Claire Mawisa resorted to twitter for advice on a suitable alias for her middle name Bulelwa. A tsunami of tweets with the hash tag made “Bulelwa” a trending topic in South Africa,
translating into: the majority of South Africans were tweeting about possible nicknames for Claire.
The ease of access to everybody is what makes Twitter brilliant. It embodies simple instant interaction for the average Joe and their wildest fantasies. The concept is easy and compared to facebook’s ever increasing privacy policies and rejection lurking behind every invite. Twitter has planted a flag in the niche market which is micro blogging and has
rightfully earned its title of 2011s infectious social media phenomenon.