Twitter Is Dead

You heard me. Well maybe you didn’t. When you’re over 50, the hearing can start to deteriorate. I SAID, TWITTER IS DEAD.

How do I know? Because I recently saw a statistic from a Pew Research report, and it indicated that Twitter usage among 50-64 year olds doubled over the past 2 years. It is now probably the fastest growing demo for this social media behemoth.

So…in a repeat performance of how baby boomers killed facebook, it’s easy to see that Twitter will be dead in no time. Not only do they not have a clue about how to monetize it --- now they’re faced with the kiss of death stranglehold exerted by baby boomers. Like giant Anacondas, our demo can squeeze the life out of anything, whether it’s the latest social media fad or a new television show. If baby boomers actively like it, you can easily predict its demise.

Face it. If we like something, our enthusiasm and sheer numbers eventually make it unpalatable to everyone else. The landscape is littered with the fads we’ve destroyed. Acid-washed jeans, cocaine, Angry Birds, water beds, Ford Thunderbird, new age anything, etc., etc. If we’re all over it, then it’s all over.

We can turn a popular program or product into toast overnight. We may not kill it completely, but we can easily turn it into a niche product that only appeals to our demographic and is reviled by everyone else.

If only we could learn to use our powers for the good of the planet. Want to end global warming? Harness the power of baby boomers by getting us to deny it exists. Bam! Overnight everyone else will accept the truth of global warming research. It’s the same reverse psychology our parents used some fifty or more years ago. They didn’t want us to smoke, so they handed us the cigarettes and matches. Wait a second – that didn’t always work out the way they thought it would.

No matter. The dictum stands. Boomers like it. Boomers kill it. Remember, you read it here first. After we’ve killed Twitter, we may move on to Snapchat.

Jay Harrison is a graphic designer and writer whose work can be seen at DesignConcept and at BoomSpeak. He's written a mystery novel, which therefore makes him a pre-published author.

Social Media. Oxymoron?

If you’ve read some of the nasty tweets that people have put out there and then had to apologize for, it makes you wonder what is so social about social media? When you can insult an entire race, country or individual in less than 140 characters, maybe it’s just too easy.

Perhaps Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and the other social media tools have actually become antisocial media. Trump insults everyone. Louis C.K. insults his fans. Courtney Love…oh, forget it. Hundreds of corporate employees have put Tweets out in the internet-o-sphere and then had to walk them back with major mea culpas if they wanted to keep their jobs.

And celebrity apologies? Take your pick. Oprah has had to eat her words. So has Ashton Kutcher, Alec Baldwin, Anthony Weiner (oy vey, not just words but pictures too), Adam Carolla, Kristen Stewart (sorry I cheated), Hugh Jackman, Spike Lee, Justin Timberlake, Roseanne Barr, Daniel Tosh, Kanye West, and the list goes on and on. If you don’t know some of these names, just trust me. They overshared or said something totally insensitive and idiotic.

But are celebrities really that different from journalists,

politicians and just plain folks when it comes to self-censoring their social media output? Email and social media have just made it so darn convenient to put words, thoughts and pictures out there without a second thought. Could your words be hurtful? Of course. Would be helpful if you reread what you just wrote and thought about whether some people might misunderstand your meaning or find it offensive? You bet. Do the serial Tweeters ever think before they type something and hit the Tweet button? Apparently not, as there are news items each and every day that detail the latest social media train wreck.

One can only guess where the social media phenomenon is headed. I can envision the day when you no longer have to type your thoughts because your computer (or the Mind Reader that replaces it) will know exactly what you’re thinking and blab it out to the whole world. There will be no opportunity for reflection or self-editing. Imagine projectile vomiting of your innermost thoughts if that metaphor is not too gross. If you think that’s what we have now, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

Jay Harrison is a graphic designer and writer whose work can be seen at DesignConcept and at BoomSpeak. He's written a mystery novel, which therefore makes him a pre-published author.

They’re All A-Twitter

If you haven’t come across it yet, there’s a new internet social networking tool known as Twitter. Their slogan is “What are you doing?” And my rejoinder is “It’s none of your business.”

Suddenly the “whole world’s a-twitter” is what it says on their website, but maybe the world is just full of twits who need to tell you everything they are doing. "I am taking a bath now. I have a bad case of diarrhea. We were going to have sex but Hank can’t maintain an erection. Julie and I were going to have dinner out but she says she’s all gassy."

You are limited to 140 characters in your message so you can’t get all literary with it. Would William Faulkner or Truman Capote be Twitter fans if they were still alive? Maybe Capote, but Faulkner? Never.

Twitter calls it being hyper-connected, but it seems to me that it’s another case of TMI – too much information. The funniest claim they make is “Twitter puts you in control and becomes a modern antidote to information overload.” The only control you have is to shut the damn thing off so that you don’t have to witness the constant stream of useless information being beamed at you every time you log on to your computer. It’s not an antidote to overload, it is the overload!

One of their endorsements reads as follows: "If you aren't familiar with Twitter, it is one of those things, like MySpace, that sounds totally ridiculous and stupid when you first hear about it. But once you start using it, you realize how much fun it is." That constitutes an endorsement? It’s fun to know exactly what your friends are up to every minute of the day? You can be sure their constant stream of "tweets" will hold you spellbound.

The big knock on baby boomers has always been how self-centered we are, but I would have to say that anyone who needs to tell everyone else what they are doing all day, every day, has a lot more ego issues than boomers ever had.

I get that Twitter wasn’t targeted to boomers, but that doesn’t calm my fears that twenty-somethings are spending their days all a-twitter. I want them out there working hard to pay for my social security, not twittering away their days. You think America is going to continue to be the world leader in worker productivity with gimmicks like Twitter nibbling away at our best workers? I don’t think so.

Jay Harrison is a graphic designer and writer whose work can be seen at DesignConcept and at BoomSpeak. He's written a mystery novel, which therefore makes him a pre-published author.