Facebook and Twitter Are Reshaping Journalism As We Know It

By Rory O'Connor, RoryOConnor.org. Posted January 20, 2009.

It's also interesting that Verizon's voice network broke down during the quake, but Twitter's service didn't, because our packet switching technology is more reliable than telephones. But in the end, it's not about technology -- it's about the idea of connecting in groups more quickly and efficiently.

ROC: What are some ways journalists are using Twitter?

BZ: We were also surprised at how quickly and expertly news organizations -- places like the New York Times, CNN and so on -- began to use Twitter. They just jumped in and impressed us with how they engaged, and their hybrid approach. Reuters, for example, began watching Twitter for trends, and found it worked. We gave help, support, and even our API (application programming interface) to the Reuters Lab people. Then CNN began using us to access information, and to find and create stories. Rick Sanchez at CNN, for example, is using both Facebook and Twitter and getting real time feedback … And the Los Angeles Times took the Twitter feed about the wildfires and put it on their home page.

Another good example is last spring's story of the Twitter user who blogged just one word  --  "Arrested" -- and had the story of his detention  splashed instantly to the world's attention, thus leading to his quick release.

ROC: Is Twitter also useful in search?

BS: We are involved on a macro level in documenting events. If you go to Search.twitter.com you can discover and cover trends in detail every minute. You could call it ‘search, ' but it's really not. ‘Search' on Twitter is more about filtering results before they hit the Internet -- so it's more a kind of ‘filter' than actual ‘search.'

ROC: Can social media such as Twitter help solve journalism's trust and credibility problem?

BS: We think that social media is largely comparable to traditional approach, in that credibility is key. In the future, social media tools will help the news media know such things as the location of the person reporting, we will be able to provide a social graph of our users … Can we then triangulate about their credibility via algorithm? We can certainly begin to get very sophisticated on credibility with new tools, and combine that with journalists leveraging open systems such as ours to find and vet crowd sources, story leads, etc.

Looking ahead, I see more sophisticated tools to deal with this issue. A credibility algorithm may be possible one day. Maybe it is even now, as rudimentary as it would still be. Our recent election feed, for example, was a smart feed. As we go forward and learn more about open systems, we can filter better and thus get more credibility. But filtering is how we get there … so one should not rely on social media alone.

Editor's note: AlterNet is now on Twitter. Check it out. And go here to sign up for your own twitter account. to view and become a follower so AlterNet.

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Filmmaker and journalist Rory O'Connor is the author of "Shock Jocks: Hate Speech and Talk Radio" (AlterNet Books, 2008). O'Connor also writes the Media Is A Plural blog.

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