The Trend of Twitter
Kate Powlowsky
How Twitter Originated
Twitter was originally thought up by Jack Dorsey. He thought of Twitter while working for a company, Odeo, that was unsuccessfully creating a podcasting app. His idea caught the attention of Noah Glass, co-founder of Odeo, who advocated Twitter to the CEO of Odeo, Evan Williams and Biz Stone. They realized how big Twitter could be when the few Twitter users were having to spend hundreds of dollars for their cell phone bills. Interestingly, Evan Williams later fired Noah Glass and Biz Stone took credit for a lot of Glass' work on Twitter.
Evam Williams, Biz Stone, and Jack Dorsey
Classes of Society and Twitter
Twitter is accepted by most people, from all classes. Businesses use it to promote their companies. For example, a popular clothing store may tweet about a sale or new items to bring in more customers. They would not promote themselves on Twitter unless it was widely used by the public. There is no one particular class that opposes Twitter, and it is used by many people who have access to the internet. People in the upper class such as celebrities use social media to connect with fans and promote themselves. While some may think that the upper class would oppose jumping on the same trends as everyone else in lower classes, they have been able to use Twitter to their benefit.
Taylor Swift proves that the upper class and lower classes use twitter through her 37 million followers.
Popular store promotes itself on Twitter by tweeting out new clothing items
Racial Differences and How it has Shaped the Nation
Because Twitter is so modern, there are not many racial differences. Instead of having racial differences on twitter, people usually use the app to voice their opinions. For example, there are lots of race related issues currently happening and people take to Twitter to speak up about the problems. While Twitter doesn't start the problems going on in the country, it does help spread it. Twitter allows for information to pass quickly and easily. This information can include anything as small as pop culture drama and gossip to news about a protest against racial injustice. Twitter allows for problems in the country to be brought to a bigger scale.
Twitter and Gender Norms
Twitter does not have a lot to do with gender norms. Again, people use Twitter to voice their opinions on gender norms in society. For example, it is easier for gender related topics to be brought to attention because of how easy it is to connect with everyone on Twitter.
Politics and Social Media
Twitter impacts politics in multiple ways. It allows quick feedback on different political strategies. It also impacts who is elected for various government positions. Most politicians have Twitters to promote themselves, for example Hillary Clinton recently tweeted a video of her speech on gun violence. Without Twitter or social media this video may have only been seen by a few and may impact citizens to vote differently. Lastly, Twitter users can easily unite on certain issues to impact what the government is forced to focus on or change.
While running for president, Hillary Clinton uses Twitter to promote various platforms she is promoting.
Backlash
The main backlash to Twitter is less aimed at Twitter and more at Social Media in general. They say that it is too addictive and believe that social media takes away from 'the art of writing' because people are forming the habit of typing with a small word limit. Also, many people believe that twitter is ruining real communication between people. Forbes stated that 93% of communication is nonverbal and clearly that that is confusing when people are communicating over Twitter. However, it the years to come we will be able look back on the Twitter trend and see how it actually is impacting the people today and the way they think and act everyday. With Twitter being relatively new it is too early to tell the long-term impacts of the app.
Works Cited
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2010-12-20/political-power-social-media
http://www.forbes.com/sites/susantardanico/2012/04/30/is-social-media-sabotaging-real-communication/
http://www.businessinsider.com/how-twitter-was-founded-2011-4
Pictures:
http://www.ealuxe.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/taylor.png
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2010-12-20/political-power-social-media
http://www.forbes.com/sites/susantardanico/2012/04/30/is-social-media-sabotaging-real-communication/
http://www.foosler.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/twitter_logo.jpg