Micro-blogging: The good, the bad, the personal.
The benefits and drawbacks of micro-blogging, and a critical reflection on my own experience.
Without even realising, micro-blogging is something that most of us engage with on a daily basis. Whether it be simply doom-scrolling through Twitter or over-sharing on Facebook, we’ve all been caught guilty.
Unless you live under a rock, yesterday marked the day in which the king of micro-blogging himself, Donald Trump, finally got crowned ‘BANNED’ from all social media platforms. Prior to this, Trump used his influence on social media to fuel his fan-base with copious amounts of propaganda, as well as organise the attack that took place at the Capitol this week. With what used to be a basic mode of networking, finding old friends and sharing videos of cats, Trump and his allies had used Facebook and Twitter to manifest a conspiracy and feed to the online communities of extremists. This exposed the dark ways in which micro-blogging can be abused by people in positions of power.
Yet micro-blogging also meant that, before journalists could get their front-page story, videos and photos of the event were going viral on the internet, specifically on Twitter. Constant live updates of the inside scoop and non-censored multimedia meant the whole world could witness the destruction that Trump had formulated. There were endless amounts of retweets and shares, as well as general feelings of anger and outrage at this abuse of white privilege.
The point I’m trying to make is, the current state of the world is looking pretty bleak and we’re engaging with micro-blogging more so than ever before.
Compared to the 24-hour lag of print-press media, micro-blogging is a more accurate depiction of ‘today’s’ news, particularly when applying it to an example like this one. From a journalistic perspective, micro-blogging opens up an array of stories and perspectives which can then be formulated into a news story. Eye-witness accounts from around the world, happening in real-time, are all available at our disposal.
NOTE: If you’re planning to use images off Twitter or Facebook for a news story, ensure that you have received copyright from the person who owns the image/ video.
I found Twitter to be a useful tool when supporting my journalism blog. It helped me find new stories in order support my posts, as well as keep up to date with current topics of conversation. For example, the Travel Industries response to the announced travel ban in December, formed the basis of my blog post: ‘Not Driving Home for Christmas.’
However, one of the obvious drawbacks of using Twitter this way, is the abundance of fake news which circulates the internet. With such a vast amount of information and opinion available to at our fingertips, it can be a lot harder to fact-check.
So far 2021 has already burdened a lot of unexpected news upon us. Another example that recently broke out via Twitter this week, was the alleged affair between the beauty guru, Jeffree Star and former presidential candidate, Kanye West. The rumours span so completely out of control that it made headline news on a number of large media outlets, including, Business Insider, Vulture and The Sun. The rumours have since been addressed by Jeffree himself, however, this is just a recent example of the issues surrounding the reliability of micro-blogging.
Remember: Not everything you read on the internet is true.
Using micro-blogging as a source of information can be risky due to the unreliability of the sources. The truth often gets lost in the complex web of speculation, with more and more people adding fuel to the fire and jumping on the trend’s bandwagon — all to gain a couple of likes and retweets, as a way to increase their profile engagement.
In terms of my own profile engagement, I generally saw the most engagement when applying hashtags. Taken from, ‘Twitter Hashtags: A Guide to Finding and Using the Right Ones’, Tweets with hashtags can increase engagement by almost 100% for individuals and 50% for brands. On average my tweets receive between 100–300 impressions when adding a relevant hashtag, for example, #COVID19. Overall, I find hashtags to be a crucial way to ensure profile engagement, as well as stay involved with recent travel news or current affairs.
Another way that I noted engagement was by commenting on viral tweets, either by quote-retweeting them or simply just replying. My recent tweet that received the most impressions and engagement provided further research and opinion on an existing popular tweet, regarding the new vaccine process in the UK. I found it interesting that this tweet didn’t include a hashtag, but further extended my reach beyond just my followers.
Whilst actively engaging with micro-blogging, I generally found Twitter a better way of fitting within a professional journalism context, as oppose to the friend-based community of Facebook. In summary, Twitter can be a good source of real-time information which can expose crimes and civil unrest, offering an insightful angle when compared to the print-press media and the existing lag in current news stories. However, it’s important to be able to differentiate the fake news from reality. On a personal note, I found micro-blogging a valuable way to engage with my small following of 20 followers and beyond, as well as being an effective online support system for my journalism blog.
Rosie Moon is —✨feeling reflective ✨
