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	<title>No Longer Bekar &#187; Response</title>
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		<title>Twitter: Most Misunderstood Since Jesus</title>
		<link>http://blog.anandphilip.com/2009/10/02/twitter-most-misunderstood-since-jesus/</link>
		<comments>http://blog.anandphilip.com/2009/10/02/twitter-most-misunderstood-since-jesus/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 01 Oct 2009 19:24:20 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>AnandP</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Response]]></category>

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		<description><![CDATA[I discovered The Pioneer a couple of months back via Kanchan Gupta&#8217;s twitter page. If the ugly lay out doesn&#8217;t put you off and you dig deeper, you would be pleasantly surprised to find that they are a good news source and a great Op-ed and food for thought site. So I was looking forward [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>I discovered <a title="The Daily Pioneer" href="http://www.dailypioneer.com/" target="_blank">The Pioneer</a> a couple of months back via Kanchan Gupta&#8217;s <a title="Kanchan Gupta, associate editor of The Pioneer, on Twitter" href="http://twitter.com/kanchangupta" target="_blank">twitter page</a>. If the ugly lay out doesn&#8217;t put you off and you dig deeper, you would be pleasantly surprised to find that they are a good news source and a great Op-ed and food for thought site. So I was looking forward to an invigorating read  when Kanchan Gupta announced that his boss, <a title="Chandan Mitra Editor of The Pioneer magazine" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandan_Mitra" target="_blank">Mr. Chandan Mitra</a> was going to write about his (low) opinion of twitter. Unfortunately the post, titled <a id="pw1o" title="Chandan Mitra on Twitter at Agent Provocateur" href="http://kanchangupta.blogspot.com/2009/09/tweeting-is-silly.html" target="_blank">Tweeting is silly</a>,  read like a rant more than anything else.</p>
<p>His arguments against twitter can be summarized as:</p>
<p>Twitter is silly because;</p>
<ol>
<li>People mostly use it to share mundane stuff like what they have for breakfast</li>
<li>140 characters is too little to write anything good</li>
<li>All/most twitter users are youngsters who are lonely and want validation/connection</li>
<li>Twitter will kill or is killing serious thought and dialogue</li>
</ol>
<p>While he give no evidence to back up his claims, underlying his assertions seem to be a belief that  online social networks are somehow inferior to real world ones, and that these networks are a sign of degeneration of the society.</p>
<p>What he gets wrong:</p>
<ol>
<li><strong>Confusing the user with the media. </strong>Mobile 	phones are used by terrorists to talk about killing people, are 	mobile phones evil? <span style="background: transparent none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">Even 	if it is granted that tweeting about ones breakfast is silly, how 	does it make twitter silly? </span></li>
<li><strong><span style="background: transparent none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">The 	mundane is not</span></strong><span style="background: transparent none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">. I 	don&#8217;t know Mr <span>Chandan</span> personally but I doubt he can get through a day if he does no &#8220;mundane&#8221; talk at all. Sharing how your day was 	with your friends and family is one of the commonest and greatest forms of &#8220;bonding&#8221; exchanges. If we only spoke of policy, politics and 	philosophy, we shall either go mad, or turn into fanatics.</span></li>
<li><strong><span style="background: transparent none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">Ignorance 	of social media and what makes it great. </span></strong><span style="background: transparent none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">I 	think Mr <span>Chandan</span> has not understood why <span>facebook</span>, twitter and blogs 	have taken the world by storm; the power of social media lies in 	the centrality of the individual. No longer must he be limited by 	the tools given to him by traditional mediums of thought exchange. 	What can be done by social media is limited purely by the ability of 	its users. </span></li>
<li><strong><span style="background: transparent none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">Bad 	basic research. </span></strong><span style="background: transparent none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">If 	he had dug just a little beneath the surface, he would have realized that 	an immense amount of good is being done via twitter,  from <a id="a50e" title="Twitter page of Build Africa" href="http://twitter.com/BuildAfrica" target="_blank">raising 	funds for Africa</a> to <a id="q_8g" title="Breakthrough's bell bajao campaign against domestic violece in india" href="https://twitter.com/Bell_Bajao" target="_blank">creating awareness about domestic violence</a> in 	India.  His own associate  editor </span><span style="background: transparent none repeat scroll 0% 0%;"> recently </span><span style="background: transparent none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">managed to expose the hypocrisy and shallowness of the ruling party  (ref: <span>cattlegate</span>)</span></li>
</ol>
<p>I sincerely hope, that as a member of the main stream media he will give twitter more serious thought, or at least be informed in his derision.</p>
<p><span style="background: transparent none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">Here are some further readings for those who wish to know that twitter can be used for and what brevity can do.</span></p>
<p><a id="o-1c" title="Click Here How to do good on twitter (Mashable)" href="http://mashable.com/2009/09/01/how-to-do-good-on-twitter/" target="_blank">How to do good on twitter (<span>Mashable</span>)</a></p>
<p><a id="w5lk" title="10 most creative uses of twitter" href="http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2008/12/18/the-10-most-creative-uses-for-twitter/" target="_blank">10 most creative uses of twitter including quitting smoking</a></p>
<p><a id="q3cl" title="How to use twitter to learn and teach" href="http://tbarrett.edublogs.org/2008/03/29/twitter-a-teaching-and-learning-tool/" target="_blank">Twitter as a teaching tool</a></p>
<p><a id="ac3y" title="how to Use Twitter to become a better writer" href="http://www.copyblogger.com/twitter-writing/" target="_blank">Use Twitter to become a better writer</a></p>
<p><a id="l99w" title="How to make a plan talk using twitter" href="http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2008/02/how_to_make_plants_talk_t.html" target="_blank">How to make a plant talk using twitter</a></p>
<p><a id="tf60" title="How a student twitterd his way out of prison" href="http://edition.cnn.com/2008/TECH/04/25/twitter.buck/index.html?eref=rss_topstories" target="_blank">How a student twittered his way out of prison</a></p>
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