John McCain telling Sean Hannity that he’s “Twittering the top 10” is a clear indication that Twitter has jumped the shark.
Twitter is a microblogging platform that allows users to share information and updates – some obsessively – with their “followers.” Twitter co-founder Evan Williams’ followers apparently include the White House economic staff with whom he’s meeting today.
According to the Pew Internet & American Life Project, 11 percent of wired Americans are Twittering:
As of December 2008, 11% of online American adults said they used a service like Twitter or another service that allowed them to share updates about themselves or to see the updates of others. Just a few weeks earlier, in November 2008, 9% of internet users used Twitter or updated their status online and in May 2008, 6% of internet users responded yes to a slightly different question, where users were asked if they used “Twitter or another ‘microblogging' service to share updates about themselves or to see updates about others.”
Of the standalone applications that enable short messaging to a network of friends, Twitter is the most well known. First made available to those online in August 2006, Twitter allows users to send messages, known as “tweets” from a computer or a mobile device like a mobile phone, Blackberry or iPhone. Users of the service are asked to post messages of no more than 140 characters and those messages are delivered to others who have signed up to receive them such as family, friends or colleagues.
And now the estimable Pew Research Center has joined the Twittering class.
To view Jon Stewart’s hilarious take on Twitter, go here.
You can follow my tweets on Twitter here.
