Map of a Tweet

Given that my last few posts have been Twitter-related, it seems important to pay some attention to what Twitter does and what, precisely a Tweet is. Raffi Krikorian, a developer on Twitter's API/Platform team has put together a map that shows the way information is embedded in each individual Tweet (or Twitter Status Object as he calls it). Maps like this one point to the data-rich documentation associated with what may seem like simple information practices. If, indeed, the Library of Congress gets all of this information, how will it be mined and analyzed in a way that can tell us something about ourselves?

Check out the map and article at:

This is What a Tweet Looks Like
Article written by Sarah Perez / April 19, 2010 8:33 AM

Library of Congress will archive Twitter

What a great way to end the winter semester and welcome spring: with tweets! Today the folks at the Library of Congress announced that they will acquired every public tweet issued since March 2006 when Twitter was launched. I'll admit that I wasn't always convinced that Twitter was anything more than a fad (I didn't think snowboarding would stick either and now it's in the Olympics). Much has been written about the social value of the billions of tweets that have been produced since 2006. But this move really seems to reify this sentiment.

The comments on the Library of Congress blog are the start of some amazing discussions. How will the archive be maintained? What information will be archived? How will it be accessed by researchers?

I guess it's time we all taking Twitter seriously?

Library of Congress Blog post:
http://blogs.loc.gov/loc/2010/04/how-tweet-it-is-library-acquires-entire-twitter-archive/

What would Margaret Atwood do?

It's the last week of the semester and I should be finishing papers and assignments, but instead, I'm reading Margaret Atwood tweets. . . Just for kicks last December, a friend and I had t-shirts made at one of those five-minute t-shirt places on Queen West. They read: "What would Margaret Atwood do?" The store had some kind of three-for-two deal on so naturally, we thought of Margaret. We sent the third t-shirt to Margaret Atwood and kind of forgot about it until I got a thank you note from her this morning! The best part? Apparently she laughed (grin). For the record, I'm pretty sure Margaret Atwood would buckle down and finish her assignments.

Check out the photo she posted on Twitter.